Pronouncing latin names of Parrots correctly

[David Adams <>]

> I pronounce Polytelis as Polly - tell - is/us
>
> and Neophema as Nee - o - fee - ma
>
> However, I've no idea if these are the 'proper' pronunciation

And who does? The ancient Romans aren't around to sort us out ;-)
Seriously, It's always amusing to see how mutually incomprehensible
Latin names can be when pronounced by my native Italian wife and
people from the English-speaking world... We run into this more with
mushroom names (Italians are mad keen mushroom hunters) than bird
names as birders tend to use common names more often. Well, in
Italian, bird common names are very often the same as or very similar
to their Latin names (Turdus merula = 'Merlo' in Italian, for
example.)
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