I. ALPHABET.

THE German Alphabet is composed of the following 26 letters:

Vater, fâ/-ter;

Ae, or Á, á, is the softened

Kälte, kel-tai,

danken, dânk/-en;

laben, lâ'-ben;

Frage, frâ'-gai;

Galle, gâl'-lai.

vowel A, a, and is pronounced like ai in fair or e in met. Käse, kai/-zai;

E, e, is pronounced like e in let, or ai in aim, or en in hen.

Blätter, blet/-ter.

trennen, tren/-nen.

Silber, zil-ber.

Rolle, rol'-lai.

J, i, is pronounced like i in is, it, in, or like ee in bee.

O, p, is pronounced like o in the words no, hope, of.

De, Ô, ó, is the softened vowel. It has no parallel sound in English; the i in bird and the e in her sound very nearly like it.

u, u, is pronounced like oo in root, or like u in put.

Löffel, löf'-fel.

(The pronunciation of the short u is marked thus: "õõ”; of the long u thus "oo".) Blume, bloo'-mai; Mutter, moot'-ter; Mund, moont.

Ue, Ú, ú, is the softened vowel 11, and has no parallel sound in English. It is pronounced like u in French.

übel, ü'-bel;

müde, mü'-dai;

Nüsse, nüss'-sai.

Y, y, has the sound of the German i, which is now generally employed in its stead.

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2. Double Vowels.

The double vowels aa, ee, oo are no diphthongs, because only one letter is sounded, and the second only serves to indicate that the syllable is long.

In the German diphthongs, the two vowels must be sounded one after the other, but so quickly as to form only one syllable.

Ai and ei are pronounced almost alike, and have the sound of the English i in

Maus, mouse;

reimen, ri'-men.

blau, blou.

Яu and eu are both pronounced like oi in oil, or oy in boy.

At the beginning of syllables, these differ but little from the English, as the end b has the sound of p, d of t, g of ch or I, v of f and s of ß.

C, t, before ä, e and i is pronounced like ts.

',

Citrone, tsee-tro'-nai.

Before a, o, u, before a consonant and at the end of a syllable it is pronounced like k, by which in most cases it may be replaced.

Conrad, Kon/-râht;

Tombac, tom/-bâck.

Carl, Kârrl; Ch, at the beginning of a word is pronounced like k, except in words derived from the French, when it preserves the French pronunciation.

Christ, krist;

Cfaratan, shâr-lâu-tân.

Chor, kore; In the middle or at the end of a word ch has a pronunciation peculiar to the German language, and more or less guttural, and for which no corresponding sound can be found in English; it is like the Scotch ch in the word loch after a, o, u, au, but softer after ä, e, i, ö, ü, äu, eu, and after a consonant.

chs or chs is pronounced like cks when these consonants belong to the root or

radical syllable.

Wachs, vâcks;

Fuchs, foocks;

Ochs, ocks.

But the preserves its guttural pronunciation, when it stands before the $ or s by contraction or in a compound word.

nachsehen, nach"-zey'-hen; des Buchs, boochs, instead of des Buches, boo'-chess. G, g, at the beginning of a syllable it is pronounced hard, like the English g in

the word good.

Gabe, gâ/-bai;

gehen, ghey'-hen;

Gruß, grooss;

At the end of a syllable, except after u, it has the sound of ch, only much softened and with this difference, that the g generally leaves the preceding vowel long whilst the shortens it.

After n at the end of a word it is pronounced like soft k.

Tag, tâhch.

Đang, hânk.

Hecht, hecht;
Freiheit, fri/-hite.

H, h, is always aspirated at the beginning of a syllable.

Ruhe, roo'-(h)ai;

The aspiration becomes however almost imperceptible before an e in the endsyllables.

Reihe, ri'-(h)ai;

sehen, zey'-(h)en.

After a vowel or a t, the h is not pronounced; but, only indicates that the syllable is long.

Hahn, hâhn;

Reh, rey;

Mehl, mail;

Rath, râht;

Uhr, oor.
Thier, teer.

Ji, only stands at the beginning of a syllable, and is pronounced like the English y in the word yet.

The long is placed at the beginning and in the middle, & only at the end of syllables. If in a non-compound word there are two s one after another, they are written ff.

Wasser, vâss/-ser;

wissen, viss/-sen;

müssen, müss/-sen.

is only placed at the end or in the middle of syllables; it is always preceded by a long vowel, and has the sound of the English sharp s or ss.

3, 3, is sounded like ts.

Zahl, tsâhl;

Zeit, tsite;

Zorn, tsorrn; Holz, hõlts;
zwanzig, tsvân'-tsich; Herz, herrts.

replaces the double and is pronounced very hard.

Blig, blits;

Nußen, noot'-tsen;

sezen, zet'-tsen.

III. SYLLABIC ACCENT.

The Accent is on the root of the word.

In verbs beginning with a separable particle, and in words derived from such verbs, this particle has the primary accent.

Words terminating in ei or ey have the accent on the last syllable.

In compound words, the root of the qualifying word has the primary accent.

IV. DIVISION OF SYLLABLES.

The general rule for division is: "Divide, as you speak.”

1) A simple consonant between two vowels is joined to the latter. Except the letter r; as, Her-en.

2) of two consonants, meeting between two vowels, one is joined to the preceding and the other to the following syllable. — ch, sch, ph, th, st, sp, d, B, ß are treated as simple consonants.

3) When three or four consonants, which are not proper to begin a syllable, meet between two vowels, such of them as can begin a syllable, belong to the latter, the rest to the former syllable; as, Men-schen, die Deut-schen.

4) A compound word is divided according to its elements.

EXPLANATION

OF THE SIGNS USED IN THE PRONUNCIATION.

â, represents the German a; like all the vowels, it is long at the end of a syllable, short before one or more consonants. To represent the long sound before a consonant â is changed into âh.

ai, ey, the former, when accented, represents the German long and open e, as ai in the word air, the latter the long and close e, as ey in obey. When unaccented the former represents the sound of ey in the noun survey.

oo, oo, the former is long, as oo in boot, the latter short, as oo in foot or u in put. ou, always like ou in pound.

'An apostrophe after the vowel makes it long before a consonant, where in English it would be short, or might be either short or long.

A breve over the vowel, makes it short, where it would be long, or might be either long or short.

indicates the accented syllable.

// Compound words have frequently two accented syllables, the primary accent is indicated by ", the secondary by '.

ö, ü and ch, these have no corresponding sounds or characters in English, and are therefore indicated in the same manner as in German.

In every other respect each syllable must be pronounced as in English.