Re: Optimum number of symbols

Thomas R. Wier <trwier@...> wrote:

>Quoting "Mike S." <mcslason@...>:
>
>> Nik Taylor <fortytwo@...> wrote:
>>
>> >"Mike S." wrote:
>> >> IMO, written
>> >> ancient Greek and Latin both fall solidly into the category of
>> >> phonemic scripts, the occasional quirk or irregularity
notwithstanding.
>> >
>> >There were several contrasts not captured by the script.  For example,
>> >the Romans rarely marked long and short vowels, even tho it had the
>> >possibility, and Greek had no way of indicating certain vowel contrasts
>> >like (IIRC) /a/ and /a:/
>>
>> That was the one biggie.  In Latin, semivowels and <Q> if you want
>> to get picky.  Other than that, highly phonemic.
>
>Well, not really though.  One must remember that what we call "Latin"
>(the language as recorded by Caesar and Cicero) was a highly artificial
>language at the time that Cicero was giving orations in the Roman Senate.
Yes now that I think about it, I did leave several hundred years
of linguistic history out of the picture.  I had in mind the classical
version of Latin I learned in school, where semivowels are semivowels
and <c> and <g> are strictly velar stops.  I'm guessing it must have
been pretty close to phonemic up to, say, 100 or 200 BC at least.



>> The folks who standardized English orthography a few centuries
>> apparently were more concerned with pretending they were in ancient
>> Rome and Greece and Norman France than making English more efficient.
>
>But a few centuries ago, Ancient Greece and Rome  were in a
>very real sense much more a daily part of life for that (small)
>part of the population that was literate.
Yes I know.  :-) My statement was both facetious and oversimplified.
Having studied Latin for three years in highschool I have a great
appreciation of classical civilization.  It's remarkable and unfortunate,
I think, how little emphasis is placed these days on teaching even
some of the things that a few years ago anyone with an education
would have taken for granted.


Regards