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Pronunciations of dinosaur/prehistoric animal names

Started by Gondwanalandia, April 30, 2015, 07:01:21 AM

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Protopatch

I probably missed a chapter ^^, but the NHM provides a fairly exhaustive dinosaurs directory, including the official (or the most common ?) pronunciation for each of them :

https://www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/dino-directory/discover/dino-directory.html

A few ancient marine reptiles pronunciations are available here :

https://blog.qm.qld.gov.au/2020/12/08/the-reign-of-the-reptiles-meet-the-monsters/

Does anyone have idea of where we can find that kind of list regarding the prehistoric flying reptiles ?

Lastly and for the fun of it, I'm also sharing below a list of 10 prehistoric animals which are apparently hard to pronounce :

https://www.thoughtco.com/hardest-pronounce-and-spell-prehistoric-animals-1092441



crazy8wizard

That top 10 list is an impressive one! I was honestly expecting Opisthocoelicaudia and Qianzhousaurus to be on there. I'm also quite glad that there are a good amount of greek rooted names in there too and not just loaded with exclusively foreign rooted names like so many other lists do.

andrewsaurus rex

#82
Several i haven't heard of on that list but i don't agree those are the top 10 hardest.  I would at the least remove Propliopithecus (walk in the park to pronounce that) and replace it with Ugrunaaluk with bonus points for Ugrunaaluk kuukpikensis.

Was a time Quetzalcoatlus would have been on a list like that but it's become somewhat familiar now and thus more know how to pronounce it.

And based on the discussion above, maybe Plesiosaur and Diplodocus should be on the list. ;D

Halichoeres

Quote from: Protopatch on July 14, 2025, 06:12:56 PMDoes anyone have idea of where we can find that kind of list regarding the prehistoric flying reptiles ?


I wonder if the administrators of Pteros could be persuaded to add this feature.
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Duna

At least in my language, scientific names should be pronounced in vulgar latin way. Not in classical latin, not in ancient greek or with English phonetics - it is SAU RUS, not "soros"
Here in this video the paleontologist Palaeos explains it very well (you can use the Translate option of the subtitles, available in all languages):

And he is Mexican, so he still misses the perfect pronuntiation but you get the point.

As Spanish derives directly from vulgar latin, it's easy for us to get the correct pronuntiation almost every time with very few changes in sounds (for example -dae is -de, -nae is -ne, ch is qui o k/c sound, ph is f...

So it's Giganotosaurus (spelt like it's written). Gi-ga-no-to-sa-u-rus (not yai or yi or soros).

Protopatch

Quote from: Halichoeres on August 11, 2025, 05:37:03 AM
Quote from: Protopatch on July 14, 2025, 06:12:56 PMDoes anyone have idea of where we can find that kind of list regarding the prehistoric flying reptiles ?


I wonder if the administrators of Pteros could be persuaded to add this feature.
Do you think that we may send them a request in this regard ?

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