Traditional English pronunciation of Latin

The traditional English pronunciation of Latin, and Classical Greek words borrowed through Latin, is the way the Latin language was traditionally pronounced by speakers of English until the early 20th century.

In the Middle Ages speakers of English, from Middle English onward, pronounced Latin not as the ancient Romans did, but in the way that had developed among speakers of French. This traditional pronunciation then became closely linked to the pronunciation of English, and as the pronunciation of English changed with time, the English pronunciation of Latin changed as well.

Until the beginning of the 19th century all English speakers used this pronunciation, including Roman Catholics for liturgical purposes.Brittain(1955) Following Catholic emancipation in Britain in 1829 and the subsequent Oxford Movement, newly converted Catholics preferred the Italianate pronunciation, which became the norm for the Catholic liturgy. Meanwhile, scholarly proposals were made for a reconstructed Classical pronunciation, close to the pronunciation used in the late Roman Republic and early Empire, and with a more transparent relationship between spelling and pronunciation.

One immediate audible difference between the pronunciations is in the treatment of vowels. The English pronunciation of Latin applied vowel sound changes which had occurred within English itself, where stressed vowels in a word became quite different from their unstressed counterpart. In the other two pronunciations of Latin, vowel sounds were not changed. Among consonants, the treatment of the letter ''c'' followed by a front vowel was one clear distinction. Thus the name Cicero is pronounced in English as , in ecclesiastical Latin as , and in restored classical Latin as . (Similarly with ''et cetera'', etc.)

The competition between the three pronunciations grew towards the end of the 19th century.
By the beginning of the 20th century, however, a consensus for change had developed. The Classical Association, shortly after its foundation in 1903, put forward a detailed proposal for a reconstructed classical pronunciation. This was supported by other professional and learned bodies. Finally in February 1907 their proposal was officially recommended by the Board of Education for use in schools throughout the UK. Adoption of the "new pronunciation" was a long, drawn-out process, but by the mid-20th century, classroom instruction in the traditional English pronunciation had ceased.

Illustrative survivals

The traditional pronunciation survives in academic and general English vocabulary:
* In a very large body of words used every day: ''album, apex, area, asylum, axis, basis, bonus, camera, census, cinema, circus, crisis, dilemma, error, focus, genesis, genius, hypothesis, icon, insignia, item, junior, major, medium, minor, murmur, onus, panacea, podium, ratio, sector, stamina, terminus, trivia''; as well as such common phrases as ''ad infinitum, et cetera, non sequitur, quid pro quo, status quo, vice versa,'' etc.
* In academic vocabulary: ''campus, syllabus, curriculum, diploma, alumnus''
* In specialized anatomical vocabulary: ''aorta, biceps, cranium, patella, penis, sinus, vertebra, vagina'', etc.
* In astronomical nomenclature, including the names of planets, moons, asteroids, stars and constellations, such as ''Mars, Io, Ceres, Sirius, Ursa Major, nova, nebula'', though many of these are irregular (e.g. expected for Libra is less common than irregular )
* In many biblical names: ''Ananias, Cornelius, Felix, Jesus, Judas, Lydia, Nicodemus, Nicolas, Priscilla, Sergius, Silas, Titus, Zacharias,'' etc.
* In a number of historical terms and names, particularly those associated with Greek or Roman culture and politics: ''augur, bacchanal, consul, fibula, lictor, prætor, toga, Augustus, Cæsar, Cicero, Diocletian, Hypatia, Plato, Socrates, Trajan,'' etc.
* In legal terminology and phrases: ''affidavit, alibi, alias, de jure, obiter dictum, sub judice, subpoena,'' etc. In many cases Classical pronunciation is used, however.
* In the specialized terminology of literary studies: ''codex, colophon, epitome, index, periphrasis, parenthesis,'' etc.
* In some mathematical terms: ''calculus, parabola, hyperbola, isosceles, rhombus, vector,'' etc.
* In medical terminology describing diseases, symptoms and treatments: ''anaesthesia, bacterium, coma, lumbago, mucus, nausea, ophthalmia, rabies, tetanus, virus, rigor mortis.'' etc.
* In words and names from classical mythology: ''Achilles, Argus, Calliope, Gorgon, Myrmidon, Sphinx,'' etc.
* In many place names: ''Carolina, Judæa, Annapolis, Dalmatia, Ithaca, Nicæa, Pennsylvania, Romania, Salina, Virginia,'' etc.
* In some religious terms: ''Angelus, basilica, Magi, martyr, presbyter,'' etc.
* In many saints' names: ''Athanasius, Eugenia, Eusebius, Ignatius, Irene, Januarius, Leo, Macarius, Marcella, Theophilus,'' etc.
* In certain sporting terms: ''gymnasium, stadium, discus, pentathlon''
* In the taxonomic nomenclature of botany and zoology: ''phylum, genus, species, chrysanthemum, hibiscus, rhododendron, foetus, larva, ovum, pupa, chameleon, lemur, platypus''

Vowel length and stress

In most cases, the English pronunciation of Classical words and names is predictable from the orthography, as long as long and short vowels are distinguished. For Latin, Latinized Greek or for long versus short α, ι, υ Greek vowels, this means that macrons and breves must be used if the pronunciation is to be unambiguous. However, the conventions of biological nomenclature forbid the use of these diacritics, and in practice they are not found in astronomical names or in literature. Without this information, it may not be possible to ascertain the placement of stress, and therefore the pronunciation of the vowels in English.

Note that the following rules are generalizations, and that many names have well established idiosyncratic pronunciations.

Stress placement

Latin stress is predictable. It falls on the penultimate syllable when that is " heavy", and on the antepenultimate syllable when the penult is "light".

In Greek, stress is ''not'' predictable, but it may be ignored when pronouncing Greek borrowings, as they have been filtered through Latin and have acquired the stress patterns of Latin words.

A syllable is "light" if it ends in a single short vowel. For example, ''a, ca, sca, scra'' are all light syllables for the purposes of Latin stress assignment.

Any other syllable is "heavy":

*if it is closed (ended) by a consonant: ''an, can, scan, scran''
*if the vowel is long or a diphthong in Latin, or in the Latin transliteration of Greek: ''ā, cā, scā, scrā'' (a long vowel) or ''æ, cæ, scæ, scræ'' (a diphthong).

Latin diphthongs may be written or , or . Long vowels are written with a macron: ''ā ē ī ō ū ȳ,'' though this is a modern convention. Greek long vowels are ει, η, ου, ω, sometimes ι, υ, and occasionally α. (Long α is uncommon.) For example, Actaeon is pronounced or . A diaeresis indicates that the vowels do ''not'' form a diphthong: Arsinoë (not *).

The importance of marking long vowels for Greek words can be illustrated with Ixion, from Greek Ἰξίων. As it is written, the English pronunciation might be expected to be * . However, length marking, ''Ixīōn,'' makes it clear that it should be pronounced .

When a consonant ends a word, or when more than a single consonant follows a vowel within a word, the syllable is closed and therefore heavy. (A consonant is not the same thing as a letter. The letters ''x'' and ''z'' each count as two consonants, but ''th'' , ''ch'' , and ''ph'' count as one, as the pronunciations in brackets indicate.) The English letter ''j'' was originally an ''i,'' forming a diphthong with the preceding vowel, so it forces the stress just as ''æ, œ, z,'' and ''x'' do.

* Exception: a consonant cluster of ''p'', ''t'', or ''c/k'' plus ''l'' or ''r'' is ambiguous. The preceding syllable was open in ordinary Latin. However, when a different stress placement was required by poetic meter, it could be treated as closed. Thus the name Chariclo ''(Chariklō)'' could be syllabified as either ''cha-ri-klō'', with an open penult and stress on the ''cha'' (normal Latin), or ''cha-rik-lō'', with a closed penult and stress on the ''rik'' (an optional poetic pronunciation), so both and are acceptable pronunciations in English.

Secondary stress

If more than two syllables precede the stressed syllable, the same rules determine which is stressed. For example, in Cassiopeia (also Cassiopēa), syllabified ''cas-si-o-pei-a,'' the penult ''pei/pē'' contains a long vowel/diphthong and is therefore stressed. The second syllable preceding the stress, ''si,'' is light, so the stress must fall one syllable further back, on ''cas'' (which coincidentally happens to be a closed syllable and therefore heavy). Therefore, the standard English pronunciation is . (Note however that this word also has an irregular pronunciation in English: .)

Long and short vowels in English

Whether a vowel letter is pronounced "long" in English () or "short" () is unrelated to the length of the original Latin or Greek vowel. Instead it depends on position and stress. A vowel followed by a consonant at the end of a word is short in English, except that final ''-es'' is always long, as in Pales . In the middle of a word, a vowel followed by more than one consonant is short, as in Hermippe , while a vowel with no following consonant is long. However, when a vowel is followed by a single consonant (or by a cluster of ''p, t, c/k'' plus ''l, r)'' and then another vowel, it gets more complicated.
*If the syllable is unstressed, it is open, and the vowel is often reduced to schwa.
*If the penultimate syllable is stressed, it is open and the vowel long, as in Europa .
*If any other syllable is stressed, it is closed and the vowel is short, as in Ganymede and Anaxagoras .

Regardless of position, stressed ''u'' stays long before a single consonant (or a cluster of ''p, t, c/k'' plus ''l, r''), as in Jupiter .

*Exception: A stressed nonhigh vowel (''a, e, o'') stays long before a single consonant (or cluster of ''p, t, c/k'' plus ''l, r'') followed by an or sound (''e, i, y'') plus another vowel at the end of a word: Proteus , Demetrius . This is because, historically and regionally, in many of these words the ''e, i, y'' is pronounced and combines with the following syllable, so that the preceding syllable is penultimate and therefore open: .

Traditionally, English syllables have been described as 'open' when their vowel (in English) is long and they are followed by a single consonant followed by another vowel, and as 'closed' in the same environment when their vowel is short. However, it is debated how accurate this analysis is, as in English syllables tend to attract a following consonant, especially when they are stressed, so that all stressed syllables followed by a consonant are arguably 'closed'. Such following consonants are sometimes described as ambisyllabic. This effect is especially apparent in some dialects, such as RP, when the consonant in question is /r/, which affects the quality of the preceding vowel. None of this changes the patterns described in this article: The long-short distinction described above is maintained regardless. For example, the 'e' in Hera is long regardless of whether it is pronounced or in a particular dialect, or analyzed as open or as closed . American dictionaries tend to follow the former transcription, and British dictionaries the latter, so when the consonant 'r' is involved the rules for the English pronunciation of Latin words are more straightforward when using the conventions of American dictionaries.

Alphabet

Anglo-Latin includes all of the letters of the English alphabet except ''w'', viz.: ''a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v x y z''. It differs from Classical Latin in distinguishing ''i'' from ''j'' and ''u'' from ''v''.
In addition to these letters, the digraphs ''æ'' and ''œ'' may be used (as in ''Cæsar'' and ''phœnix''). These two digraphs respectively represent mergers of the letters ''ae'' and ''oe'' (diphthongs, as are Greek αι and οι) and are often written that way (e.g., ''Caesar, phoenix''). However, since in Anglo-Latin both ''ae'' and ''oe'' represent a simple vowel, not a diphthong, the use of the single letters ''æ'' and ''œ'' better represents the reality of Anglo-Latin pronunciation.
Despite being written with two letters, the Greek sequences ''ch, ph, rh, th'' represent single sounds. The letters ''x'' and Greek ''z'', on the other hand, are sequences of two sounds (being equivalent to ''cs'' and ''dz'').

Conversion of Greek to Latin

Anglo-Latin includes a large amount of Greek vocabulary; in principle, any Greek noun or adjective can be converted into an Anglo-Latin word. There is a conventional set of equivalents between the letters of the Greek and Roman alphabets, which differs in some respects from the current mode of Romanizing Greek. This is laid out in the tables below:

''Rh'' is used for Greek ρ at the beginnings of words, e.g. ῥόμβος (rhombos) > ''rhombus''.
Rarely (and mostly in words relatively recently adapted from Greek), ''k'' is used to represent Greek κ. In such cases it is always pronounced and never (as it might be if spelled ''c'') : e.g. σκελετός (skeletos) > ''skeleton'' not "sceleton".

Greek accent marks and breath marks, other than the "rough breathing" (first in the list of consonants above), are entirely disregarded; the Greek pitch accent is superseded by a Latin stress accent, which is described below.

Frequently, but not universally, certain Greek nominative endings are changed to Latin ones that cannot be predicted from the tables above. Occasionally forms with both endings are found in Anglo-Latin, for instance Latinized ''hyperbola'' next to Greek ''hyperbole''. The most usual equations are found below:

Examples:
* Greek ἄγγελος (aggelos) > Latin ''angelus'' (γγ > ng, -ος > us)
* Greek ἔλλειψις (elleipsis) > Latin ''ellipsis'' (ει > i (shortened before ps), ψ > ps)
* Greek μουσεῖον (mouseion) > Latin ''mūsēum'' (ου > ū, ει > ē, -ον > um)
* Greek μαίανδρος (maiandros) > Latin ''mæander'' (αι > æ, -ρος > er)
* Greek χρυσάνθεμον (chrȳsanthemon) > Latin ''chrȳsanthemum'' (χ > ch, υ > y, θ > th, -ον > um)
* Greek διάῤῥοια (diarroia) > Latin ''diarrhœa'' (ῤῥ > rrh, οι > œ)

Consonants

Letters and sounds

* The letters ''b, f, k, l, m, p, v'' and ''z'' have each only one sound, which corresponds to the equivalent IPA symbols .
* The letter ''j'' has the single sound .
* The letter ''r'' has a single sound, in rhotic dialects of English. In nonrhotic dialects, it varies according to placement in a syllable. At the beginning of a syllable, it is pronounced . At the end of a syllable, i.e. between a vowel and a consonant, or after a vowel at the end of a word, it is dropped—though not without, frequently, affecting the pronunciation of the previous vowel sound. If ''r'' occurs at the end of a word after a vowel, and the next word begins with a vowel, it is usually pronounced as the beginning of the first syllable of the next word. ''Rh'' and ''rrh'' are pronounced exactly like ''r'' and ''rr''.
* When followed by a vowel, the combinations ''qu'' (always) and ''gu'' and ''su'' (usually) stand for , , and respectively.
* The combination ''ph'' is pronounced .
* The combination ''th'' is pronounced .
* The combination ''ch'' is pronounced in all environments - although in Scottish pronunciation it is pronounced at the end of a syllable.
* The letters ''c, d, g, h, n, s, t, x'' have different values depending upon surrounding sounds and syllable structure.

Phonemes

The underlying consonantal phonemes of Anglo-Latin are close in most respects to those of Latin, the primary difference being that and are replaced in Anglo-Latin by and . The sound was borrowed from Greek.

Consonantal allophones

Greek consonant clusters

Several word-initial clusters, almost all derived from Greek, are simplified in Anglo-Latin by omitting the first consonant:
* βδ ''bd'' becomes : ''bdellium''
* τμ ''tm'' becomes : ''tmesis''
* κν ''cn'', γν ''gn'', μν ''mn'' and πν ''pn'' become : ''Cnossus, gnosis, Mnemosyne, pneumonia''
* ψ ''ps'' becomes : ''psyche''
* κτ ''ct'' and πτ ''pt'' become : ''Ctesiphon, ptosis''
* χθ ''chth'' and φθ ''phth'' become : ''Chthon, phthisis''
* ξ ''x'' becomes : ''Xanthippe''

In the middle of words both consonants in these clusters are pronounced (e.g. ''Charybdis, Patmos, Procne, prognosis, amnesia, apnœa, synopsis, cactus, captor''); medial ''chth'' and ''phth'' are pronounced and respectively, as in ''autochthon'' and ''naphtha''.

Polyphony

The letters ''c, d, g, h, n, s, t'' and ''x'' have different sounds (phonemes) depending upon their environment: these are listed summarily below.

The full set of consonantal phonemes for Anglo-Latin is almost identical to that of English, lacking only .

=Miscellaneous environments

=
Environments that condition the appearance of some of these phonemes are listed below:

The change of intervocalic to is common but not universal. Voicing is more common in Latin than in Greek words, and never occurs in the common Greek ending ''-sis'', where ''s'' is always voiceless: ''basis, crisis, genesis''.

=Palatalization

=
The most common type of phonemic change in Anglo-Latin is palatalization. Anglo-Latin reflects the results of no less than four palatalization processes. The first of these occurred in Late Latin, the second in Proto-Gallo-Romance, the third and fourth within the history of English. While the first two palatalizations are universally used in variants of Anglo-Latin, the third and especially the fourth are incompletely observed in different varieties of Anglo-Latin, leading to some variant pronunciations.
*Palatalization 1 affected only the sound of ''t'', converting it to when it preceded a semivowel ''i'' (at that stage pronounced ) and did not follow ''s'', ''t'', or ''x''. This sound eventually merged with and was subject to further changes in Palatalization 3. When followed or it did not change; in some cases it might later change to by Palatalization 4. Note that ''t'' did not change to before semivowel ''e'', but remained as in ''confiteor''.
*Palatalization 2 affected the sounds of ''c'' and ''g'', converting them to and ; the arising from c merged with the arising from t, and both shared further developments of this sound, turning to . When geminate (double), palatalized ''cc'' and ''gg'' were affected diversely; only the second ''c'' in ''cc'' was palatalized, producing the sound , as in ''successor''; but both ''g''s in ''gg'' were palatalized, producing a sound, as in "exaggerate".
*Palatalization 3 affected and of whatever origin, changing them to and .
*Palatalization 4 affected and exactly as Palatalization 3 did, but also affected and , changing them to and

Some of the occasions on which palatalizations 3 and 4 fail to take effect should be noted:
* Palatalization 3 fails: ''asphyxia, Cassiopeia, dyspepsia, excelsior, exeunt, gymnasium, symposium, trapezium''. Note that the semivowel ''i'' is always pronounced as a full vowel in these cases. In some dialects Palatalization 3 frequently fails when another sound follows, as in "enunciation", "pronunciation", "appreciation", "glaciation", "association", with the sound then generalized to closely related forms ("enunciate", "appreciate", "associate").
*Palatalization 4 fails (in some dialects): ''cæsura, fistula, pæninsula, pendulum''.

Summary

See further the section on the "semivowel" below.

=Degemination

=
Following all of the above sound changes except palatalizations 3 and 4, "geminate" sequences of two identical sounds (often but not always double letters) were degeminated, or simplified to a single sound. That is, ''bb, dd, ff, ll, mm, nn, pp, rr, ss, tt'' became pronounced . However, for the purposes of determining whether a syllable is open or closed, these single consonants continue to act as consonant clusters.

Other notable instances involving degemination include:

*''cc'' developed two pronunciations:
**before a front vowel (''e, æ, œ, i, y'') ''cc'' is pronounced , and as it consists of two distinct sounds, is not degeminated.
**before a back vowel (''a, o, u'') ''cc'' was pronounced which degeminated to simply
* ''cqu'' degeminated to
* ''gg'' also has two pronunciations:
** before a front vowel, ''gg'' is pronounced after degemination.
** before a back vowel, ''gg'' is pronounced after degemination.
* ''sc'' before a front vowel was pronounced , and degeminated to .
* ''sc'' and ''ss'' before the "semivowel" are pronounced

The following combinations, derived from Greek, are also pronounced as single consonants:
* κχ ''cch'' is pronounced : ''Bacchus''
* πφ ''pph'' is pronounced : ''Sappho''
* τθ ''tth'' is pronounced : ''Pittheus''

Syllables

The simple vowels of Anglo-Latin (''a, æ, e, ei, i, o, œ, u, y'') can each have several phonetic values dependent upon their stress, position in the word, and syllable structure. Knowing which value to use requires an explanation of two syllabic characteristics, ''openness'' and ''stress''.

Openness

''Openness'' is a quality of syllables, by which they may be either ''open'', ''semiopen'', ''semiclosed'', or ''fully closed''.

Fully closed syllables

''Fully closed'' syllables are those in which the vowel in the middle of the syllable (the vocalic ''nucleus'') is followed by at least one consonant, which ends or "closes" the syllable. Vowels in fully closed syllables appear:
* At the end of a word followed by at least one consonant, e.g. ''plus, crux, lynx''.
* In the middle of a word followed by two or more consonants. The first of these consonants "closes" the syllable, and the second begins the following syllable; thus a word like ''lector'' consists of the two closed syllables ''lec'' and ''tor''. Sequences of three or more consonants may be broken up in different ways (e.g., ''sanc.tum'', ''sculp.tor'', ''ul.tra'', ''ful.crum'', ''ex.tra'') but nothing depends upon the exact way in which this is done; any sequence of three or more consonants creates a closed syllable before it. The letter ''x'' is equivalent to ''cs'', and as such also closes a syllable; a word like ''nexus'' is syllabified ''nec.sus'', and consists of two closed syllables.
* Two successive consonants of identical pronunciation are always pronounced as a single consonant in Anglo-Latin. When such a consonant sequence follows a penult syllable, the syllable counts as closed for the purposes of determining the position of stress: ''ba.cíl.lus, di.lém.ma, an.tén.na, co.lós.sus''; they also prevent a penult syllable from lengthening, as in the previous examples and also ''pal.lor, com.ma, man.na, cir.rus, cas.si.a, pas.sim, glot.tis''. They also count as closed for the purpose of determining whether a ''u'' is open or closed. In these respects they act precisely like syllable-closing consonant sequences, although they are pronounced as single sounds. (In words like ''successor'' the two ''cs do not merge, because each of them has a different sound— and , respectively.)
* Certain sequences of consonants do not close syllables: these include all instances of obstruents (stops and fricatives) followed by ''r'', including ''br, cr, chr, dr, gr, pr, tr, thr''. Thus words like ''supra'' and ''matrix'' are syllabified as ''su.pra'' and ''ma.trix'', and the first syllable of both words is open; likewise ''a.cro.po.lis, di.plo.ma, de.tri.tus.'' The sequence (spelled ''qu'') also does not close the preceding syllable; i.e., one syllabifies ''re.qui.em'' and not ''req.ui.em''.
* Sequences of obstruents followed by ''l'' are less consistent. The sequences ''cl, chl, gl'' and ''pl'' do not close a syllable, e.g. ''nu.cle.us'', ''du.plex'' with open first syllables; but the sequences ''bl, tl, thl'' do close a syllable, producing the syllabifications ''Pub.li.us'', ''at.las'', ''pen.tath.lon'', with closed syllables before the ''l''.

Semiclosed syllables

''Semiclosed'' syllables are closed, unstressed syllables that had been closed and became open due to the merger of two following consonants of the same sound. For the purpose of determining vowel reduction in initial unstressed syllables they count as open.
*Double consonants following an initial syllable containing ''a, e, i, o'' merge to count as one consonant: ''a.(c)cumulator, a.(g)gres.sor, ca.(l)li.o.pe, a.(p)pen.dix, e.(l)lip.sis, co.(l)lec.tor, o.(p)pres.sor, o.(p)pro.bri.um''. The first syllables of all these words are only partially closed, and the vowels are reduced.
*The same phenomenon occurs after ''u'', but note that the ''u'' is both closed and reduced: ''su.(p)pres.sor, su.(c)ces.sor, cu.(r)ri.cu.lum''.

Semi-open syllables

''Semiopen'' syllables are syllables that had been closed and unstressed, and that are followed by a sequence of consonants that can stand at the beginning of a syllable. Since instances of obstruents +''r'' or ''l'' are already considered open, ''semiopen'' syllables are practically restricted to instances of ''s'' + obstruent, ''bl'', and in some cases perhaps ''tl''. Vowels in initial semiopen syllables may be treated as open for all purposes except for determining the value of ''u'', which is still closed in semiopen syllables.
*When ''s'' is followed by a consonant, ''s'' syllabifies with the following consonant: ''a.spa.ra.gus'', ''pro.spec.tus'', ''na.stur.ti.um'', ''a.sphyc.si.a'' (''asphyxia''). ''S'' also syllabifies with a following palatalized ''c'' (pronounced ): ''a.sce.sis, pro.sce.ni.um''. When ''s'' syllabifies with a following consonant, the preceding syllable counts as semi-open. Possible exceptions are ''pos.te.ri.or'', ''tes.ta.tor''.
*Other sequences of consonants fully close an initial unstressed syllable and produce a short vowel: ''an.ten.na, am.ne.si.a, bac.te.ri.um, mag.ni.fi.cat, mac.sil.la (maxilla), spec.ta.tor, per.so.na, oph.thal.mi.a, tor.pe.do.''

See further the section on initial unstressed syllables below.

Open syllables

''Open'' syllables are those in which the nucleus is followed:
* By no consonant at the end of the word: ''pro, qua''.
* By a vowel in the middle of a word : ''oph.thal.mi.a, fi.at, cor.ne.a, cha.os, chi.as.mus, a.ma.nu.en.sis''.
* By only a single consonant in the middle of a word: ''sta.men, æ.ther, hy.phen, phœ.nix, ter.mi.nus, a.pos.tro.phe''.
* By those consonant clusters that do not fully or partially close a syllable In the middle of a word : '' ma.cron, du.plex, Cy.clops, tes.ta.trix, a.cro.po.lis''.

Stress

Primary stress

''Stress'' is another characteristic of syllables. In Anglo-Latin, it is marked by greater tension, higher pitch, lengthening of vowel, and (in certain cases) changes in vowel quality. Its exact concomitants in Classical Latin are uncertain. In Classical Latin the main, or ''primary stress'' is predictable, with a few exceptions, based on the following criteria:
* In words of one syllable, stress falls on that syllable, as marked in the following syllables with an acute accent: ''quá'', ''nón'', ''pár''.
* In words of two syllables, stress falls on the first syllable of the word (the ''penult'', or second from the end): e.g., ''bó.nus'', ''cír.cus''.
* In words of three or more syllables, stress falls either on the penult or the ''antepenult'' (third from the end), according to these criteria:
** If the penult contains a short vowel in an open syllable, the stress falls on the antepenult: e.g., ''stá.mi.na, hy.pó.the.sis''.
** If the penult contains a long vowel; a diphthong; a closed syllable (with any length of vowel); or is followed by ''z'', the stress falls on the penult.
*** Long vowel: cicāda > ''cicáda'', exegēsis > ''exegésis''.
*** Diphthong: ''amóeba, Acháia, paranóia, thesáurus''
*** Closed syllable: ''aórta'', ''interrégnum'', ''prospéctus'', ''rotúnda''
***''z'': ''horízon''
Primary stress can therefore be determined in cases where the penult is either closed or contains a diphthong. When it contains a vowel that may have been either short or long in Classical Latin, stress is ambiguous. Since Anglo-Latin does not distinguish short from long vowels, stress becomes a lexical property of certain words and affixes. The fact that ''decorum'' is stressed on the penult, and ''exodus'' on the antepenult, is a fact about each of these words that must be memorized separately (unless one is already familiar with the Classical quantities, and in the former case, additionally with the fact that ''decus -ŏris'' n. with short ''-o-'' syllable became in late Latin ''decus/decor -ōris'' m. with long ''-o-'' syllable: ''Dómine, diléxi decórem domus tuæ'').

Secondary stress

''Secondary'' stress is dependent upon the placement of the primary stress. It appears only in words of four or more syllables. There may be more than one secondary stress in a word; however, stressed syllables may not be adjacent to each other, so there is always at least one unstressed syllable between the secondary and primary stress. Syllables containing semivowel ''e'' or ''i'' are never stressed.
* If a four-syllable word has primary stress on the antepenult, there is no secondary stress: ''pa.rá.bo.la, me.tá.the.sis''.
* If a four-syllable word has primary stress on the penult, secondary stress is on the first syllable, marked hereafter with a grave accent: ''à.la.bás.ter, è.pi.dér.mis, sì.mu.lá.crum, prò.pa.gán.da, ùl.ti.má.tum''.
* If a 5-syllable word has primary stress on the antepenult, secondary stress is on the first syllable: ''hìp.po.pó.ta.mus, Sà.git.tá.ri.us, Phì.la.dél.phi.a''.

Secondary stress in words with three or more syllables before the primary stress is less predictable. Such words include those of five syllables with penult primary stress, and all words of six syllables in length or longer. The following generalizations about such long words may be made:
* The syllable immediately before the primary stress is never stressed.
* Words produced by derivation from a shorter word convert the primary (and, if any, secondary) stress of the stem into a secondary stress, as long as it does not fall immediately before the new primary stress: ''é.le.phant- + í.a.sis'' becomes ''è.le.phan.tí.a.sis''
* Compounds of which the compound element consists of more than one syllable likewise convert the primary stress of their elements into secondary stress: ''phár.ma.co- + póei.a'' becomes ''phàr.ma.co.póei.a''.
* If a primary stress is eliminated in compounding or derivation because it would stand next to another stress, secondary stress remains unchanged: ''pùsillánimus'' + ''itas'' becomes ''pùsillanímitas''.
* Single-syllable prefixes and single-syllable compound elements are generally unstressed: ''ac.cù.mu.lá.tor, im.pè.di.mén.ta, Her.mà.phro.dí.tus''
* In other cases where the composition of the word may be unclear, every other syllable before the primary stress may be stressed: ''a.mà.nu.én.sis, ò.no.mà.to.póei.a.'' In some cases the third syllable before the primary stress is stressed when the second syllable is light, just as when assigning the primary stress.

Unstress

''Unstressed'' syllables are all others. They are always adjacent to a stressed syllable; that is, there can never be more than two unstressed syllables in a row, and that only when the first one follows a stressed syllable.

Semivowel

Several sound-changes in Anglo-Latin are due to the presence of the "semivowel", an alteration of certain front vowels. Originally ordinary vowels, they acquired at different points in history the value of the glide (a ''y''-sound like that in English canyon). Subsequently, their value has fluctuated through history between a consonant and a vowel; the term "semivowel" thus reflects the intermediate historical as well as phonetic position of this sound. The environment in which the semivowel was produced was as follows:

# The vowel was ''e (æ, œ), i (ei),'' or ''y''.
# The vowel came immediately before a vowel or diphthong.
# The vowel was not in the initial syllable: ''e, æ, ei, i'' and ''y'' in ''rhea, mæander, meiosis, fiat, diaspora, hyæna, '' did not become semivowels.
# The vowel was unstressed: ''e, æ, œ, ei, i'' in ''idea, Piræus, diarrhœa, Cassiopeia, calliope, elephantiasis'' did not become semivowels.

Examples of words where ''e, i, y'' became semivowels include: ''miscellanea, chamæleon, nausea, geranium, rabies, Aries, acacia, ratio, fascia, inertia, halcyon, polyanthus, semiosis, mediator, Æthiopia, Ecclesiastes.''

The effects of the semivowel include the following:
# Though always in hiatus with a following vowel, semivowel ''i'' and ''y'' are never pronounced like long ''i'' or ''y'' (e.g. ); historically semivowel ''e'' could also be distinguished from "long e" (formerly or ). In current varieties of Anglo-Latin, semivowels are pronounced in a variety of ways:
#* Most frequently as : ''labia, radius, azalea, præmium, cornea, opium, Philadelphia, requiem, area, excelsior, symposium, Cynthia, trivia, trapezium''. In British Received Pronunciation, the prescribed pronunciation was once .
#* In some dialects or registers of English as , e.g. ''junior'' pronounced .
#* Merged with a following ''-es'' or ''-e'' ending, as in ''Aries, scabies''.
#* They are usually deleted following the palatals , , and : ''Patricia, consortium, Persia, nausea, ambrosia, Belgium''.
#*Occasionally a semivowel is retained after a palatal sound: ''ratio,'' sometimes ''Elysium''. This type of pronunciation is an artificiality, as the sounds and resulted from an absorption of the original in the sequences , . The pronunciations with and result from a re-introduction of the i sound to conform with the spelling. This pronunciation was, however, recommended by academics, and as such is common in the pronunciation of Anglo-Latin phrases such as ''ab initio, in absentia, venire facias''.
# The consonant ''t'' changed to and then to before the semivowel arising from ''i'': ''minutia, inertia, nasturtium''.
# The sibilants (including ''ss, sc, c,'' and ''t'') and (usually spelled ''s'') are usually palatalized before the semivowel:
#* > : ''cassia, fascia, species, militia''
#* > : ''amnesia, ambrosia''
# The vowels ''a, e, æ,'' and ''o'' in an open antepenult syllable become long if a semivowel appears in the next syllable:
#* ''radius, Asia, azalea, area''
#* ''anæmia, chamæleon''
#* ''genius, medium, interior''
#* ''odium, cochlea, victoria''
:This lengthening takes place regularly in antepenultimate syllables. It is less regular in syllables further back. On the one hand, there are words that do seem to lengthen before a semivowel in the next syllable:
:* ''Æthiopia, Ecclesiastes, mediator, negotiator, variorum''.
:On the other hand, some words have short vowels:
:* ''gladiator, apotheosis, Meleagrus, polyanthus'' (and other words containing ''poly-'' followed by a vowel).
:In general, those words with lengthened vowels in pre-antepenult syllables before a semivowel in the next syllable are those that are derive from a word with a regularly lengthened vowel in an antepenult syllable, e.g., ''Æthiopia'' from ''Æthiops'' ("Ethiopian"), ''Ecclesiastes'' from ''ecclesia'' ("church"), ''mediator'' from ''medium'', ''negotiator'' from ''negotium'' ("business'), ''variorum'' from ''varius'' ("manifold"). The failure of ''gladiator'' (from ''gladius'', "sword") to have a long vowel is anomalous.

Vowels

Mergers

The most notable distinction between Anglo-Latin and other varieties of Latin is in the treatment of the vowels. In Anglo-Latin, all original distinctions between long and short vowels have been obliterated; there is no distinction between the treatment of a and ā, etc., for instance. However, the subsequent development of the vowels depended to a large degree upon Latin word stress (which was preserved nearly unchanged in the medieval period), and as this was in part dependent upon vowel length, in certain cases Latin vowel length contrasts have been preserved as contrasts in both stress and quality. However, the immediate governing factor is not length but stress: short vowels that were stressed for various reasons are treated exactly like stressed long vowels.

In addition to the merger of long and short vowels, other vowel mergers took place:
* the diphthongs ''æ'' and ''œ'' merged with ''e''
* the vowels ''i'' and ''y'' merged
* the diphthong ''ei'' (also ''æi, œi''), when still written distinctively, in pronunciation was merged with ''i'' or (more frequently) ''e''

The merger of ''æ'' and ''œ'' with ''e'' was commonly recognized in writing. Sometimes forms written with ''æ'' and ''œ'' coexist with forms with ''e''; in other cases the form with ''e'' has superseded the diphthong in Anglo-Latin. Consider the following:
* ''æon'' and ''eon'', ''æther'' and ''ether'', ''amœba'' and ''ameba'', ''anæmia'' and ''anemia'', ''anæsthesia'' and ''anesthesia'', ''cæsura'' and ''cesura'', ''chamæleon'' and ''chameleon'', ''dæmon'' and ''demon'', ''diæresis'' and ''dieresis'', ''encyclopædia'' and ''encyclopedia'', ''fæces'' and ''feces'', ''fœtus'' and ''fetus'', ''hyæna'' and ''hyena'', ''prætor'' and ''pretor''
The following words are usually spelled with ''e'', though they originally had ''æ'':
* ''ænigma'' > ''enigma'', ''æquilibrium'' > ''equilibrium'', ''æra'' > ''era'', ''Æthiopia'' > ''Ethiopia'', ''diarrhœa'' > ''diarrhea'', ''mæander'' > ''meander'', ''musæum'' > ''museum'', ''œsophagus'' > ''esophagus'', ''pæninsula'' > ''peninsula'', ''præcentor'' > ''precentor'', ''prædecessor'' > ''predecessor'', ''præmium'' > ''premium'', ''præsidium'' > ''presidium'', ''tædium'' > ''tedium''

In other cases, particularly names, the forms with the diphthongs are the only correct spelling, e.g., ''ægis, Cæsar, Crœsus, Œdipus, onomatopœia, pharmacopœia, Phœbe, phœnix, Piræus, sub pœna''.

The sequences ''ei, æi, œi'' (distinguished in writing and pronunciation from ''ej'', the vowel followed by a consonant, as in ''Sejanus'') are sometimes retained in spelling preceding a vowel. In such cases the sequence is invariably pronounced as a simple vowel, sometimes ''i'' (as in ''meiosis'', pronounced as if ''miosis''), sometimes ''e'' (as in ''Cassiopeia, Deianira, onomatopœia'', pronounced as if ''Cassiopea, Deanira, onomatopea''), and sometimes either (Pleiades, commonly pronounced as if ''Pleades'' or ''Pliades'').

The result was a system of five vowels, ''a, e, i, o, u''. These would subsequently split, according to their environment, into long, short, and (eventually) unstressed variants; and these variants would eventually also be altered based on neighboring sounds. However, in phonemic terms, Anglo-Latin still has ''only'' five vowels, with multiple allophones.

In addition, there were the diphthongs, ''ai'', ''oi'', ''ui'', ''au'' and ''eu''. Of these, ''ai'' and ''au'' eventually monophthongized, ''eu'' merged with the open variant of ''u'', and ''yi'' merged with the "long" ''i''. Only ''oi'' and ''ui'' remained as true diphthongs, but both are extremely rare.

Realizations of ''a, e, i'' and ''o''

The vowels ''a, e, i, o'' each have three primary variants: long, short, and reduced. Each of these may, in turn, exhibit allophonic variation based on features of its phonetic environment, including whether it is stressed, whether it is in an open or closed syllable, where it is positioned in the word, and what consonants are next to it. One of the most common environmental causes of vowel alteration is the presence of a following ''r''. Vowels altered by a following "r" are called "r-colored".

Short vowels

This is the default value for vowels, observed:
#In closed monosyllables
# In stressed closed penult syllables
#In all antepenult syllables, open or closed, which receive primary stress, ''except'' for those lengthened due to a following semivowel
#In all syllables with secondary stress
#In fully closed unstressed syllables which immediately precede, but do not follow, a primary or secondary stress (usually in the first syllable of a word), with exceptions for certain prefixes

All short vowels have variants colored by a following ''r'' sound when the ''r'' is followed by a different consonant (not ''r'') or by the end of the word. In addition, there is a variant of short ''a'' that only appears after a sound – chiefly found in the sound ''qu'' . This is a relatively recent phonetic development in English and Anglo-Latin, so it wasn't present in earlier stages of Anglo-Latin.

Exceptionally, monosyllables ending in ''es'' are pronounced with the rhyme , e.g., ''pes, res''. This pronunciation is borrowed from that of ''-es'' used as an ending.

Exceptions to the pronunciation of short ''y'' generally involve prefixed elements beginning with ''hy-'' in an open syllable, such as ''hydro-'' and ''hypo-''; these are always pronounced with a long ''y'', e.g. ''hydrophobia, hypochondria''. This pronunciation is the result of hypercorrection; they used to be pronounced with a short , as is still the case in the word "hypocrite" and (for some speakers and formerly commonly) ''hypochondria''.

Prefixes may also behave in anomalous ways:
# The prefix ''ob-'' in unstressed syllables may be reduced to , even when it closes a syllable: cf. "obsession, oblivion".
# The Greek prefix ''en-, em-'' in a closed unstressed syllable may be reduced to , : ''encomium, emporium''.
# The prefix ''ex-'' in an unstressed syllable may be reduced to , , despite always being in a closed syllable: ''exterior, exemplar.''
# The prefix ''con-, com-'' is reduced to , when unstressed: ''consensus, compendium'', regardless of whether the syllable is closed or not.
# The preposition and prefix ''post(-)'' is anomalously pronounced with "long o": : ''post-mortem'' and cf. "postpone"; also thus in words in which ''post'' was originally a preposition (''postea, postquam'') but not in other derivatives, being pronounced with short o in ''posterus, posterior, postremo, postridie''.

Long vowels

Long vowels are those that historically were lengthened. By virtue of subsequent sound changes, most of these are now diphthongs, and none is distinguished by vowel length—however, the term "long" for these vowels is traditional. "Long" vowels appear in three types of environments:
# ''a, e, i'' and ''o'' are long in an open monosyllable
# ''a, e, i'' and ''o'' are long in a stressed open penult syllable
# ''a, e'' and ''o'' are long when in an open syllable followed by semivocalic ''i'' and ''e''
# ''a'' and ''o'' are long when they precede another vowel in hiatus; ''i'' and ''e'' are long in the same environments, but only when they are not semivocalic (i. e., when they are in the initial syllable or receive primary stress). Hiatus may be original, or may arise from the deletion of ''h'' between a stressed and unstressed syllable

Reduced vowels

Reduced vowels appear in unstressed syllables, except for:
* Closed initial unstressed syllables, which are generally short.
* Certain unstressed final syllables.

=Initial unstressed syllables

=
A variety of possible realizations are available for open, semiopen, and semiclosed initial unstressed syllables, including (for ''e'' and ''i'') long, short, and reduced variants. Fully closed initial unstressed syllables are always short.

* A " schwi". It generally conflates with in RP and with schwa in Australia. Directly before another vowel it may be the 'HAPPY' vowel.

** A rounded schwa. It has a w-like offglide before another vowel the way does, but otherwise in many dialects it conflates with schwa.

The variation in the value of the initial open unstressed vowel is old. Two different types of variation can be distinguished; the older use of a "long" vowel for ''i, y, o'' (and their variants); and more recent variations in the value of the reduced vowel.

No completely general rule can be laid down for the appearance of an initial unstressed long vowel, although such vowels must have appeared before the shortening of geminate consonants, as they are restricted to fully open syllables. The most general tendency is for long vowels to appear when ''i'' and ''y'' are either preceded by no consonant or by ''h'', e.g., ''idea, isosceles, hyperbola, hypothesis''. The prefixes ''in'' and ''syn'' never have long vowels: ''inertia, synopsis''. ''I'' and ''y'' also tend to be short when the next syllable contains an ''i'' or ''y'', short or long: ''militia, divisor''.

''O'' is a little less likely to appear with a long value in this location; or, at any rate, it is harder to distinguish the long value from the reduced vowel.

Unstressed ''e'' and ''i'' in open syllables had merged by the early 17th century; their reduced reflex is often transcribed , but by many speakers is still pronounced as a high front lax vowel, distinct from the derived from ''a'', here transcribed . For such speakers, the first syllables in ''Demeter'' and ''Damascus'' are pronounced differently.

Unstressed ''o'', also often transcribed , is by many speakers pronounced with considerable lip-rounding, here transcribed .

The partially closed initial unstressed vowels began as short vowels, but were later reduced.

These are the same sounds as in the preceding chart, but without the option of the "long" vowels and much less rounding of the ''o''.

''proscenium'' does not fall in this group, apparently because felt to be ''pro''+''scenium''.

=Medial unstressed syllables

=
All vowels in medial unstressed syllables are reduced to or , regardless of whether they are in open or closed syllables.

Open and closed ''u''

The pronunciation of the letter ''u'' does not depend upon stress, but rather upon whether the syllable in which it appears is open or closed. There are no "long" and "short" variants of either type of ''u'', but there are reduced and ''r''-colored variants of both types.

Open ''u''

The underlying sound of open ''u'' is ; it shares developments with the homophonous diphthong ''eu'', which can however appear in closed syllables.

The sound in and its variants is deleted in various environments:
* After palatal consonants (), whether original or resulting from the merger of and the preceding consonant, in both stressed and unstressed syllables; e.g. : ''junior, Julius, Jupiter, cæsura, educator, spatula, fistula''

After the following consonants when they precede ''u'' in an initial, final, or stressed syllable:
* and : ''rumor, verruca, luna, Lucretia, Pluto, effluvium''
* , (except in conservative speech): ''super, superior, Vesuvius,'' and variably ''Zeus''

In some dialects, particularly of American English, is deleted after all dental/alveolar consonants when they precede ''u'' in an initial, final or stressed syllable:
* , , and : ''duplex, caduceus, medusa, nucleus, lanugo, tutor, Thucydides''
* For some speakers, is pronounced following these consonants.

is not deleted in the following environments:
* When ''u'' is the first letter of the word or follows : ''uterus, humerus''
* Following a vowel: ''Ophiuchus''
* Following labials : ''pupa, furor, nebula, uvula, musæum''
* Following velars : ''cumulus, lacuna, Liguria''
* When it is in an interior unstressed syllable not following a palatal consonant, remains after a single consonant even when it might be deleted in a stressed syllable: ''amanuensis'' and cf. "cell''u''lar, gran''u''lar", for some speakers "vir''u''lent".
* After a consonant cluster may or may not be deleted: ''pæninsula, cornucopia''

Closed ''u''

Closed ''u'' appears only in closed syllables, except for instances of the prefix ''sub-'' before a vowel. It has reduced and ''r''-colored variants, as shown below. ''r''-coloration only appears when the ''r'' is followed by a different consonant (not ''r'') or the end of the word.

Diphthongs

Diphthongs in Anglo-Latin are distinguished from simple vowels by having no long or short variants, regardless of position or syllable type. The only diphthongs that are at all common are ''au'' and ''eu''. For variations in the pronunciation of the latter, see Open ''u''. ''Au'' is, rarely, reduced in an unstressed syllable to : ''Augustus'' pronounced as if "Agustus". Such words may be pronounced with the full value of the diphthong, however.

Note that ''ui'' is generally disyllabic, as in ''fruc.tu.i, va.cu.i, tu.i''. The monosyllabic words ''cui'' and ''huic'' were traditionally pronounced and .

In general, ''ua'', ''ue'', ''ui'', ''uo'', and ''uu'' come immediately after ''q'', ''g'', or ''s''. However, when they occur in the same syllable, as in ''suavitas'', ''questus'', ''anguis'', ''aliquot'', and ''equus'', they are not considered diphthongs (except in the exceptional pronunciations of ''cui'', ''huic'', and the above examples). Accordingly, when these letter combinations occur in the penultimate syllable, it is not necessarily stressed (e.g., ''équitas'', not ''equítas''). Note that their second vowel may become reduced, r-colored, or take on a different quantity even in a monosyllable.

Endings

The pronunciation of the final syllables of polysyllabic words do not always correspond to what might be expected from the constituent phonemes. Some endings also have more than one pronunciation, depending upon the degree of stress given to the ending.

Three types of endings can be distinguished:

Vowel alone

The first class consists of vowels alone, i.e. ''-a, -e, -æ, -i, -o, -u, -y''. In this class, the vowels are generally long, but -a is always .

Words deriving from Greek long ''-ê'' (η) end in unless assimilated, such as ''simile'' ending in (the 'HAPPY' vowel).

In the words ''mihi , tibi, sibi'', by an old tradition, the final ''i'' was pronounced like final ''e'' above (i.e., as if spelled ''mihe, tibe, sibe'').

A late and purely academic pronunciation distinguished final ''-ā'' from -a by pronouncing the former like "long ''a''", : for instance, Oxford professor A. D. Godley rhymed ''Rusticā'' and "day". That this was not the usual pronunciation can be told from such forms as ''circa, infra, extra, in absentia, sub pœna'', all of which have an originally long final vowel: circā, sub pœnā, etc. This use is distinct from the older tradition (in use in the 17th-18th centuries) had made ''all'' final ''as "long", regardless of their Latin length.

Vowel before a consonant cluster

The second class consists of vowels followed by consonant clusters such as ''ns, nt, nx, ps, x''. In this class, the vowels are always short, except for ''u'', which may be reduced to .

Vowel before a single consonant

The third class consists of vowels followed by the consonants ''l, m, n, r, s, t''. The treatment of these endings is inconsistent. Generalizations include:
# All vowels are reduced before final ''r'' for : ''Cæsar, pauper, triumvir, Mentor, sulfur, martyr''.
# All vowels are reduced to before ''l'': ''tribunal, Babel, pugil, consul''.
# Except sometimes before ''t'', ''a'' is reduced to before any of this class of consonant: ''animal, memoriam, titan, atlas''.
# All instances of ''u'' are reduced to before any of this class of consonant: ''consul, dictum, locus''.

The remaining endings are: ''-at, -em, -en, -es, -et, -im, -is, -it, -on, -os, -ot''. Of these, ''-em, -im, -is, -it, -on, -ot'' have two possible pronunciations, one with a short vowel and one with . Final ''-es'' and ''-ies'' are alike pronounced . Final ''-eus'', when derived from Greek -ευς ''-eus'' (as in Proteus) rather than from -εος ''-eos'' with the ''-os'' changed to ''-us'' in Latin, may be pronounced as a single syllable with a diphthong (), or as two syllables with a long (though unstressed) ''e'' followed by ''-us'' (). However, even when pronounced as two syllables, ''-eus'' counts as a single syllable for the purpose of determining vowel length – that is, the syllable preceding the ''-eus'' ending is considered the penult, just as happens in derivatives ending in ''-ian'' – though the placement of the stress shifts. E.g. Ἰλιονεύς ''Īlioneus'' .

* The vowel of ''-is, -it'' is a " schwi". It generally conflates with in RP and with schwa in Australia.

This last pronunciation of ''-os'' is the expected one; however, in the masculine accusative plural, where the ending is historically -ōs, the academic prescription was the pronunciation . Such an ending is not found in English loan words or proper names.

Adjectives in ''-an'' and ''-ic''

English adjectives formed from Greek and Latin roots often end in a suffix ''-an'' or ''-ic'' added to the oblique stem, sometimes retaining a preceding thematic vowel. These produce generally predictable sound changes in the stem though, depending on its source or simply due to confusion, English ''-ean'' may be either stressed or unstressed. The first derives from the Latin adjectival suffix ''-ānus'', though it has far wider application in English than in Latin. (''Pythian'', for example, translates the Latin adjective ''Pythius''.) The other suffix, ''-ic'', derives from the Greek adjectival suffix -ικος ''-ĭkos''.R.W. Chapman (1934) ''Adjectives from Proper Names''. Clarendon Press, pp 54–55.

The fact that these suffixes are added to the oblique stem is relevant with words of the third declension whose stems end in a consonant that alters or disappears in the nominative case, as is apparent in such English noun–adjective pairs as Pallas ~ Palladian, Mars ~ Martian, Venus ~ Venerian, and indeed from non-adjectival derivatives of these words such as 'palladium'. Some roots have more than one oblique stem, in which case they may have more than one adjectival form in English.

;Stressed vowel plus -an and unstressed -ian
The forms of these suffixes depends on the first vowel of the nominal suffix in Latin or Greek. The resulting forms are carried over into Latin from Greek, and into English from Latin. English adjectives in -ean, where the ''e'' is inherited from the Greek, are stressed on the suffix, but there are also adjectives in -ean where the ''e'' originates in Latin, and those are not stressed.

For example,
*Greek ''Samos'' > adjective ''Samios'' > Latin ''Samius'' > English 'Sā́mian'
*Greek ''Periklēs'' > adjective ''Perikleios'' > Latin ''Periclēus'' > English 'Pericléan'
*Greek ''Lēda'' > adjective ''Lēdaios'' > Latin ''Lēdæus'' > English 'Ledaean' or 'Ledéan'
*Greek noun and adjective ''Ptolemaios'' > Latin ''Ptolemæus'' > English 'Ptolemaean'
*Greek ''Argō'' > adjective ''Argōos'' > Latin ''Argōus'' > English 'Argóan'
*Greek ''Sapphō'' > adjective ''Sapphōios'' > Latin ''Sapphōius'' > English 'Sapphóian'

Because the ''i'' of the suffix -ian makes an exception to the usual shortening of antepenultimate vowels, forms such as 'Samian' above are pronounced with a long stressed vowel.

Many Greek nouns ending in ''-o-'' take adjectives like those ending in ''-ē-'' instead, and some may take either form, in which case there may be two adjectives in English. An example is ''Sisyphus'':
*Greek ''Sīsyphos'' > adjective ''Sīsyphios'' > Latin ''Sīsyphius'' > English 'Sisýphian'
* (or, alternatively) > adjective ''Sīsypheios'' > Latin ''Sīsyphēus'' > English 'Sisyphéan'

In the opposite direction, ''ē''-vowel ''Aristotelēs'' produces 'Aristotḗlian' alongside expected 'Aristoteléan'.

The final iota subscript in Greek feminine words ending in -ῳ ''-ōi'' is frequently omitted in Latin, – if an 'i' appears in English it may be taken directly from the Greek, – but words that end in plain -ω ''-ō'' in Greek may also have Greek adjectives in ''-ōios'' if the 'i' was historically present.

;Unstressed -ean
There is another suffix spelled -ean in English, but this one unstressed. It corresponds to the unstressed Latin adjectival suffix ''-ĕus'' and does not derive from Greek. An example is Latin ''Herculēs'' > Latin adj. ''Herculĕus'' > English 'Hercúlean', alongside Greek ''Hēraklēs'' > Greek adj. ''Hērakleios'' > Latin ''Hēraclēus/Hēraclīus'' > English 'Heracléan'. The stress assignment of the 'Herculean' has been affected by 'Heraclean' (or perhaps simply by the ambiguity of having two suffixes spelled '-ean'), so the mixed form 'Herculéan' is now also heard.

;Adjectives in -ic
The Greek suffix -ικος ''-ĭkos'' replaces the vowels of nominal endings apart from retaining ''a'' or ''ō'', which will be stressed in English. Stress assignment (and the corresponding vowel quality) of English follows the Latin, as though the suffix were ''-icus'' in English as well and the last syllable of the stem were the antepenult when it English it's actually the penult. Thus English 'Homeric' is pronounced with a short stressed penultimate ''e'', when in other English words from Latin an ''e'' in that position would be pronounced long. (Cf. ''botanic'', which has the same stressed 'a' and same vowel quality as ''botanical''.)

For example,
*Greek ''Homēros'' > adjective ''Homērikos'' > Latin ''Homēricus'' > English 'Homĕ́ric'
*Greek ''Aristotelēs'' > adjective ''Aristotelikos'' > Latin ''Aristotelicus'' > English 'Arístotĕ́lic'
*Greek ''Alkaios'' > adjective ''Alkaikos'' > Latin ''Alcaicus'' > English 'Alcáic'
*Greek ''hērōs'' > adjective ''hērōikos'' > Latin ''hērōicus'' > English 'heróic'
*Greek ''ēchō'' > adjective ''ēchōikos'' > Latin ''ēchōicus'' > English 'echóic'

Thus 'Aristotelian' is pronounced with a long ''e'', but 'Aristotelic' with a short ''e''.

A number of Greek nouns ending in ''ē'' (which historically is a long ''ā'') form adjectives in -aic, such as 'Cyrenaic' (Greek ''Kȳrēnē'' > adj. ''Kȳrēnaikos'' > Latin ''Cȳrēnaicus'').

History

Latin as traditionally pronounced by English speakers is part of the living history of spoken Latin through medieval French into English.

Three stages of development of Anglo-Latin can thus be distinguished:

Note: The English pronunciation of Latin varies with accent as much as English itself, as the two's phonological systems are inseparably connected. For convenience's sake, the list below will end with approximately a received pronunciation accent. As the traditional pronunciation of Latin has evolved alongside English since the Middle Ages, the page detailing English's phonological evolution from Middle English (in this case, from the Middle-English-Latin pronunciation roughly midway through the 1400-1600 section) can give a better idea of what exactly has happened, and this is just an overview.

Stage I

Latin from the period when its orthography and grammar became standardized through to the pronunciation changes of Late Latin, while it was still a living language. Changes that took place in this period included:
* the merger of ''f'' and ''ph'' as
* the change in pronunciation of ''v'' (formerly ) to and of ''j'' (formerly ) to .
* the merger of ''i'' and ''y'' as
* the merger of ''e, æ'' and ''œ'' as
* the change of non-initial, unstressed, prevocalic and to
* the loss of distinctions of vowel length (merger of all long and short vowels)
* the palatalization of ''t'' to before

Stage II

Latin spoken in the context of Gallo-Romance and French from approximately the 6th to the 11th-12th centuries. During this period, Latin became a primarily written language, separated from the ordinary spoken language of the people. While it escaped many of the changes of pronunciation and grammar of Gallo-Romance, it did share a few of the changes of the spoken language. This was for the most part a period of stability.
Changes in this period included:
* the palatalization of ''c'' and ''g'' to and before front vowels
* the voicing of intervocalic ''s'' to
* the fronting of ''u'' to
* the restoration (based on spelling) of the vowels and from

Stage III

Latin spoken in the context of English from the 11th/12th centuries to the present. This last stage provides the greatest and most complicated number of changes. It starts with the displacement of the native pronunciation of Latin under the Anglo-Saxon kings with that used in the north of France, around the time of the Norman conquest in 1066. The English and French pronunciations of Latin were probably identical down to the 13th century, but subsequently Latin as spoken in England began to share in specifically English sound changes. Latin, thus naturalized, acquired a distinctly English sound, increasingly different from the pronunciation of Latin in France or elsewhere on the Continent.

Some phases of development in this third stage can be reconstructed:

1200–1400

* The adaptation of the French sounds to English:
** was substituted for . (The French sound changed at about the same time; however, Anglo-Latin did not share related French simplifications such as > .)
** the vowels were given the values ''a'' , ''e'' , ''i'' , ''o'' , ''u''
** was substituted for in closed syllables, eg lux > . did ''not'' substitute out as in unstressed open syllables, as it would have if the distinction was solely length based: ''saeculum''
** At some point in the Middle English period, the distinctly French vowel was substituted with the English diphthong . It is unclear when exactly this happened, and may have always been the English pronunciation of French (and consequently Latin) ''u''.
* Stressed open penultimate vowels were lengthened, creating the short/long contrasts:
::''a'' :, ''e'' (also ''ae'', ''oe'') :, ''i'' (also ''y'') :, ''o'' :, ''u'' :

1400–1600

* Merger of unstressed open with
* Non-syllable-initial, unstressed, prevocalic became (a change almost identical to that of Late Latin)
* Lengthening of the first of two vowels in hiatus
* Lengthening of ''e'' , ''i'' , or ''o'' in pretonic initial syllables
* Diphthongization of to
* Lengthening of vowels in open syllables before in the next syllable
* Raising of and to and .
* Degemination of geminate consonants
* Palatalization of and before
* Fronting of to

1600–1800

* Monophthongization of ''ai'' to and ''au'' to
* Change of to (later > ) in many words, restoring original syllabicity.
* Change of fronted ''u'' () to
* Palatalization of before (usually unstressed) (later > )
* Lowering (and unrounding in the case of ) of short , to ,
* Tensing of short ''e'' to
* Former long ''i'' becomes
* Fronting and raising of short ''a'' , long ''a'' , and long ''e'' to , creating the new contrasts: ''a'' : , ''e'' :, ''i'' :, ''o'' :
* Beginning of vowel reductions to .
* Short ''e'', ''i'' and ''u'' before R; i.e. , and are all merged to . (the NURSE merger)
* Short ''a'' is lowered and lengthened before ''r'' in a closed syllable, ultimately reaching modern

1800–2020

* Breaking of and to diphthongs and , and then laxing to and the latter further to
* In non-rhotic accents, syllable-final ''r'' becomes a vowel . The vowel-R sequences simplify somewhat: ''arC'' > , ''orC'' > , ''erC, irC, urC'' > .
* Continued reduction of unstressed vowels to .
* Shortening of ''a'' in a stressed open penult syllable, e.g., data (not for all speakers)

Other languages

A similar situation occurred in other regions, where the pronunciation of the local language influenced the pronunciation of Latin, eventually being replaced with reconstructed classical pronunciation. In German-speaking areas, traditional Germanized pronunciation of Latin is discussed at Deutsche Aussprache des Lateinischen , with reconstructed classical pronunciation at Schulaussprache des Lateinischen .

References in literature

In Rattigan's play '' Separate Tables'' the following conversation takes place between Major Pollock, who has been lying about his background, and Mr Fowler, a retired schoolmaster:
:Pollock: . . . Still, those days are past and gone. Eheu fugaces, Postume, Postume.
:Fowler: ''(Correcting his accent)'' Eheu fugaces, Postume, Postume. Didn't they teach you the new pronunciation at Wellington?
:Pollock: No. The old.
:Fowler: When were you there?
:Pollock: Now, let's think. It must have been nineteen eighteen I went up—
:Fowler: But they were using the new pronunciation then, I know. . . .

In '' Goodbye, Mr. Chips'', Chips says: "Well, I—umph—I admit that I don't agree with the new pronunciation. I never did. Umph—a lot of nonsense, in my opinion. Making boys say 'Kickero' at school when— umph—for the rest of their lives they'll say 'Cicero'—if they ever—umph—say it at all. And instead of 'vicissim'— God bless my soul—you'd make them say, 'We kiss 'im'! Umph— umph!"

In a fictional case ''Rex v. Venables and Others'' in A. P. Herbert's ''Uncommon Law'', after a barrister uses phrases such as "ooltrah weerayze" ( ultra vires) and "preemah fakiay" ( prima facie) with the new Classics pronunciation he was taught at school, the Lord Chief Justice says "You are not to be blamed, Mr. Wick. But I am bound to make it clear to you, to the rest of your gallant generation and to the generations that come after, that His Majesty's judges will not permit the speaking of the Latin tongue after that fashion in the King's Courts. I cannot hear you, Mr. Wick, for the very good reason that I cannot understand you. We are using different languages. ... The bitter conclusion is, Mr. Wick, that you must go away and learn to pronounce the Latin tongue correctly, according to the immemorial practice of your profession."

Sources

* Andrews, E. A., and S. Stoddard, 1836. ''Grammar of the Latin Language for the Use of Schools and Colleges.'' This popular Latin grammar printed toward the end of the period when Anglo-Latin pronunciation was still commonly taught in schools, devotes a section to the rules of the pronunciation. While somewhat scattershot in its approach, it reveals several otherwise inaccessible details of the traditional pronunciation.
* Mainly devoted to establishing the authenticity of Anglo-Latin against the claims of the Italianate pronunciation.
* Campbell, Frederick Ransom, 1888. ''The Language of Medicine.'' Chapter II, pp. 58–64 describes the pronunciation used in late 19th-century scientific and medical Latin.
*. History and advice on singing Latin written or performed in the British Isles, France, Germany, Italy, Spain and Portugal.
* Dobson, E. J., ed., 1957. ''The Phonetic Writings of Robert Robinson.'' Includes a phonetic transcription of a Latin poem representing the English pronunciation of Latin c. 1617, the direct ancestor of the later Anglo-Latin pronunciation.
*
*Owen, Andrew
''Pronouncing the Pater Noster in Modern English Latin''
taken from Copeman (1992) page 279
*
* Robinson, D. H., revised by Hannah Oliver, 1903. ''The Latin Grammar of Pharmacy and Medicine.'' Chapter I, pp. 7–11, describe the pronunciation of pharmaceutical and medical Latin.
*
* Sturmer, Julius William, 1908. ''Rudiments of Latin.'' pp. 9–17 describe early 20th-century scientific Latin pronunciation.
* Although this handbook is mostly devoted to establishing the position of the accent in Classical names used in English, it also includes an essay setting out some of the rules and regularities in the Anglo-Latin pronunciation.
* The Westminster Schoolbr>pronunciation of Latin
re
Charles Low reads the Election Dinner graces
/ref>
Perseus Greek and Latin dictionaries
The most complete Greek and Latin dictionaries available online, they include the entire 9th edition of Liddell & Scott's '' A Greek–English Lexicon.'' Greek headwords use the following conventions to remedy the defective orthography for vowels: ''α^ ι^ υ^'' for short ''α ι υ'' (adapted to Latin as ''ă ĭ y̆'') and ''α_ ι_ υ_'' for long ''α ι υ'' (adapted to Latin as ''ā ī ȳ'').

See also

* Law Latin

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Traditional English Pronunciation Of Latin
Forms of Latin
English phonology