With the release of the game World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King, there has been some debate [mostly between gamers] of the correct pronunciation of the word ‘lich’. It seems that most are pronouncing it like “litch”. However, I’ve also heard the following pronunciations:
Like
Leech
Lish
Leesh
Lick
Any linguists out there care to comment?
Cheers,
-O
You don’t want linguists when you want a ‘correct’ pronunciation. At best we’ll just tell you what you already know: the standard appears to be ‘litch’ but these other pronunciations have also been documented. 
Personally, I wouldn’t want to associate liches with licking in any way, including pronunciation.
I’ve heard ‘Lick’ and ‘Leak’, but the consensus appears to be ‘Litch’.
Rhymes with “bitch”. Wrath of the Bitch Queen, in fact, would be a fabulous title for an expansion.
It’s an antique British word for body or trunk (torso).
Et voila.
I think I’ve only heard it pronounced as ‘lish’, but I seem to be in a minority here.
The developers are pronouncing it “litch.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QY9iTUaS97g Skip to 4:06
Being the cunning linguist I am, I agree it’s to be pronounced “litch”.
Q
This particular debate has been running for decades amongst D&D gamers.
The consensus seems to have tumbled out to litch, but there is still the occasional hold out who insists on lick.
I’ve never heard of the other options mooted in the OP though.
In Warcraft III, several of the undead characters say things like “For the Lich King” when you order them to do something. They pronounce it litch. So that’s been the standard for the company at least for a while now.
I have not played WOW, partly because I fear I’d never stop.
According to a cartoon in Dragon magazine
“You’re in the army now,
without a funeral shroud.
You’ll never get rich,
you son of a lich.
You’re in the army now.”
I’ve heard litch from all but one gamer I’ve ever known.
IANALinguist, but the only two English words I can think of which end in “-ich” are “rich” and “which”, both of which (heh) rhyme with the “litch” pronunciation. That seems good evidence for it being more correct than the others.
My American Heritage dictionary must be too ole. Lich isn’t in it.:rolleyes:
I had a D&D friend who insisted it was pronounced Like as in the first syllable of lichen. I always went with litch though.
Or too new. It’s not a new word.
Well there’s enrich too, but of course that’s just a variation on rich.
My old Oxford has it and has “litch”.
sigh… I’m so going to hell… I can’t even read “cunning ling” without my brain auto-filling the last part. 
In regards to the OP, I’ve always pronounced it ‘lick’, but what do I know?
From age 8 on up i always thought Square-enix’s “chocobo” was pronounced “chock-a-boo!”, oh how dissappointed i was when the first voiceover Final Fantasy pronounced it “cho-co-bo”.
The consensus is “litch.” I’ve also hears “leesh,” but I’ve only ever encountered that pronunciation when it’s spelled liche.
Now if you REALLY want to start a flame war try creating an argument about Scholomance (Skolo or sholo).
My 8 year old brain couldn’t fathom how to pronounce" dodongo" from Zelda for some reason… my solution “dongdduhgo” or to be more clear “Don” like the name “g-d” kind of like “gid” with an almost silent i, “duh” I mean, duuuh ;), go… the only part of the name I got right. Yeah, I shaped up quickly later.
:smack: And that means it’s a cognate of German “Leiche” (“corpse”) – which makes a lot of sense now that I think about it. How did I miss that?