[Spellyans] Goat

[Michael Everson]

On 10 Apr 2009, at 11:30, Owen Cook wrote:

> I'm weighing in late, but I completely agree with Dan, Jon and Craig  
> on this word. I see nothing wrong with 'gaver'. It's textually  
> attested in the scribal tradition,

How specifically do you define this here?

> while 'gavar' is not.

I don't accept this interpretation. The scribal tradition attests the  
following for 'speech'.

lavar x43 (PA x1, PC x1, TH x4, BK x8, CW x21, Late x7)
lauar x73 (CF x2, PA x8, OM x15, PC x26, RD x22)
laver x12 (PC x1, BM x1, SA x3, BK x7)
lauer x19 (OM x1, BM x18)

All of this shows that the scribal tradition admits both -ar and -er  
(favouring the former).

It is true that the texts offer us very few examples of 'goat'

gaver x2 (OM x1, BM x1)
gauer x1 (BM x1)

I don't believe it is credible to suggest that "lavar" and "gavar" did  
not rhyme. And I do not believe it is credible to suggest that if goat  
occurred more frequently that "gavar" or "gauar" would never have  
occurred.

> It clearly indicates the intended pronunciation. If we absolutely  
> must see this spelling as an olive branch to KK -- oh, terror! --  
> then it is certainly an olive branch we can extend without scruple.

My interest in offering MORE olive branches has pretty much dwindled  
at this point. If they had allowed is to keep the PROMISED olive  
branch (text in the SWF permitting publishers to use diacritics) I  
might be inclined to agree now. They engineered it so that we had to  
make that major derogation. In light of that, <eu> and all the other  
changes we made was enough of an olive branch. It's not as though  
they're giving us anything.

Michael Everson * http://www.evertype.com/