• Stovetop@lemmy.world
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    11 days ago

    OP is also arguably using it incorrectly in this case. Thorn (Þ/þ) is specifically for a soft/unvoiced ‘th’ like that in “thorn” or “with” or “thought”.

    The voiced “th” sound, as you see in “this” or “feather” or “brother”, is actually Eth (or Daet, pronounced the same as “that”), which is written as Ð/ð.

    • skisnow@lemmy.ca
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      11 days ago

      I just had a look at ðeir bio, and correctness isn’t necessarily ðeir priority lol

      (EDIT to save you a click, it says: “Imagine a world in which enough people generate enough content containing þe Old English þorn (voiceless dental fricative) and eþ (voiced dental fricative) characters þat þey start showing up in AI generated content.”)

    • cobysev@lemmy.world
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      11 days ago

      Nice! I knew the “ð” character was also a “th” sound, but I didn’t realize the subtle differences in pronunciation. I thought it was just used in other languages that don’t have the “þ” character.

      • Stovetop@lemmy.world
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        11 days ago

        For what it’s worth, þ and ð can sometimes be used interchangeably for English, particularly now that the lines have been blurred with the consolidation into “th” (e.g. ‘with’ is usually a soft ‘th’ for me but ‘without’ is hard; ‘cloth’ is soft but ‘clothing’ and ‘clothes’ are hard, etc.), and English overall went through a substantial phonetic shift between when those letters were used and today.

        But if OP wants to be pedantic about archaic letter use, I withhold the right to be equally so.

    • Superb@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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      11 days ago

      What’s the actual difference between voiced an unvoiced? The “th” sounds that same in all of these words

      • vithigar@lemmy.ca
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        11 days ago

        In simplest terms, voiced sounds engage the vocal cords, unvoiced ones do not.

        To compare more directly with what would be otherwise an identical syllable:

        The “th” in “this” is voiced.

        The “th” in “thistle” is not.

      • skisnow@lemmy.ca
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        11 days ago

        Trying saying the first syllable of “thistle”. Does it sound different to when you say “this”?

    • teft@piefed.social
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      11 days ago

      Thorn would be correct in this case. Eth wasn’t preferred over thorn. In modern english you could in theory split them via voiced and unvoiced but historically they were interchangeable.

      The letter thorn that you use is why we have “Ye olde tavern”. Y was used as a substitute for thorn since olde english typesetters didn’t have thorn in the sets they got from Belgium.

    • WIZARD POPE💫@lemmy.world
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      11 days ago

      The big eth always takes me out because it’s the same simbol as Đ in south slavic languages that is pronounced like the j in James/Jack.