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ArchivesPronunciation of "Zane" in Italian
There is a rare pet form of Giovanni that's been used in the area of Italy around Venice which is spelled Zane. That has caused a lot of baby name books and sites to list Zane as a form of John, which in an English speaking context is not true, as it clearly comes from the non-Italian family surname which gave the author Zane Grey his given name.
I am assuming that Zane in Venice is pronounced something like "Tsah-neh". Can any of you who speak Italian confirm that this is correct, or is it pronounced some other way in northern Italy?
Thanks!
I am assuming that Zane in Venice is pronounced something like "Tsah-neh". Can any of you who speak Italian confirm that this is correct, or is it pronounced some other way in northern Italy?
Thanks!
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Replies
Thanks so much for all your helo!
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I'm not positive, but from what little I do know, I would guess ZJA-neh
I think this is right, but I may be wrong.
I think this is right, but I may be wrong.
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Venetan
Venetan is very different from Italian, even Venetian Italian dialect is from standard Italian (this can be seen in Donna Leon's novels). And that is true in phonetics:
"Venetian has some sounds not present in Italian, an interdental voiceless fricative [θ] spelled ç or z(h) and similar to English th in thing and thought, to Castilian (not Latin-American) Spanish c(e, i)/z (as in cero, cien, zapato), Modern Greek θ (theta), and Icelandic Thorn þ/Þ and Eth Ð/ð; it occurs, for example, in çena/zhena (supper), which sounds the same as Castilian Spanish cena (same meaning). However this sound, which is present only in some variants of the language (Bellunese, north-Trevisan, some Central Venetian rural areas around Padua, Vicenza and the mouth of the river Po), is considered provincial with most variants using other sounds instead such as [s], [z], and [ʃ]. Some variants also present an interdental voiced fricative written "z" (el pianze=he cries) but this often turns into voiced-S, i.e. [z] (written x: el pianxe) or into dental D (el piande)."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venetian_language#Sound_system
So I suspect that the name could have a sound as THAH-neh (but, obviously, I don't know).
I suggest you to contact with the creators of http://www.sitoveneto.org (a site devoted to Venetan) or to put the question in http://www.wordreference.com, where there are speakers of all Romance languages and dialects.
Venetan is very different from Italian, even Venetian Italian dialect is from standard Italian (this can be seen in Donna Leon's novels). And that is true in phonetics:
"Venetian has some sounds not present in Italian, an interdental voiceless fricative [θ] spelled ç or z(h) and similar to English th in thing and thought, to Castilian (not Latin-American) Spanish c(e, i)/z (as in cero, cien, zapato), Modern Greek θ (theta), and Icelandic Thorn þ/Þ and Eth Ð/ð; it occurs, for example, in çena/zhena (supper), which sounds the same as Castilian Spanish cena (same meaning). However this sound, which is present only in some variants of the language (Bellunese, north-Trevisan, some Central Venetian rural areas around Padua, Vicenza and the mouth of the river Po), is considered provincial with most variants using other sounds instead such as [s], [z], and [ʃ]. Some variants also present an interdental voiced fricative written "z" (el pianze=he cries) but this often turns into voiced-S, i.e. [z] (written x: el pianxe) or into dental D (el piande)."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venetian_language#Sound_system
So I suspect that the name could have a sound as THAH-neh (but, obviously, I don't know).
I suggest you to contact with the creators of http://www.sitoveneto.org (a site devoted to Venetan) or to put the question in http://www.wordreference.com, where there are speakers of all Romance languages and dialects.
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I agree with Chrisell that it would be pronounced with a soft "z" sound rather than a "ts" sound. However, I'm from the South of Italy and Northern dialects are quite incomprehensible for me, since there's great variety from one region to the other, actually I'd never heard of this form, which I suppose is a deformation of Gianni. So I'm not really sure how the pronounciation of the dialect of Veneto works.
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I can only comment on the pronunciation, from what I learned in Italian at uni. It would be ZAH-neh, not "Tsah-neh". The 'ts' or 'tz' sound only occurs where there's a double 'z', as in pizza. A single 'z' is just 'z', as in zucchini.
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