Coptic Pronunciation Reform - Reformed Pronunciation (Greco-Bohairic)

Reformed Pronunciation (Greco-Bohairic)

During the time of Pope Cyril IV (1854–1861), there were discussions between the Coptic Orthodox Church and the Greek Orthodox Church about whether to unite, so that one Patriarch would be the head of both Churches in Egypt. The unification did not come about, but one of the proposals made at the time was to make Coptic pronunciation conform more closely to Greek.

The chief architect of this project was Arian G. Moftah, who taught Coptic in the Patriarchal Church at that time. Since the Coptic alphabet shares many letters with the Greek alphabet, he assumed that any change of Coptic pronunciation towards Greek would be a positive reform, and would also assist with the expected union between the churches. At the time, popular feeling in Egypt had been stirred up by the French military expedition (1798–1801), whose scientists remained in Egypt for some years, and many people had come to feel that the European ideas and practices were superior to Egyptian (or Ottoman) customs. The Greco-Bohairic pronunciation introduced phonemes like dh, p, th and v, in addition to an increase in glottal stops.

The reformed pronunciation was spread by the authority of the Klirikia (Theological Seminary), though not without controversy, and by the 1950s it had become established throughout Egypt, except in a small number of parishes in upper Egypt that refuse to accept any priest from outside the local village. In the course of this campaign of reform, the old Bohairic pronunciation was often inaccurately referred to as Sahidic (the name of another Coptic dialect). However, some European Coptologists commented on the fact that the villagers of Upper Egypt retained a more authentic tradition, and wrote disparagingly about the Greek-influenced pronunciation. Most notably Dr G. Sobhy commented on Greco-Bohairic pronunciation in an article saying that 'All modern books written on Coptic by native authors adopt more or less a mutilated form of Greek pronunciation and apply it entirely to their language. Unfortunately none of our native authors here knows sufficient Greek to realise the outstanding mistakes he is trying to form into rules applicable to the Coptic language'.