BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 25 Mar 12 - 06:35 PM

Strangely enough, never having heard of Stearn, I used the self same analogy in my earlier post.

The truth is that until the technology to record sound came into being, nobody knew how any language was pronounced as little as 250 years before, and the point about dialects is also important in this context.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 25 Mar 12 - 04:18 PM

Ran across this quotation in the introductory chapter to Botanical Latin, Wm. T. Stearn-

Sic enim potius loquamur: melius est reprehendant nos grammatici quam non intelligant populi.
Let us rather than declare: it is better that the grammarians censure us than that the public does not understand us.
St. Augustine of Hippo (A.D. 354-430) Ennar. in Psalm, cxxxviii, 20

In discussing botanical Latin, Stearn says: ".....it is so far evolved that it is almost as different from classical Latin as modern from Chaucerian English."
The same is true of church and other modified forms of Latin, which owe much to Renaissance Latin.

Roman pronunciation- MtheGM is correct, we have no real knowledge of the pronunciations of the times- I say pronunciations, because we are told, and examples show, that the educated Roman and the common man spoke widelly different versions of the language.
Nor do we know how the spoken roots of other modern languages were pronounced or sounded.

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 25 Mar 12 - 12:50 AM

A P Herbert, barrister, and humorist of the 1920s-30s, one of whose topics was English usage & pronunciation, had much to say in Punch magazine and in his books about the different theories of Latin pronunciation.

His point, and surely the point we must take on board in this thread, is that NOBODY REALLY KNOWS HOW THE ROMANS PRONOUNCED THEIR OWN LANGUAGE ~~ so none of the theories postulated, or pronunciations chosen, has any more theoretical validity than any other.

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 24 Mar 12 - 06:51 PM

""By the way Don T, did you learn Latin from Kennedy's Latin Grammar by any chance?""

I believe we started out with Kennedy and moved to another, the name of which escapes me.

My experience was very different. We had an inspirational teacher of Ancient Languages, who taught us with great enthusism and verve.

I was fascinated by Latin Greek and English (Lang and Lit) and managed to read in the original language, during my time at Grammar school, The Gallic Wars, Virgil's Aeneid, Homer's Iliad and Eurypides Alcestis.

The three subjects account for my three GCE "A" level passes.

My greatest regret is that I chose chemistry for a career because I didn't fancy being a teacher or a librarian, which was about all that was on offer back then for a classics graduate.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 24 Mar 12 - 04:45 PM

Now please, do not bring up the pronunciation of legal phrases as voiced by the legal profession.

Lo and behold, I still have a couple of my Latin books from junior high (1930s). This was in New Mexico, so Spanish was the basis of pronunciation. Two years of Latin was still required in schools there at that time.
Latin is still required in better schools in Italy, Italian pronunciation usual.

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: catspaw49
Date: 24 Mar 12 - 03:32 PM

Es vos Jon Corelis quisnam lost suus genitor ut a rhinoceros in Africa?

Perhaps??? But how do you pronounce it?

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: catspaw49
Date: 24 Mar 12 - 03:26 PM

Thanks Sins....Good point!!! Now for our next phrase, translate the question:

Are you the Jon Corelis who lost his cock and balls to a rhino in Africa?


Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: GUEST,Eliza
Date: 24 Mar 12 - 03:00 PM

By the way Don T, did you learn Latin from Kennedy's Latin Grammar by any chance? We used to giggle (silly schoolgirls), it was full of virgins going off to the woods and Marcus and his mates on their way to the Forum. We had to translate the Gallic Wars, in which I believe Caesar divided Gaul into three parts. That is the sum total of all we absorbed, it was horrendously boring and tedious, but Miss Bailey-Reynolds got us all through O Level! At Uni in my French studies, I was delighted to hear we'd be learning something called 'Vulgar Latin' (!) but it turned out to be just as stultifying, and not Vulgar at all!

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: GUEST,Eliza
Date: 24 Mar 12 - 02:52 PM

yes, mayomick, I'm afraid Miss Bailey-Reynolds was a bigot in many ways, and was very anti-Catholic, pro-Protestant Establishment. She also loved the song "The English are best, I wouldn't give tuppence for all of the rest." I used to go to Mass with my cousin Ann and was enchanted by the Latin accent of the priest there. (pre-Vatican 2) I loved responding "Et cum spirito tuo". My mother was an Irish Catholic from Cork, and she had always pronounced the Mass in a very Italian way.

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: SINSULL
Date: 24 Mar 12 - 02:29 PM

Pee Knee Blow num????
Shouldn't that be fellatum?

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: Jon Corelis
Date: 24 Mar 12 - 10:17 AM

No need to vote on it: stress accent in classical Latin is determined by two simple rules which cover almost all words, and which you can find in any Latin grammar: 1) words of two syllables have the accent on the first syllable, and 2) words of more than two syllables have the accent on the penult (next to last) syllable if the penult is long, otherwise on the antepenult (the syllable before the penult.) Since the u in mortuis is short, the accent goes on the antepenult, MOR-tu-is.

As for Latin pronunciation in general, scholars in English language countries typically use a pronunciation which approximates the classical pronunciation but doesn't try to reproduce it exactly. It sounds odd if you get the accents wrong, though. Any Latin grammar will have a section on pronunciation; particularly complete and lucid is the one in Lane's A Latin Grammar for Schools and Colleges (1903), though some professional philologists may tell you it needs to be updated in the light of subsequent research.


Jon Corelis
Shards of Time: Translations

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: mayomick
Date: 24 Mar 12 - 09:39 AM

Funny what Miss Bailey-Reynolds told Eliza . "We will never know how it was spoken , but try it with an Italian accent" , is what my old school teacher -an Irish Catholic - used to say .

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 24 Mar 12 - 08:53 AM

For a while, my Latin teacher was RM Wingfield who wrote "The Only Way Out", and always insisted that there was little point in worrying about saying the words correctly if most of the time the words were wrong!!

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 24 Mar 12 - 02:37 AM

'For a dead language, it is surprisingly changeable.'
.,,.
Not really 'dead' in that sense tho, Don. Not current within any actual country to be sure; but for many centuries the lingua franca [NB!] of scholars thruout Europe, & of lawyers.

And who more contentious and frangible and factional than such communities!

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: Bev and Jerry
Date: 24 Mar 12 - 12:01 AM

OK. With 93% of the precincts reporting, the latest results (including one vote by Merriam Webster) are:

de-MORE-tu-is --- 8 votes
de-more-TU-is --- 2 votes

So, we are declaring de-MORE-it-us the winner.

Victory speech coming up momentarily. Film at eleven.

Thanks for all your help.

Bev and Jerry

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: Dave MacKenzie
Date: 23 Mar 12 - 08:38 PM

Joe and Don.

Is the k in knee silent?

---

"Yes," said Joe.

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 23 Mar 12 - 08:03 PM

Going back to my schooldays again, as I was learning Latin much closer to the 1920s than most here, I think.

We were taught that words beginning with c were to be pronounced ch, au was taught as in "cause", ae was taught as in "ale", not "aisle".

However the motto under discussion was definitely ""Day MORE-too-iss KNEE-hill KNEE-sea BOW-noom. (that's "bow" as in arrow)"", exactly as Joe had it.

Unless we have somebody older than me who remembers his Latin classes, I think that's as close as you are likely to get to academic Latin of the twenties.

For a dead language, it is surprisingly changeable.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: catspaw49
Date: 23 Mar 12 - 07:55 PM

I think Sinsull has it best at DE MOR tu is NIL NIS i Bo num, meaning, "Speak nothing but good about the dead."

Joe Offer is wrong as usual with Day MORE-too-iss-merde KNEE-hill pee-KNEE BLOW-noom which actually means "Could you give my dead friend a blowjob."


Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: Bev and Jerry
Date: 23 Mar 12 - 07:40 PM

We think Joe Offer had a good point when he started his post with:

"Well, I've always heard it as..."

We shouldn't have asked for the "correct" pronunciation but, instead, we should have asked how you have heard the phrase pronounced. After all, this is a play and we're trying to reflect the way most English people would have pronounced it in the 1920s whether it was "correct" or not.

Bev and Jerry

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: GUEST,mg
Date: 23 Mar 12 - 06:55 PM

Our Agnuses ..Agni?? always had g's in them. And is it not a tragedy that a language that millions of people in probably every country of the world had at least a passing acquaintance with, was just plain killed. mg

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 23 Mar 12 - 05:44 PM

Stearn-
"The pronunciation of Church Latin is based on modern Italian pronunciation, c before i and e accordingly pronounced as the English ch and not as s (the conventional English pronunciation) or k (the Reformed Academic pronunciation)."

Reformed Academic
a (macron) as in father
a circumflex as in apart
ae as ai in aisle
au as in house
c as in cat
ch (of greek words) as k or k-h (if possible)
e macron as in they
e circumflex as in pet
ei as in rein
g as in go
i macron as in machine
i circumflex as in pit (consonant i) as y in yellow
ng as in finger
o macron as in note (long vowel)
o circumflex as in not (short vowel)
oe as oi in toil
ph as p
r always trilled
s as in sit, gas
t as in table. native
u macron as in brute
u circumflex as in full
ui as oui (French), we
v (consonant u) as w
y macron as u in French pur
y circumflex as in French du

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: SINSULL
Date: 23 Mar 12 - 03:18 PM

DE MOR tu is NIL NIS i Bo num.
But I agree it should be NEE hil not nil

Speak nothing but good about the dead.

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 23 Mar 12 - 03:09 PM

(Which makes Joe Offer correct, I guess)

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 23 Mar 12 - 03:06 PM

A few years ago, a somewhat extended thread on Latin pronunciation (I believe the main controbutors were WYSISWYG, Dicho, Q, Joe- went into this subject.

1. Don is essentially correct. The Latin of the Romans is lost. Church Latin evolved, Italians and many RC clergy using a modified Italian pronunciation. Anglican (old school) again differs somewhat.
Example- Agnus Dei is pronunced An-yus Day-e in RC, and most Anglican, service, but scientific Latin, especially Botanical Latin, differs- Ag-nus Day-e generally accepted in English where extended Latin is required, e. g., descriptions of new plant species, where a Latin diagnosis is necessary.

A few comments from William T. Stearns on pronunciation:
Scientific Latin was based on Erasmus, 1528, De recta Latini Graecique Sermonis Pronunciatione.
He described speeches to Emperor Maxmilian; the French ambassador with a Gallic accent, a German speaking as if he was speaking German, a Dane who spoke like a Scotchman, etc.

Stearn- "In English-speaking countries there exist two main systems, the traditional English pronunciation generally used by gardeners and botanists and the "reformed" or "restored" academic pronunciation adopted by classical scholars as presenting "a reasonably close approximation to the actual sounds of the language as spoken by educated Romans"."
"This academic pronunciation comes closer to the usual Latin pronunciation of Continental People than does the conventional English pronunciation.
"Words containing more than one vowel or diphthong (i. e. two vowels pronounced as one, e. g. ae, au, ei, eu, oe, ui) are divided into syllables." Thus al-bus, mag-nus, ple-nus, etc., ple-ni-flo-rus, etc.
In Latin, every vowel is pronounced, hence co-to-ne-as-ter...and in endings -o-i-des (not oi-des).
"In classical Latin words of several syllables the stress falls on the syllable next to the last one (penultimate) when this syllable is long...e. g. for-mo'-sus....but falls on the last syllable but two ...when the last one is short, e. g. flo'-ri-dus, sil-va'ti-cus.
....the 'i' sound varies, as eye in al-pi'-nus but te in se-ro-ti-nus; the short i in words of Greek origin. .
Consonents as in English.

Table later. A lot of stuff here.

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: Dave MacKenzie
Date: 23 Mar 12 - 02:49 PM

I'd guess that Anglicans of that period would pronounce it as if it were English, eg neye-seye instead of nee-see.

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: Bev and Jerry
Date: 23 Mar 12 - 02:10 PM

We had no idea this was such a complicated question. Perhaps a little more information about the question would help.

Jerry is rehearsing for a play in which he plays an Anglican priest (those of you who know him can resume reading when you're done laughing). The time is the 1920s and all the characters are English. Someone else, a lay person says, "Ladies and gentlemen - de mortuis nil nisi bonum" and then Jerry says, "Brethren, de mortuis - exactly ..."

So, perhaps the fact that we're all playing English people and the time period makes a difference.

The actors are all Americans and the question came up in rehearsal when the lay person said de mor-TU-is and Jerry said de MOR-tu-is.

Bev and Jerry

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 23 Mar 12 - 01:51 PM

Given that the Roman Empire crumbled around 1600 years ago and that the differences between ancient Latin and modern Italian will be wider far than the gap between Modern and Middle English, it seems unlikely that anyone living today has the slightest idea of how it should be correctly pronounced.

Even in the fifty years since I finished my schooldays, the pronunciation I was taught is now apparently out of date.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: Joe_F
Date: 23 Mar 12 - 01:22 PM

I suspect "arduis" is right, and yes, it would be the ablative plural of "arduum" = something steep or difficult. The meaning would be something like "by difficult feats, to the sun". I would have trouble construing it with "-us", but what do I know?

*In Latin*, the o in "bonum" (neuter singular of "bonus", good) is short. However, N.B., when Latin words are taken bodily into English, the classical quantity of the vowels has (almost) no influence on their pronunciation in English; instead, long vs short is largely determined by the ending. "Bonus" is a handy example: As an English word, it has long o. For a discussion, see Fowler's Modern English Usage s.v. False quantity.

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: GUEST,Eliza
Date: 23 Mar 12 - 12:17 PM

My old Latin teacher, Miss Bailey-Reynolds, (an Oxford female graduate Blue with sticky-out teeth and a posh accent you could cut paper with) always said, "Speak Latin with an ENGLISH accent, we're not bloody Italians here!" (Only she used an more racist word beginning with W) She'd have said, " Day more tew iss nih-hill nissy bonn um", speaking exactly like the Queen. She was an eccentric old stick, but ever so funny.

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: bubblyrat
Date: 23 Mar 12 - 07:07 AM

Sorry to wander slightly from the subject , but I have encountered some heated debate and controversy recently , regarding the spelling of a warship's Latin "motto" . Beneath the ship's "crest" ( wrong word heraldically speaking ,but nevertheless in common usage ) of the carrier HMS Eagle ,are the words " Arduus Ad Solem " . However, a manufacturer of gold wire blazer badges has misrepresented it as "Arduis Ad Solem" . Is this another example of an ablative plural ??

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: Joe Offer
Date: 23 Mar 12 - 01:54 AM

Well, I've always heard it as De mortuis nihil nisi bonum

Day MORE-too-iss KNEE-hill KNEE-sea BOW-noom. (that's "bow" as in arrow)

"Nil" and "nihil" both mean "nothing," but "nihil" seems to be more common.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: mg
Date: 23 Mar 12 - 01:49 AM

I must disagree not with the classic latin but with the church latin, as practiced among perhaps predominantly Irish Catholics in PNW USA...and I have always thought our latin had a bit of irish accent to it...but we would definitely have used the long o..is your choir Catholic? It barely amtters because most would not even remember how Latin was pronounced in the good old days when the music was pretty in the church. mg

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 23 Mar 12 - 01:42 AM

Legal Latin is pronouced differently from either, though, with the words pronounced as if they were English words spelt that way ~~ so that, e.g., 'nisi' becomes 'nigh sigh', as in the 'decree nisi' awarded in a divorce case. So a lawyer would render this as "dee more tew is nill nigh sigh bonn 'em".

~M~

Subject: How to pronounce "de mortuis nil nisi bonum"
From: Genie
Date: 23 Mar 12 - 01:13 AM

The only thing I'd change is that, having been taught to use pure vowel sounds in Latin for single letters, instead of dipthongs like a long "I" or long "a," I'd write it in pseudo phonetics like this:

deh more too ees neel neesee bohn um   (with the "o" in "bonum" more like the "o" in "for" than like the "o" in "so")   

The point being to try not to turn the vowels into dipthongs (the long "a" being actually the dipthong "ah-ee" and the long "o" being actually the dipthong "oh-oo")   

That may be pickier than what you were looking for, but that's what I've been taught, whether for classic Latin (which I learned in high school) or church Latin (which I've been taught in choir).

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: katlaughing
Date: 23 Mar 12 - 12:14 AM

My old Latin teacher is in my head, also putting the emphasis on the first syllable, fwiw. I'll ask my brother, tomorrow. HE remembers everything from Latin class.:-)

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: Bev and Jerry
Date: 22 Mar 12 - 11:01 PM

Interesting. Merriam-Webster online dictionary puts the emphasis on the first syllable. That makes it a two-to-two tie so far. Are we going to have to go into overtime?

Bev and Jerry

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: Joe_F
Date: 22 Mar 12 - 10:11 PM

I do not know if the rules changed in medieval Latin, but in classical Latin, at any rate, if the penultimate (the syllable before the last) is long, it gets the stress; if short, the syllable before it gets the stress. A syllable is long if it has a long vowel or if it has a consonant cluster. According to my dictionary, the u in mortuis (ablative plural of mortuus, dead) is short, so the stress is on the first syllable. That also happens to be the way I have always heard it pronounced; but I looked it up to be sure.

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: Dave MacKenzie
Date: 22 Mar 12 - 08:46 PM

Emphasis normally on the penultimate syllable. The pronunciation mg gives is more or less what I was taught as 'authentic' non-church Latin in 1965 as a Protestant.

Subject: RE: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: mg
Date: 22 Mar 12 - 08:42 PM

church latin circa 1963

day more too ees neel neesee bone um emphasis on too

Subject: BS: How to pronounce this Latin phrase?
From: Bev and Jerry
Date: 22 Mar 12 - 08:26 PM

We need to know the correct pronunciation of this Latin phrase:

"de mortuis nil nisi bonum"

Loosely translated it means "Speak nothing but good of the dead".

Specifically, how do you pronounce "mortius"? Which syllable gets the emphasis?

Come on, you Latin scholars. Joe?

Bev and Jerry