APPENDIX.
RULES FOR THE ORTHOGRAPHY OF GEOGRAPHIC NAMES.
CONTRIBUTED BY MR. HERRLE.
British System—French System—German System—Alphabets, Russian-English; English-Russian.
BRITISH SYSTEM.
Rules adopted in 1885, by the Royal Geographical Society at London, for the Orthography of Native Names of Places.
Taking into consideration the present want of a system of geographical orthography, and the consequent confusion and variety that exist in the mode of spelling in English maps, the Council of the Royal Geographical Society have adopted the following rules for such geographical names as are not, in the countries to which they belong, written in the Roman character. These rules are identical with those adopted for the Admiralty charts, and will henceforth be used in all publications of the Society.
1. No change will be made in the orthography of foreign names in countries which use Roman letters: thus Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, etc., names will be spelt as by the respective nations.
2. Neither will any change be made in the spelling of such names in languages which are not written in Roman character as have become by long usage familiar to English readers: thus Calcutta, Cutch, Celebes, Mecca, etc., will be retained in their present form.
3. The true sound of the word as locally pronounced will be taken as the basis of the spelling.
4. An approximation, however, to the sound is alone aimed at. A system which would attempt to represent the more delicate inflections of sound and accent would be so complicated as only to defeat itself. Those who desire a more accurate pronunciation of the written name must learn it on the spot by a study of local accent and peculiarities.
5. The broad features of the system are that vowels are pronounced as in Italian and consonants as in English.
6. One accent only is used, the acute, to denote the syllable on which stress is laid. This is very important, as the sounds of many names are entirely altered by the misplacement of this "stress."
7. Every letter is pronounced. When two vowels come together, each one is sounded, though the result, when spoken quickly, is sometimes scarcely to be distinguished from a single sound, as in ai, au, ei.
8. Indian names are accepted as spelt in Hunter's Gazetteer.
The amplification of the rules is given below:—
| Letters. | Pronunciation and Remarks. | Examples. |
| a | ah, a as in father | Java, Banána, Somáli, Bari. |
| e | eh, e as in benefit | Tel-el-Kebír, Oléleh, Yezo, Medina, Levúka, Peru. |
| i | English e; i as in ravine; the sound of ee in beet. Thus, not Feejee, but | Fiji, Hindi. |
| o | o as in mote | Tokio. |
| u | long u as in flute; the sound of oo in boot. Thus, not Zooloo, but | Zulu, Sumatra. |
| All vowels are shortened in sound by doubling the following consonant. | Yarra, Tanna, Mecca, Jidda, Bonny. | |
| Doubling of a vowel is only necessary where there is a distinct repetition of the single sound. | Nuulúa, Oosima. | |
| ai | English i as in ice | Shanghai. |
| au | ow as in how. Thus, not Foochow, but | Fuchau. |
| ao | is slightly different from above | Macao. |
| ei | is the sound of the two Italian vowels, but is frequently slurred over, when it is scarcely to be distinguished from ey in the English they. | Beirút, Beilúl. |
| b | English b. | |
| c | is always soft, but is so nearly the sound of s that it should be seldom used. If Celebes were not already recognized it would be written Selebes. | Celebes. |
| ch | is always soft as in church | Chingchin. |
| d | English d. | |
| f | English f. ph should not be used for the sound of f. Thus, not Haiphong, but | Haifong, Nafa. |
| g | is always hard. (Soft g is given by j) | Galápagos. |
| h | is always pronounced when inserted. | |
| j | English j. Dj should never be put for this sound. | Japan, Jinchuen. |
| k | English k. It should always be put for the hard c. Thus, not Corea, but | Korea. |
| kh | The Oriental guttural | Khan. |
| gh | is another guttural, as in the Turkish | Dagh, Ghazi. |
| l m n | As in English. | |
| ng | has two separate sounds, the one hard as in the English word finger, the other as in singer. As these two sounds are rarely employed in the same locality, no attempt is made to distinguish between them. | |
| p | As in English. | |
| q | should never be employed; qu is given as kw | Kwangtung. |
| r s t v | As in English. | |
| w | As in English. | Sawákin. |
| x | As in English. | |
| y | is always a consonant, as in yard, and therefore
should never be used as a terminal, i or e
being substituted. Thus, not Mikindány, but not Kwaly, but | Kikúyu. Mikindáni. Kwale. |
| z | English z. | Zulu. |
| Accents should not generally be used, but where there is a very decided emphatic syllable or stress, which affects the sound of the word, it should be marked by an acute accent. | Tongatábu, Galápagos, Paláwan, Saráwak. |
FRENCH SYSTEM.
Rules adopted in April, 1886, by the Société de Géographie at Paris, for the orthography of native names of places.
The geographic names in countries in which the Roman character is employed in writing (which includes the néo-Latin, Germanic, and Scandinavian languages) shall be written in the orthography of the country to which they belong.
The following rules apply solely to geographic names in countries without a written language, and to geographic names in countries where another than the Roman character is employed in writing.
Names of places for which the orthography, through long usage, has become consecrated shall, however, be excepted from the rules. Examples: La Mecque, Naples, Calcutta.
The rules in detail are:
1. The vowels a, e, i, and o are pronounced as in French, Spanish, Italian, and German. The letter e shall never be mute.
2. The French sound of u shall be represented by u with a tréma like the German ü.
3. The French sound ou shall be represented by u, as in Italian, Spanish, and German.
4. The French sound eu shall be represented by the character oe [ligated] and be pronounced as in oeil.
5. The lengthening of a vowel sound shall be indicated by the 'accent circonflexe' (^), and the shortening by an 'apostrophe' (').
6. The consonants b, d, f, j, k, l, m, n, p, q, r, t, v, and z are pronounced as in French.
7. g and s have always the hard French sound, as in gamelle, sirop.
8. The sound represented in France by ch shall be written sh. Examples: Kashgar, Shérif.
9. Kh represents the strong and gh the soft Arabic guttural.
10. Th shall represent the articulation in the English word path (Greek theta), and dh the sound of th in the English word those (Greek delta).
11. Unless the letter h is employed to modify the sound of the letter preceding it, it shall always be aspirated; it should, therefore, never have an apostrophe in names beginning with it.
12. The i semi-vowel shall be represented by an y, pronounced as in yole.
13. The semi-vowel w is to be pronounced as in the English word Williams.
14. The double sounds dj, tch, ts shall be written with the letters which represent the sounds of which they are composed. Example: Matshim.
15. The ñ, n with a tilde, is to be pronounced like gn in seigneur.
16. The letters x, c, and q are not to be employed as duplicates, but the letter q may serve to represent the Arabian qaf, and the aïn could be represented by a double dot.
The idea is to indicate, by means of the characters above given as near as possible the local pronunciation without attempting a complete reproduction of all sounds heard.
GERMAN SYSTEM.
Rules adopted in 1888 by the Imperial German Hydrographic Office, for the orthography and pronunciation of foreign geographic names.
The names from nations who use the Roman or German alphabet are to be rendered in the native form, excepting such for which a German orthography has been generally adopted, as Kopenhagen, Neapel, Genna, etc. Other foreign names which are generally known and whose orthography has been generally adopted, as Zanzibar, not Sansibar; Zulu, not Sulu, will not be changed.
The letters are pronounced as follows:
a, as a in Vater.
å, between a and o (Åland's Inseln).
e, as in Eden.
i, as in Ida.
o, as in Brot.
u, as in nur.
ä, (æ, Ae) retain their German sounds.
ö, (oe, Oe) retain their German sounds.
ü, (ue, Ue) retain their German sounds.
ai, as in Kaiser.
au, as in auch.
ao, not quite as one sound.
ei, as in Ei.
b, d, g, h, j, k, l, m, n, p, r, s, t, w, x and z retain their German sounds.
f, retains its German sound; also for ph, but the latter will not be used.
c, always soft (as z). For the sound of k, c is not to be used.
j [with umlaut], for the English j (dj).
q, will not be used; it is replaced by k; respectively by ku.
ch, as tsch.
sh, as sch.
y, is only used for the consonantal sound, not for i.
gh, oriental guttural sound (Dagh, Ghazi).
kh, oriental guttural sound (Khan).
v, is always soft; not to be used to give the sound of f.
When a vowel is to be pronounced clear and open the following consonant will be doubled: (Tanna, Mekka, Bonny). To lengthen a vowel sound, it will not be doubled, but if the vowel is repeated each will be pronounced separately (Nuuluha, Oosima).
But one accent (') will be used to indicate if particularly necessary, that is, in exceptional cases, the syllable on which stress is to be laid (Matupí).
