# Transliteration of Russian "Х" in names



## rusita preciosa

Completely off topic, but may I ask why *Ханин* in your transliteration is Xanin (Ksanin)? Why not Hanin or Khanin?


----------



## William Stein

rusita preciosa said:


> Completely off topic, but may I ask why *Ханин* in your transliteration is Xanin (Ksanin)? Why not Hanin or Khanin?


I just wanted to give you something to criticize in an otherwise perfect translation


----------



## rusita preciosa

William Stein said:


> I just wanted to give you something to criticize in an otherwise perfect translation


I wasn't trying to be picky, it's just I have seen it before many times (Eng. X => Rus. X) and I was wondering of there is a logic behind it - other than the shape of the letter.


----------



## William Stein

rusita preciosa said:


> I wasn't trying to be picky, it's just I have seen it before many times (Eng. X => Rus. X) and I was wondering of there is a logic behind it - other than the shape of the letter.


 
No, it's just easier than Kh, but logically it would be pronounced Ks, as you say.


----------



## morzh

Well, think of it as of "X" in "Mexico city".


----------



## William Stein

morzh said:


> Well, think of it as of "X" in "Mexico city".


 
I think of it as "X" as in an "ex-issue", but try to make the most of it.


----------



## morzh

Yes I was about to suggest that. It will sound as in "Xavier" (Ig-zay-vee-or).
So it will be "Ig-zah-nin"


----------



## yoysl

I myself use X in transliteration sometimes because it's the transliteration accepted in academic papers that require transliteration of Slavic languages that have /x/ [as in Ханин]. Outside of that, kh is usually used. h can be used, too. I think kh looks kinds of ugly, and I think h is more misleading than kh, so I usually use x in whatever I'm writing. But in academic writing you also transliterate я ю etc. as ja / ju, which ends up looking kind of chaotic sometimes too (ljublju for example) and ends up misleading people who only speak English, so I usually use ya / yu (lyublyu). When you look at how more well-known Russian names are spelled in English, kh is more common, and so is y-. For example, Chekhov, Khrushchev, Mikhail Gorbachev, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Lev Tolstoy. (We also miss the ё entirely, which I have mixed feelings about ...)

I don't know. I just like x because it's economical, and it's a funky letter anyway. I never know how to pronounce anything from Chinese with "x", like Xao ... or Albanian ... Enver Hoxha?? (less common, I know ...  )


----------



## elemika

Maybe :
Татарский - Ханин - Гиреев
Tartar(ski) -Khan(in) - Giray(ev) 
????????


----------



## William Stein

elemika said:


> Maybe :
> Татарский - Ханин - Гиреев
> Tartar(ski) -Khan(in) - Giray(ev)
> ????????


 
I guess they all have something do with Turkish or Central Asian peoples. I only know "Giray" as a Turkish first name, does it mean anything else in Turkish? (I got to "intermediate B" level in Turkish when I was teaching in Istanbul but now I'm down to about 17 levels below ground floor!).


----------



## elemika

Have a look at this article in wiki please

In fact, not "Tartar" but "Tatar", sorry


----------



## rusita preciosa

morzh said:


> Well, think of it as of "X" in "Mexico city".


Mexico DF (Мехико)  and Texas (Техас) are transliterated like this because in Spanish they are proponounced with  as in "house".


----------



## morzh

rusita preciosa said:


> Mexico DF (Мехико)  and Texas (Техас) are transliterated like this because in Spanish they are proponounced with  as in "house".




I know. This is why I suggested it.  They are also pronounced like this due to Old Spanish rules, long since extinct; due to this "Mejico" spelling also exists as a second version, mostly used in Spain.

Also "X" was pronounced as "H" in "Don Quixote".

And then it was a joke on my part anyway.


----------



## William Stein

morzh said:


> I know. This is why I suggested it.  They are also pronounced like this due to Old Spanish rules, long since extinct; due to this "Mejico" spelling also exists as a second version, mostly used in Spain.
> 
> Also "X" was pronounced as "H" in "Don Quixote".
> 
> And then it was a joke on my part anyway.


 
I don't want to rain on your parade but both "x" and "j" in Spanish are pronounced as a very strong "kh", not "h". They're sometimes pronounced as "h" in certain Central and South American countries but that's considered to be a dialect. When properly pronounced by a Spaniard, it has sufficient force to displace 1 metric ton of phlegm 7.8 km.


----------



## rdimd

*Андрей Щепкин* (исп. _Andrei Xepkin_, _Andrij Schtschepkin)_
*Ара́нча Са́нчес-Вика́рио* (исп. _Arantxa Sánchez Vicario)_
Does this mean that they are from Barcelona?

*Lucía Etxebarría de Asteinza*
And this woman is of Basque origin?

By the way, in other languages it sounds almost in the same way.
*Але́кс Тейше́йра Са́нтос* (порт. _Alex Teixeira Santos)_
*Дэн Сяопин* ( пиньинь _Dèng Xiăopíng)_

And in Albanian x=dz and xh=j
*Энве́р Хо́джа* (алб. _Enver Hoxha)_


----------



## morzh

William Stein said:


> I don't want to rain on your parade but both "x" and "j" in Spanish are pronounced as a very strong "kh", not "h". They're sometimes pronounced as "h" in certain Central and South American countries but that's considered to be a dialect. When properly pronounced by a Spaniard, it has sufficient force to displace 1 metric ton of phlegm 7.8 km.



I meant Russian "x" sound.

"J" in SA Spanish isn't nearly as strong as you describe it. I don't know about Castillano. And, no SA languages are really dialects anymore (they are, but recognized as standards): as soon as a country speaking a dialect becomes independent, its language gains a formal independent status.

A language is a dialect with an Army and Navy, remember?


----------



## William Stein

morzh said:


> I meant Russian "x" sound.
> 
> "J" in SA Spanish isn't nearly as strong as you describe it. I don't know about Castillano. And, no SA languages are really dialects anymore (they are, but recognized as standards): as soon as a country speaking a dialect becomes independent, its language gains a formal independent status.
> 
> A language is a dialect with an Army and Navy, remember?


 

I said "j" is sometimes pronounced as "h" in a few countries of SA, so I don't know how strong you think I described it. It's a guttural "kh" in Castilian and Mexico as I said: http://www.forvo.com/word/m%C3%A9xico/#es


----------



## rusita preciosa

William Stein said:


> I said "j" is sometimes pronounced as "h" in a few countries of SA, so I don't know how strong you think I described it. It's a guttural "kh" in Castilian and Mexico as I said: http://www.forvo.com/word/m%C3%A9xico/#es


I speak with people from all over LatAm every day and in their versions of Castellano the  is a bit more "closed" than that in English and a bit more 'open" than in Russian, but nothing drastic (at least no visible phlegm). I'm not sure about European castellano though. 

That's beside the point. My original question was the transliteration of Russian X into English.


----------



## morzh

William Stein said:


> I said "j" is sometimes pronounced as "h" in a few countries of SA, so I don't know how strong you think I described it. It's a guttural "kh" in Castilian and Mexico as I said: http://www.forvo.com/word/méxico/#es



It's a regular Russian "h". No different.
The first two are almost exact Russian.
Third one is a bit softer. (both 1st an 3rd are Mexican, second - Chilean).
Then 4th and 5th again - quite like Russian.
So I'm not sure what you trying to tell me.

What you described initially, I thought, was closer to Hebrew "h" sound. That one is really....strong.
Now, a Spanish man,   juanpirincho,                           indeed says it like this.
But then another Spanish man,   Momislo, says it in aspirational way, almost like in English, only stronger.


----------



## William Stein

rusita preciosa said:


> I speak with people from all over LatAm every day and in their versions of Castellano the  is a bit more "closed" than that in English and a bit more 'open" than in Russian, but nothing drastic (at least no visible phlegm). I'm not sure about European castellano though.
> 
> That's beside the point. My original question was the transliteration of Russian X into English.




I don't know what you mean by . Technically that sound doesn't even exist in Spanish. In "hablar", for example, the "h" is silent". And your "original question" was as off-topic as this one, as you admitted yourself:
"Completely off topic, but may I ask why *Ханин* in your transliteration is Xanin (Ksanin)?"


----------



## William Stein

morzh said:


> It's a regular Russian "h". No different.
> The first two are almost exact Russian.
> Third one is a bit softer. (both 1st an 3rd are Mexican, second - Chilean).
> Then 4th and 5th again - quite like Russian.
> So I'm not sure what you trying to tell me.
> 
> What you described initially, I thought, was closer to Hebrew "h" sound. That one is really....strong.
> Now, a Spanish man, juanpirincho, indeed says it like this.
> But then another Spanish man, Momislo, says it in aspirational way, almost like in English, only stronger.


 
Well, believe it or not, my formula "it has sufficient force to displace 1 metric ton of phlegm 7.8 km" was a joke. As to what I was trying to tell you, you said it was pronounced as , which is not the same as [kh] in Russian or Spanish, and I disagree, that is what I was trying to tell you. In fact, it is a guttural, as you yourself admit. A lot of Spaniards pronounce it as hard as Sentio, the last version on the page, and I think that's generally considered the most typical pronunciation in Spain, although it varies widely.


----------



## morzh

William Stein said:


> I don't know what you mean by . Technically that sound doesn't even exist in Spanish. In "hablar", for example, the "h" is silent".




We are talking about the sound "h", not letter "h". You mix the two. The letter "h" in "hacer/hablar/hay" is silent, but in "Juanita/Mexico/ojos/mejor" those "j"s and "X" carry the sound "h" (or in other systems it is written as "x"), and the sound is never silent. And, BTW, it is in many examples you gave (links to pronunciation) is quite like Russian, in some cases closer to Israely one, in some - to strengthened Englsih one, but those are still "h (x)" sound versions.


----------



## William Stein

morzh said:


> We are talking about the sound "h", not letter "h". You mix the two. The letter "h" in "hacer/hablar/hay" is silent, but in "Juanita/Mexico/ojos/mejor" those "j"s and "X" carry the sound "h", and the sound is never silent. And, BTW, it is in many examples you gave (links to pronunciation) is quite like Russian, in some cases closer to Israely one, in some - to strengthened Englsih one, but those are still "h" sound versions.


 
"Juanita/Mexico/ojos/mejor" those "j"s and "X" do not carry the sound "h" which is only slightly aspirated at most but the guttural sound '"kh" as in "ach" in German and the gutturals in Arabic and Hebrew. The Russian is transliterated as "kh", too, not as "h". What precisely is your definition of the "sound h"? What phonetic alphabet are you referring to?


----------



## morzh

IPA, Sanish

Some dialects _*j*aca_ [ˈhaka] 'pony' corresponds to /x/ in other dialects.

In various dialects the same words are said with glottal fricatives vs. velar ones.

I probably should've used "x" as this is velar, but then

Hebrew הר [haʁ] 'mountain'
"h" is used to denote something harder.


----------



## cyanista

*Mod note*

Please note that this is the *Russian forum*. WRF has also got lots of Spanish forums for your convenience. 

Please see it as a concentration exercise in an increasingly ADS world.


----------



## dePrades

Hi there,

I think I'm able to help a bit on that...  you're mixing different Spanish pronunciation and different languages spoken in Spain... 

On the one hand, *Ара́нча Са́нчес-Вика́рио *she's from Barcelona but her name (Arantxa) is of Basque origin (Arantzazu)... "tx" stands in Catalan for the "ch" in Spanish... that would explain why some Russian names have different spellings when transliterated to Latin alphabets... Let's take for example Чайковский, Txaikovski in Catalan and Chaikovski in Spanish... and go on with other languages... 

By the way, I agree that "x" shouldn't be translated as "x" in Russian, since it never sounds as a J in Spanish or a H in English (and i'm not saying that these two sound the same way!  )



rdimd said:


> *Андрей Щепкин* (исп. _Andrei Xepkin_, _Andrij Schtschepkin)_
> *Ара́нча Са́нчес-Вика́рио* (исп. _Arantxa Sánchez Vicario)_
> Does this mean that they are from Barcelona?
> 
> *Lucía Etxebarría de Asteinza*
> And this woman is of Basque origin?
> 
> By the way, in other languages it sounds almost in the same way.
> *Але́кс Тейше́йра Са́нтос* (порт. _Alex Teixeira Santos)_
> *Дэн Сяопин* ( пиньинь _Dèng Xiăopíng)_
> 
> And in Albanian x=dz and xh=j
> *Энве́р Хо́джа* (алб. _Enver Hoxha)_


----------



## morzh

dePrades said:


> ... agree that "x" shouldn't be translated as "x" in Russian, since it never sounds as a J in Spanish or a H in English (and i'm not saying that these two sound the same way!  )



I agree too. The transliteration in question was into English, and, pronounced back in Russian it makes "Ксанин" vs "Ханин" (Ksah-nin / Khah-nin).


----------



## Nanon

rusita preciosa said:


> I have seen it before many times (Eng. X => Rus. X) and I was wondering of there is a logic behind it - other than the shape of the letter.


If there is any logic behind it, _x _for _h_, _kh_ or _ch _is an IPA-based translitteration, I presume. See this thread.
Мои две копейки .


----------



## William Stein

Nanon said:


> If there is any logic behind it, _x _for _h_, _kh_ or _ch _is an IPA-based translitteration, I presume. See this thread.
> Мои две копейки .


 

Aha, axa, akha, I knew there was a method to my madness!


----------

