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by akavi 1206 days ago
Where are you getting an /f/ sound from?

Edit: Ah, it seems the digraph "ευ" is pronounced /ef/ in Modern Greek, despite (by convention) being transliterated "eu".

2 comments

Correct. Thee same pronunciation exists in ancient greek for example ευ ζην is ef zin (the good life).

Also the ευ situation is a little more complex ie sometimes it is pronunciated as ev (depending if the next letter is a vowel).

Wikipedia suggests that "ευ" was pronounced /eu̯/ in ancient greek[0]. My suspicion is that "ευ ζην" is an Ancient Greek "fixed phrase" which is pronounced with Modern Greek phonology.

[0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Greek_phonology#Diphth...

Huh, this seems to be the same linguistic phenomenon observed in British English with the word "lieutenant" but perhaps independently evolved.