Message: "How do you pronounce Ylva?"

[Facts] How do you pronounce Ylva?

by Karen (guest)

11/27/2004, 2:20 PM

I found Ylva on this website, and loved its Old Norse meaning of “she-wolf”. My only qualm is the pronunciation. I’ve been saying ILL-vah, but my friends say YIV-lah. Also, I found several websites that say the Old Norse pronunciation of Y is like the German Ü with the umlaut over it. Ylva is cognate with Ulva, which I’m pretty sure has to be OOHL-vah. Which is correct?

Thanks so much for your help!
Karen

#pronunciation #Ylva

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- Leona (guest)

6/28/2022, 7:46 AM

The name Ylva has records that are older in old Sweden and Scandinavia than the first mentionings of the name in Germany. It is found on ancient Rune Stones and after that as the name of the mother of the founding father of Stockholm Birger Jarl. Therefore the pronounciation might be more interesting in swedish rather than in german. In Sweden, Norway and Danmark the letter Y is hard for many foreign laungage speakers. If you can pronounce the Y in Yggdrasil it is the same Y in Ylva.
The isn’t really a letter in the english alphabet that quite catches the sound. Some laungage schools says to think of the ee in week but with a rounder mouth but I don’t think it takes you all the way to the Swedish Y. Write Yggrasil in Google translate and push the microphone button :)

https://translate.google.com/?t=mjolnir&sl=auto&tl=en&text=yggdrasil&op=translate

- Satu (guest)

11/28/2004, 3:16 PM

Hi Karen,

Listen here:

http://www.knickweg.de/ylvaulva.html

Regards, Satu

- Caprice +3

11/27/2004, 2:38 PM

Ylva is pr. approximately like you said: ILL-vah. Y is pr. like the German Ü. Ulva is very hard for an English-speaker to pr. It's more like ULL-vuh than OOHL-vah.

- Lala (guest) +2

11/28/2004, 7:35 AM

a question for caprice

Now would the "ULL" part rhyme with seaGULL? I think I know what sound your trying to show, and I just want to be sure.

Lala

- Caprice +1

11/28/2004, 10:41 AM

Nope, it wouldn't. The U in Ull is more like U in "duh".

- Jo (guest)

4/8/2022, 2:54 PM

In German the double dots over a vowel is written out with an e. So it would be Uell, and in German "when two vowels go walking the second does the talking." So it would sound more like ewe � with a rounded mouth.

Source, my mother is born and raised German, has a green card for US but maintains her citizenship... and I was born there.

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