Des Higgins writes


And more labiatae: BAYsil instead of BAHsil is very American (bahs-ill-ikko
in Italian?)
Pronouncing A like AY in Hay is very Anglophone and especially in US.
In most Euro languages I know A is just Ahh unless you stick dots or funny
bits around it to change it.
In German you get Ay from an A with an umlaut (2 dots) and some of these
umlaut pronuncaitions seem to have gone into English but only in some words.

Your Oregano pronunciation has me guilty now. I would have said the US
or-egg-ano was wrong so live and learn.

I'd be surprised if the genus was orEGGanum rather than oregAHnum, so we
are just following the pronunciation of the genus.
--
Kay