At 12:11 2001-10-23 -0700, Kenneth Whistler wrote: >The answer to this depends on someone with expertise in Slovak >typography coming forward. > >The editorial committee would be happy to make any clarification >to the names list and text of the standard, if definitive information >about Slovak typography for the capital L-caron is forthcoming.
You may consider my previous message definitive: Both forms are acceptable, the one that looks like the apostrophy is definitely the preferred one in printed matter. The one that looks like a little raised v is used in handwritten text and on typewriters which do not have the apostrophe-shaped one available. Slovak typewriters usually have lcaron but not not necessarily dcaron and tcaron. I have never seen one with Lcaron. There just are not enough keys. There always is a dead key with caron itself, so to type Lcaron you strike the caron key first, then the L. As for computer fonts with Slovak support, they should always use the apostrophe-shaped form of lcaron, dcaron, tcaron, and Lcaron. They should not confuse these with d apostrophe (etc) which would be a sequence of two letters. Any composition software seeing L, l, d, or t with any kind of caron modifier should combine them as described in the previous paragraph. As for the local name, both Czech and Slovak use the caron. In Slovak it is called makcen, which describes its function. I do not know whether hacek is its official Czech name. I know that hacek is a Czech word which describes its shape (little hook). As for the word "carka" that someone else mentioned, that, too, is a Czech word. My high school math teacher (back in the 60's) was Czech and she used it to describe an acute sign, and a similar Czech word for primes (as in a prime, a double prime, etc). In Slovak "ciarka" means comma, while acute is "dlzen" (with acute over l, caron over z and n), meaning the length sign. That brings up another point: The L (and l) can use the caron or the acute (not at the same time) and it is very important to make sure they look different: The acute should be above the letter, while the apostrophe-shaped letter to the right of top of the stem. Of course the hook style caron is always above the letter. The caron, in Slovak, makes the letter softer. E.g. l is pronounced as in most European languages. Lcaron is pronounced like 'gl' in Italian. The dlzen (acute) makes a vowel long: We pronounce it three times as long as those without the dlzen. By long I mean its duration in time only. It is not a different sound (i.e., not in the meaning of English long and short vowels - our short vowels are similar to English long vowels, while our long vowels last three times as long). The letters r and l can be either vowels or consonants. That is why they can be used with an acute. We have no soft r, so we do not have rcaron (Czechs do, though, they pronounce it more or less the same as the Polish rz). We do have soft l, so we do have lcaron (Czechs do not). Adam --- http://EasyDomain.com/ Domains for less
