I can just about understand how the French definite article “le” ends up as “ru” in Japanese, as it is probably closer to the pronunciation than a Japanese “re” would be in that case, but there is no way that the first syllable of Renoir in French sounds like “ru”, to give one of many examples.
Antipodian said,
June 11, 2012 at 4:04 pm
This is because the French pronunciation of the e in Renoir is actually like the e in le rather than the e in dress.
alexcase said,
June 11, 2012 at 8:32 pm
Not according to the recording I linked to
alexcase said,
June 11, 2012 at 8:36 pm
And according to Wikipedia there is a French sound with the same IPA symbol as an English “e”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_phonology
Fabian said,
September 19, 2012 at 9:47 pm
A friend of mine used to live in a mansion called プチルーブル. It was more “petit” than “Louvre”.