Rijndael is Pronounced “Rhine Dahl”

By Daniel Miessler on March 20th, 2008: Tagged as Encryption | Information Security

Well, technically [rɛindaːl], but “Rhine Dahl”, or even, “Rine Doll” is pretty close.

Although there’s a joke that it’s now pronounced “AES” since Rijndael was selected to be the standard’s algorithm. There’s even a wave file of it being pronounced as such, which serves both as the joke and the definitive guide to pronouncing Rijndael (he has to say “rhine dahl” in order to get the joke out). e

“Rhine Dahl” (Rijndael) is pronounced “A – E – S”.

Pronunciation Clip | rijndael.info

Comments

Steven G. Harms

The trouble with that this name is that it features two exclusively Dutch dipthongs: first the ĳ. First this letter nota bene is not i+j, but a ligature.

This dipthong is pronounced "ay" and denotes the Dutch "lange ĳ". Frequently, in handwriting, this is shortened to "ȳ" or with an umlaut. The macron or umlaut serve to make this glyph distinct from the Greek y (y-griega in Spanish or y-Grec in French).

The æ, being the second dipthong, is particularly difficult. Pronounce the "a" in the English "pal" with an extended length in the a. Then allow your throat to "close in". You may get closer to the right feel by working your adam's apple lower.

As a result the closing "l" will occur by touching the tip of your tongue to your front teeth, making a very soft "l" sound.

Dutch is the missing link between Anglo-Saxon and modern English.