Dante

Hi, my son is named Dante, after the poet and because we love the soft sound and the meaning of his name. It really gets to my hubby (and Dante) and myself when people, including some teachers call him Dontay (and we didn't name him Donte). There is no O in Dante and the correct Italian pronunciation is this, for anyone who wishes to know it! http://youtu.be/W1DkugwyuDw

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I am tempted to replace the vowels of the names of peoples' names who mispronounce our son's name (Jane instead of John, anyone? Shonnon, not Shannon? Come on, it isn't that difficult!) but am trying to be more tolerant! I guess it's not easy for some people to say?

I prefer the DAHN-tay pronunciation personally. Beautiful but strong and masculine Italian name with a great history -to me it's a diamond in the rough and I can't believe not many people are using this name.

In Italian, the vowels A, E, I, O, and U are pronounced AH, A, E, O, and OO. There is no other pronunciation for these letters like there is in English. This name is absolutely pronounced "DON-tay" in Italian (but of course, no "y" sound, I only put that there for emphasis on the long A).

This wouldn't be pronounced DAHN-te (long 'ah') in Italian, which does not use the longer vowel. It would be DAN-te. But American pronunciations can go as far as dawn-TAY.