I recall I always used to say “pronounciation”.

Anyway, I looked it up, and according to Wiktionary, it’s derived

> From Latin pronuntiatio, noun of action from perfect passive participle pronuntiatus, from verb pronuntiare proclaim, from pro- for + nuntiare announce.

According to my dictionary, this is the origin of Pronounce:
ORIGIN late Middle English : from Old French pronuncier, from Latin pronuntiare, from pro- ‘out, forth’ + nuntiare ‘announce’ (from nuntius ‘messenger’ ).

So it seems it may be more a case of pronounce gains an O, rather than pronunciation losing it.

Having said that, as someone who learned English as a foreign language, the reasons and origins of the grammar, spelling and pronunciation is still much of a mystery to me…(Worcestershire is my favorite example)

It is a mystery; here’s the classic example, often cited by ESL teachers. Many sources;
GBS= George Bernard Shaw.

How can “ghoti” and “fish” sound the same? GBS explained it like this:

the gh = f as in rouGH
the o = i as in wOmen
the ti = sh as in naTIon
Of course, this was a joke. The word “ghoti” is not even a real word. But it showed the inconsistency of English spelling.

Great-I have another somewhat related question (sorry if this is a threadjack): why do some news reporters (I’m thinking like the late Canadian ABC anchor Peter Jennings) pronounce “negotiations” as “neh-go-see-ay-shuns”?

Good question…..a bit like southern English (London-ish area) sometimes seem incapable of pronouncing ‘th’ and instead pronounce it as ‘f’.......f.ex.: Three => Free and Think => Fink

So, would that make it Ben Thinkel? Fat’s a joke, I fink.

lol…...it would be hilarious if it went in both directions…..