Pronunciation in the Latin course

[owainlurch]

Hard “C” in the Welsh words taken from Latin as well

[louis]

“cist” being a good example, English “chest”:

[owainlurch]

Mind you, I do remember reading somewhere, somewhere I can’t remember or find now, that Latin in Britain was thought of as being spoken in a comparatively formal or old fashioned style. A little like English in India, if you see what I mean. Without references this means little, of course! Latin was pronounced differently in different areas over different times. The Roman Empire covered a huge area over a very long time.

[louis]

Latin in Britain

I would like to find a comparative study of the influence of Latin on Welsh vs. Latin influence on another language, say Dutch - not English, because that suffered a few consonant and vowel shifts over the centuries. Failing that, I’ll do one myself

[tygerc]

I briefly listened some of the first lesson and it sounded horribly English to me…

I’ve never studied Latin but I’ve heard the Finnish version of the classical pronunciation and it’s different.

[louis]

You’re lucky, you have the Nuntii Latini on radio

[tygerc]

Heh, yes we do. But you can listen it on the web. I think.

[mikeellwood]

Hardly “new”. I only became aware of “other” pronunciations after 6 years of rigorous but enjoyable Latin lessons at my school in Aberdeen (ergo 1962).“weni, widi, wici” and “Caesar” (kye zar) still sound normal and natural to me.

When I first had the pleasure of singing in Bach’s Mass in B Minor and heard my fellow choristers singing “Pleni sunt Chaylee” instead of Pleni sunt coeli (to rhyme closely with “coyly”), I thought they were “avin’ a laugh”. I soon concluded that I had to learn another version (which I still call church Latin). My revered Latin master, “Hoot” Gibson, would be turning in his grave.

Well yes, “new” was very much written in quotation marks and spoken with an invisible tongue in cheek. However, my experience was the opposite of yours…our Latin was all taught by RC priests or brothers and so I presume they automatically used “Church Latin”. (And of course we got another dose of the same pronunciation in church until the changes in the liturgy in the 1960s). I did not come across the “weni - weedy - weechy” pronunciation until years later.

[HuwJones]

weechy

Did I say “weechy”? - I meant “weeky”
Good to hear about your mirror image experience.
The moral we can draw from this whole thread might be “Latin should be seen and not heard”

[mikeellwood]

Did I say “weechy”? - I meant “weeky”

Apologies Huw: I appear to have made that one up…

The moral we can draw from this whole thread might be “Latin should be seen and not heard”

[Courtenay]

For anyone who’s interested, there’s a short (and quite amusing) video on YouTube:
What Latin Sounded Like — And How We Know

(And yes, it seems Caesar really would have said “Wayny, Weedy, Weaky”. )

[HuwJones]

And yes, it seems Caesar really would have said “Wayny, Weedy, Weaky”

Never doubted it.