Talk:Alaksandu

Name Standardization

The possible spellings of Hittite names are too numerous to list all of them. The most popular methodology today is to use 's' for 'sh', and 'h' for the laryngeal. (In the past, these have been normalized as 'sh' and 'kh', but this has fallen by the wayside over time.) A third approach, but more difficult to achieve, is to use 'š' or even 'ş', and a character that isn't available in Wikipedia for the laryngeal (an 'h' with a cupped diacritical under it). A further problem is that of vocalization. Hittite does not distinguish voiced from voiceless phonemes. It is also standard to show the root stem without the nominative 's' ending. This corresponds with how the Hittites themselves wrote names when they were not attempting to indicate case. Thus 'Alaksandu'. Variants such as 'Alaksandus', 'Alakshandush', 'Alagsandu', Alagšandu, Alakšandu, Alakšanduš, etc. are easily recognized as the same name.

In this name, we have even the further complication that 'kš' might actually be a cuneiform attempt to represent 'x' ('ξ'). Admittedly, 'š' is the most technically precise, but only a dedicated group even know how the 'š' character is supposed to be pronounced, and it is frequently accepted that the Hittites pronounced it 's' anyway. (A fact that, personally, I find a stretch, as 's' is perfectly distinct in cuneiform. My very few contemplations on this matter seem to suggest a pronunciation more like 'tz', but alas cuneiform also knows the 'ṣ' consonant as well.)

Another problem with attempting to use special characters like 'š' is that search engines don't always recognize them. Google is smart enough to make the connection (even suggesting "Mursili" as an alternative for "Murshili"), but Yahoo doesn't.

dab, I preferred the solution that you offered yourself: Details of the transcription of Hittite names should be discussed at the Hittite cuneiform article.

As usual, this is just my two cents worth. I'm making it policy not to make a change more than once, so I just make this revision once as a recommendation. Publik (talk) 16:13, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

Paris killing Achilles

Paris doesn't kill Achilles in the Iliad. Someone's added something from non-Homeric sources. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 199.76.145.118 (talk) 23:19, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

Is the name Alaksandu a possible forerunner to Alexander? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.34.213.184 (talk) 03:00, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

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