How did Celtic's founding fathers manage to get the name pronounced as "Sell-tick" rather than "Kell-tick"?

This pronunciation didn't exist as far as I know, the word was universally known as "Kell-tick", so was it difficult for the people in charge to assert this? And what was the thinking behind the unique pronunciation anyway? Now virtually all sports clubs with "Celtic" in their name have it pronounced "Sell-tick" too. There's nothing in any Celtic history book I've read regarding this subject.

How did Celtic's founding fathers manage to get the name pronounced as "Sell-tick" rather than "Kell-tick"?
"Why is Celtic pronounced Seltic rather than Keltic, as it is in every other context?"





A tricky one this. Ed Mortimer started us off. "The answer is simple," he said. "We are wrong to pronounce the word Keltic. It's one of those words where the pronunciation has changed for some reason in one context but not in others. Following the general rule that 'c' followed by 'e' or 'i' is pronounced as an 's', we have Seltik, as in the football club. The same pronunciation used to apply to the adjective describing the ancient inhabitants of the western fringes of Europe, including parts of modern-day Scotland, England, Ireland, Wales, France and Spain. The 's' pronunciation still applies in French, Breton and Galician - but for some reason English has changed to the keltic variant. Put simply, the football club pronunciation is the right one."





Graeme Gardiner offered an alternative view. "Celtic were founded in 1888 to benefit the Irish immigrant population of Glasgow's east end. The name Celtic was chosen to reflect the common roots of the Scots and Irish, who were on the receiving end of considerable sectarian prejudice. Unfortunately the name wasn't used much outside academic circles and was simply mispronounced by the local population. Of course the de facto pronunciation among the faithful is Sellick."








However, the truth, if it is to be had, seemed to be that both pronunciations are ostensibly correct, with Keltic having become the more accepted usage only in the last 30 years. Celtic, having been formed in the last century, naturally retained the Seltic pronunciation. This from the Medieval Scotland website, which a number of readers kindly pointed out:





"The reason the Boston Celtics and Glasgow Celtic and all those other sports teams founded around 1900 (give or take a couple decades) pronounce their names Seltic is not because they were founded by ignorant folk who didn't know any better, but because they spoke English and did know the proper pronunciation of the English word 'Celtic'.





"So what happened? Well, any number of things might explain why the in-crowd pronunciation shifted to Keltic (such as the German influence on Celtic studies, which was strong in the 19th- and early 20th-centuries) but the upshot is that it is now fashionable - almost obligatory - in certain circles to pronounce the word with a K sound rather than the original S sound. In fact, in certain circles (both in and out of academia) it is something of a litmus test - if you don't use the K sound, it will be assumed you are not knowledgeable about things Celtic. But the one and only reason Keltic is now one of the correct pronunciations of the word is because that is how many educated people pronounce it. That is the only logic in the Keltic pronunciation's favour. The standard rules of English, the rules of language, long use and practice, all argue in favour of Seltic, not Keltic. But it still remains that Seltic is a long-established, traditional pronunciation of the word in English. There is absolutely nothing wrong with pronouncing Celtic as Seltic."
Reply:There are a few exceptions,but the general rule of the English language today is that ce and ci are pronounced with the soft c sound,whereas ca,co and cu have the hard c sound.So your question should be,why is Celtic,as in the ethnic group,pronounced with a hard c sound?And since it is,as to how the football club reversed this,I have no idea.
Reply:Well celtic basketball team pronounce it Kel-tic. Maybe it wasn't meant to be a thing done on purpose, Maybe fans just prounced it this way when they said it or sounded that way considering irish and scottish accents make a lot of words sound different without meaning too.





Btw all this is just a random guess. I've always called celtic celtic and even when I was younger I called kel-tic(celtic basketball team celtic like sel-tic coz I couldn't pronounce my ks at that point)





This is just a guess I don't know
Reply:They did it to help gers fans, you see when they were shouting abuse from the terraces in days of old their wallies being ill fitting or their fathers passed down to them, they would pop clean out of their heads when they shouted keltic. Then the Johnny Beattie School of Oratory Parlance stepped in with the answer circa 1895, changed it to seltic, thus they cut down the shocking site of gers fans scrambling about to find their teeth..





HAIL HAIL 4 IN A ROW
Reply:Becuase "c" in old latin was pronouced "k" like KEL-TIC, but as the Latin language evolved "c" became "s" like SEL-TIC. Actually in the modern language, the word Celtic(keltic) should be pronounced SELL-TIC.
Reply:It was probably lost in translation, multi cultural Scotland and regional pronunciations over the ensuing years.
Reply:Well for all the hype there is about football, to the clubs it's all about selling tickets innit?





Gerrit?
Reply:Yur aw wrang.


It came aboot when a prisoner caw'd them efter hiz fleas.


Thus Cell Tick wiz born.
Reply:well genius ,we dont sing Kampionees do we ,
Reply:They just did ok pal?
Reply:who cares.. scottish football is S-H-I-T-E