34
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Why does Latin have five different noun declensions?
The different declensions started in Proto-Indo-European. Latin regularized and simplified them, giving the five somewhat-regular patterns you're familiar with.
PIE nouns came in a few different types:...
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27
votes
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Rhotacism: why?
It's often difficult to say "why" a sound change happened, so I'll focus on your other questions. Rhotacism in Latin happened via a series of sound changes. It only affected inherited *s in specific ...
- 27.3k
24
votes
Rhotacism: why?
Introduction and Definition
Why questions in linguistics are the hardest because we can only speculate. That being said, there is plenty of evidence to make an educated guess.
Lundquist 2016 defines ...
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23
votes
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Why do we say that an ablative absolute has a participle?
The ablative absolute does not require a participle. It can be a noun and an adjective, as you say, or two nouns (Caesare duce urbem cepimus), or even an adjective and an accusative with infinitive (...
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23
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Did Latin have the same gender labels that the Romance languages have?
Yes, Latin had a distinction between masculine and feminine nouns (and also a third category, "neuter"). This didn't always correspond to biology—homo "human" is always masculine, ...
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20
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Why does the ablative case also include the locative?
There is a locative case in Proto-Indo-European, but in many later languages it merged into other cases, Slavonic languages being an exception. (So Slavonic didn't invent the locative case.)
Old ...
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20
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When and why did the ablative form?
The Latin ablative case represents a merger of three earlier Proto-Indo European (PIE) cases: the ablative (sometimes referred to as the 'from' case, because it was used to express ideas of source, ...
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19
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Are the names of these months realistic?
In addition to the familiar September–December, there were two more numerically named months before they were renamed in early imperial era: Quintilis and Sextilis.
These should definitely go to your ...
- 111k
18
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When did “c” before “e” or “i” start to be pronounced as [ts] (in contrast to classical [k])?
This pronunciation change was underway by the fifth century, but perhaps not finalized until the sixth or seventh.
Paul M. Lloyd, in From Latin to Spanish, writes:
There is no inscriptional ...
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18
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When did 'ph' start to be pronounced like 'f'?
It's impossible to pinpoint an exact date, but there is evidence. As usual, Vox Graeca or Sihler's New Comparative Grammar is where to look.
The earliest inscription we have of a Greek phi ...
cmw♦
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17
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When did the consonant U (i.e., V) begin to be pronounced as the fricative [v] instead of [w]?
There is indeed evidence for the u-consonant being pronounced as a voiced fricative during the Classical period, even as early as the middle of the 1st century. A wax tablet dated to AD 39 records a ...
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17
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Is there a relationship between the phonology in Old Latin and later Vulgar Latin?
Almost everything in Romance languages that comes from Old Latin passed through Classical Latin.
u/o changes
In the case of u/o, it's probably a coincidence that some Old Latin o corresponds to ...
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16
votes
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When did the latin alphabet become bicameral?
Ancient and late antique scripts
Roman cursive was sometimes mixed indiscriminately with Roman square capitals:
There was no difference in meaning between upper case and lower case letters. The ...
- 1,223
16
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What is the first text considered Italian instead of Latin?
According to the Handbook of Medieval Culture (Albrecht Classen, vol. 2):
The first written evidence considered to be Italian rather than Latin is known as the Placiti Cassinesi, which are four ...
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16
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Where do the plurals of locus come from?
As usual, to answer this question we need to step into our comparative linguistics-fueled time machine and go back to Proto-Indo-European times, so we can see what function the ending -a, which we ...
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15
votes
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Does any historical Latin-based sign language exist?
This is a fascinating question which taught me several new things about Roman culture!
The extent to which we can answer this question affirmatively depends heavily on how we define "sign language." ...
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15
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Does Latin have a mechanism to disambiguate possessive pronouns of the same gender referring to distinct persons?
Two key mechanisms of disambiguation come to mind:
Using hic (latter) and ille (former) is one way. Simple example: "A and B meet. The former eats, the latter drinks." — A et B conveniunt. Ille ...
- 111k
15
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When and why did the ablative form?
This is a very abbreviated answer, which I will intend to expand on in the future (unless others get in there before me). The short answer is that the ablative didn't replace any earlier case - it ...
- 4,678
15
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Did Latin change less over time as compared to other languages?
Blame Cicero!
Note the last line of that quote, about "authors of inferior Latinity". In other words, this isn't about the Latin language in general, but is about Latinity—the quality of ...
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14
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Old vs Classical latins
Old Latin bears the same kind of relationship to Classical Latin as English of, a few centuries ago does to modern English. The oldest Old Latin texts we have, unless I'm remembering incorrectly, are ...
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14
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Remnants of the dual number
The -ī of vīgintī "20" is originally a dual ending, the same one as in frēnī (PIE *-ih₁). This is why the ending of vīgintī is different from that of the other tens (trīgintā etc.)
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14
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When did the silencing of 'h' start?
Before the late Republic
Already in Republican inscriptions we find people leaving off H's, as in Oratia for Horatia, or adding them where they don't belong, as in havet for avet. During this time, ...
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13
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Which verbs have reduplicated perfect stems?
Since you’re asking about reduplicated perfect (and not reduplicated present, as in bibo < *pi-ph3-e or sero < si-sh1-e, Weiss 2009: 405), I will try to address perfect formation only.
One of ...
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13
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When did “c” before “e” or “i” start to be pronounced as [ts] (in contrast to classical [k])?
Sturtevant, The Pronunciation of Greek and Latin, says of the change in pronunciation of C before front vowels (p. 167): "The epigraphical evidence of this change is not abundant enough to inspire ...
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13
votes
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Why sequundus > secundus?
Secundus is regular, eqvus isn't
There's a sound change called the "Boukólos Rule", which started back in Proto-Indo-European. When labiovelar consonants (like /kʷ/ and /gʷ/) appeared next ...
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12
votes
Relationship between early Latin and Greek?
Do not confuse relations of languages with relations of writing systems.
Both Latin and Greek descended from PIE in oral form, prior to the introduction of (a preserved and widely used) writing ...
- 111k
12
votes
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Relationship between early Latin and Greek?
Latin and Greek share a common ancestor, Proto-Indo-European, which scholars believe was spoken in the 4th millennium BC or earlier, and then began diverging into separate languages by 3500 BC. Many ...
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12
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Why does "e" occur in forms of 'vōs' but not 'nōs'?
Yes, the forms of vōs did originally resemble those of nōs. But there was a sound change in Latin whereby the sequence vo became ve; this is an example of dissimilation. Apparently this only occurred ...
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11
votes
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Why do fear clauses invert the meaning of ut and ne?
It is most natural (to me at least) to see ut/ne clauses corresponding to wishes as independent.
A couple of examples should make this idea clear:
Timeo, ne veniat. > Timeo. Ne veniat! > I fear. May ...
- 111k
11
votes
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How is the supine related to the derived fourth declension noun?
Remember than infinitives are “typically frozen case-forms” of verbal nouns (Fortson 2010: 107; see also Weiss 2009: 445). So, in several IE branches (Balto-Slavic, Indo-Iranian and Italic), there is ...
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