Long vowel AND extension?


In an artwork of a pokemon, Lunala in English, it is written ルナアーラ. Why, after
the ナ, are there both an ア and a ー? It would just be pronounced as if any of
those two were removed, so why are they both there?




> It would just be pronounced as if any of those two were removed

No, that's not true. Japanese people will pronounce ルナラ, ルナーラ and ルナアーラ
**very** differently. ルナラ is 3
[morae](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_\(Japanese_prosody\)) long, ルナーラ is 4
morae long, and ルナアーラ is 5 morae long. ルナアーラ would be approximated as "lunar,
ah, rah." Forget how it has been translated in other languages for now.

This type of "double-elongated vowel" is uncommon, but can be seen in compound
words whose element happens to contain an elongated vowel. ルナアーラ is probably
etymologically ルナ (lunar, "moon") followed by アーラ
([ala](http://www.dictionary.com/browse/ala), "wing"), and is pronounced as
such.

A similar example in native Japanese would be 大鬼 ("big ogre"), which is
written as おおおに in hiragana. This お is three times as long as normal お. A
great-aunt (parent's aunt) is 大叔母 (おおおば) in Japanese, and is pronounced very
differently from 叔母 (おば, "aunt") or 大葉 (おおば, "big leaf").

**Bonus:** Some speakers may unconsciously use a [glottal
stop](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glottal_stop) when saying words and
phrases like ルナアーラ, 大叔母, いい色 or 王を追おう to indicate the second part is a
separate component (although the glottal stop is usually not a distinguish
feature in Japanese). Instead of a long continuous vowel, you may hear a
slight "stop" between ルナ and アーラ, depending on the speaker.




> It would just be pronounced as if any of those two were removed

No, that's not true. Japanese people will pronounce ルナラ, ルナーラ and ルナアーラ
**very** differently. ルナラ is 3
[morae](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_\(Japanese_prosody\)) long, ルナーラ is 4
morae long, and ルナアーラ is 5 morae long. ルナアーラ would be approximated as "lunar,
ah, rah." Forget how it has been translated in other languages for now.

This type of "double-elongated vowel" is uncommon, but can be seen in compound
words whose element happens to contain an elongated vowel. ルナアーラ is probably
etymologically ルナ (lunar, "moon") followed by アーラ
([ala](http://www.dictionary.com/browse/ala), "wing"), and is pronounced as
such.

A similar example in native Japanese would be 大鬼 ("big ogre"), which is
written as おおおに in hiragana. This お is three times as long as normal お. A
great-aunt (parent's aunt) is 大叔母 (おおおば) in Japanese, and is pronounced very
differently from 叔母 (おば, "aunt") or 大葉 (おおば, "big leaf").

**Bonus:** Some speakers may unconsciously use a [glottal
stop](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glottal_stop) when saying words and
phrases like ルナアーラ, 大叔母, いい色 or 王を追おう to indicate the second part is a
separate component (although the glottal stop is usually not a distinguish
feature in Japanese). Instead of a long continuous vowel, you may hear a
slight "stop" between ルナ and アーラ, depending on the speaker.

