Re: an announcement...

Ed Heil wrote:
>
> >         Same for me with Latin in High School. I tried to pronounce right
> the
> > long vowels, but nobody cared.
>
> Oh, but it's the only way for Latin verse to have any audible
> structure whatsoever!  How can people not care?...
>
> Actually I learned to do long vowels by being taught how to scan the
> Aeneid.  We were never taught to pronounce long vowels when we were
> first learning the language (for me, that was in high school, when I
> was about 15), but when we started scanning verse it suddenly became
> very necessary.
>
        You know, in France, learning Latin (until the baccalaureate) was
simply to learn the grammar and some vocabulary. The goal of it was to
be able to translate a small text, knowing the trickiest parts of
grammar that it could involve, and then commenting the text (generally a
philosophical text). I never scanned a verse in my classes of Latin.

> > Moreover, the pronunciation of Latin we
> > are taught in French schools is very strange : the 's' is always
> > pronounced /s/, the diphtongs pronounced nearly seperating the vowels,
> > but the 'r' is pronounced like in French. Anyway, it is still better
> > than Latin taught to French pupils just 30 years ago (everything was
> > pronounced as in French, except that no consonnant was silent. So you
> > had 's' /z/ between vowels and 'ae' /e/).
>
> I understand that a hundred or so years ago, everyone pronounced
> Latin as if it was his or her native language, much the same as,
> according to Dave Barry, it is the custom of people in Miami, Florida
> to drive according to the traffic laws of their native country. :)
>
        :)

--
        Christophe Grandsire

        Philips Research Laboratories --  Building WB 145
        Prof. Holstlaan 4
        5656 AA Eindhoven
        The Netherlands

        Phone:  +31-40-27-45006
        E-mail: grandsir@natlab.research.philips.com