Official Pronunciation of Xiuquatl ?

[Thedenofsin.7340]

For many non-central Americans, this is a hard to pronounce word.

 

Can ArenaNet provide us with an official pronunciation for it?

 

Is it Shee-ke-tl?

Shee-caw-til ?

She-qua-til?

ZI-kwa-tul?

 

 

[yoni.7015]

I just call it Snepter (Snake + Scepter)

[Danikat.8537]

I've been calling it Zew-kwa-tul. But only in my head as I've not needed to say it out loud.

 

The second half is the same as Tequatl so I assume it's said the same. But now I can't remember if we ever hear that name spoken in-game. (And considering how many sylvari names are said, and I think there's at least 1 NPC who pronounces the W in sword, I'm not sure that would be accurate anyway.)

[Tommo Chocolate.5870]

Does being central American make it easier? It's spelt differently enough from [Xiuhcoatl](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xiuhcoatl "Xiuhcoatl") that it might not.

 

In my head I've been reading it as (using [OED pronunciation symbols](https://public.oed.com/how-to-use-the-oed/key-to-pronunciation/ "OED pronunciation symbols")) 'ʃiːʊˌkwatl. That's something like "SHEE-uh-quatl", with "quatl" rhyming with "battle" rather than "wattle". But that's a total guess on my part.

[Thedenofsin.7340]

> @"Tommo Chocolate.5870" said:

> Does being central American make it easier? It's spelt differently enough from [Xiuhcoatl](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xiuhcoatl "Xiuhcoatl") that it might not.

>

Perhaps not easier, but far more likely to pronounce it correctly. It's clearly it's a Meso-American styled word, which implies the letters and letter pronunciations would follow suit. As such, someone from the area would be more likely to be able to pronounce it correctly than one not from the area.

 

The qu may be more like the qu sound of Quetzalcoatl, which is similar to 'ke', but I'm not sure.

 

I mean, if you're going to come up with a scepter with a name like that, you darn well better have the pronunciation correct, and tell us how to say it correctly.

[Tommo Chocolate.5870]

> @"Danikat.8537" said:

> I think there's at least 1 NPC who pronounces the W in sword

That's amazing! Can you remember who? Somehow I find that much less annoying than the constant mispronunciation of "golem" and "jotun".

 

> I'm not sure that would be accurate anyway.

This is a good point - if there is an "official" pronunciation, it's probably no more "right" than anything you come up with yourself.

[kasoki.5180]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help:IPA/Nahuatl

 

It seems its closest to options 1 or 2 that OP presented

[Leon de Damasco.8105]

Hello!

 

First at all yes, I know is no the same word, but I hope this helps.

 

The name comes from the náhuatl "Xiuhcoatl". Náhuatl is/was a language spoken by some prehispanic cultures from México (and then mesoamerica), then is not central America, is North America.

 

About pronunciation you can see here some (not ANet) options:

https://es.howtopronounce.com/xiuhcoatl/

In case you do not want to visit that site, the most vote are:

- Zio-coa-tl

- Xi-uh-coatl

 

A bit of culture: Xiuhcoatl means Snake of fire, Sun's Snake, Bright Snake. Is the most powerful weapon of gods and was wielded for Huitzilopochtli, the God of War.

 

Have fun and good luck.

[thehipone.6812]

I'll call it Shoe Waddle

 

Close enough for me.

[Kalendraf.9521]

I thought the Xiu phoneme sounds more like "shoo", so I would expect it's pronounced like Shoo-kwa-tul

[Auri.1365]

> @"Tommo Chocolate.5870" said:

> ...In my head I've been reading it as (using [OED pronunciation symbols](https://public.oed.com/how-to-use-the-oed/key-to-pronunciation/ "OED pronunciation symbols")) 'ʃiːʊˌkwatl. That's something like "SHEE-uh-quatl", with "quatl" rhyming with "battle" rather than "wattle". ..

 

Thats mostly the same what I found on the Internet about this language (Nahuatl?). In my head the "a" in the ending is not like in "battle", but more like in "task" or "father".

 

 

[Danikat.8537]

> @"Leon de Damasco.8105" said:

> Hello!

>

> First at all yes, I know is no the same word, but I hope this helps.

>

> The name comes from the náhuatl "Xiuhcoatl". Náhuatl is/was a language spoken by some prehispanic cultures from México (and then mesoamerica), then is not central America, is North America.

>

> About pronunciation you can see here some (not ANet) options:

> https://es.howtopronounce.com/xiuhcoatl/

> In case you do not want to visit that site, the most vote are:

> - Zio-coa-tl

> - Xi-uh-coatl

>

> A bit of culture: Xiuhcoatl means Snake of fire, Sun's Snake, Bright Snake. Is the most powerful weapon of gods and was wielded for Huitzilopochtli, the God of War.

>

> Have fun and good luck.

 

That's really interesting. Thanks. :)

 

I wonder what Anet intend their name to mean. I know Tequatl means 'sunless' (which means it's full name is redundant - Sunless the Sunless) and is basically the hylek word for cursed. (Most hylek worship the sun, so to be sunless is to be without god, or disregarded by god.) Taking a wild guess that means in GW2 quatl means sun, or relating to the sun. But I'm not sure about xiu.

[TheNecrosanct.4028]

Since Nahuatl (pronounced Nawatl) was a pictographic language, translating it into Roman letters has always been an imperfect system. For instance, the Spanish added -u- but that vowel is not a part of the Nahuatl pronunciation system. They only had 4 vowels: a, e, i and o, so the u is usually quiet or part of another sound (for instance, qu is pronounced as k, not kwe or ku).

 

Based on what we know of Nahuatl pronunciation, the name of the scepter can be pronounced as Sheekatl. The u's are silent, x is sh, qu is k, and the a sounds more like wattle instead of battle.

 

Even though classical Nahuatl is a dead language, there are still dialects that approximate the pronunciation, though they have been influenced by Spanish. Huesteca Nahuatl (named after the La Huesteca region in Mexico) is the best example and still spoken by about a million people today.

[Cevlakohn.2165]

Strictly speaking, in Nahuatl "-quatl" would rhyme closer to English "watch" or "Watts" than "wattle" or "battle". The last sound is a lateral affricate, a consonant not used in any European language (including Welsh and Icelandic-- Welsh has a fricative, not an affricate, and what Icelandic has is.. complicated).

 

Also the u's aren't silent in Classical Nahuatl, they mark labialization on consonants.

[TheNecrosanct.4028]

> @"Cevlakohn.2165" said:

> Strictly speaking, in Nahuatl "-quatl" would rhyme closer to English "watch" or "Watts" than "wattle" or "battle". The last sound is a lateral affricate, a consonant not used in any European language (including Welsh and Icelandic-- Welsh has a fricative, not an affricate, and what Icelandic has is.. complicated).

>

> Also the u's aren't silent in Classical Nahuatl, they mark labialization on consonants.

 

The a in wattle and battle do not sound the same. The a in wattle sound the same as the a in watch, so wattle is a good example. Maybe Americans pronounce it the same way as battle, but I always use (and prefer) original English, not the American dialect.

 

And Nahuatl only has 4 vowels, which does not include the u. The u in translating classical Nahuatl to Roman script was added by the Spanish, since that sound does not occur in the language. So whenever a u is in a word, it is not pronounced as such, but usually a part of the letter that precedes or follows it. In the case of quatl, that translates to a pronunciation of katl, not kwatl, like I hear a lot of people say (it's how everyone chooses to pronounce Tequatl: it's not Tekwatl, but Tekatl). For it to be Tekwatl, it would have to be written as Tecuatl instead of Tequatl. So silent might not have been the right choice of words, it is still erroneous to think it's an actually pronounced vowel in Nahuatl. But in effect, at least when it comes to the quatl part of the word, it is very much silent.

[Cevlakohn.2165]

No, you are incorrect. You may be confused by the fact that in Spanish-based orthographies, the phoneme /k/ before a front vowel is written "qu" (the same way it's "ch" in Italian). That only applies before front vowels, however. Nahuatl has, as a consonant, the labialized velar stop /kʷ/, and when this occurs before a non-front vowel it is written "qu". See this page from the Summer Institute of Linguistics: http://www.mexico.sil.org/language_culture/aztec/notes-on-nahuatl-orthography

 

Re. wattle and battle, the point I was making was on the consonant, not the vowel. In my dialect, the vowel in "wattle" is pretty far back so I wouldn't say either word really matches the more central open vowel I'd expect to find in -quatl.

[Ayakaru.6583]

 

Sh'u-qwa-t'l

Is what i say

[Robj.6815]

I think the official pronunciation is:

 

Z...zuh...zuhhh...umm...zuhk...yeah, the new thingamabob.

 

**I totally am right. It says so in the official Ocksfird Dictonary!**

[Gaile Gray.6029]

I have not asked, but I say: zwee-KWAT-l

 

~trots off to ask Narrative if they have an official answer~

[Thedenofsin.7340]

> @"Gaile Gray.6029" said:

> I have not asked, but I say: zwee-KWAT-l

>

> ~trots off to ask Narrative if they have an official answer~

 

I'm sure that's how zee Germans say it! Ya?

 

Und now, ve make zee new zepter. Zay guten tag to zwee-kwat-l!

[Haleydawn.3764]

I pronounce it (in my head!):

Zee-oo-kwa-tel

 

There is a hylek that vocalises Tequatl’s name, so I’m pronouncing the -quatl suffix as it is spoken in game.

[Thedenofsin.7340]

> @"Haleydawn.3764" said:

> I pronounce it (in my head!):

> Zee-oo-kwa-tel

>

> There is a hylek that vocalises Tequatl’s name, so I’m pronouncing the -quatl suffix as it is spoken in game.

 

Really? They pronounce it as an 'Americanized' "quatl"? Interesting!

[Haleydawn.3764]

> @"Thedenofsin.7340" said:

> > @"Haleydawn.3764" said:

> > I pronounce it (in my head!):

> > Zee-oo-kwa-tel

> >

> > There is a hylek that vocalises Tequatl’s name, so I’m pronouncing the -quatl suffix as it is spoken in game.

>

> Really? They pronounce it as an 'Americanized' "quatl"? Interesting!

 

I’m also nicknaming the familiar ‘Zuzu of the Snekter’

[RoseofGilead.8907]

Based on the in-game pronunciation of "Tequatl", my brain is saying "Xuiquatl" would be something like [ʃiʍ 'kw: a: tɫ] (she-wuh KWAHtul). Or maybe Anet will make up their own rules even more and say it's meant to be pronounced "Shelly." :p

[Haleydawn.3764]

> @"RoseofGilead.8907" said:

>Or maybe Anet will make up their own rules even more and say it's meant to be pronounced "Shelly." :p

 

I was thinking this too. Reminded me of the "how to spell potato" meme.