Foreign Minister Johann WadePhul: How to pronounce the name correctly

A name has recently appeared more and more in the news: Johann WadePhul. He is visiting the United States, comments on the war in Ukraine or sits on political talk shows. The 62-year-old CDU politician from Schleswig-Holstein took over the Federal Foreign Office from his predecessor Annalena Baerbock (Greens) in the Merz government.

Although he is now much more present than before, WadePhul’s name still causes confusion in some people. Johann Walter David Rudolf WadePhul – this is the full name of the Foreign Minister. Friends and acquaintances call him “Jo”, very simple. But if you want to address it with surnames, it is more difficult.

“WadePhul”: How does the voice in your head speak the second half of the name? Just like the English word for swimming pools, calf pool? Or like the English fool, calf fool? Here is an instructions for use.

The “PH” in WadePhul can be a real obstacle in pronunciation – as was the tax policy in the coalition negotiations between the Union and the SPD. But if you follow this rule, it is very simple: the “pH” is pronounced like a “f”. So “WadeFul”. This saves them the phonetic writing.

Would you like donkey bridge? This is comparable to the first name Philipp. There are different spellings (Philipp, Philip, Phillip), but it is always expressed: Filip.

Now that we have clarified the pronunciation, another question arises: Why does the name WadePhul not write how to speak it?

When writing the name WadePhul, mistakes can quickly creep in. In everyday editorial life this occurs every now and then – especially if things have to be done quickly. So much transparency must be. Wade powder, Wade Pful, WadeFul. Everything is close to the original, but everything is wrong.

The colleagues of the “” explain the spelling using the name researcher Professor Jürgen Udolph. Accordingly, the name WadePhul originated in Low German. The first part “calf” is derived from “calf”, which means “wading” today. The old ending “Puhl” refers to the Low German word “pool” or “Pohl”. That means “pool” or “pond”.

According to this explanation, one of the ancestors Wadephul liked to wade through pools. His descendant, on the other hand, now flies over the large pond as a foreign minister. He already fulfills the second part of the explanation.