Page:A grammar of the Bohemian or Cech language.djvu/24

2 n, as in English.

ň, as ny.

o, always short.

ó, only occurs in the interjection.

p, as in English.

r, stronger than in English. Sometimes vocalic; vide infra.

ř, pronounced rzh, as řeč, rzhetch.

s, sharp, as in English.

š, pronounced as English sh.

t, as in English.

ť, as in French métier.

u, as oo in English.

ú, the same sound, somewhat longer.

ů, also like oo.

v, as in English.

y, as Italian i.

ý, same sound, but longer.

z, as in English.

ž, as zh, like s in pleasure, or French j in jour.

When the vowels are to be pronounced long they are accented, as á, é, í, ú. Long ó practically does not exist in Bohemian. It is ordinarily changed into ů, which is pronounced like oo (or the o in do).

ou is the only diphthong, and is pronounced something like English oo, only longer, and more of each vowel is heard.

In pronunciation the difficult groups of sounds which occur are frequently softened; thus, the j is not heard before a consonant at the beginning of a word; jsem, I am, is pronounced sem; jméno, a name, méno; dcera, a daughter, cera (cf. the Polish córka); hřbet, the back, řbet; hvězda, a star, vězda; and ctnost, virtue, cnost, the latter now having become the ordinary orthography. In the vocative of the first declension, before e, h