However, some European Coptologists commented on the fact that the villagers of Upper Egypt retained a more authentic tradition, and wrote disparagingly about the Greek-influenced pronunciation.
Unfortunately none of our native authors here knows sufficient Greek to realise the outstanding mistakes he is trying to form into rules applicable to the Coptic language."
After completing a doctorate on the subject at Oxford University (Thesis available online), he returned to Egypt hoping to restore the older way of pronouncing Coptic in place of the reformed pronunciation (sometimes referred to as Greco-Bohairic).
The Institute of Coptic Language, which studied and promoted the Old Bohairic pronunciation, came under strong opposition from some Church leaders, but the Pope continued to support Dr Maher, and ordained him priest (as Father Shenouda) in the 1990s.
The Old Bohairic pronunciation is evidence-based, using archived sound recordings and transcriptions of the oral tradition of Zeneya, Dabeyya, and other villages made by various scholars such as Georgy Sobhy, Petraeus, Galtier, Maria Cramer, Rochmonteix, in addition to the works of W.H.