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Help[Facts] Re: Leila and Lila
in reply to a message by Laura
This is originally an Arabic name. There isn't universal agreement on how to transliterate names from the Arabic alphabet into the Roman (English) alphabet.
The form Leila was probably originally the popular spelling in English because it is the spelling used by the poet Lord Byron for characters in his poems The Giaour (1813) and Don Juan (1823). Byron's poems introduced the name to many in both England and the USA during the 19th century. I am not sure how Byron pronounced the name, but most readers back then would of course come to their own conclusions about it. "Leela" became the most common pronunciation in the 19th and early 20th centuries in the USA because that seemed natural for that spelling to Americans at that time. But I think LIE-lah or LAY-lah are closer to the original Arabic pronunciation of the name. The spellings Lila and Layla developed to give those pronunciations in English. However, Lila would be pronounced "LEE-lah" in most European languages besides English, and probably naturally developed that pronunciation in languages like Spanish, and that was later imported back into English.
Lila and Lilah may also have sometimes been separately derived from Delilah, or even created by a few as "Latinate" forms of Lily.
The form Leila was probably originally the popular spelling in English because it is the spelling used by the poet Lord Byron for characters in his poems The Giaour (1813) and Don Juan (1823). Byron's poems introduced the name to many in both England and the USA during the 19th century. I am not sure how Byron pronounced the name, but most readers back then would of course come to their own conclusions about it. "Leela" became the most common pronunciation in the 19th and early 20th centuries in the USA because that seemed natural for that spelling to Americans at that time. But I think LIE-lah or LAY-lah are closer to the original Arabic pronunciation of the name. The spellings Lila and Layla developed to give those pronunciations in English. However, Lila would be pronounced "LEE-lah" in most European languages besides English, and probably naturally developed that pronunciation in languages like Spanish, and that was later imported back into English.
Lila and Lilah may also have sometimes been separately derived from Delilah, or even created by a few as "Latinate" forms of Lily.
This message was edited 7/13/2008, 2:32 PM
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Replies
And, of course, the pronounciation LEE-lah matches quite closely a word of Sanskrit origin whose etymology not clear: lI means to cling etc., but lIlA means to play, a game, in the very general sense of child's play all the way to the existence as embodying a cosmic game. It was used as a name and as first part of a name from at least a 1000 years back in India.
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