Things I hate (pronunciation and spelling)

[Matthaeus]

No, e in aggreditur is short; the hexametre has been scanned correctly. The apex here marks the ictus.

 

[sinalefa]

Oh, so it is a scan.
But now my doubt remains: in normal speech, where does the accent fall in aggrĕditur? I learned that if the penultimate is short, the accent would fall on the antepenultimate, and it couldn't go further back than that.
So I'd say (here the apex marks the accent):
aggréditur
vénerem

 

[Nikolaos]

Yes, that's correct. Bitmap wasn't marking accent, though - he was using the acute mark to denote the ictus (the start of a foot in hexameter).

 

[Matthaeus]

Here is a good article to read up on.

 

[Nikolaos]

While reading on Old Latin, this reminded me of this post. Thoughts?

plaudere ['plaudere]
plodere ['plo:dere]

Plaudere is a hypercorrection by the elites, since they noticed that the diphthong au was pronounced by some lower class denizens as o. But plodere must have been the original pronounciation, because it exists in explodere.

 

[sinalefa]

While reading on Old Latin, this reminded me of this post. Thoughts?

plaudere ['plaudere]
plodere ['plo:dere]

Plaudere is a hypercorrection by the elites, since they noticed that the diphthong au was pronounced by some lower class denizens as o. But plodere must have been the original pronounciation, because it exists in explodere.

The au diphtong must have been kept in some regions, since some Romance languages show traces of it:
aurum > Pt. ouro, Rom. aur, Occ. aur, etc.
paucum > Pt. pouco, Romansch pauc

 

[Ana Maria]

This is a great thread, because I've got a complaint about Latin that I have as well.

Having lived in Italy for almost a year, and having grown up around a good amount of Spanish speakers, I've come to notice that speakers of Romance languages speak very quickly. (In fact, I've had 2 Romanians tell me Romanians speak faster than the other Romance speakers). Why is it, then, that most of the videos or soundfiles of spoken Latin that are out there on the internet have Latin being spoken very slowly? There are some exceptions, of course. But it seems the focus of spoken Latin is maintaining correct vowel length over rapidity of speech. After living in Rome for about 10 months, I can't stand but to get a little irritated at the slow pace at which Latin is read/spoken, because all of its surviving descendants' speakers speak fast as heck. Perhaps I'm just ranting a little bit, but does anyone agree?

This is what kinda set me off a little bit:

. I can just imagine Ovid reading it like that with his eyes closed and opening them at the end to find all in his audience are sleeping like logs. It's true that we can't jump into a time machine and go find out how Latin was actually pronounced in everyday speech, or the way it was read at a poetry reading, but to ignore that all its descendants are spoken at a rapid pace is quite ridiculous.

Does anyone have any opinions about this?

Hello, I'm also from Romania, and I can confirm that we do speak very fast. Reff. to the video, probably because of all the critics here D) the guy removed it from youtube, so I couldn't see what you were talking about...still, I have read some material about rethorics, and it is true that oratory speech had some specific rules, among which were pauses at some points, specific gestures, position of the hands...etc.

 

[Quasus]

As to myself, I know very little of Latin intonation and pace. ​ I wonder if
anyone knows. ​ And I wonder to what extent it is reconstructed. ​ It’s rather
naive to judge from modern languages. ​ The pronunciation (including
intonation) changes over time, and was is no doubt influenced by substratum in
provinces.

As far as we don’t have any data, there are no restrictions. ​ What’s
more, slow pace is good for mutual comprehension.

 

[Abbatiſſæ Scriptor]

Long and short vowels go very easily and naturally with the sort of musical pitch accent that Old Latin is believed to have had; but once the original pitch accent had given way to stress accent, whatever long vowels were left in unstressed syllables would have started living on borrow'd time.

 

[limetrees]

Does anyone know of good recordings of Tacitus' Annals? I'm slowly working my way through them them, and to hear them well read would be wonderful.

If not, might I suggest it as a good deed for someone???

Thanks.

 

[Aurifex]

Does anyone know of good recordings of Tacitus' Annals? I'm slowly working my way through them them, and to hear them well read would be wonderful.

I can't vouch for how good they are, but there are some here.
I've only ever listened to a bit of Vergil and Cicero from Librivox, and I'm afraid they weren't too pleasant to listen to. But they're done by volunteers, so we mustn't complain.

 

[limetrees]

Ah, thanks for these, and I guess I should have said, but I meant Tacitus in Latin.

 

[Deleted member 13757]

Ah, thanks for these, and I guess I should have said, but I meant Tacitus in Latin.

This is not Tacitus but if you want to listen to some audio books, here are some:

http://www.vivariumnovum.it/edizioni/index.php/Multimedia/Audiolibri.html

EDIT: Look at the last too books

 

[Aurifex]

Ah, thanks for these, and I guess I should have said, but I meant Tacitus in Latin.

Very sorry. Are these not in Latin? I didn't check. The Librivox recordings of Cicero and Vergil I listened to were in Latin.

These are the only ones in Latin, then, I think.

It seems the Cicero recording I listened to then was not a Librivox one.

 

[limetrees]

This is not Tacitus but if you want to listen to some audio books, here are some:

http://www.vivariumnovum.it/edizioni/index.php/Multimedia/Audiolibri.html

EDIT: Look at the last too books

Thanks for these. I have listened to a little bit of it (and will listen to more) and I notice that he does the Italian thing of C before I and E becoming "ch", while C before A, O, and U becomes "k". I like this, and since I speak a bit of Italian, this seems to me a natural way to do it, and pleasant on the ear, but I remember in a Latin translation group here (in Ireland), when I used to do this, one of the more senior members used to roll his eyes and almost moan in horror.

 

[LVXORD]

Thanks for these. I have listened to a little bit of it (and will listen to more) and I notice that he does the Italian thing of C before I and E becoming "ch", while C before A, O, and U becomes "k". I like this, and since I speak a bit of Italian, this seems to me a natural way to do it, and pleasant on the ear, but I remember in a Latin translation group here (in Ireland), when I used to do this, one of the more senior members used to roll his eyes and almost moan in horror.

I've never liked the ecclesiastical pronunciation either.

 

[Deleted member 13757]

I remember in a Latin translation group here (in Ireland), when I used to do this, one of the more senior members used to roll his eyes and almost moan in horror.

No one who really practices active spoken latin would care about this crap . idest, no one will roll eyes or moan because of your preferred dialect. If they do this, it just in bad taste or they the cannot put 2 words together without a dictionary themselves. Even a strong American accent is very intelligible provided a language is spoken decently.
It takes a conversation to get your ear tuned in, not a "performance reading" done by those who roll their eyes. Yes sometimes it happens that you cannot understand a word because you are not used to hearing it in another dialect, but very rare.

Just don't pay attention them nay sayers, that's all. If you wish to take lessons in spoken latin, advanced or intermid., I can connect you with my friend who used to teach at Vivarium Novum.

 

[Carolus Victor]

I really hate it when people pronounce "-ii" as "ee-aj", and when people pronounce "Caesar" as "Sea-zar" rather than "Kajsar". But I think what I hate the most is when people pronounce all (or most) "I:s" as an English "I".

Edit: Also when people make Roman names shorter in English.

"Hm..., there is a city called 'Pompeii' and a man called 'Pompeius'. Bah, let us call them both 'Pompey! Makes a lot more sence."

I am almost surprised that people do not call Iulius Caesar "Yules".

 

[Ana Maria]

This is not Tacitus but if you want to listen to some audio books, here are some:

http://www.vivariumnovum.it/edizioni/index.php/Multimedia/Audiolibri.html

EDIT: Look at the last too books

As always, this site is the best place to get info about Latin material! Thank you very much!

 

[Nikolaos]

Well, local pronunciation of names evolved with local language. If it hadn't, few native English speakers would be able to pronounce names like "Verres" even if they wanted to.