How come they’re called the Boston Celtics (pronouncd Selticks) but it is Celtic Music (pronounced Keltick)? Isn’t it from the same base word?
I don’t know. But I’ve heard that the word Celtic (from the greek Keltoi) was pronounced differently by the two main groups of Celtic speaking peoples.
Goidelic Celts (sp?) would use the soft C, wheras Brythonic Celts would use the hard C.
I may have this backwards.
Regardless, over time, modern Celtic tounges have blended a bit, and some pronunciations have shifted to a standard. Exceptions, of course, for isolated places like the Isle of Man.
I am not a linguist, this may be totally wrong.
Because we’re Americans, and we screw up the pronunciation of perfectly good words. Detroit, Des Moines, Notre Dame, leftenant…
Me, I pronounce it “Boston Keltics,” just to amuse all my SCA friends.
Glasgow Celtic is pronounced with the soft C, too.
Here is entry on origin of the scotish football club Glagow Celtic (which uses the same pronounciation, and was founded 60 years before Boston Celtics). From the always interesting “The Knowledge” The Knowledge feature from the Guardian:
“Why is Celtic pronounced Seltic rather than Keltic, as it is in every other context?” asks Sam Easterbrook.
A tricky one this. Ed Mortimer can start us off. “The answer is simple,” he says. "We are wrong to pronounce the work Keltic. It’s one of those words where the pronunciation has changed for some reason in one context but not in others. Following the general rule that ‘c’ followed by ‘e’ or ‘i’ is pronounced as an ‘s’, we have Seltik, as in the football club.
“The same pronunciation used to apply to the adjective describing the ancient inhabitants of the western fringes of Europe, including parts of modern-day Scotland, England, Ireland, Wales, France and Spain. The ‘s’ pronunciation still applies in French, Breton and Galician - but for some reason English has changed to the keltic variant. Put simply, the football club pronunciation is the right one.”
Graeme Gardiner offers an alternative view. “Celtic were founded in 1888 to benefit the Irish immigrant population of Glasgow’s east end. The name Celtic was chosen to reflect the common roots of the Scots and Irish, who were on the receiving end of considerable sectarian prejudice. Unfortunately the name wasn’t used much outside academic circles and was simply mispronounced by the local population. Of course the de facto pronunciation among the faithful is Sellick.”
However, the truth, if it is to be had, seems to be that both pronunciations are ostensibly correct, with Keltic having become the more accepted usage only in the last 30 years. Celtic, having been formed in the last century, naturally retained the Seltic pronunciation.
This from the Medieval Scotland website, which a number of readers kindly pointed out: "The reason the Boston Celtics and Glasgow Celtic and all those other sports teams founded around 1900 (give or take a couple decades) pronounce their names Seltic is not because they were founded by ignorant folk who didn’t know any better, but because they spoke English and did know the proper pronunciation of the English word “Celtic”.
"So what happened? Well, any number of things might explain why the in-crowd pronunciation shifted to Keltic (such as the German influence on Celtic studies, which was strong in the 19th and early 20th centuries) but the upshot is that it is now fashionable - almost obligatory - in certain circles to pronounce the word with a K sound rather than the original S sound. In fact, in certain circles (both in and out of academia) it is something of a litmus test - if you don’t use the K sound, it will be assumed you are not knowledgeable about things Celtic.
"But the one and only reason Keltic is now one of the correct pronunciations of the word is because that is how many educated people pronounce it. That is the only logic in the Keltic pronunciation’s favour. The standard rules of English, the rules of language, long use and practice, all argue in favour of Seltic, not Keltic.
“But it still remains that Seltic is a long-established, traditional pronunciation of the word in English. There is absolutely nothing wrong with pronouncing Celtic as Seltic.”
So basically, it’s all the fault of some toffs, and everybody’s right.
Of course a word can only have one pronunciations. I read somewhere that if you read about it, you’ll find that’s just not possible to have two.
If you think you can, I’ll lead you to a dark alley and attack you with a lead pipe.
Here, if you say “Seltic” people will assume you are talking about the football team.
I know I am used to saying it Keltic and I have to check myself.
When I looked it up years ago either (I-ther) Pronunciation is accepted for the word but the B-Ball team uses Seltic not Keltic.
Jim
IANA linguist, but I find the explanation from “The Knowledge” highly unconvincing.
What that implies, if anything, is that we’re spelling it wrong, not pronouncing it wrong. The English word is derived from the Greek Keltoi, as Tristan notes, and the related words Gael, Gaul, and Galician all have a hard G sound, which is the voiced equivalent of the unvoiced K. On that basis, I find it hard to believe that the “original” pronunciation would have been “selt.”
American tourist: “So, you’re a Selt?”
Scotsman: “Yes, and you are a sunt.”
