Please help: how would you pronounce?

iVillage Member
Registered: 01-20-2005
Please help: how would you pronounce?
6
Fri, 02-10-2006 - 2:09pm

We're trying to decide how to spell our new girls name. How would you pronounce this name?

Elliana

Thanks for the help! She is due mid-next week, and three weeks early.

iVillage Member
Registered: 01-07-2006
Fri, 02-10-2006 - 2:13pm

To me, Elliana is "elly-on-a," Eliana is "ee-lee-on-a," and Ellianna is "elly-ann-a."

HTH!
~Erin

iVillage Member
Registered: 06-14-2003
Fri, 02-10-2006 - 2:16pm

El-ee-AH-nuh

Many will say El-ee-ANN-uh, though. Correctly, one "n" would give the "ah" sound whereas two "n"s would give it the "ann" sound.

iVillage Member
Registered: 12-09-2005
Fri, 02-10-2006 - 3:53pm
I would pronounce it Elle-ee-anna

                             
iVillage Member
Registered: 01-26-2006
Fri, 02-10-2006 - 4:07pm

Eliana is a Hebrew name. "elly-AH-nah." It means something like "G-d answers."

How do you *want* to pronounce this name? If you like it as above, I suggest dropping the second "l" because it's utterly unnecessary. Leave the rest of the name intact. Eliana. If you want it to sound like "Ellie Anna" but run together, then Eleanna is your best bet.

My friend Liana runs into this problem all the time. Her name is pronounced "Lee Anna," but everyone says it "Lee AHNna." She has discovered that if she spells it Leanna, everyone says it correctly 100% of the time. It's just a reaction to the "i" versus the "e" in the name.

To recap, from Liana's 25 years of wisdom: Liana is pronounced LeeAHna, whether you like it or not. Leanna is pronounced LeeAnna, whether you like it or not. Add an "e" at the start to get what you're going for either way.

Eliana is uncomplicated and a "real name."
Eleanna benefits from the same beginning as Eleanor, so it's mostly familiar and doesn't look as invented as Ellianna would.

iVillage Member
Registered: 09-29-2005
Fri, 02-10-2006 - 6:40pm

I'd pronounce it el-ee-ahn-ah (not ann-ah, if you KWIM ... I'm bad at phoentic spellings LOL). Of course, I know a girl with this name, spelled Eliana, so I may have an advantage over someone who's never heard the name (I've seen a few people considering this complaining how people try to pronounce it like El-ee-ann-ah, which would be Elianna really, so I can understand if that's the dilemma you're having). Incidentally, I think a woman on another board actually used this very spelling with the double Ls to try and avoid this issue ... she said it seemed to make people more apt to pronounce the name correctly, instead of trying to tack Anna onto the end (if I remember correctly, her daughter is a few years old now with no complaints, so maybe it worked! LOL). HTH!

~Kelli


Powered by CGISpy.com
iVillage Member
Registered: 09-29-2005
Fri, 02-10-2006 - 6:43pm

I certainly agree with you olive, but I think the distinction would be more in the -anna as opposed to -ana endings. I'll bet if she tried Lianna she'd get the "Anna" at the end as well. ;)

~Kelli


Powered by CGISpy.com