MM: Lesson - Latin I Review - Lingua Latina
Culture Lesson - Lingua Latina
Along with grammar, Pseudolus teaches his pupils about the basics of rhetoric: public speaking. Latin was a spoken language, and Romans enjoyed public readings and speeches as a form of entertainment. At home, Romans rarely, if ever, read to themselves, instead delivering family readings, often with the pater familias (head of household) doing the reading.
Pseudolus emphasizes that to speak Latin well, one must learn a set of general rules for pronunciation. These rules were introduced in Latin I, but it is well worth going back through some of the most important aspects of Latin pronunciation.
At its greatest extent the Roman Empire covered most of Europe, Asia Minor and northern Africa. When the Romans conquered a country they insisted that the people should learn and speak Latin. Of course, those people already had a native language and the romance languages are the result of the blending of Latin, the language of Rome, with the other languages. Latin is the root language of the romance languages: Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Catalan, French, and Romanian.
Latin alphabet
The classical Latin alphabet is not very different from the modern English alphabet. Most of the letters are the same. The classical Latin alphabet consisted of twenty-three letters.
| LANGUAGE | ALPHABET |
|---|---|
| LATIN | A B C D E F G H I K L M N O P Q R S T V X Y Z |
| ENGLISH | A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z |
As you can see above the letters J, U, W are missing from the Latin alphabet. The Romans used the letter i as both a vowel (I) and a consonant (J), and they originally used V as a vowel (U) and a consonant (V/W). Our course will follow the later tradition of using the letter U to represent the vowel sound. The letter K was rarely used, except in loanwords borrowed from Greeks. The letters Y and Z were added after the Romans conquered the Greeks towards the end of the Roman Republic.
Pronunciation - Vowels
In Latin, vowels have two sounds, long and short. When we pronounce a long vowel we hold it twice as long as a short vowel. In some text books long vowels are shown by a long line called a macron (ā, ē, ī, ō, ū) placed over the vowel, but this course will not use macrons. There are no silent vowels in Latin, so all vowels must be sounded. Use the interactive object below to listen to each vowel sound.
Pronunciation - Diphthongs
Latin has six diphthongs (ae/ai, au, ei, eu, oe/oi, ui). A diphthong is when two vowels come together to form a single sound. Diphthongs function as a single syllable and make a single sound when pronounced correctly.
Pronunciation - Consonants
Most Latin consonants are pronounced exactly as they are pronounced in English. There are a few exceptions, which are shown below. Additionally, certain consonants can be combined to make double consonants. Use the object below to learn more about consonant sounds.