by David Dominé

Since July 14 was Bastille Day, some of you might be contemplating the French influence that has contributed to our city’s cultural make up. It all started in 1780, when Kentucky was still part of Virginia, and then governor Thomas Jefferson and the General Assembly approved a charter naming a city after King Louis XVI. The idea was to honor the French troops who had come to the aid of the American colonies during the Revolutionary War. As a result, we in the know do not say “Lewis-ville,” but rather drop the s for a more Francophile “Louey-ville” (or one of the other s-less variants that appear on the well known tee shirts). Gratitude to the French royalty was expressed even further when the young river city adopted the noble iris or lily flower as its own symbol. But just how do you pronounce “fleur-de-lis” or “fleur-de-lys,” as it’s also spelled?

Most English-speakers drop the s, and say something akin to “fleur-duh-lee” (flûr’də-lē’ or flʊr’ də-lē’ according to the International Phonetic Alphabet) – a conclusion reinforced by no small number of English dictionaries, including the American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language – but is this the real way the word should be pronounced?

Never fear, here to save the day is Mr. Language Man. (Or else he might just muddy the linguistic waters a bit.) Although Mr. Language Man would by no means profess any degree of fluency in the French language, he has had enough college French and upper-level linguistics to offer his two centime’s worth to those who’d care to know the answer to this pressing issue. The authentic pronunciation of “lis” in this case is actually more like the English word “lease.” The best way to say the word therefore is “fleur-duh-lees” – i.e. pronounced with the s – and not “fleur-duh-lee” with a silent s. Why? Because that’s the way the Francophones say it.

“Non, non, non,” says Danielle Day, a native speaker of French and longtime colleague of Mr. Language Man. “Americans say it wrong! It is fleur-de-lees! – lees, lees, lees!”

Although the French s is often silent at the end of words or syllables, this is not always the case.

“If you say ‘lee’ without the s,” scolds Danielle, “it sounds like the French word for bed.”

So, Mr. Language Man advises you to keep the s if you want to preserve a somewhat accurate pronunciation of the original. Drop the s, and you’ll sound like many, many speakers of English who haven’t had the benefit of this quick tutorial.

On a pedagogical side note, the s in the English pronunciation of fleur-de-lis most likely fell away in a linguistic phenomenon known as hypercorrection. In this case of over-correcting, individuals overcompensate and “correct” things that weren’t wrong in the first place. A common example of hypercorrection in English occurs when speakers say things like “between you and I” in lieu of the correct “between you and me” because they have learned it is incorrect to say things like “You and me went to the store.” (It is incorrect to say “You and me went to the store” because “me” is an object, and in this case, a subject, “I,” would be in order; By the same token, it is grammatically incorrect to use “between you and I” because “I” is a subject and the preposition “between” requires an object, i.e. “me.”)

That’s most likely what happened to our sibilant friend, the s, in fleur-de-lis. Individuals with some knowledge of French pronunciation realized that the s went silent at the ends of many words and liberally applied this rule to all French words, even those where the s needed to be pronounced.

So, think about this tonight as you and your sweetheart clink together your glasses over dinner at Le Relais. (By the way, the “Le” is not pronounced “la” – it rhymes with “duh.” le, le, le!) After you’ve had a bottle or two of Beaujolais, get in touch with me and let’s talk about what we should do with the noble citizenry of Ver-sales, Kentucky. Versailles? I somehow don’t see them switching over to the real French pronunciation there, but, who knows? Stranger things have happened.