How to pronounce 'Christoffel'

[westwood]

Kinda silly question. I would like to know how to pronounce 'Christoffel'. If I were to take a stab at it, I would guess two syllables 'Christ' (as in 'grist', with a ch as in 'Christopher') and 'offel' as in 'awful'. Am I close?

 

[bcrowell]

Kinda silly question. I would like to know how to pronounce 'Christoffel'. If I were to take a stab at it, I would guess two syllables 'Christ' (as in 'grist', with a ch as in 'Christopher') and 'offel' as in 'awful'. Am I close?

That's how I remember my GR prof saying it. Accent on the first syllable.

 

[Nabeshin]

How my professor/TA/associates pronounce it as well.

 

[Ich]

Yep, like Christopher, but the accent is on the 'o', the second last syllable.

 

[HallsofIvy]

I agree with Ich- accent on the second syllable: "Crist-AH-fel", not "CRIST-a-fel". That would be an "English" pronunciation and Christoffel was German.

 

[George Jones]

Nowadays, students calculate by hand the Christoffel symbols for a few systems as a rite of passage, and then, if they get serious about GR, use computer algebra packages to do the calculations.

A "retired" astrophysicist whom I know took a GR course in 60s when "by hand" (often quite painful) was the only method available, and he always uses the pronunciation "Christ awful symbols".