Nuts and Bolts: itacism.

 Last week we gazed in amazement at iotacism; now we move swiftly on to itacism.

Luckily it's not far to go because it's basically the same thing, and still to do with the pronunciation of Greek, ancient and modern.

Ancient Greek had a lot of vowel-sounds, but over time many of these began to be pronounced like the letter e in the English word pretty, or the i in ship. Nowadays the Greek vowels  ι, η, υ, ει, οι, and υι are all pronounced like the aforementioned i in ship, which is the sound originally spelled ι in Ancient Greek . (That letter is called iota.) 

That process of that happening is one meaning of the word iotacism, and itacism is what some scholars call this pronunciation after the shift had happened.

There are people who devote their lives to the study of this kind of thing. We give them a lot of respect, and sometimes even a salary. 

Well, there are many more dangerous obsessions, after all. 

Word To Use Today: well, how about a word that has more than one pronunciation? Like garage, or grass, or tomato. 

Or even Kyiv.