User talk:2603:3015:D01:8000:9491:4B22:81AF:FED3

pharaoh

@2603:3015:D01:8000:9491:4B22:81AF:FED3, 2603:3015:D01:8000:90AF:663:78AA:CE6C:

Hello. Thank you for your interest in improving Wiktionary. We appreciate that.

I noticed that you have made some edits lately to our entry for pharaoh.

pharaoh, like a small number of other words such as parent, is not originally a solely /-æɹ-/ word. In dialects of English that do not merge the distinct sounds /-ɛɚ-/, /-æɹ-/, and /-ɛɹ-/, a very small subset of words, which includes "parent" and "pharaoh," can have either /-ɛɚ-/ or /-æɹ-/. As far as I can tell, historically, the usual pronunciation for such had /-ɛɚ-/. However, in the past several decades, an additional /-æɹ-/ pronunciation emerged in the United States of America for a tiny number of words, including "parent" and "pharaoh".

Contrast that with, for instance, Britain's Received Pronunciation. Received Pronunciation, which obviously has no merger, traditionally pronounces "parent" as /ˈpɛə.ɹənt/ and pharaoh as /ˈfɛəɹəʊ/.

With that said, there appears to be some evidence of a similar phenomenon as aforedescribed popping up for some younger people in England as well, with alternative /-æɹ-/ pronunciations emerging for a tiny number of words (like parent).

So, you see, /ˈfɛəɹoʊ/ is not a merging pronunciation. It is the historically usual pronunciation for pharaoh in English, and today it remains one of two pronunciations that the word might have in the numerous dialects that continue to distinguish the distinct sounds /-ɛɚ-/, /-æɹ-/, and /-ɛɹ-/.

There are very few words that fall into what might be termed the PARENT category. It is an incredibly limited category of words, and from everything that I can tell it did not exist as a category even just sixty years ago. Tharthan (talk) 19:40, 20 November 2022 (UTC)