Re: Latin /j/ etc. (was: Latin <h>)
| From: | Ray Brown <ray.brown@...> |
|---|
| Date: | Thursday, January 15, 2004, 6:42 |
|---|
On Wednesday, January 14, 2004, at 06:28 PM, Benct Philip Jonsson wrote:
> At 21:08 12.1.2004, Ray Brown wrote:
>
>> Not Sardinian - but 'twas so in Romanian. Old French had [dZ]. One must
>> remember that intervocalic /j/ was always geminate in Latin, i.e. [jj].
>> It was a change from [jj] --> [dj], and confusions in spelling, {z} ~
>> {di}
>> ~ {i} show the change going on in the 2nd & 3rd cents. CE.
>
> What do you think of the hypothesis that the spelling
> MAGIS represented /majjis/ even in classical times?
Not much :)
The geminated [jj] meant that syllable preceding intervocalic {i} is heavy,
irrespective of its vowels, so, e.g. in verse the first syllable of 'eius'
and 'maior' are heavy. The first syllable of 'magis' is light, showing
that:
- the /a/ is short, and
- /g/ is not geminate.
Also we have the testimony of the Romancelangs; French 'mais' and Spanish
'más' cannot derive from [majjIs]. *
* 'magis' [adv.] = more, rather. The Spanish meaning continues the first
Latin
meaning; the French (= 'but') is derived from the second.
Ray
===============================================
http://home.freeuk.com/ray.brown
ray.brown@freeuk.com (home)
raymond.brown@kingston-college.ac.uk (work)
===============================================
"A mind which thinks at its own expense will always
interfere with language." J.G. Hamann, 1760
Replies