Re: OT: What color is blond(e)? (was Re: anti-Sanskritism and more)

----- Original Message -----
From: Roger Mills
Sent: Monday, December 08, 2003 6:52 AM


> John Cowan wrote
> > Mark J. Reed scripsit:
> >
> > > Which means you were taught the "restored Classical" pronunciation of
> > > Latin - or possibly the Ecclesiastical, but I'm not sure how -ae is
> > > pronounced in the latter.
> >
> > In Eccl. Latin, ae = oe = long e; e.g. "caelum" [tSe:lum].
> >
> Aside from Latin class, most of my experience with Latin as She is Spoke
> comes from watching Christmas Eve Mass from St.Peter's, and recordings of
> liturgical works.
>
> Depending on the nationality of the choirs involved, one hears a variety of
> pronunciations, but yes, things like [Eks'tSelsis] ['tSe(:)li] and ['bone
> volun'tatsis] are general.  In some recording or other by a French choir, I
> noticed they were pronouncing "u" as [y] with fair regularity.
Ha! That's definitely Ecclesiastic (read: Italian) Latin. Btw, here in Ukraine
(as well as in Russia, AFAIK) we use so called "academic" (read: German)
pronunciation for Latin with no vowel length (since both Russian and Ukrainian
lack it). "Reconstructed Pronunciation" is used only by some posh scholars.
Anyway, the control phrase would sound (IIRC)
["glOrija in eks"tsEl_jsi.or "dE.i | in "tEr:am "paks h\O"minibus "bOne
vol_jun"tatis]

-- Yitzik