So it the "C" in "Cimmerian" (the people of 'Cimmeria', Conan's homeland) hard or soft?

It's soft in the 1982 film (which, granted, has little connection to the stories of REH), but I believe that it's hard when referring to the historical Cimmerians.

Thoughts?

The Cimmerians were a real-world historical people from asia minor in 7th century B.C.

The Oxford English dictionary has the name pronounced as: 'səˈmerēən', which indicates a soft C.

Its a soft C. See this post quoting a discussion with a close friend of REH on how he pronounced it: http://www.mongoosepublishing.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=1361

Also, Cimmerians are not Celtic in origin as many assume: https://www.britannica.com/topic/Cimmerian. They were pronounced with a soft C.

I thought that the origin of the historical word for "Cimmerian" was Greek ("Kimmerians" also is used sometimes), and hence hard. It was a term applied to the (historical) Cimmerians.

Quote from: Skywalker;919184Its a soft C. See this post quoting a discussion with a close friend of REH on how he pronounced it: http://www.mongoosepublishing.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=1361

OK, well that would settle it!

Quote from: Akrasia;919185I thought that the origin of the historical word for "Cimmerian" was Greek ("Kimmerians" also is used sometimes), and hence hard. It was a term applied to the (historical) Cimmerians.

They are via Asia Minor. However, the historical people are pronounced with a soft C.

Same conundrum as Celtic (Greek Keltoi > Latin Celtae) where the OED recognizes both pronunciations as valid.

Quote from: The Butcher;919188Same conundrum as Celtic (Greek Keltoi > Latin Celtae) where the OED recognizes both pronunciations as valid.

No conundrum at all. it's unequivocally a soft c.

But there is no debate as to the pronunciation of the most famous Cimmerian's name. There's nothing soft about Conan.

There's no such thing as a soft "C" in Greek or classical Latin. Same with "G". Herodotus and Tacitus would have used the hard consonant for Cimmerians, Celts, Germans, etc. Later evolution of the Romance languages gave us the soft "C" and "G" but if the contemporary pronunciation had been "Simmerians" they would have used "S" or sigma to represent it.

Howard was inspired by history but not bound by it--he can do whatever he likes.

(Tolkien, though, specified hard "C" in his pronunciation guides, IIRC, so "Celebrimbor" is like "Kelebrimbor", etc.)

According to Novalyne Price Ellis who knew Howard well it was KOn'n and Simeereea. She was on my list of people to look up and ask personally when I was researching. Unfortunately never got the chance but apparently someone else did.

Conan is pronounced "AH-nuld"

I've always pronounced it as Sonan the Kimmerian...

Quote from: Spinachcat;919223Conan is pronounced "AH-nuld"

Don't you means "GET-to-da-chop-PA"?

side note: In the end its an irrelevant question. Other countries will probably pronounce it differently based on their own dialects and spelling conventions. And there is likely variations even amongst the Cimmerian tribes.

Soft.