Rules for a Dictionary Catalogue / U. S. Bureau of Education Special Report on Public Libraries—Part II, Third Edition

by Charles A. Cutter

6. One accent only is used—the acute—to denote the syllable on which stress is laid.

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.
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,w,x,y	as in English	Sawákin.
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	Mikíndáni.
	not Kwaly, but	Kwale.
z	English z	Zulu.
	Accents should not generally be used, but when 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.

A few points need to be emphasized. Of course the consonantal sound in itch should never be expressed in transliteration by the Polish cz, nor by the German tsch. Tch has been much used for this sound; but the t is hardly necessary if, as the Geographical Society recommend, ch is always used with this sound only and never with the sound sh. Of course there is no reason why ch should be used in foreign names with the sound sh any more than j with the sound zh. All that was needed to prevent ambiguity was for some competent authority to make a rule; and these rules of the Geographical Society will no doubt soon be copied into all manuals and followed by the majority. In this connection we express our regret that a new edition of Dr. Thomas’s excellent Dictionary of Biography continues to give his support to what we believe is an obsolescent system of transliteration.

Nor should the consonantal sound in judge be rendered by the English dg, nor the French dj, nor the German dsch, but by j alone. Likewise the consonantal sound in she is not to be written after the French style, ch, or as the Germans do, sch. The sound which the French transliterate by j we must express by zh (e.g., Nizhni Novgorod). Tz is best to use in Semitic and Slavic names, and ts in Japanese and Chinese. For the Semitic “yod” y is the proper equivalent, and not the German j. But after a consonant in the same syllable it is usual to change the y to i (Biela not Byela), and in Russian names ai, ei, oi, ui are used instead of ay, ey, oy, uy (Alexei not Alexey). After i the y is dropped (Dobni not Dobniy). W is to be used rather than i in Arabic names (e. g., Moawiyah). But the Russian, Serb, Bulgarian, and Wallach contain no such sound or letter as w, and we must write Paskevitch, Vasili, not as do the Germans, Paskewitch, Wasili. In the last syllable of names of places (Azov, Kiev) ev and ov are to be used, because the Russians used the corresponding letter, though they pronounce ef and of (in the nominative cases). But in the last syllable of family names, similarly pronounced, of and ef may be used, because the Russians sign their names off and eff when using Roman characters. The last f, which they use, may be omitted as being plainly not required to express the sound, and not corresponding to the Russian character. Kh represents the full guttural, which the Germans make ch and the Spanish j in Slavic and Oriental names. H answers to the softer guttural as well as to the Hebrew he. K answers to the Semitic Kaph and Koph.

The use of ei for the sound of a in fate, ea in great, ai in trait, is not altogether satisfactory. It is not easy to see why e was not used to represent this sound, and {111} the short e, like the short a, i, o, and u, indicated by doubling the following consonant, as Yeddo, Meddina.

The general rule, then, is to use the consonants with their English value, the vowels with their continental, or, to speak more exactly, their German and Italian value, for the French value of u should never be used, and the short French a requires of us a doubled consonant after it. Their ou and our oo is quite unnecessary to express the sound of the last syllable of Timbuctu or Khartum.

C: A. CUTTER.
C. B. TILLINGHAST.
W: C. LANE.
MICHAEL HEILPRIN.