Pronunciation of Chattan?

[ThistleDown]

Interesting. The Keith's came for Chattam and we were told it was derived from the Catti celtic tribe from the low country that emigrated to Scotland during Malcohm I time. That said, we always pronouced it Cattam.

Stay with The Keiths you have, bdk. There was a family by the name who were tenants at Dunachton a long ways back and, I suspect, were 'captured' by the sept rievers of the 19C; thereafter all of the name became Chattans, according to the plagiarising sept lists. Not true unless you can accurately trace your ancestry to that single family.

As for the tales of origin, it is most likely that the clanchattan descended of local (aboriginal) folk who attached themselves -- in Lochaber -- to an abbot of the old church who called himself Chattan. The other story, descent from the Cattii, is stretching credibility and time-lines to the limit.

That's Chattan with an "n" by the way, bdk, not an "m".

[creagdhubh]

Stay with The Keiths you have, bdk. There was a family by the name who were tenants at Dunachton a long ways back and, I suspect, were 'captured' by the sept rievers of the 19C; thereafter all of the name became Chattans, according to the plagiarising sept lists. Not true unless you can accurately trace your ancestry to that single family.

As for the tales of origin, it is most likely that the clanchattan descended of local (aboriginal) folk who attached themselves -- in Lochaber -- to an abbot of the old church who called himself Chattan. The other story, descent from the Cattii, is stretching credibility and time-lines to the limit.

That's Chattan with an "n" by the way, bdk, not an "m".

Quite right Rex, and correct me if I am wrong, but I believe the tribe of the Catti, originally came from the region in western Europe that is now the country of Germany.

[ThistleDown]

correct me if I am wrong, but I believe the tribe of the Catti, originally came from the region in western Europe that is now the country of Germany.

Yes, originally, but in the first century BCE at least a part of the German tribe moved from the east bank of the Main and settled in what is now Holland. Bdk is referring to the long tale that a detachment of the Hollander Catti bunch emigrated to Britain in the first century CE time of the mythic King Corbred II and settled in its far Northeast which they called after themselves, Caithness.

[bdkilted]

Right you are. That is exactly the story I was talking about. It is the verbal history of my clan, which our 11th chief confirmed.

[Mike_Oettle]

The various assertions on how to pronounce Chattan intrigued me because, since I speak Afrikaans and German (and a bit of Dutch) the guttural sound found in loch is very familiar to me.
There is a general English-speaking tendency to lose that sound wherever possible (it was part of Anglo-Saxon).
It is a dead give-away when an English-speaker tries to speak Afrikaans and gets the g-sound wrong (both g and ch have guttural pronunciations in Dutch and Afrikaans).
And in the wider world we come across people who rave over the “locks” of Scotland and, especially in the US, those who anglicise Hispanic names like Juan (Wan), Julio (Hoolio) and Mexico (Meksiko) where there properly are kh-sounds.
The public school-educated sons of Scottish lords and lairds also fall into this trap, so I am not surprised to learn that at least one claimant to the chiefship of Clan Chattan talks of Clan Hatton.
But I am happy to have my suspicions confirmed and to continue speaking of Clan Khattan.
Regards,
Mike

[wildrover]

Hmmm...makes me think of the difference in pronunciation between Norwegian and Danish. The guttural G...I am imagining something close to a glottal stop...? Do you have an example?

Where is there a "kh" in Mexico? Maybe I'm missing it...there is a difference between a Mexican accent and a Spanish accent, and I learned "Spain" Spanish rather than "Mexico" Spanish when I was younger, so my pronunciation is a little different than a lot of guys in the area who speak Spanish as a first language. Come to think of it, I'm not sure OTOH if Mexicans add a "kh" as in "Mehikho" or not...the sound I make at the "c" isn't anything like "loch" or the description of the "kh" sound...it's like the "kh", but much softer.

?

-Sean

The various assertions on how to pronounce Chattan intrigued me because, since I speak Afrikaans and German (and a bit of Dutch) the guttural sound found in loch is very familiar to me.
There is a general English-speaking tendency to lose that sound wherever possible (it was part of Anglo-Saxon).
It is a dead give-away when an English-speaker tries to speak Afrikaans and gets the g-sound wrong (both g and ch have guttural pronunciations in Dutch and Afrikaans).
And in the wider world we come across people who rave over the “locks” of Scotland and, especially in the US, those who anglicise Hispanic names like Juan (Wan), Julio (Hoolio) and Mexico (Meksiko) where there properly are kh-sounds.
The public school-educated sons of Scottish lords and lairds also fall into this trap, so I am not surprised to learn that at least one claimant to the chiefship of Clan Chattan talks of Clan Hatton.
But I am happy to have my suspicions confirmed and to continue speaking of Clan Khattan.
Regards,
Mike

[Morris at Heathfield]

The guttural G...I am imagining something close to a glottal stop...? Do you have an example?

A fricative g, I believe, like the g in Spanish where it doesn't occur at the beginning of the word (or after n, or before i or e...). Examples: lago (lagho), galgo (galgho)

Except that, from what I've read, Afrikaans has no fricative g, it having merged with the fricative c/k, so it would be the same "kh" sound that has been discussed previously in this thread.

Where is there a "kh" in Mexico?

In the x: Mekhiko

[ThistleDown]

The various assertions on how to pronounce Chattan intrigued me because, since I speak Afrikaans and German (and a bit of Dutch) the guttural sound found in loch is very familiar to me.
There is a general English-speaking tendency to lose that sound wherever possible (it was part of Anglo-Saxon).
It is a dead give-away when an English-speaker tries to speak Afrikaans and gets the g-sound wrong (both g and ch have guttural pronunciations in Dutch and Afrikaans).
And in the wider world we come across people who rave over the “locks” of Scotland and, especially in the US, those who anglicise Hispanic names like Juan (Wan), Julio (Hoolio) and Mexico (Meksiko) where there properly are kh-sounds.
The public school-educated sons of Scottish lords and lairds also fall into this trap, so I am not surprised to learn that at least one claimant to the chiefship of Clan Chattan talks of Clan Hatton.
But I am happy to have my suspicions confirmed and to continue speaking of Clan Khattan.
Regards,
Mike

Those are the changes to pronunciation that often come about when a dominant culture sets the tone. It's why we must always look to the native speaker and not to our own prejudices. I should say two things, however: first, not all public school educated folk fall into the trap you described and, two, there are no "claimants" to the chiefship of Clan Chattan. The Clan Chattan chief is Mackintosh of Torcastle, but Clan Chattan is a "super clan" and has others who are chiefs in right of their hereditary positions in their own clans. Among these are Mackintosh of Mackintosh, chief of the Mackintoshes, Macpherson of Cluny, chief of the Macphersons, Farquharson of Invercauld, chief of the Farquharsons, etc.

Thank you for the Khattan, Mike

Rex