How do you, the great and wonderful players, pronounce the word "Drow"?
Coming as I do from a hybrid world of grognardia, I have pronounced it to rhyme with 'Ow'. After some conversation with my Resident Expert Grognard (aka Beloved Spouse... *looks for the kobolds*) I am returning to the Gygaxian original pronunciation. Which rhymes with 'Oh'.
This is a wonderful example of the written word being pronounced differently by different people, and I'd love to see how different people pronounce this common gaming word.
Also, I would like to hear people ringing in on this to present it in the format of:
Rhymes with "Ow" or Rhymes with "Oh".
When you started gaming. (By edition, game, or year as you see fit)
Did you self-learn this pronunciation, or were you affected by another person's input.
Thanks in advance for your contributions to Science!
Rhymes with cow, but I'm English so Americans may pronounce it slightly different.
According to Frank Mentzer's pronunciation guide in Dragon #93, either is acceptable.
I use "rhymes with pow".
I love reading Monte Cook's articles on how as a young fantasy reader you often make up your own pronunciations because you have no comparison.
For example, for years I pronounced lich as if it were "lih" (hard h).
You should have heard the nonsense we were comming out with when we first started playing C'thulhu!
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The real question is, how do the drow pronouce it, and do they kill you for saying it wrong?
No, they kill you just for speaking at all. ;)
Of course, given the drow, they probably have more pronunciations than we do. They probably start House wars over it. Now there's an adventure idea. Imagine the villains big reveal for the global war being a single word.
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I been playing since 1978-9 (OD&D, purplish boxed set) and I always pronounced it drow, to rhyme with crow(the large black avian). At times there are people who try to sway you to their chosen pronunciation and declare your way to be WRONG(whether there is any reasoning or not) but I have never swayed. I really don't care if there is an official way to say it, that is my chosen way.
As opposed to the nonsense you use when you play it now? :)
Yea.
Ia! Ia! Shub-Nigurrath indeed...|
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For example, for years I pronounced lich as if it were "lih" (hard h).
I always pronounce it "lick" although I get ribbed for it a lot. "You are ambushed by a Lich." I say. "Ew, now I'm all slobbery!" says my players. "Make a fortitude save, jerk. DC= 1 higher than you happen to roll because you teased the DM. Dick." I say.
I believe in Shadow in the Sky, Pathfinder 13, it says that Drow rhymes with bow.
An excellent answer (especially in written form)!
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I think it would be safe to follow the way things shake out IRL and say that perhaps a human from the Frost Barbarians calls them "trauvenalvar" whereas a guy from the Hold of the Sea Princes might say "drow" to rhyme with "cow" with a little sexy latin roll of the r; whereas a guy from Keoland would say "drow" and shoot them with his bow that rhymes with how he pronounces their name.
Then the word came from high elven "drowilvafaelinil lillinirimil" or what have you, but humans,.....only living a mere 50 years, shortened it to drow so they wouldn't waste a massive portion of their life saying "drowilvafaelinil lillinirimil" every time they wanted to say the word "drow."
Then, there's the gnomes of whosafrajitss who call them "nibnirpokpak" because their farts smell like the rancid giant lizard grease they fry their fungus fritters in.....well you get the jist I guess.
I pronounce it Drow rhymes with "Ow!". Because properly played... you should not see them until you've felt the pinprick of a dart. :)
If they wanted it to sound like "Dro" minus the "w" they should have spelled it that way.
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I believe in Shadow in the Sky, Pathfinder 13, it says that Drow rhymes with bow.An excellent answer (especially in written form)!
That was a hilarious editorial. Very cleverly written.
Going back to FakeHealer - I wouldn't dispute your pronunciation. Mine (as in Bach or Loch) is closer to yours than to the common "litch". The etymology of the word is very cloudy, even moreso than drow.
Although there may be some credence to the argument that since the plural is "liches" the pronunciation would be a soft sound - again why I originally went with "lih".
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I just refuse to say it 'dro'. Sounds stupid to me. So I of course ryhme it with cow.
Finnish speakers would pronounce it 'dro', but that's because in our language every word is pronounced as written. I've rhymed it with 'cow' with English speakers, and that is actually how Vin Diesel pronounced it, too (on 'Late Night with Conan O'Brien'). So I rest my case, 'cuz Vin can't be wrong... ;)
Ah...this old chestnut, it always warms my heart.
There is only ONE correct answer: OW should be pronounced as it ALWAYS is pronounced in English. Pronounce it just as you would in cow or low. Cf. bow and sow if you need further clarification.
Ah...this old chestnut, it always warms my heart.
There is only ONE correct answer: OW should be pronounced as it ALWAYS is pronounced in English. Pronounce it just as you would in cow or low. Cf. bow and sow if you need further clarification.
Thank you Professor. The problem there is that both your examples have multiple CORRECT pronunciations. Bow is either bow to a gent or fire a bow. Sow is either a female pig or what you do with seeds in a field.
You may address me as Mikhaila D Coyote, Super Pedant.
I understand you're probably trying for comedic point of pronunciation, I'm just being contrary...
Harumph! You have your answer! I can't help it if you think the truth is a "problem"! No longer shall I cast my pearls of wisdom before...sows!
Strolls away, singing, "Why can't the English teach their children how to speak?"
PS. I recommend drawing a bow, rather than firing it. You'll get more out of it.
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Rhymes with Cow, even though I know (doesn't rhyme with cow) it's officially dro.
Started with the red book.
As I know the official version and ignore it, which do you figure?
I have NEVER heard a single employee of either WOTC or Paizo ever pronounce it dro. Every official pronouncement has been consistent even from the TSR days. Every one of them has always rhymed it with cow.
Frankly, I would rather people start pronouncing Paizo correctly.
Wouldn't that be swell?
That was a hilarious editorial. Very cleverly written.I believe in Shadow in the Sky, Pathfinder 13, it says that Drow rhymes with bow.An excellent answer (especially in written form)!
Yes, and what made it even funnier was that there were people who read it and went away insisting that it justified their one true pronunciation, while invalidating the other, authoritatively wrong pronunciation. Priceless.
What would be really entertaining (and likely) is if different tribes of Drow pronounced it differently.
And were snobbish about it.
I mean, how can you have a proper invocation to Lolth if the High Priestess has some awful Upper Underdark accent? The horror!
Like everything about the drow, pronunciation should follow the structure of the matriarchy.
Whenever drow females say, oh, drow males say, ow.
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I think it would be safe to follow the way things shake out IRL and say that perhaps a human from the Frost Barbarians calls them "trauvenalvar" whereas a guy from the Hold of the Sea Princes might say "drow" to rhyme with "cow" with a little sexy latin roll of the r; whereas a guy from Keoland would say "drow" and shoot them with his bow that rhymes with how he pronounces their name.
Then the word came from high elven "drowilvafaelinil lillinirimil" or what have you, but humans,.....only living a mere 50 years, shortened it to drow so they wouldn't waste a massive portion of their life saying "drowilvafaelinil lillinirimil" every time they wanted to say the word "drow."
Then, there's the gnomes of whosafrajitss who call them "nibnirpokpak" because their farts smell like the rancid giant lizard grease they fry their fungus fritters in.....well you get the jist I guess.
Excellent answer professow !
I would pronounce it like Cow but hell I don't really care coz i'm french :D
It rhymes with cow and so sayeth I and I'm always right.
Page 246 of the Pathfinder Campaign Setting presents a phonetical spelling of the way "drow" is said in Golarion. I hope that puts this question to rest at least in terms of how it's handled in Paizo products.
Personally, though, I break it up: "Five Dr. Ows, coming your way" I've been known to say.
Once about this guide they know
The correct pronunciation shall grow
What is the phonetics for drow=DROW? It rhymes with cow I think, and that would seem to be the opinion of the majority of posters, but I don't understand what that phonetic actaully sounds like. Its just capitalisation to me.
The page Wes is referring to has a guide drow - DROW, in contrast to the long o's getting OH. (The problem is, OW is not phonetic. But yeah, the weight of both majority and authority seems to fall pretty clearly on hOUse not jOE.)
Edit: Did you edit your post, or am I just not completely awake yet?
I heard from Wizards when it used to be TSR that drow rhymed with cow. Drow does not rhyme with row. But since WOTC has changed so much of D&D who know how they pronounce it. May it is now pronounced DRIZZIT! :)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drow_(Dungeons_&_Dragons)
The basis of this entire thread comes from my Beloved Spouse (Kobold chorus: "We love you!") and I talking over the changes that Drow have undergone over the years. She started playing D&D when it was Brand Spanking New (relatively speaking) and her pronunciation is based on her recollection of how Gygax - the person who made Drow what they are today - would pronounce it.
Of course, if there's one thing I've learned about language (from speaking some small to middling amount of 7 different tongues) it is that pronunciation is best left to the speaker.
*peers upthread* Seriously, this is the biggest thread I've ever started... wow you guys, thanks!
Drow does not rhyme with row.
Why not? Cow rhymes row.
Or not. Depends on the row. I had a row about this once. In fact, I had three or for rows about it in a row.
*peers upthread* Seriously, this is the biggest thread I've ever started... wow you guys, thanks!
This is nothing. One day, some guy complained that the boards were too long. He demanded that threads be cut off after 50 posts or so.
I stopped posting there after 1000 or so replies, and it was still going strong. :D
Personally, though, I break it up: "Five Dr. Ows, coming your way" I've been known to say.
Dr. Ow. I love that.
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I, along with most of my long time gaming friends, are very firmly in the camp the says Drow rhymes with bow (as in bow and arrow).
To my mind and ears, rhyming Drow with cow just sounds terrible but I think it comes down to what you heard first.
For what it's worth, I attended the D&D camp at Shippensburg University back in the mid 80's as a kid and Frank Mentzer was a guest. I actually asked him this very question. He said that they pronounced it both ways at TSR but he personally prefered it to rhyme with bow (as in bow and arrow)
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My grandfather's surname was Prow, which the family pronounced as rhyming with Crow, so when I first started playing Dnd back in the first edition days, I couldn't have imagined saying drow with an "ow" sound. I still say it with an "oh" sound, and scowl when my players do otherwise. A bit of advice: Never correct the GM's pronunciation.
Drow spoken like droh sounds awful.
Drow spoken like droh sounds awful.
In English, yes. In German, perhaps. I have found that in french, its the other way around...
But then again, francophones like to alter names. Perseus wasn't good enough, it had to become Persé! Odysseus became Ulysse. Drow might as well be Drow...
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I have always said drow (rhymes with crow). I started playing in the 90s and played the tail end of AD&D, but mostly 3.x, and that is how the other players said it. But I decided to give it some thought. I think that the drow might pronounce it differently than elves would.
Take bow (like cow) and bow (like crow), both as verbs.
If you bow (like cow), you are bending yourself or part of yourself (e.g., your head). In a mostly intransitive sense.
If you bow (like crow), you bend something, like your bow from which you will soon fire arrows. A thing can be bowed. It's transitive--needs an object.
So I think the elves would say drow (like crow), seeing the drow as elves who have been bent, by the forces of nature, magic, or evil. But I think the drow would call themselves drow (like cow), seeing themselves not as the victims, but as the ones who chose to live underground and continue to choose their twisted course.
That said, I've said drow (like crow) for so long, it just sounds funny to me to say it a different way.