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The Latin alphabet most resembles the Greek alphabet around 540
BC, as it appears on the red-figures pottery of the time.
Letterforms
Letters and phonemes
Consonants
Notes on phonetics
Notes on spelling
Vowels
Monophthongs
Long and short vowels
Adoption of Greek upsilon
Sonus medius
Vowel nasalization
Diphthongs
Vowel and consonant length
Table of orthography
Syllables and stress
Old Latin stress
Classical Latin syllables and stress
Syllable
Nucleus
Onset and coda
Heavy and light syllables
Stress rule
Iambic shortening
Elision
Latin spelling and pronunciation today
Spelling
Pronunciation
Post-Medieval Latin
Loan words and formal study
Ecclesiastical pronunciation
Letterforms
The forms of the Latin alphabet used during the Classical period did
not distinguish between upper case and lower case. Roman
inscriptions typically use Roman square capitals, which resemble
modern capitals, and handwritten text often uses old Roman cursive,
which includes letterforms similar to modern lowercase.
This article uses small caps for Latin text, representing Roman
square capitals, and long vowels are marked with acutes,
representing apices. In the tables below, Latin letters and digraphs are
A papyrus fragment inRoman cursive with portions
paired with the phonemes they usually represent in the International of speeches delivered in theRoman Senate
Phonetic Alphabet.
1. The vowel letters a, e, i, o, u, y represented both short and long vowels. The long vowels were often marked by
apices during the Classical period⟨Á É Ó V Ý⟩, and long i was written using a taller version⟨I⟩, called i longa "long I":
⟨ꟾ⟩;[1] but now long vowels are sometimes written with amacron in modern editions (ā), while short vowels are
marked with a breve (ă) in dictionaries when necessary.
2. Some pairs of vowel letters, such asae, represented either a diphthong in one syllable or two vowels in adjacent
syllables.
3. The letters i and u - v represented either the close vowels/i/ and /u/ or the semivowels /j/ and /w/.
In the tables below, Latin letters and digraphs are paired with the phonemes that they usually represent in the International Phonetic
Alphabet.
Consonants
This is a table of the consonant sounds of Classical Latin. Sounds in parentheses are allophones, sounds with an asterisk exist mainly
in loanwords and sounds with a dagger (†) are phonemes only in some analyses.
Velar
Labial Dental Palatal Glottal
plain labialized
voiced b d ɡ ɡʷ†
Plosive voiceless p t k kʷ†
aspirated pʰ* tʰ* kʰ*
voiced z*
Fricative
voiceless f s h
Nasal m n (ŋ)
Rhotic r
Approximant l j w
Notes on phonetics
The labialized velar stops/kʷ/ and /ɡʷ/ may both have been single phonemes rather than clusters like the/kw/ and /
ɡw/ in English quick and penguin. /kʷ/ is more likely to have been a phoneme than/ɡʷ/. /kʷ/ occurs between vowels
and counts as a single consonant in Classical Latin poetry , but /ɡʷ/ occurs only after [ŋ], where it cannot be identified
as a single or double consonant.[2] /kʷ/ and [ɡʷ] were palatalized before a front vowel, becoming[kᶣ] and [ɡᶣ], as in
quī [kᶣiː] listen compared with quod [kʷɔd], and lingua [ˈlɪŋ.ɡʷa] compared with pinguis [ˈpɪŋ.ɡᶣɪs]. This sound
change did not apply to/w/ in the same position: uī - vī [wiː].[3]
/kʷ ɡʷ/ before /u/ may have become [k ɡ] by dissimilation. This is suggested by the fact thatequus [ˈɛ.kʷʊs] and
unguunt [ˈʊŋ.ɡʷʊnt] (Old Latin equos and unguont) are spelledecus and ungunt, which may have indicated the
pronunciations [ˈɛ.kʊs] and [ˈʊŋ.ɡʊnt]. These spellings may, however, simply indicate that c g before u were
labialized like /kʷ ɡʷ/, so that writing a doubleuu was redundant.[4]
The voiceless plosives/p t k kʷ/ in Latin were likely less aspirated than voiceless plosives at the beginning of words
in English; for example, Latin/k/ was not as strongly aspirated ask in kind but more like k in English sky or look.
However, there was no phonemic contrast between voiceless and aspirated plosives in native Latin words, and the
voiceless plosives were probably somewhat aspirated at the beginnings of words and near /r/ and /l/.[5][6] Some
Greek words beginning with the voiceless plosives/p t k/, when they were borrowed into colloquial Latin, were
spelled with the graphemes used to represent voiced plosivesb d g /b d ɡ/, e.g., Latin gubernator besides West
Greek κυβερνάτας [kʉbernaːtaːs] (helmsman). That suggests that Latin speakers felt the Greek voiceless plosives to
sound less aspirated than their own native equivalents. [7]
The aspirated consonants/pʰ tʰ kʰ/ as distinctive phonemes were originally foreign to Latin, appearing in educated
loanwords and names from Greek. In such cases, the aspiration was likely produced only by educated speakers. [5][6]
/z/ was also not native to Classical Latin. It appeared in Greek loanwords starting around the first century BC, when it
was probably pronounced[z] initially and doubled [zz] between vowels, in contrast toClassical Greek [dz] or [zd]. In
Classical Latin poetry, the letter ⟨Z⟩ between vowels always counts as two consonants for metrical purposes. [8][9]
In Classical Latin, the coronal sibilant/s/ was likely unvoiced in all positions. In Old Latin, single/s/ between vowels
was pronounced as voiced[z] but had changed to /r/ by rhotacism by the time of Classical Latin, as ingerō /ˈɡe.roː/
as compared with gestus /ˈɡes.tus/. Intervocalic /s/ in Classical usually derives from an earlier double/ss/ after a
long vowel or diphthong, as incausa, cāsus from earlier caussa, cāssus;[10] or from loanwords, such aspausa from
Greek παῦσις (pausis).
In Old Latin, final /s/ after a short vowel was often lost, probably after first changing to[h] (debuccalization), as in the
inscriptional form Cornelio for Cornelios (Classical Latin Cornelius). Often in the poetry ofPlautus, Ennius, and
Lucretius, final /s/ before a word beginning in a consonant did not make the preceding syllable heavy .[10]
/f/ was labiodental in Classical Latin, but it may have beenbilabial [ɸ] in Old Latin,[11] or perhaps [ɸ] in free variation
with [f]. Lloyd, Sturtevant, and Kent make this argument based on certain misspellings in inscriptions, the Proto-Indo-
European phone *bʰ from which many instances of the Latinf descended (others are from*dʰ and *gʷʰ) and the way
the sound appears to have behaved in Vulgar Latin, particularly in Spain.[12]
In most cases /m/ was pronounced as a bilabial nasal. At the end of a word, however , it was generally lost beginning
in Old Latin (except when another nasal or a plosive followed it), causing the preceding vowel to be lengthened and
nasalized,[13] as in decem [ˈdɛ.kẽː] listen . In Old Latin inscriptions, it is often omitted, as inviro for virom
(Classical virum). It was frequently elided before a following vowel inLatin poetry, and it was lost without a trace
(apart from the lengthening) in the Romance languages, [14] except in monosyllabic words.
/n/ assimilated to /m/ before labial consonants as inimpar [ˈɪm.par] listen < *in-par, to [ɱ] before /f/ (if it did not
represent nasalization) and to[ŋ] before velar consonants, as inquīnque [ˈkᶣiːŋ.kᶣɛ] listen .[15] This assimilation
likely also occurred between the prepositionin and a following word: in causā [ɪŋ ˈkau̯ .saː], in pace [ɪm ˈpa.kɛ].[16]
/ɡ/ assimilated to a velar nasal [ŋ] before /n/.[17] Allen and Greenough say that a vowel before[ŋn] is always long,[18]
but W. Sidney Allen says that is based on aninterpolation in Priscian, and the vowel was actually long or short
depending on the root, as for examplerēgnum [ˈreːŋ.nũː] from the root of rēx [reːks], but magnus [ˈmaŋ.nʊs] from
the root of magis [ˈma.ɡɪs].[19] /ɡ/ probably did not assimilate to[ŋ] before /m/. The cluster /ɡm/ arose by syncope,
as for example tegmen [ˈtɛɡ.mɛn] from tegimen. Original /ɡm/ developed into /mm/ in flamma, from the root of
flagrō.[2] At the start of a word,[ŋn] was reduced to [n], and this change was reflected in the orthography in later
texts: gnātus [ˈnaː.tʊs] became nātus, gnōscō [ˈnoː.skoː] became nōscō.
In Classical Latin, the rhotic /r/ was most likely an alveolar trill [r]. Gaius Lucilius likens it to the sound of a dog, and
later writers describe it as being produced by vibration. In Old Latin, intervocalic /z/ developed into /r/ (rhotacism),
suggesting an approximant like the English[ɹ], and /d/ was sometimes written as/r/, suggesting a tap [ɾ] like
Spanish single r.[20]
/l/ had two allophones in Latin:[l] and [ɫ]. Roman grammarians called these variantsexīlis ('thin') and plēnus or
pinguis ('full' or 'thick'). Those adjectives are used elsewhere forfront and back vowels respectively, which suggests
that the "thin" allophone was a plainalveolar lateral approximant[l], like the clear /l/ in English leaf in some English
dialects or that of languages likeSpanish or German, while the "full" or "thick" allophone wasvelarized like the
English dark /l/ in full. It is partly uncertain where these allophones occurred. Sihler and Allen agree that /l/ was clear
when the sound was doubled as/ll/, and dark when it occurred before another consonant or at the end of a word, but
disagree on whether clear or darkl occurred before vowels. Sihler says that/l/ was clear before /i/ and dark before
other vowels, but Allen says that/l/ was dark before back vowels in pre-Classical Latin and clear before both front
and back vowels in Classical Latin.This represents a partial agreement, however , in that Sihler argues the Classical
Latin /l/ had three degrees of velarization, with a darker enunciation before consonants than vowels. [21][22]
/j/ generally appeared only at the beginning of words, before a vowel, as in iaceō /ˈja.kɛ.oː/, except in compound
words such as adiaceō /adˈja.kɛ.oː/ listen . Between vowels, this sound was generally not found as a single
consonant, only as doubled/jː/, as in cuius /ˈkuj.jus/ listen , except in compound words such astrāiectus /traː
ˈjek.tus/. /j/ varied with /i/ in the same morpheme in iam /jãː/ and etiam /ˈe.ti.ãː/, and in poetry, one could be replaced
with the other for the purposes ofmeter.[23]
/w/ was pronounced as an approximant until the first century AD, when/w/ and /b/ began to develop into fricatives. In
poetry, /w/ and /u/ could be replaced with each other, as in /ˈsi.lu.a/ for silva /ˈsil.wa/ and /ˈɡen.wa/ for genua /
ˈɡe.nu.a/. Unlike /j/, it was not doubled as/wː/ or /ww/ between vowels, except in Greek loanwords:cavē /ˈka.weː/,
but Evander /ewˈwan.der/ from Εὔανδρος.[24]
Notes on spelling
Doubled consonant letters, such ascc, ss, represented geminated (doubled or long) consonants:/kː sː/. In Old Latin,
geminate consonants were written singly like single consonants, until the middle of the 2nd century BC, when they
began to be doubled in writing.[note 2] Grammarians mention the marking of double consonants with thesicilicus, a
diacritic in the shape of a sickle. This mark appears in a few inscriptions of theAugustan era.[25]
c and k both represent the velar stop/k/; qu represents the labialized velar stop/kʷ/. The letters q and c distinguish
minimal pairs between/ku/ and /kʷ/, such as cui /kui̯/ and quī /kʷiː/.[26] In Classical Latin, k appeared in only a few
words, such as kalendae.[27]
x represented the consonant cluster/ks/. In Old Latin, this sequence was also spelled asks, cs, and xs. X was
borrowed from the Western Greek alphabet, in which the letterform of chi Χ was pronounced as/ks/. In the standard
Ionic alphabet, used for modern editions of Ancient Greek, on the other hand, Χ represented /kʰ/, and the letter xi Ξ
represented /ks/.[28]
In Old Latin inscriptions,/k/ and /ɡ/ were not distinguished. They were both represented byc before e and i, q before
o and u, and k before consonants anda.[1] The letterform of c derives from Greek gamma Γ, which represented /ɡ/,
but its use for /k/ may come from Etruscan, which did not distinguish voiced and voiceless plosives. In Classical
Latin, c represented /ɡ/ only in c and cn, the abbreviations of thepraenomina (first names) Gaius and Gnaeus.[27][29]
The letter g was created in the third century BC to distinguish the voiced/ɡ/ from voiceless /k/.[30] Its letterform
derived from c by the addition of a diacritic or stroke. Plutarch attributes this innovation toSpurius Carvilius Ruga
around 230 BC,[1] but it may have originated withAppius Claudius Caecusin the fourth century BC.[31]
The combination gn probably represented the consonant cluster[ŋn], at least between vowels, as inagnus [ˈaŋ.nʊs]
listen .[13][32] Vowels before this cluster were sometimes long and sometimes short.[19]
The digraphs ph, th, and ch represented the aspirated plosives/pʰ/, /tʰ/ and /kʰ/. They began to be used in writing
around 150 BC,[30] primarily as a transcription of Greekphi Φ, theta Θ, and chi Χ, as in Philippus, cithara, and
achāia. Some native words were later also written with these digraphs, such as pulcher, lachrima, gracchus,
triumphus, probably representing aspirated allophones of the voiceless plosives near /r/ and /l/. Aspirated plosives
and the glottal fricative/h/ were also used hypercorrectively, an affectation satirized in Catullus 84.[5][6]
In Old Latin, Koine Greek initial/z/ and /zz/ between vowels were represented bys and ss, as in sona from ζώνη and
massa from μᾶζα. Around the second and first centuries B.C., the Greek letterzeta Ζ was adopted to represent/z/
and /zz/.[9] However, the Vulgar Latin spellings z or zi for earlier di and d before e, and the spellings di and dz for
earlier z, suggest the pronunciation/dz/, as for example ziomedis for diomedis, and diaeta for zeta.[33]
In ancient times u and i represented the approximant consonants /w/ and /j/, as well as the close vowels/u(ː)/ and
/i(ː)/.
i representing the consonant/j/ was usually not doubled in writing so a singlei represented double /jː/ or /jj/ and the
sequences /ji/ and /jːi/, as in cuius for *cuiius /ˈkuj.jus/, conicit for *coniicit /ˈkon.ji.kit/, and rēicit for *reiiicit /ˈrej.ji.kit/.
Both the consonantal and vocalic pronunciations ofi could occur in some of the same environments: comparemaius
/ˈmaj.jus/ with Gāius /ˈɡaː.i.us/, and Iūlius /ˈjuː.li.us/ with Iūlus /iˈuː.lus/. The vowel before a doubled/jː/ is sometimes
marked with a macron, as in cūius. it indicates not that the vowel is long but that the first syllable isheavy from the
double consonant.[23]
v between vowels represented single/w/ in native Latin words but double/ww/ in Greek loanwords. Both the
consonantal and vocalic pronunciations ofv sometimes occurred in similar environments, as ingenua [ˈɡɛ.nʊ.a] and
silva [ˈsɪl.wa].[24][34]
Vowels
Monophthongs
Latin has ten native vowels, spelled a, e, i, o, u. In Classical Latin, each vowel had short and long versions: /a ɛ ɪ ɔ ʊ/ and /aː eː iː oː
uː/. The long versions of the close and mid vowels e, i, o, u had a different vowel quality from the short versions, so that long /eː, oː/
were similar to short /ɪ, ʊ/. Some loanwords from Greek had the vowel y, which was pronounced as /y yː/ by educated speakers but
approximated with the native vowelsu and i by less educated speakers.
Short mid vowels (/e o/) and close vowels (/i u/) were pronounced with a different quality from their long counterparts, being also
more open: [ɛ], [ɔ], [ɪ] and [ʊ]. This opening made the short vowels i u [ɪ ʊ] similar in quality to long é ó [eː oː] respectively. i é and
[35]
u ó were often written in place of each other in inscriptions:
Short /e/ and /i/ were probably pronounced closer when they occurred before another vowel. mea was written as mia in inscriptions.
Short /i/ before another vowel is often written with i longa, as in dīes, indicating that its quality was similar to that of long /iː/ and is
almost never confused withe in this position.[37]
Vowel nasalization
Vowels followed by a nasal consonant were allophonically realised as Examples of nasalized vowels at
long nasal vowels in two environments:[41] ends of words and before -ns-, -nf-
sequences
Before word-final m:[14] monstrum
monstrum /ˈmon.strum/ > [ˈmõː.strũː]. 0:00
dentem /ˈden.tem/ > [ˈdɛn.tẽː]
[16]
Before nasal consonants followed by a fricative: mensis
censor /ˈken.sor/ > [ˈkẽː.sɔr] (in early inscriptions, often 0:00
written as cesor)
consul /ˈkon.sul/ > [ˈkõː.sʊl] (often written as cosol and
abbreviated as cos) infans, infantem
inferōs /ˈin.fe.roːs/ > [ˈĩː.fæ.roːs] (written as iferos)
0:00
Those long nasal vowels had the same quality as ordinary long
vowels. In Vulgar Latin, the vowels lost their nasalisation, and they
merged with the long vowels (which were themselves shortened by Problems playing these files? See media
help.
that time). This is shown by many forms in the Romance languages,
such as Spanish costar from Vulgar Latin cōstāre (originally constāre) and Italian mese from Vulgar Latin mēse (Classical Latin
mensem). On the other hand, the short vowel and /n/ was restored in French enseigne and enfant from insignia and infantem (e is the
normal development of Latin shorti), likely by analogy with other forms beginning in the prefixin-.[42]
When a final -m occurred before a plosive or nasal in the next word, however, it was pronounced as a nasal at the place of articulation
of the following consonant. For instance, tan dūrum [tan ˈduː.rũː] was written for tam dūrum in inscriptions, and cum nōbīs [kʊn
ˈnoː.biːs] was a double entendre,[14] possibly for cunnō bis [ˈkʊnnoː bɪs].
Diphthongs
Diphthongs classified by
beginning sound
Front Back
Close ui ui̯
ei ei̯ oe oi̯ ~ oe̯
Mid
eu eu̯ ou ou̯
ae ai̯ ~ ae̯
Open
au au̯
ae, oe, au, ei, eu could represent diphthongs: ae represented /ae̯ /, oe represented /oe̯ /, au represented /au̯ /, ei represented /ei̯/, and
eu represented /eu̯ /. ui sometimes represented the diphthong/ui̯/, as in cui listen and huic.[26]
If there is a tréma above the second vowel, both vowels are pronounced separately:aë [a.ɛ], aü [a.ʊ], eü [ɛ.ʊ] and oë [ɔ.ɛ].
In Old Latin, ae, oe were written as ai, oi and probably pronounced as[ai̯, oi̯], with a fully closed second element, similar to the final
syllable in French travail . In the late Old Latin period, the last element of the diphthongs was lowered to [e],[43] so that the
diphthongs were pronounced /ae̯ / and /oe̯ / in Classical Latin, similar to the diphthongs in English high and boy. They were
then monophthongized to /ɛː/ and /eː/, starting in rural areas at the end of the Republican period.[note 3] The process, however, does
not seem to have been completed before the 3rd century AD in Vulgar Latin, and some scholars say that it may have been regular by
the 5th century.[44]
Long consonants were usually indicated through doubling, but ancient Latin orthography did not distinguish between the vocalic and
consonantal uses of i and v. Vowel length was indicated only intermittently in classical sources and even then through a variety of
means. Later medieval and modern usage tended to omit vowel length altogether. A short-lived convention of spelling long vowels
by doubling the vowel letter is associated with the poet Lucius Accius. Later spelling conventions marked long vowels with an apex
(a diacritic similar to anacute accent) or, in the case of long i, by increasing the height of the letterlong
( i); in the second century AD,
those were given apices as well.[45] Distinctions of vowel length had become less important in later Latin and have ceased to be
phonemic in the modern Romance languages, in which the previous long and short versions of the vowels have been either lost or
replaced by other phonetic contrasts.
A minimal set showing both long and short vowels and long and short consonants is
ānus /ˈaː.nus/ ('buttocks'), annus /ˈan.nus/ ('year'), anus /ˈa.nus/ ('old woman'). 0:00
Table of orthography
Notes
Latin Latin
English approximation
grapheme phone
⟨c⟩, ⟨k⟩ [k] Always hard as k in sky, never soft as in cellar, cello, or social
⟨t⟩ [t] As t in stay, never as t in nation
⟨s⟩ [s] As s in say, never as s in rise or measure
⟨g⟩ [ɡ] Always hard as g in good, never soft as g in gem
⟨gn⟩ [ŋn] As ngn in wingnut
[n] As n in man
⟨n⟩
[ŋ] Before ⟨c⟩, ⟨x⟩, and ⟨g⟩, as ng in sing
[l] When doubled ⟨ll⟩ and before ⟨i⟩, as clear l in link (l exilis)[46][47]
⟨l⟩
[ɫ] In all other positions, as darkl in bowl (l pinguis)
⟨qu⟩ [kʷ] Similar to qu in quick, never as qu in antique
⟨v⟩ [w] Sometimes at the beginning of a syllable, or after⟨g⟩ and ⟨s⟩, as w in wine, never as v in vine
[j] Sometimes at the beginning of a syllable, asy in yard, never as j in just
⟨i⟩
[jj] Doubled between vowels, asy y in toy yacht
⟨x⟩ [ks] A letter representing ⟨c⟩ + ⟨s⟩: as x in English axe, never as x in example
Pronunciation of Latin vowels
Latin Latin
English approximation Audio
grapheme phone
⟨a⟩
[aː] similar to a in father when long 0:00
⟨e⟩
[eː] similar to ey in they when long 0:00
⟨o⟩
[oː] similar to o in holy when long 0:00
faciō 'I do/make', factus 'made'; pronounced /ˈfa.ki.oː/ and /ˈfak.tus/ in later Old Latin and Classical Latin.
afficiō 'I affect', affectus 'affected'; pronounced /ˈaf.fi.ki.oː/ and /ˈaf.fek.tus/ in Old Latin following vowel reduction,/af.
ˈfi.ki.oː/ and /af.ˈfek.tus/ in Classical Latin.
In the earliest Latin writings, the original unreduced vowels are still visible. Study of this vowel reduction, as well as syncopation
(dropping of short unaccented syllables) in Greek loan words, indicates that the stress remained word-initial until around the time of
Plautus, the 3rd century BC.[49] The placement of the stress then shifted to become the pattern found in classical Latin.
Nucleus
Every short vowel, long vowel, or diphthong belongs to a single syllable. This vowel forms the syllable nucleus. Thus magistrārum
has four syllables, one for every vowel (a i ā u: V V VV V), aereus has three (ae e u: VV V V), tuō has two (u ō: V VV), and cui has
one (ui: VV).[53]
V
CV
CCV
CCCV
CVV
CVC
CVVC
VV
VC
VVC
Thus, a syllable is heavy if it ends in a long vowel or diphthong, a short vowel and a consonant, a long vowel and a consonant, or a
diphthong and a consonant. Syllables ending in a diphthong and consonant are rare in Classical Latin.
The syllable onset has no relationship to syllable weight; both heavy and light syllables can have no onset or an onset of one, two, or
three consonants.
In Latin a syllable that is heavy because it ends in a long vowel or diphthong is traditionally called syllaba nātūrā longa ('syllable
long by nature'), and a syllable that is heavy because it ends in a consonant is called positiōne longa ('long by position'). These terms
are translations of Greek συλλαβὴ μακρά φύσει (syllabḕ makrá phýsei = 'syllable long by nature') and μακρὰ θέσει (makrà thései =
'long by proposition'), respectively; therefore positiōne should not be mistaken for implying a syllable "is long because of its
position/place in a word" but rather "is treated as 'long' by convention". This article uses the words heavy and light for syllables, and
long and short for vowels since the two are not the same.[54]
Stress rule
In a word of three or more syllables, the weight of the penult determines where the accent is placed. If the penult is light, accent is
placed on the antepenult; if it is heavy, accent is placed on the penult.[54] Below, stress is marked by placing the stress mark [ˈ] before
the stressed syllable.
Iambic shortening
Iambic shortening or brevis brevians is vowel shortening that occurs in words of the type light–heavy, where the light syllable is
stressed. By this sound change, words like egō, modō, benē, amā with long final vowel change to ego, modo, bene, ama with short
final vowel.[55]
Elision
Where one word ended with a vowel (including a nasalized vowel, represented by a vowel plus m) and the next word began with a
vowel, the former vowel, at least in verse, was regularly elided; that is, it was omitted altogether, or possibly (in the case of /i/ and
/u/) pronounced like the corresponding semivowel. When the second word was est or et, a different form of elision sometimes
occurred (prodelision): the vowel of the preceding word was retained, and the e was elided instead. Elision also occurred in Ancient
Greek, but in that language, it is shown in writing by the vowel in question being replaced by an apostrophe, whereas in Latin elision
is not indicated at all in the orthography, but can be deduced from the verse form. Only occasionally is it found in inscriptions, as in
scriptust for scriptum est.[56]
Spelling
Modern usage, even for classical Latin texts, varies in respect of I and V. During the Renaissance, the printing convention was to use
I (upper case) and i (lower case) for both vocalic/i/ and consonantal /j/, to use V in the upper case and in the lower case to use v at the
start of words and u subsequently within the word regardless of whether/u/ and /w/ was represented.[57]
Many publishers (such as Oxford University Press) have adopted the convention of using I (upper case) and i (lower case) for both /i/
and /j/, and V (upper case) and u (lower case) for both /u/ and /w/.
Most modern editions, however, adopt an intermediate position, distinguishing between u and v but not between i and j. Usually, the
non-vocalic v after q or g is still printed as u rather than v, probably because in this position it did not change from /w/ to /v/ in post-
classical times.[note 4]
Textbooks and dictionaries indicate the length of vowels by putting a macron or horizontal bar above the long vowel, but it is not
generally done in regular texts. Occasionally, mainly in early printed texts up to the 18th century, one may see a circumflex used to
indicate a long vowel where this makes a difference to the sense, for instance, Româ /ˈroːmaː/ ('from Rome' ablative) compared to
Roma /ˈroːma/ ('Rome' nominative).[58] Sometimes, for instance in Roman Catholic service books, an acute accent over a vowel is
used to indicate the stressed syllable. It would be redundant for one who knew the classical rules of accentuation and made the
correct distinction between long and short vowels, but most Latin speakers since the 3rd century have not made any distinction
between long and short vowels, but they have kept the accents in the same places; thus, the use of accent marks allows speakers to
read a word aloud correctly even if they never heard it spoken aloud.
Pronunciation
Post-Medieval Latin
Since around the beginning of the Renaissance period onwards, with the language being used as an international language among
intellectuals, pronunciation of Latin in Europe came to be dominated by the phonology of local languages, resulting in a variety of
different pronunciation systems.
Latin words in common use in English are generally fully assimilated into the English sound system, with little to mark them as
foreign, for example, cranium, saliva. Other words have a stronger Latin feel to them, usually because of spelling features such as the
digraphs ae and oe (occasionally written as ligatures: æ and œ, respectively), which both denote /iː/ in English. The digraph ae or
ligature æ in some words tend to be given an/aɪ/ pronunciation, for example,curriculum vitae.
However, using loan words in the context of the language borrowing them is a markedly different situation from the study of Latin
itself. In this classroom setting, instructors and students attempt to recreate at least some sense of the original pronunciation. What is
taught to native anglophones is suggested by the sounds of today's Romance languages, the direct descendants of Latin. Instructors
who take this approach rationalize that Romance vowels probably come closer to the original pronunciation than those of any other
modern language (see also the section below on D
" erivative languages").
However, other languages—including Romance family members—all have their own interpretations of the Latin phonological
system, applied both to loan words and formal study of Latin. But English, Romance, or other teachers do not always point out that
the particular accent their students learn is not actually the way ancient Romans spoke.
Ecclesiastical pronunciation
Because of the central position of Rome within the Catholic Church, an Italian pronunciation of Latin became commonly accepted,
but this was not the case until the latter part of the 19th century. This pronunciation corresponds to that of the Latin-derived words in
Italian. Before then, the pronunciation of Latin in church was the same as the pronunciation as Latin in other fields and tended to
.[59]
reflect the sound values associated with the nationality of the speaker
The following are the main points that distinguish modern ecclesiastical pronunciation from Classical Latin pronunciation:
Vowel length is not phonemic. As a result, theautomatic stress accent of Classical Latin, which was dependent on
vowel length, becomes a phonemic one in Ecclesiastical Latin. (Some Ecclesiastical texts mark the stress with an
acute accent in words of three or more syllables.)
The digraphs ae and oe (sometimes written as ligaturesæ and œ) represent /ɛ/.[60]
c denotes [t͡ʃ] (as in English ⟨ch⟩) before ae (æ), oe (œ), e, i or y.
g denotes [d͡ʒ] (as in English ⟨j⟩) before ae (æ), oe (œ), e, i or y.
h is silent except in two words:mihi and nihil, where it represents /k/ (in the Middle Ages, these words were spelled
michi and nichil).[61][note 5]
s between vowels represents/z/ or /s/;[62] sc before ae (æ), oe (œ), e, i or y. represents /ʃ/.
ti, if followed by a vowel, not word-initial or stressed, and not preceded by s, t, or x represents [t͡si].[60]
the letter v when it starts a syllable is pronounced/v/, and not /w/ as in classical Latin. Betweeng or q and a vowel, it
retains the ancient /w/ pronunciation, and as a syllable nucleus, it retains/u/. Unlike in the ancient orthography, the
letter v is now written v when it is pronounced/v/, but u when it is pronounced/w/ or /u/.
th represents /t/.
ph represents /f/.
ch represents /k/.
y represents /i/.
gn represents /ɲ/.
x represents /ks/, the /s/ of which merges with a followingc that precedes ae (æ), oe (œ), e, i or y to form /ʃ/, as in
excelsis /ekˈʃelsis/[60]
z represents /dz/.
Word-final m and n are pronounced fully, with no nasalization of the preceding vowel.
In his Vox Latina: A guide to the Pronunciation of Classical Latin, William Sidney Allen remarked that this pronunciation, used by
the Catholic Church in Rome and elsewhere, and whose adoption Pope Pius X recommended in a 1912 letter to the Archbishop of
Bourges, "is probably less far removed from classical Latin than any other 'national' pronunciation"; but, as can be seen from the table
above, there are, nevertheless, very significant differences.[63] The introduction to the Liber Usualis indicates that Ecclesiastical
Latin pronunciation should be used at Church liturgies.[64] Ecclesiastical pronunciation is also the preferred pronunciation of
Catholics whenever speaking Latin even if not as part of liturgy. The Pontifical Academy for Latin is the pontifical academy in the
Vatican that is charged with the dissemination and education of Catholics in the Latin language.
Outside of Austria and Germany, it is the most widely used standard in choral singing which, with a few exceptions like Stravinsky's
Oedipus rex, is concerned with liturgical texts. Anglican choirs adopted it when classicists abandoned traditional English
pronunciation after World War II. The rise of historically informed performance and the availability of guides such as Copeman's
Singing in Latin has led to the recent revival ofregional pronunciations.
Examples
The following examples are both in verse, which demonstrates several features more clearly than prose.
[note 6]
1. Ancient Roman orthography (before 2nd century)
0:00
ARMA·VIRVMQVE·CANÓ·TRÓIAE·QVꟾ·PRꟾMVS·ABÓRꟾS
ꟾTALIAM·FÁTÓ·PROFVGVS·LÁVꟾNIAQVE·VÉNIT Recording of first four lines of Aeneid
LꟾTORA·MVLTVM·ILLE·ETTERRꟾS·IACTÁTVS·ETALTÓ
in reconstructed Classical Latin
Vꟾ·SVPERVM·SAEVAE·MEMOREM·IVNÓNIS·OBꟾRAM
pronunciation
2. Traditional (19th century) English orthography
Note the elisions in mult(um) and ill(e) in the third line. For a fuller discussion of the prosodic features of this passage, see Dactylic
hexameter.
Some manuscripts have "Lāvīna" rather than "Lāvīnia" in the second line.
From Medieval Latin
Beginning of Pange Lingua Gloriosi Corporis Mysterium by Thomas Aquinas (13th century). Rhymed accentual metre. Translation:
"Extol, [my] tongue, the mystery of the glorious body and the precious blood, which the fruit of a noble womb, the king of nations,
poured out as the price of the world."
1. Traditional orthography as in Roman Catholic service books (stressed syllable marked with an acute accent on words of three
syllables or more).
See also
Latin alphabet
Latin grammar
Latin regional pronunciation
Traditional English pronunciation of Latin
Deutsche Aussprache des Lateinischen(in German) – traditional German pronunciation
Schulaussprache des Lateinischen(in German) – revised "school" pronunciation
Französische Aussprache des Lateins(in German) - traditional French pronunciation
Notes
1. APPIVS CL AVDIVS
C(AI) F(ILIVS) CAECVS
CENSOR CO(N)S(VL) BIS DICT(A TOR) INTERREX III
PR(AETOR) II AED(ILIS) CVR(VLIS) II Q(VAESTOR) TR(IB VNVS) MIL(ITVM) III COM(-)
PLVRA OPPIDA DE( )S AMNITIBVS CEPIT
SABINORVM ET TVSCÓR VM EXERCI(-)
TVM FVDIT P ÁCEM FIERÍ CVM P YRRHO
REGE PROHIB VIT IN CENSVR A VIAM
APPIAM STR AVIT ETAQVAM IN
VRBEM( )ADD VXIT AEDEM BELL ONAE
FECIT
2. epistula ad tiburtes, a letter by praetor Lucius Cornelius from 159 BC, contains the first examples of doubled
consonants in the wordspotuisse, esse, and peccatum (Clackson & Horrocks 2007, pp. 147, 149).
3. The simplification was already common in rural speech as far back as the time of
Varro (116 BC – 27 BC): cf.De
lingua Latina, 5:97 (referred to in Smith 2004, p. 47).
4. This approach is also recommended in thehelp page for the Latin Wikipedia.
5. This pronunciation of mihi and nihil may have been an attempt to reintroduce/h/ intervocalically, where it seems to
have been lost even in literary Latin by the end of the Republican periodSmith
( 2004, p. 48) as indicated by the
alternative Classical spellingsmī and nīl.
6. "The word-divider is regularly found on all good inscriptions, in papyri, on wax tablets, and even graffiti
in from the
earliest Republican times through the Golden Age and well into the Second Century . ... Throughout these periods
the word-divider was a dot placed half-way between the upper and the lower edge of the line of writing. ... As a rule,
interpuncta are used simply to divide words, except that prepositions are only rarely separated from the word they
govern, if this follows next. ... The regular use of the interpunct as a word-divider continued until sometime in the
Second Century, when it began to fall into disuse, and Latin was written with increasing frequency , both in papyrus
and on stone or bronze, inscriptura continua." Wingo 1972, pp. 15, 16
References
1. Sihler 1995, pp. 20–22, §25: the Italic alphabets
2. Allen 1978, p. 25
3. Allen 1978, p. 17
4. Allen 1978, pp. 19, 20
5. Allen 1978, pp. 26, 27
6. Clackson & Horrocks 2007, p. 190
7. Allen 1978, pp. 12, 13
8. Levy, p. 150
9. Allen 1978, pp. 45, 46
10. Allen 1978, pp. 35–37
11. Allen 1978, pp. 34, 35
12. Lloyd 1987, p. 80
13. Lloyd 1987, p. 81
14. Allen 1978, pp. 30, 31
15. Lloyd 1987, p. 84
16. Allen 1978, pp. 27–30
17. Allen 1978, pp. 23–25
18. Allen & Greenough 2001, §10d
19. Allen 1978, pp. 71–73
20. Allen 1978, p. 33
21. Allen 1978, pp. 33, 34
22. Sihler 1995, p. 174, §176 a: allophones ofl in Latin
23. Allen 1978, pp. 37–40
24. Allen 1978, pp. 40–42
25. Allen 1978, p. 11
26. Allen 1978, p. 42
27. Allen 1978, pp. 15, 16
28. Allen 1978, p. 45
29. Allen & Greenough, §1a
30. Clackson & Horrocks 2007, p. 96
31. Allen 1978, p. 15
32. Allen 1978, p. 23
33. Sturtevant 1920, pp. 115–116
34. Allen & Greenough 2001, §6d, 11c
35. Allen 1978, pp. 47–49
36. Allen 1978, p. 51
37. Allen 1978, pp. 51, 52
38. Allen 1978, p. 52
39. Allen 1978, p. 56
40. Allen 1978, p. 59
41. Clackson 2008, p. 77
42. Allen 1978, pp. 55, 56
43. Ward 1962
44. Clackson & Horrocks 2007, pp. 273, 274
45. Allen 1978, pp. 65
46. Sihler 2008, p. 174.
47. Allen 2004, pp. 33–34
48. Fortson 2004, p. 254
49. Sturtevant 1920, pp. 207–218
50. Allen 1978, p. 83
51. Allen 1978, p. 87
52. Allen & Greenough 2001, §11
53. Allen et al.
54. Allen 1978, pp. 89–92
55. Allen 1978, p. 86
56. Allen & Greenough 2001, p. 400, section 612 e, f
57. Gor example, Henri Estienne'sDictionarium, seu Latinae linguae thesaurus(1531)
58. Gilbert 1939
59. Brittain 1955.
60. Liber Usualis (http://www.musicasacra.com/pdf/liberusualis.pdf), p. xxxviij
61. Introduction to the Liber Usualis
62. Robinson, Ray (1993).Up front!: becoming the complete choral conductor . p. 192. ISBN 9780911318197. "Not all
authorities agree that s between vowels in Church Latin should be voiced. Of the sources cited in the bibliography
,
Hines, May/Tolin and Wall prefer the voiced s"
63. Allen 1978, p. 108
64. Liber Usualis (http://www.musicasacra.com/pdf/liberusualis.pdf), p. xxxvj
65. Allen 1978, pp. 28–29
66. Allen 1978, p. 119
67. Pope 1952, chapter 6, §4
Bibliography
Alkire, Ti; Rosen, Carol (2010). Romance Languages: A Historical Introduction. Cambridge
University Press. ISBN 978-0521889155.
Allen, William Sidney (1978) [1965]. Vox Latina—a Guide to the Pronunciation of Classical Latin
(2nd ed.). Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-37936-9.
Allen, William Sidney (1987). Vox Graeca: The Pronunciation of Classical Greek. Cambridge
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Allen, Joseph A.; Greenough, James B. (2001) [1903]. Mahoney, Anne, ed. New Latin Grammar
for Schools and Colleges. Newburyport, Massachusetts: R. Pullins Company. ISBN 1-
58510-042-0.
Brittain, Frederick (1955). Latin in Church. The History of its Pronunciation (2nd ed.). Mowbray.
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Oxford, UK: Blackwell Publishing. ISBN 978-1-4051-6209-8.
Clackson, James (2008). "Latin". In Roger D. Woodward. The Ancient Languages of Europe.
Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-68495-8.
Gilbert, Allan H (June 1939). "Mock Accents in Renaissance and Modern Latin". Publications of
the Modern Language Association of America. 54 (2): 608–610. doi:10.2307/458579.
Hayes, Bruce (1995). Metrical stress theory: principles and case studies. University of Chicago.
ISBN 9780226321042.
Levy, Harry L. (1989). A Latin Reader for Colleges. University of Chicago Press.
Lloyd, Paul M. (1987). From Latin to Spanish. Diane Publishing. ISBN 978-0-87169-173-6.
Neidermann, Max (1945) [1906]. Précis de phonétique historique du latin (2 ed.). Paris.
McCullagh, Matthew (2011). "The Sounds of Latin: Phonology". In James Clackson. A Companion
to the Latin Language. Blackwell Publishing. ISBN 978-1405186056.
Pekkanen, Tuomo (1999). Ars grammatica—Latinan kielioppi (in Finnish and Latin) (3rd-6th ed.).
Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. ISBN 951-570-022-1.
Pope Pius X (November 22, 1903). "Tra le Sollecitudini". Rome, Italy: Adoremus. Retrieved
15 June 2013.
Pope, M. K. (1952) [1934]. From Latin to Modern French with especial consideration of Anglo-
Norman (revised ed.). Manchester: Manchester University Press.
Sihler, Andrew L. (1995). New Comparative Grammar of Greek and Latin. Oxford: Oxford
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Smith, Jane Stuart (2004). Phonetics and Philology: Sound Change in Italic. Oxford University
Press. ISBN 0-19-925773-6.
Sturtevant, Edgar Howard (1920). The pronunciation of Greek and Latin. Chicago: University of
Chicago Press.
Ward, Ralf L. (June 1962). "Evidence For ThePronunciation Of Latin".The Classical World. 55 (9): 273–275.
doi:10.2307/4344896. JSTOR 4344896.
Wingo, E. Otha (1972).Latin Punctuation in the Classical Age. De Gruyter Mouton. ISBN 978-9027923233.
Further reading
Hall, William Dawson, and Michael De Angelis. 1971.Latin Pronunciation According to Roman Usage.Anaheim, CA:
National Music Publishers.
Trame, Richard H. 1983. "A Note On Latin Pronunciation." The Choral Journal 23, no. 5: 29.
https://www.jstor.org/stable/23546146.Copy
External links
PHONETICA L ATINÆ :Classical and ecclesiastical Latin pronunciation with audio examples
"Ecclesiastical Latin". Catholic Encyclopedia. 1910.
Lord, Frances Ellen (2007) [1894].The Roman Pronunciation of Latin: Why we use it and how to use .itGutenberg
Project.
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