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Aloisiuslast Wednesday at 5:22 AM1 replyview on HN

Spelling it center provides the significant benefit of removing foreign orthography from English, making it easier to learn to read and write.

I see no value spelling it centre. That some other languages spell the word doesn't matter as they're pronouncing it without a vowel between the t and r which is rather different than English.

In French it's pronounced santr. In Italian it's sen-tro. In Czech it's tsen-troom. In Swedish it's sen-trum.

Languages that, like English, pronounce it with a vowel between the t and r? They spell it that way.

In Albanian it's qendër pronounced very close to rhotic English sen-ter.

In Norweigian it's senter (sen-ta) which is pretty close to non-rhotic English.

In Croation, it's centar (sen-tar).

In Lombard it's center.

In Swedish, the other word for center (meaning a center (place) or sports position) is spelled... center.

And even Czech, which spells it centrum, changes the spelling to center in the genitive plural, to match the pronunciation.

So even if we're going to choose spelling based on other languages, there's plenty that spell it similarly to center to argue for it in English - though I would still argue that other people are doing it isn't a compelling argument.


Replies

kazinatorlast Wednesday at 8:13 AM

According to Etymonline (i.e. Douglas Harper), quite curiously, the "center" speling in English is actually older!

Quote:

The spelling with -re was popularized in Britain by Johnson's dictionary (following Bailey's), though -er is older and was used by Shakespeare, Milton, and Pope.

At the same time, it Etymonline traces the origin to Old French (14th century) which had it as centre.

Just because Milton, Pope and Shakespeare wrote "center" doesn't mean it was a good idea. The latter couldn't spell his own name the same way twice!