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How do you pronounce this name? And according to this website, its sound seems to be identical with the word "effect". Am I right?
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Replies
It's not at all the same as effect. The first consonant is /v/ rather than /f/ and there's no /k/ sound.
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Thanks, maybe it's because of my accent (mixing up /v/ and /f/)
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f and v are partial allophones (two phonemes that aren't always recognized as such, at least graphically). Usually we change the letter when the sound changes (leaf/leaves, sieve/sift, weave/weft), but not always (dwarfs), and /f/ once represented both phonemes in English.. The difference is entirely whether it is voiced (v) or unvoiced (f), which is entirely situational. for some phonemes we still don't distinguish in normal use (e.g. /th/ for both voiced and unvoiced phonemes), and many others we don't change the spelling when there are voiced/unvoiced phonemes in different derivatives of the same word or suffix. e.g. the /d/ in -ed is not changed to t when unvoiced (except in some older forms like slept, wept where the preceding vowel is shortened or unvoiced as well).
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"archer" looks like an overstretch of meaning to me. The name finally goes back to the Germanic name Ivo that is cognate to Modern English yew (kind of tree). It is true that yew wood was the preferred wood for making bows in medieval Europe, but this does not turn the meaning of Ivo into "archer", not is it source for an old French term meaning archer.
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She did say "Baby Names for Girls", so I'm guessing another site with no research just rumours they heard somewhere. Archer is a stretch, but these tree names were common euphemisms for the weapons made from them and the people who used them. it's poetic imagery that carries over into onomastics. but Old French for archer, no. Yvette is a double diminutive, Yvette a diminutive of Yvon, a diminutive of Yves.
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