🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <587ugn$o0u@nimble.mta.ca>, cprchrd@mailserv.mta.ca (Christian P
Richard) wrote:

> How exactly is Latin supposed to be pronounced?

> If anybody can help me find a mini-treaty on Latin pronunciation that is
> not biased to English accents?  Or can anybody explain the proper phonetics
> for all long/short vowels and consonants of Latin?

First of all, as already pointed out, we must specify which Latin we are
talking about. The following book:

V. Pisani, Grammatica latina storica e comparativa, Rosenberg & Sellier,
Torino, 1962 (3rd edition)

(a good textbook in Latin historical linguistics, but I guess it is only
available in Italian) describes the pronunciation of "literary and learned
Latin between the end of the republic and the beginning of the empire".
Unfortunately the author doesn't use IPA, so I try to give a (broad) IPA
equivalent. This appears to be, in most cases, quite obvious; anyway, since I
am just an amateur and not a professional scholar nor a student in this 
field, I may not have been totally accurate. I have omitted any explanations 
about IPA: I hope this is ok for you, in any case I think you can easily get
information about it, otherwise let me know.

I think we could summarize the whole thing saying that each letter of the
Latin alphabet had (at the time specified above) basically the value it has
been given in IPA, with the exception of:

C  [k]
GN [velar n + n] 
N followed by C, G or Q: [velar n]
(the velar n is the one denoted in IPA by a right-tailed n)
GU followed by a vowel: [gw]
QU [kw]
V  [w] 
(note that the distinction between u and v has been introduced in relatively
modern times, since Romans didn't have the v in their alphabet, and used the 
V sign just as an uppercase "u")
X  [ks]

This applies also to the letters Y and Z and to the combinations PH TH CH RH,
which were introduced to reproduce the original pronunciation in words 
borrowed from Greek (hence Y = [y], PH = [ph], CH = [kh] etc.).
Note that this implies also a stronger (and longer) pronunciation for double
consonants (as in Italian); note also that the English pronunciation of T, 
D or R doesn't correspond to IPA [t] [d] [r] (Italian does; French is ok for 
[t] and [d], Spanish for [t] and [r]).

About vowels it has to be added that, as Pisani says, "short vowels were more 
open than the corresponding long ones". I guess this can be "translated" to
IPA as follows:

[a:] [e:] [i:] [o:] [u:] for long vowels

[a]
["open" e] (the one denoted in IPA by an epsilon)
["open" i] (the one denoted in IPA by a small capital i)
["open" o] (the one denoted in IPA by a turned c)
["open" u] (the one denoted in IPA by an upsilon or a small capital u)
for short vowels
I am in doubt about the long a. Was it also closer than its short 
counterpart? if so, which was its pronunciation? (an open schwa?)

Note also that:
"I" when in the beginning of a word and followed by a vowel (as in "iugum"),
or when comprised between two vowels (as in "maior"), was (always?) 
pronounced [j] (in the latter case doubled: [jj]).
AE OE AU EI EU were pronounced as diphthongs (this does not apply if the
second vowel is long).
Stress was always on the penultimate syllable, excepting when this had a 
short vowel and the word had more than two syllables: in this case it fell on 
the preceding (last but two) syllable.

The pronunciation of Latin in classical times can be inferred not only from
what Romans themselves have written about it or by other indirect information
available in Latin literature, but also from sources like transcriptions of
Latin words in Greek alphabet or viceversa, words passed from Latin to other
languages in ancient times (e.g. German "Kaiser" from Latin "Caesar"),
analysis of modern languages and dialects derived from Latin, phonetic 
changes in Latin itself (for example, the change e > i in "lignum", which 
comes from the same root of the verb "legere", is always found when "e" 
precedes a velar n, so showing that the "g" in "gn" was actually a velar n), 
onomatopoeic words, etc.

It is to be noted that, at least in Italy, the pronunciation taught in school 
(and hence commonly used to pronounce Latin words or sentences) is different 
from the one described above, but rather "it reflects approximately the 
learned pronunciation of fifth century A.D." (Pisani). This is also the
pronunciation used in Catholic Church usage - I guess not only in Italy, but 
I am not sure about it. Basically this "traditional" pronunciation consists 
in pronouncing Latin more or less as it were Italian, the main differences 
being:
AE or OE = ["open" e]
TI + vowel = [tsi]
(excepting when the I is stressed or the T is preceded by S, X or another T)
PH = [f].
I wonder how Latin or single Latin words are commonly pronounced in different
countries. It seems that in English Latin words are generally pronounced as
they were English. But how does the educated English-speaking person 
pronounce, say, a verse of Vergilius or a whole Latin sentence (like "fortuna 
audaces iuvat")? And how do they pronounce "status quo" in Japan or Russia?

P.S. Should anyone have comments, I would greatly appreciate to have them
also E-mailed, since I can't regularly follow the newsgroup.

... and sorry for the delay, hope this helps anyway.
-- 
Alfredo Moscianese
Ancona
Italy