What kind of means do we have of ascertaining whether Latin words like mortuus and lituus were dissyllabic or trisyllabic? We are taught they are trisyllabic, exiguus and assiduus being by the same token tetrasyllabic. As dissyllabic and trisyllabic, respectively, they would thus be mortvus, litvus, exigvus and assidvus. Or was there vacillation in Latin on this point? Words ending in -quus, like equus and antīquus, surely do not belong here but merely have the qu digraph for labiovelar.
Then there is quattuor. Here again we are taught it’s trisyllabic, not dissyllabic. On what grounds?
(1) Latin phonology, more specifically phonotactics, which put restrictions on consonant clusters. (2) Meter, e.g. passer mortuus est, iam litui strepunt, saepe exiguus mus.
Thank you, mwh. I was a little fooled by metrics, since many forms of lituus would work both as dissyllabic and trisyllabic, forming the thesis of either dactyl or spondee. But then I searched for mortuus in Virgil in Perseus, which said that V. uses mortuus only twice in his extant corpus (one would expect many more on basis of his content, right?), in ecl. 3,15 (et si non aliqua nocuisses, mortuus esses) and in Aen. 8,485 (Mortua quin etiam iungebat, corpora uiuis).
What are generally the restrictions (if any) of using metrics in reconstructing Latin phonetics? Do poets use force to fit words in the metre, or can we rely on poetry? I don’t have De Vaan’s etymological dictionary at hand at the moment, but I do vaguely remember that on one of the neutre words ending in -u (like gelu) he claimed that metrics cannot be trusted in ascertaining whether u is long or short (I missed the reasoning behind, unfortunately).
Could you please elaborate on phonotactics here? That e.g. [w] is not met after [t]? I’m a little concerned about circular reasoning here, reconstructing Latin phonotactics from poetry, then using this for it.
Do you know any commendable Latin reverse dictionaries? It might be fun to collect a few of these -uus words.
The examples I offered were just what came into my head, from wellknown poems. The first two in aeolochoriambic meters requiring two shorts in that position (Catullus and Horace, Od.2.1?), the third from the end of a Vergilian hexameter in a phrase where a spondee would be intolerable. There must be no end of others.
mortuus in Vergil: I guess pathos is better served by moriturus than by mortuus. But both instances settle your question. When you come up with an idea you should see if anything disproves it.
Big questions about phonetics and metre, too big for me to tackle here. Basically they’re complementary. And Latin poets have very limited prosodic licence. A reasonable point in principle about risk of circular argument, but as for phonotactics you can look for other consonants after dentals for example. And empirically, if there’s nowhere –uus is necessarily monosyllabic, and many where it’s necessarily disyllabic, that’s probative enough. There are morphological considerations too. But I should make it clear I’m no linguist.
Sorry, I know of Greek reverse dictionaries but not Latin.
Thank you so much, Michael. Your words have been most useful for me. I had to be aduocatus diaboli for a moment, to better see if there are any flaws in our perceptions. I shall have to acquaint myself more profoundly with the intricacies of Latin phonotactics, possibly by reading Leumann’s Grammatik. There could even be newer works of that scope.
Shame about Latin reverse dictionaries. I thought there was no stone unturned in Latin studies.
Yes Leumann will probably give you what you need on phonotactics, at least implicitly. Just don’t expect it to be called Phonotaktik!
I didn’t mean there are no Latin reverse dictionaries. There may well be, but I wouldn’t know of them. Latin’s not really my thing. The only Latin dictionary I use is the OLD (occasionally L&S, plus the TLL for the really serious stuff). But you should be able to make your own easily enough. All it takes is a simple sorting program that even I could write.
But both instances settle your question. When you come up with an idea you should see if anything disproves it.