Why is there so much confusion about how to pronounce KNIPEX?


In order to answer this question, we have to look back to the 15th century. Until then, the k in words like knight, knee and knot was still pronounced, as it was in all Old Germanic languages.

But then, the English decided that it was simply too much trouble to pronounce /kn/ in a syllable onset. They were not completely unjustified to do so as it is a tricky consonant cluster: to produce the /k/ you have to move the back of your tongue to the back of your throat; to produce /n/ you then have to move the tip of the tongue to the roof of your mouth right behind your teeth. That’s a big distance to cover between only two sounds. The easy way out was to simply drop the /k/ and from then on knight, knee, knot and KNIPEX have been pronounced without it.

In other Germanic languages, like Dutch, Swedish and German we still find /kn/ as a syllable onset today. So in German, Knie, Knoten und KNIPEX are pronounced with the /k/.

The proper German pronunciation of KNIPEX is k-nee-pex [knipɛks], but
phonetically speaking, it is very reasonable to pronounce it nee-pex in
English.

 

Some videos to help with the pronunciation: 

 

 

 

 

How do you say KNIPEX? Do you think a brand name should be pronounced as in its language of origin or can brand names be adapted to language-specific pronunciation rules?

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