Forgive me if this has already been asked, but I’ve long wondered about the (now obsolete) standard – if it was a standard – of using diacritics – primarily the circumflex accent – in Latin texts.
It is something that I have seen in very old Latin textbooks I have found in used bookstores. It seems to have been the standard in the 19th century and earlier.
There are only two patterns I have been able to discern from these texts:
- The circumflex is used over any vowel preceding a consonantal “i”. For instance, “mâior” or “cûius”. This is a practice that is preserved in the most recent edition of Allen and Greenough’s New Latin Grammar (revised and edited by Professor Anne Mahoney of Tufts University). This practice is clearly intended to call attention to the fact that the -i- glide in words such as these is actually pronounced twice in these words. That is, it’s “mai-ior” (or “mae-jor” or however you prefer to spell it), and not “ma-ior”, and it’s “cooey-yus”, not “coo-yus” (to fall back on English spelling for the phonetics
).
- The circumflex is used over a final “-a” when that vowel is long. Perhaps only specifically when it represents the ablative singular ending of a first-declension noun, as in magnâ cum laude
- The circumflex also seems to be used in some situations where a consonant has been omitted (precisely its use in modern French (a remarkable fact which is decipherable only by those who know the etymology of the French words or perhaps their cognates in other Romance languages: e.g. the circumflex in même represents the lost “s” [the letter “s” seems to account for the bulk – if not perhaps the entirety – of the ommited letters represented by the circumflex in French] that can still be seen in Spanish mismo). I can’t off the top of my head think of an example for sure, but I vaguely seem to remember that, for instance, the preposition ad sometimes shows up as simply â in some of these old texts. I think there may be other abbreviations employing the circumflex that I have seen, but I can’t remember any.
I don’t remember whether any diacritics other than the circumflex are used (At the moment, I can’t think of any examples, but I would guess that the diaeresis would also be used – as in Greek – to identify a sequence of vowels that would normally form a diphthong but are to be pronounced separately: but if so, then I would imagine that this practice would still be in use today, and not obsolete like that of the circumflex, so it’s not the same kind of thing I am talking about here.)
One of the things I found interesting about the circumflex was that it seemed somewhat arbitrary. When I first saw it used over an ablative, I thought maybe it was being used to mark length: but no, other long vowels are not so marked. It also seemed to be used, as I have mentioned, to mark the omission of a consonant that is normally written, or, in the case of words like maior to mark the omission of a consonant that is never written.
I also wonder how old this particular practice is. Does it date back to the middle ages? To the Renaissance? Is it only something that they did in, say, the 18th and 19th centuries? Frustratingly, I have never seen any mention of it in any of the (large number of) books I have on the history of writing, or of the alphabet, or concerning Latin and/or Greek paleography. There is a lot of stuff written about other complex ligatures and abbreviations that used to be commonplace, but I’ve seen nothing about accents in Latin, or why the circumflex persisted even into the early 20th century, when all the other ligatures and abbreviations had long since been abandoned.
Can anyone illuminate?
That’s a really fascinating topic, Iustaniane. I hope someone more knowledgeable than myself will be able to offer an explanation.
My feeling is that the circumflex may actually be a pronunciation diacritic, like the circumflex in Greek. This would be consistent with the classical pronunciation that I have construed thus far. I don’t know if anyone else has noticed, but I always found it rather hard to pronounce the final ‘ā’ of first declension nouns in their ablative forms with a fluidity that would pass into the next word. Then after spending time in Italy, I discovered, to my astonishment, that Italians seem to pronounce the final ‘a’ in a phrase like “in Francia” in a manner much longer if they simply stated “la Francia.” Specifically, there is a certain rising of pitch and holding of the vowel for at least a doubled length at the end of “in Francia,” not unlike a Greek circumflex, that occurs only when these feminine Italian words are in a construction that in Latin would be ablative. It’s truly remarkable. It’s entirely possible that the ingrained trends of Latin speech have remained in Italian (most of the other long vowels have, so I don’t see why not), and Italians continue to do as the Romans did. I’ll have to do more research on this trend this fall to see how widespread it is.
It is quite telling that Italians do not use macrons to denote long vowels in their Latin, yet still understand and read the classical poetry with as much skill as anyone (excepting certain elements of Ecclesiastical pronunciation which are so brutto).
It’s entirely possible that the ingrained trends of Latin speech have remained in Italian (most of the other long vowels have, so I don’t see why not), and Italians continue to do as the Romans did.
Which goes to show you, when in Rome, do as the Romans did.
David
I don’t mean to be pushy, but is there no one who has any insight into this matter? This subject has been in my head for days, and I anxiously await the wisdom of anyone who might clarify the usage and purpose of these circumflex accents in Latin.
I don’t mean to be pushy, but is there no one who has any insight into this matter? This subject has been in my head for days, and I anxiously await the wisdom of anyone who might clarify the usage and purpose of these circumflex accents in Latin.
Aside from what skewed logic I might have to profer on the subject of Latin and Greek diacritics, I can only offer my own recollections of what professors have told me in the past.
Someone please, correct me if I’m wrong, but it seems as though the entire system of diacritical use has been an academic interjection to make classical texts more ‘user friendly;’ at least insofar as the determination between similiar homonyms are concerned. In any advanced classical text - outside of the early 19th century retranslations are concerned- authors tend to disclude diacritics as well as macrons under the pretext that the reader is able to discern the pronuncatorial (is that a word?) differences betwixt words based entirely on context - which, as native readers of similiar texts, we are readily able to do.
Take into account that my academic knowledge of Greek, and its lilting circumflexes are not as keen as my (limited) knowledge of Latin - but take for example modern Cantonese or Mandarin:
Many words with the same basic phoneme structure take entirely different shapes based on -what could logically be construed as similiar to- a modern take on the Latin/Greek diacritic, however, there is no vowel/dipthong differentiating by diacritic marks; it’s just a known thing based on context.
Since my first classes in Greek and Latin, I’ve always hated it when the professor asks, “How do we know this is what this word means?” and everyone rejoins, “Context!” - I’m sure you’ve all encountered this. However, there is a definite truth to the matter, no matter the extent of the cliche.
Personally, I’m waiting for Whiteoctave’s imminent rejoinder to the initial question.
-FV