Quote:
Originally posted by preciousjeni
And, "strong" in French.
ETA: I just looked it up...forte (for-tay) in Italian means loud, hard and strong.
So, basically, it is incorrect to say fort and correct to say for-tay.
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Not quite.
When using 'forte' to refer to a person's strongest ability, the 'correct' pronunciation should be /fort/ - versions of the OED have alternated between declaring this (correct) version dead, and attempting to revive it.
When using 'forte' as a musical term, you add the ending flourish /tay/.
The reason why you do NOT add the 'tay' for the first meaning is precisely the same as what you said - the term comes from the french word for strong. Much like "morale" or "locale," we have mistakenly adopted the feminine version of the French term, but kept the masculine pronunciation.
Don't feel bad if you're a 'for-tay' person, though, as I'd say well over 99% of the people on the planet use this pronunciation. Many consider it to be a 'disputed' pronunciation at this point, but it seems obvious which has 'won.'