Can someone explain the change of gender in “duae ll…per unum l”? Quis mihi benignè explicabit cur sit distinctio generis in hâc commâ: “duae ll…per unum l”
Sic verto:
Labdacism they say is a fault in which the same letter is expressed too thinly by certain people or too broadly. And in fact both are faults of certain nations. For look, the Greeks make this sound slenderly. For instance, when they say “ille mihi dixit” the two l’s of the first syllable sound thus: as if that particular word would consist of one l. Others pronounce in the opposite way as follows: “ille meum comitatus iter”, and “illum ego per flammas eripui”, as to some extent there the sounds of the consonant [l] seem to mix, because it’s of very broad protraction [very broadly protracted]. The Roman tongue has a correction also by way of distinction in the following. For in one place more broadly, in another place more thinly it ought to be produced: more broadly when either b follows, as in albo; or c as in pulchro; or f as in adelfis; or g as in alga; or m as in pulmone; or p as in scalpro; more thinly however is preferred wherever a word is begun by it, as in lepore, lana, lupo; or where in the same word the prior syllable ends, and the following begins, with it, as “ille” and “Allia”.
Perhaps, “For instance, when they say ‘ille mihi dixit’ the first two ll syllables sound thus: as if that particular word would pause by means of one l”.
I find it a little difficult, my best advice would be to look at syllable as a nominative plural and perhaps ll as an apposition.
Thanks, Bretone. Maybe it’s a MS glitch given in Keil. Just found it given otherwise in this site, which is basically what you say. Gratias, Bretone. Fortassè est vitium manuscripti. Id aliter in hôc sito scribitur, ut modò inveni, quod simile eius quod dicis est.