Prius pronunciation

[Mick F]

Heard today, someone pronouncing Prius as "pree-oss".

I've always thought of it as "pry-uss".

Which is correct? ....................... or is an issue of "eeth-er" or "eyeth-er"?

Mick.

[Harters]

I always pronounce it the same way as the Americans do, pri-us which his basically how its spelt.

 

Years ago I remember saying pry-us

 

[Chris Dance]

Pri-us is how most folk I talk to say it. Our dealer pronounces it this way as well.

[Stivino]

Pree-oos for me

[TheProfessor]

Pree-us

[Mick F]

So ............ the Scottish pronunciation is with E ......................... and the English is with  I.

Correct, or not?

Mick.

[Ancient Nerd]

I'm English, but go with Pree-us. Although, there is some Scottish in the family from long long ago!

[TheProfessor]

I'm English, even though I live in Scotland.

To be honest, I've never heard another pronunciation, ever. Both Scottish and English dealerships both call it a Pree-us. Every YouTube video on the vehicle, including official Toyota videos, or ones created by amateurs (American, Canadian, Australian, British, etc) all call it Pree-us.

[Ancient Nerd]

I think that most of the weird pronunciations were in the early days ( I bought my first one in 2008, after missing one in 2006 as the seats were seriously uncomfortable that year). It seems to have stabilised in recent years. 

AFAIR, the pree-oos was only seen once in an article by a journalist who knew nearly as much about the car as he did about how its name was pronounced. 

[Mick F]

Anyone here speak Latin?

Prius is a Latin word for "first" or "to go before".

Mick.

[Mick F]

........... and how do we pronounce "priority"?  It's an I followed by a vowel just as Prius is.

Mick.

[Stivino]

2 hours ago, Mick F said:

Anyone here speak Latin?

Prius is a Latin word for "first" or "to go before".

Mick.

Not Latin but, I have studied Italian and I am currently studying Spanish.  I have Spanish homework today if anybody wants to help?

In both these languages, and as far as I know, the other Latin languages too, the letter "I" is always pronounced ee.  In English we pronounce the letter i as ah-i.

[kithmo]

English Pr- eye-uss for me. 😉

 

[PeteB]

When I managed a fleet of Prius I met a number of people from Toyota head office, and also met some Toyota people at a pre-launch event for the Gen 2 Prius in 2003 and the Gen 3 in 2009.  All of them called it Pr-ee-us.

I suspect the other pronunciation came from a number of Top Gear presenters (one in particular!), who I strongly suspect did it in the knowledge it irked a fair few owners.

[flash22]

Pri'hus

 

There is another spelling

Pi'dantic

[Stivino]

19 minutes ago, flash22 said:

Pi'dantic

I hate to be a pedant but, it's pedantic. 😀

[flash22]

It's the pronunciation not the spelling 😋

[Stivino]

7 minutes ago, flash22 said:

It's the pronunciation not the spelling 😋

In that case, both are wrong.

[flash22]

ok then pəˈdæn.tɪk

 

I did not know this was such a punctiliousness forum

[Mick F]

Sorry for bringing this subject up!  

Seemed to me, that the word was being pronounced wrongly.  I'm a Lancastrian by upbringing though having lived in Cornwall for most of my life, but I still have a Wigan accent and pronounce with flat vowels.  Bath is a word for instance.  There is no R in bath.

Prius is pry-uss ........... spoken with a Wigan accent.

Mick.

[QuantumFireball]

I never heard anyone say "pry-uss" outside of that troll Clarkson.

Latin doesn't have the same ambiguity with vowel sounds as English. A long "i" sound like in "prius" should be pronounced like the "i" in "machine".

The Japanese transliteration プリウス (puriusu) also maintains this "i" = English "ee" sound. It would need to be "ai" to sound like "eye", e.g. the "ai" in "Daihatsu". Similarly there's no ambiguity in vowel sounds in Japanese, so there's only one "i" sound. Considering this, many English Speakers pronounce "Isuzu" and "Hino" incorrectly...

[TonyHSD]

Prius is a Prius same as IKEA is IKEA 😂👍

[Ten Ninety]

I've always said pree-us, as have all the Toyota staff I've interacted with in the UK. Given the number of dealerships I've visited in search of a car, that's quite a few across a wide swathe of the country from Bristol to Norwich to Sheffield, so I don't think it's a regional dialect thing. That doesn't mean pree-us is correct, especially given the legendary lack of knowledge that Toyota staff tend to exhibit about these cars, but it does suggest that it may be the more common pronunciation.

To be honest, I always thought pry-us was a p***-take, coming from Clarkson and others mocking early adopters in the 00s, who were often somewhat 'pious' about their green credentials. And if we're talking of p***-takers, I must confess that I laughed out loud when I first saw some dude on a US car show sporting a t-shirt with the following logo. That most definitely requires pree-us to be the pronunciation for the joke to work!

 

 

[FROSTYBALLS]

Response from Toyota GB:

" Hello Mike,

Thank you for your email.

The correct pronunciation of the 'Prius' would be pronounced as 'Pre'.

I hope this helps and thanks for contacting Toyota Customer Support.

Kind regards

Joseph Coke
Customer Support
Toyota (GB) PLC "

[Stivino]

Is that pre as in preh or pre as in previous?