Esperanto Pronounciation : Esperanta Prononco

Introduction: Enkonduko

Esperanto is very easy to pronounce. It is purely phonetic. There are no silent letters. It is also easy to transcribe. You know exactly how to spell a word, even if you don’t know the word, just from hearing it. Every sound can come from only one possible letter. You might quibble on that, since, in theory, a ts sound could be the letter c or the combination ts. However, in all the Esperanto words I am familiar with, the ts sound is always a letter c.

Oddly non-native speakers of English find it easier to understand other non-native speakers speaking English, even when they have completely different accents. This is because non-native speakers tend to speak more clearly, even if warped in a consistent way than native speakers who tend to slur. This fact bodes well for Esperanto.

When I attended my first Esperanto conference, I discovered that people spoke Esperanto with regional accents, much the way English is spoken in different ways in different parts of the world. Even though there is a supposedly neutral Esperanto accent, most people betray their country of origin in the way they pronounce. You just have to get used to it. It would have taken me many weeks to learn the dozens of accents I heard at that conference.

Here is a sampling of three accents. I would be happy to include some more if you have the patience to record the necessary sound files and email them to me. In a pinch, you could just record the words on a cassette tape and mail that to me.

The sound files are MP3 format. You can play them with WinAmp, Windows Media Player, QuickTime… plug-in. They are just like MP3 music files you download and play on an iPod.

Esperanto Pronounciation : Esperanta Prononco
Sound	How Pronounced	Sample Esperanto Word	North Western American Accent	Canadian Accent	South Eastern American Accent	English Meaning
a	like a as in father	pala				pale
		sana				healthy
b	like b as in bath	bano				bath
		rabo				robbery
c	like ts as in tsar	laca				tired
		caro				tsar
cx / ĉ	as ch as in chisel	acxa / aĉa				rotten, despicable
		cxamo / ĉamo				chamois
d	like d as in dog	dato				date
		ada				ongoing
e	like e as in get	de				of, from
		pale				palely
f	like f as in fish	pafi				to shoot
		felo				fur
g	like g as in gone	agi				to act
		gemo				a gem
gx / ĝ	like j as in John	agxo / aĝo				age (of a person)
		gxemi / ĝemi				to groan
h	like h as in hello	halo				hall (large room)
		homo				person, human being
hx / ĥ	like ch as in Scottish loch	hxoro / ĥoro				chorus, choir
		ehxo / eĥo				echo
i	i as in machine	fina				final
		ido				offspring
j	like y as in yes	jono				ion
		ejo				place (for something)
jx / ĵ	zh like s as in measure	jxus / ĵus				just (in the immediate past)
		ajxo / aĵo				thing, object
k	like k as in ketchup	kelo				cellar
		ekbrili				to begin to shine
l	like l as in leaf	lumo				light
		rolo				role
m	like m as in more	muso				mouse
		ema				having a tendency toward
n	like n as in never	nazo				nose
		dankon				thanks
o	like o as in forty, not o as in code, not o as in got.	oro				gold
		povas				can (am, is, are able)
p	like p as in pen	porko				pig
		kapo				head
r	Italian trilled r, distinctly pronounced.	ruza				cunning
		moro				(a) moral
s	s as in sit	sidi				to sit
		aso				(an) ace (in a deck of cards)
sx / ŝ	like sh as in ship	sxultro / ŝultro				shoulder
		masxo / maŝo				noose
t	like t as in terror	temi				to have as a subject, topic
		kato				cat
u	like oo in moon	utero				womb
		multaj				many
ux / ŭ	like w as in how	hodiaux / hodiaŭ				today
		Euxropo / Eŭropo				Europe
v	like v as in very	vazo				vase
		lavi				to wash
z	like z as in zone	zomi				to zoom (in)
		frazo				sentence
aj	like the i as in bite	bonaj				good (plural)
ej	like the a as in mate	vejno				vein
oj	like the oy as in royal	bojkoti				to boycott
uj	like ui as in ruinous	prujno				rime ice
aux / aŭ	like ow as in how	morgaux / morgaŭ				tomorrow
eux / eŭ	no English equivalent, a bit like ow in how or ow in slow.	neuxtrala / neŭtrala				neutral

Sample Paragraph : Specimena Pargrafo

Be patient. The sound file for the entire paragraph must download before you hear anything. Click the corresponding flag.

Por ni esperantistoj nacianeco estas ne absoluta. Gxi signifas sole malsamon de lingvo, kutimo, kulturo, hauxtkoloro kaj tiel plu. Ni rigardas nin kiel gefratojn de unu granda familio “homaro”. Ni tion ne teorias, sed sentas. Ekstere ni estas ligitaj de unu sama lingvo, kaj interne de unu sama sento. Ni ankaux amegas nian propran patrion. Tamen tiu cxi amo ne estas tia, kia ne povas kunstari kun amo kaj estimo al aliaj nacioj.

~ Verda Majo (Hasegawa Teru) from En Cxinio Batalanta

For us Esperantists nationality is not absolute. It means only a difference of language, custom, culture, skin color and so forth. We look at ourselves as brothers in one great family “mankind”. For us this is not a theory but a feeling. Externally we are linked by the same language, and internally by the same feeling. We also love our own country. But this love is not such as cannot stand together with love and respect for other nations.

The Speakers : La Parolantoj


The International speaker Alan Cranshaw of Montréal Canada doing his best at a neutral accent. A neutral accent sounds somewhat Spanish. He has one year experience. The recordings are *.mp3 files sampled at 128k.	The male American speaker is the late Don Harwlow (born: 1942-07-08 died: 2008-01-27 at age: 65) from Oregon. He was an experienced speaker, and past president of the Esperanto League for North America. His recordings were originally .au files sampled at 8 kHz — hence the relatively poor quality, particularly in sibilant (s) sounds (frequencies above 4 kHz will be garbled). The .au files have been converted to MP3 format for consistency with the other sounds.	The Canadian speaker is Roedy Green from British Columbia, a complete novice. The recordings are *.mp3 files sampled at 64K. You can hear how difficult the trilled Esperanto r is for Canadian speakers. You might also notice wobbling vowels, particularly o and e improperly pronounced differently in different contexts. A Canadian tends to slur and soften sounds.	The female American speaker is Geneva Hagen from Alabama. The recordings are *.mp3 files sampled at 64K. You can hear how difficult the Esperanto trilled r is for American speakers.

The definitive Esperanto pronunciation would be professor John C. Wells (born: 1939-03-11 age: 70) and his 45 RPM phonograph record that came out in the 70s. Unfortunately my copy along with any equipment that could play it, long ago disappeared. Perhaps if enough of us urged him he might put something definitive up on the net.

	You can get the freshest copy of this page from:	or possibly from your local J: drive (Java virtual drive/mindprod.com website mirror)
	http://mindprod.com/esperanto/esounds.html	J:\mindprod\esperanto\esounds.html
	Please email your feedback for publication, errors, omissions, typos, formatting errors, ambiguities, unclear wording, broken/redirected link reports, suggestions to improve this page or comments to Roedy Green :
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