The early pronunciations

[Paul Younan]

Shlama Ivan,

See the Gouden Hoorn, the Journal of Byzantium article by Edip Ayden (a speaker of the Western dialect) titled "A bird's eye view of the Syriac language and literature", Volume 5, issue 1 (summer 1997) here http://isidore-of-seville.com/goudenhoorn/51edip.html

Eastern and Western Pronunciation

Written Syriac today is almost the same in morphology as the classical Syriac of the fourth century. While the language remained the same, there emerged two dialectical pronunciations of Syriac, usually known as the Eastern and the Western. The Eastern, which is more archaic, is used by the members of the Church of the East. The Western on the other hand, is mainly used by Syrian Orthodox and the Maronites. A clear difference between the Eastern and the Western consists in the pronunciation of original a: the Eastern pronunciation preserves it (e.g. bayta 'house'), while the Western alters it to o (bayto).

Also, see "Notes from Nineveh" by Rev. J. P. Fletcher (the bottom of page 59 and the top of page 60) here:

http://www.peshitta.org/pdf/nfn.pdf