I'm interested in knowing Nordhoff better.

Nordhoff is the person who gives us (*as far as presently known) the first mention of "chanty-man" in the 1856 publication The Merchant Vessel. It's his memory of observations of cotton screwmen in Mobile in 1848, while a merchant sailor of circa 18 years old. He said the songs were called "chants" and the activity was called "chanting."

What I'm curious about is Nordhoff's reason for spelling it "ch." Did he hope to convey (to put it as a false binary) "etymology" or "pronunciation" with these spellings?

Nordhoff was a literary man, even before his sailing career. I suppose that his spelling choice was deliberate.

The first record of the song-type spelled with the "y" sound on the end is the journal (manuscript) of Abbe's 1858-59 voyage on Atkins Adams. Abbe spells it "shantie."

Unless we suppose that the pronunciation of the word changed in the 10 years between Nordhoff and Abbe's experiences, Abbe's spelling tells us that Nordhoff was conveying (presumed) etymology. Nordhoff, so this would mean, expected his readers to know that "chants" should be pronounced "as in French."

**This is where it gets unsettling for me.**

I'd feel more comfortable had Nordhoff, elsewhere in the account, discussed the French heritage of Mobile, such that we understood we were getting some local flavor. Or, had he tossed around French terms elsewhere, we'd see he had a penchant for that. But everything reads as bog-standard Joe America as far as I can see.

How could readers know they were to see "chants" and "chanting" but that they should pronounce "ch" as a sibilant?

Some discussion in my article, mentioned up-thread, could explain "chant" as a spelling variation of the Anglicized-French "chaunt"—the French term borrowed into English. In that case, *maybe* readers would see Nordhoff's "chant" and intuit it as "the French chant" rather than "the English chant." But what would they do with "chanting," whose "-ing" ending looks distinctly English, or the "y" in "chanty-man," which doesn't look French? Nordhoff’s spellings would appear to contradict themselves unless readers could cleverly infer that they were hybrids of French and English or Creole terms.

Importantly, Nordhoff does put these words in italics, which certainly signals something. Yet here again I'm not fully reassured. He doesn't use italics to mark foreign/non-English words in the text, but rather to mark off notable terms. For instance, he puts "gang" in italics.

We know that "chants" is a special term here, clarified by the italics, but more so because Nordhoff also refers to this stuff as "songs" and "singing" ("chants" and "chanting" are the special terms for that). And later in the book, when he's leaving Liverpool and they sing "Across the briny ocean," he only calls that a "capstan song"—giving the possible implication that "chant" was more specifically the local/Mobile/screwmen's term for this variety of song.

My issue is this: The only thing that leads me to supposed that Nordhoff's "chant" was pronounced with the sibilant is the Abbe spelling ten years later in a different context and the fact that, as we have inherited it, "chanty" is pronounced with the sibilant. There is less to suggest in Nordhoff alone that his "chants" should be pronounced with the sibilant and *more* (I think) to lead the reader to assume the affricate.

The funny thing is that when I discuss, in speech, Nordhoff's work, I have no idea how I should pronounce "chants"!