Lesson 1 Notes
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The Latin accent, for the Revivalists, is like a toned down Italian accent, in a way
Classical Latin is pronounced generally with an English accent but can be pronounced in
whatever accent the speaker would like, considering he or she follows these rules.
Latin has the same alphabet as English with the exceptions of J and W
Y and Z are found only in words derived from, or actually, Greek
Vowels
1. Latin has the same vowels that English does: A, E, I, O, U, and Y
2. Vowels may be either long or short in Latin
a. Vowels that are naturally long have a macron over them
i. A macron is merely a line above a vowel, e.g. ā
ii. Macrons are essential to the spelling of a word. If asked to translate a
word from English to Latin, or to spell a word in Latin, the macrons must
be included
b. A vowel may, alternatively, have a circumflex over it to mark length
i. A circumflex is an arrow above a vowel, e.g. â
ii. This happens occasionally. I don’t do it this way
c. Vowels that are naturally short have no mark over them
3. The vowels, long and short, are pronounced as follows:
A, pronounced like the “a” in “cat”
Ā, like “a” in “father”
E, like “e” in “pet”
Ē, like “ay” in “way”
I, like “i” in “pit”
Ī, like “e” in “we”
O, like “o” in “pot”
Ō, like “o” in “clover”
U, like “u” in “put”
Ū, like “u” in “rude”
Y, either long nor short, pronounced like “eu”
as the French have or like “ü” as it is in German,
but not as hard
4. In certain combinations called diphthongs, vowels create a different sound
a. If a combination of vowels is not one of the certain diphthong conversations,
pronounce them as two separate letters. They may run together and make a sound
of the combined letters as would be natural. Diphthongs don’t quite do this
b. The certain combination of vowels are:
AE, like “I” in English
AU, like “ou” in house
EI, like “eig” in “reign”
EU, like “e” and “u” pronounced
quickly together
OE, like “oi” in “oil”
UI, like “u” and “i” quickly
Consonants
1. Certain consonants vary in Latin from English
2. These consonants may be divided between those needed for both Classical and Revived
pronunciation and just Revived
3. Consonants for both Classical and Revived Latin:
C, always hard like “k”
T, always hard like “tall”
G, always hard like in “get”
S, always soft, like in “sick”. It is
acceptable to pronounce the finale
“s” like a “z” if preceded by a
consonant
V, always like “w”
I, makes a “y” sound when first letter
of word preceding a vowel or when
between two vowels, works like an
“i (vowel)” for first vowel and “y”
for second vowel
CH, makes an aspirated “k” sound
PH, makes an aspirated “p” sound
TH, makes an aspirated “t” sound
4. Consonants for Revived Latin:
BS/BT, make a “ps/pt”
Q, always has a “u” afterwards;
makes “kw” sound
GN, makes “ngn” sound, like “hangnail”
R, always trilled, like in Italian and
Spanish
H, aspirated, not as hard as “h” in English
X, always “ks” never “gz”
M, pronounced like in English but
nasalized at end of a word, like “n” in
French
Z, pronounced hard, like “dz”
Syllabification
1. Putting a word into syllables answers the question of how to pronounce a word, e.g. is the
Latin word “cubiculum” pronounced “cu-bi-cu-lum” or “cub-i-cul-um”?
2. To show a separation of syllables, use a straight line down ( | ) in between syllables so:
“cu|bi|cu|lum”
3. There is a process for separating a word into syllables, or syllabicating a word:
a. Look for any diphthongs in the word and treat them as a single vowel
b. Syllabicate the word from left to right using the 5 rules:
i. The first consonant(s) before the first vowel go with the first vowel in the
same syllable and the final consonant(s) after the final vowel go with the
final vowel
ii. When two vowels that are not a diphthong are next to each other, they are
in separate syllables. (don’t forget that diphthongs count as one vowel)
iii. When there is a consonant between two vowels, the consonant goes into a
syllable with the second vowel
iv. When there are two consonants between two vowels, you split the
consonants so that the first consonant goes into a syllable with the first
vowel and the second consonant with the second vowel
v. A case with three or more consonants between two vowels is rare in Latin.
In such a case if you do run into it, just syllabicate wherever it seems least
awkward to pronounce the letters, as vague as that is…
4. The case of a Mute-Liquid is that where it counts as a single consonant
a. Mutes and Liquids are consonants such that when a mute is placed before a liquid,
the combination becomes one consonant, most of the time.
b. The Mutes are: P, B, T, D, C, G, and F
c. The Liquids are: L and R
d. This does not happen when a Liquid comes before a Mute
e. This rule isn’t followed: when for some reason, emphasis wants to be given and
the mute and liquid can be separate consonants, and fairly often in poetry, where
need be.
5. The consonants CH, PH, and TH should be treated as a single consonant.
6. QU, should be treated as a single consonant. The U must not be considered a distinct
vowel and affect the syllabification process in anyway
Syllable Length
1. Syllables have the quality of being long and short in Latin.
a. When they are long, they are long either by nature or position.
b. Short syllables are short by nature, alone
2. Syllables that are long by nature:
a. Have vowels that are long by nature, i.e. they have a macron
b. Have diphthongs (diphthongs are long because they combine two short vowels to
make a long sounding vowel)
3. Syllables that are long by position:
a. When a vowel comes before two consonants, the vowel becomes long by position
and thus the syllable that it is in is long, regardless of whether the two consonants
are in the same syllable as the vowel or not
i. Do not forget that a Mute-Liquid, CH, PH, TH, and QU are single
consonants
b. When a vowel comes before X and Z. X and Z are considered to be two
consonants for the reasons that X makes a “ks” and Z makes a “dz/ds”.
4. Syllables that are short are syllables that are not long by nature nor position, i.e. it is
neither has a macron nor is a diphthong nor is it a vowel followed by two consonants that
are not of the ones listed above
5. To indicate syllable length, draw a line (sort of like a macron but not) over the letters of a
long syllable and make a breve ( ˘ or ͝ ) over letters of a short syllable
6. The significance of syllable length is that it tells you about the rhythm in Latin poetry and
is the basis for rules regarding stress
Stress
1. Stress tells you how to pronounce a word, e.g. whether to pronounce it “LIH-ber” or “lihBER”
2. Stress, in Latin, is marked by an acute accent mark over the vowel of the syllable of
stress, e.g. “líber” and “fluvórum”
3. Two important terms used when dealing with stress are penult and antepenult. Penult
means the second to last syllable; Antepenult means third to last syllable
4. There are two rules for where to put the stress in Latin:
a. If a word has only to syllables, the stress goes on the penult
b. If a word has more than two syllables, the stress goes on the penult, ONLY if the
penult is long. If the penult is not a long syllable, the stress goes on the
antepenult, regardless of whether or not the antepenult is long
5. In some longer Latin words, there may be more than one stressed syllable. These are not
important at the moment. If you really want, the steps to find the other accents are:
a. Take the long word already accentuated for the first step 4 stress.
b. Drop the accentuated vowel and the letters after it
c. Reapply the two rules for finding accents on the temporarily shorter word and
place the accent
d. Reattach the syllables that were dropped off in step b
e. To find other accents, repeat process