Take the 2-minute tour ×
English Language & Usage Stack Exchange is a question and answer site for linguists, etymologists, and serious English language enthusiasts. It's 100% free, no registration required.

Disclaimer: I'm no native speaker.

Thomas gets pronounced with a starting "T" (the "h" is silent), while Theodore with a "Th". What rule is followed here?

share|improve this question

4 Answers 4

up vote 10 down vote accepted

There is no rule at all. As Robusto mentioned, there isn't really any rule for pronouncing th, and even if there were it's common for names not to follow rules.

Thomas comes from the Aramaic t’om’a, while Theodore comes from the Greek Θεόδωρος (Theodōros), which is probably the reason for the difference in pronunciation. Eventhough the th in Thomas comes from the later Greek spelling, it's likely that the pronunciation remained from the original form.

Thomas
Theodore

share|improve this answer

Unfortunately, the rule is pretty much that you have to know how it it is pronounced for every single word in the English language that begins with th-. Especially for proper names.

Even then it won't help if you work with two women named Thalia, one of whom insists on her name being pronounced Talia and the other wants the lithpier version.

Oh, and by the way ... Theodore's nickname is Ted! And you thought English pronunciations ought to make sense. That's just ... adorable! :)

P.S. I'm not poking fun at you, but at our silly, unreasonable language.

share|improve this answer

From the great poem on English pronunciation The Chaos:

The th will surely trouble you

More than r, ch or w.

Say then these phonetic gems:

Thomas, thyme, Theresa, Thames.

Thompson, Chatham, Waltham, Streatham,

There are more but I forget 'em-

Wait! I've got it: Anthony,

Lighten your anxiety.

It was actually written by a Dutch teacher of English.

share|improve this answer

I once had an English trainer who taught us that proper nouns that start with Th should be pronounced with a silent h. Like Thomas = Tomas or Thailand = Tai-land. I don't know if it's really how it should be. I kind of adapted it but it doesn't really apply to all such words.

share|improve this answer

Your Answer

 
discard

By posting your answer, you agree to the privacy policy and terms of service.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.
{"cc_re__cc_re__cc_by_sa_3_0": ["        <li><a href=\"http://area51.stackexchange.com\" title=\"proposing new sites in the Stack Exchange network\">Area 51</a></li>\r\n                        <li><a href=\"http://careers.stackoverflow.com\">Stack Overflow Careers</a></li>\r\n                    \r\n                </ol>\r\n            </td>\r\n    </tr>\r\n</table>\r\n                </div>\r\n            </div>\r\n\r\n            <div id=\"copyright\">\r\n                site design / logo &#169; 2014 stack exchange inc; user contributions licensed under <a href=\"http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/\" rel=\"license\">cc by-sa 3.0</a> \r\n                with <a href=\"http://blog.stackoverflow.com/2009/06/attribution-required/\" rel=\"license\">attribution required</a>\r\n            </div>\r\n            <div id=\"svnrev\">\r\n                rev 2014.8.20.1790\r\n            </div>\r\n            \r\n        </div>\r\n    </div>\r\n    <noscript>\r\n        <div id=\"noscript-warning\">English Language &amp; Usage Stack Exchange works best with JavaScript enabled<img src=\"http://pixel.quantserve.com/pixel/p-c1rF4kxgLUzNc.gif\" alt=\"\" "], "copyright__copyright__copyright": ["\n\nI once had an English trainer who taught us that proper nouns that start with Th should be pronounced with a silent h. Like Thomas = Tomas or Thailand = Tai-land. I don't know if it's really how it should be. I kind of adapted it but it doesn't really apply to all such words.\n\nshare|improve this answer\n\nYour Answer\n\n\u00a0\ndiscard\n\nBy posting your answer, you agree to the privacy policy and terms of service.\n\nNot the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question."]}