6

In George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire series, there is a somewhat exotic character called Jalabhar Xho:

JALABHAR XHO, an exile prince from the Summer Isles

I’m not sure how to pronounce this character’s last name: “Xho”.

A few reasonable guesses for the ⟨xh⟩ digraph include:
/k/, /ks/, /ksh/, /ʃ/, /gz/, /ʒ/, /dʒ/, /h/, /x/, /χ/, /kǁʰ/, /ᵏǁʰ/, ∅

But, as I’m not sure which language(s) inspired the Summer Tongue, it’s unclear which (if any) of these guesses are correct.

Are there any clues as to how George intended this name to be pronounced?

Improve this question
2
  • 1
    relevant: scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/216729/… - you always have "reader's rights". Commented Jun 12, 2024 at 16:52
  • 1
    My immediate suspicion is that you should pronounce it the way you would say the beginning of Xhosa. The Summer Isles, if I recall correctly, are the closest, most developed part of Sothoryos, so they're part of the Africa analogue—probably the only analogous groups, since the actual landmass of Sothoryos fits the "Darkest Africa" stereotype to the extent that the Sothoryi are allegedly not even humans. So the odds are good that Xho is directly from the word Xhosa. Commented Jun 13, 2024 at 4:19

0

Reset to default

Start asking to get answers

Find the answer to your question by asking.

Ask question

Explore related questions

See similar questions with these tags.