Re: Morae (was: Re: Lurkers, poetic forms)

On Thu, 27 Apr 2000, Raymond Brown wrote:

> At 12:13 pm -0600 26/4/00, dirk elzinga wrote:
> [....]
> >
> >Perhaps its just my training, but I don't see a real difference
> >between the Latin accentuation based on syllable weight and the
> >Greek system based on vowel length (in principles, not
> >particulars!). If a vowel is long, the syllable containing it is
> >heavy. The difference is purely if a language exercises the
> >moraic coda option, which Latin did, and Greek didn't.
>
> ...but Greek did!
[snipped]

Thanks for the clarification, Ray! It seems unusual to me that a
metrical system would be based on different acoustic and formal
cues than the accentuation system; I am frankly fascinated--I
just may have to sit in on some Greek courses and finish up the
year of Classical Greek I started as an undergrad (my wife and I
are already planning on working through a Latin textbook this
summer "just for fun").

> My regret is that by using the term 'mora' _both_ as a measurement of
> syllabic weight in verse rhythm _and_ as a measure of vowel length in
> determing the permitted position of pitch accent in ancient Greek, the old
> confusions have been resurrected under a different form.
Yes. I hope that I haven't unwittingly contributed to the
confusion for list members! However, I still think it would be
useful to maintain a uniform vocabulary when discussing
accentuation systems since accentuation systems across languages
seem to be built on the same principles. If 'mora' isn't the
appropriate term for countable units relevant to accentuation,
then something else should be.

Dirk

--
Dirk Elzinga
dirk.elzinga@m.cc.utah.edu