Latin Language during and after the Late Antiquity. Originally: Pronounciation of Aetius

[✠Ikaroqx✠]

I pronounce it aye-shus, but I've also heard it pronounced 'aye-tee-oos'

[Magister Militum Flavius Aetius]

That is the correct pronunciation in english, "Aye-shus" and when pronouncing it in latin it is "aye-tee-oos."

[Diocle]

That is the correct pronunciation in english, "Aye-shus" and when pronouncing it in latin it is "aye-tee-oos."

The fact that you are not able to correctly pronounce the diphthong in words as 'saecula' it doesn't implies that ypur pronunciation of the same diphthong in Aetius is correct.

Listen to the 'Credo and learn the correct pronunciation of the Latin diphthong 'ae'.

But if you prefer the English-Latin, keep your 'Ayeteoos', who cares.

Anyway even the simple count of the large amount of the alphabetical letters you have to use for your 'Ayeteeoos' (9 vs 6)

and the observetion of difference between 'Ayeteeoos' and the simple Latin (and Italian) 'Aetius', it should tell you something about how distant are your sounds from the Latin sounds,

... but, ... but, ... but this only in the case you are interested in the Latin sounds, of course,

because if this is not your case, then who cares about Aetius and who cares about the old Latin Language at all!
So .... be happy and long life to Ayeteeoos!

Historical linguistics aside, thank you for the vids, Diocle. I've enjoyed listening to those Ecclessiastical Latin samples. Although, to be honest, I don't like the music. I may be touching some people's musical sensibilities (if so, I apologize), but I have never been fond of that Gregorian style. I know many people like it, but I'm not one of them.

Yes, you're right, the Gregorian Chant isn't the most easy kind of music, the text of the 'Venit Spiritus' is of the IX century, but the music is really hard to listen ... I've fully discovered the absolute beauty of the Gregorian Chant, many years ago, when I spent few days in the Convent de Saint Marie de La Turette, near Lyon:




The Convent is a masterpiece by the great Swiss/French Architect Le Corbusier,...
... ... so I was there for architectural reasons ... but in the Convent there are still the Dominican friars, and one day, early in the morning I listened their Gregorian Chant, and it was sipmly an astonishing, surprising and displacing experience, listening at that mesmerizing Latin medieval Chant, coming from nowhere deeply inside those modern abstract spaces ...
.... well: I saw the light!


Anyway another example of wonderful Gregorian Chant, the text is absolutely epical, and the music, ... the music forces you to sart a Crusade to free Jerusalem!

So, ladies and gentlemen, the wonderful ...'Dies Irae' .... in all its beauty!
Read while listening .....
('Irae' MMFA, simply 'Irae', not EEREY! anyway Evan, the text is very interesting for its poetic use of the words, its structure and the use of the 'future' and of the 'infinite future' that is not so common ....

"... Quantus tremor est futurus
Quando iudex est venturus,
Cuncta stricte discussurus!

Tuba mirum spargens sonum
Per sepulchra regionum
Coget omnes ante thronum.

Mors stupebit, et natura,
Cum resurget creatura
Iudicanti responsura.

Liber scriptus proferetur
In quo totum continetur
Unde mundus iudicetur.

Iudex ergo cum sedebit,
Quidquid latet apparebit:
Nil inultum remanebit.

Quid sum miser tunc dicturus,
Quem patronum rogaturus,
Cum vix iustus sit securus? ...."

.... a masterpiece!)

[Renatus]

I know that I am going over old ground but I think that it bears repeating. A good way of determining the sound of Latin is to see how it is spelt when transliterated into Greek. Zosimus mentions Aëtius in Bk. 5.36, where his name is spelt Ἀέτιον. ‘Αε’ is not a diphthong in Greek and, therefore, the letters ‘α’ and ‘ε’ should be pronounced individually, ‘ah-et-i-on’. This is, no doubt, the reason why Aëtius is spelt in English with a dieresis over the ‘e’. ‘Ae’ is a diphthong in Latin, pronounced ‘eye’, and, if that had applied to Aëtius’ name, Zosimus would have spelt it Ἀίτιον, in the same way as he spelt ‘Caesar’ Καίσαρος in Bk. 1.5. Consequently, it is reasonable to assume that the correct pronunciation of Aëtius in Latin would have been ‘ah-et-ee-oos’.

That said, applying strict Latin pronunciation to the name nowadays may appear excessively pedantic and, therefore, it is reasonable to seek a rendering of ‘Aëtius’ that is more acceptable to modern ears. ‘Eye-shus’ and ‘eye-tee-oos’ do not suffice, as they both preserve the myth of the non-existent diphthong. A reasonable compromise between ancient and modern usage may be either ‘eye-ee-shus’ or ‘eye-eet-yoos’. I think that I prefer the latter but others may have other ideas.

[Diocle]

While I may agree that some of these arguments may sound pretty old, I mean 'old' only for this old thread, of course, I've to admit that I'm pretty intrigued and fascinated by the concept of 'Modern ears' ... it sounds cool, related to the 'Old King'!

[Magister Militum Flavius Aetius]

Well, Aetius actually isn't a latin name, it comes directly from the Greek Aetios (Eagle). So Renatus is technically correct.

[Diocle]

Maybe yes or ... maybe not.

Anyway the good lawyer forgets that:

1 - The Greek alphabet that we both have painfully studied, actually is a creation of byzantine copysts of the VIII century.

2- The same can be obviously said, for the tonic accentes (acute, grave and circumflex), also they are a later Byzantine creation.

3- I don't enter the problem of the 'source code' of Zosimus because I don't want to be too pedantic.

... but the argument of Renatus is absolutely weak, only in my not humble opinion, of course.

[PSEUDO ROMANUS]

Just to make sure I understand your position, guys... am I right in assuming that you (Diocle) state that "AE" should always be pronounced "EH" (in English sounds) because that is the accurate way to do it, while you, Renatus, defend the argument of two separate sounds for such combination of vowels?

[Diocle]

Pseudo Romanus, my dear friend, light of my eyes, fratello, compagno, adorato amico, anima mia, creatura divina, spirito eletto, scrigno di sapienza, nobile ingegno, inestimabile tesoro, straordinario esempio di purezza e nobiltà, illustre intelletto, divina sapienza .... you already well know the sound I mean for the Latin diphthong AE .... it's the sound of the italian 'e' (not the 'è' but the simple sound of the closed 'e' of 'Ezio' or 'Enrico' or Encalve' or 'Enciclpedia' or 'Emendamento' etc. etc) ... it's impossible describing the sound to the British audience, because the Anglo saxons don't have it so, I simply proposed to listen to the Gregorian Chant of the Church of Sant'Ambrogio to help the understanding of the sound.... but, it didn't worked.
(actually, to be honest, I hadn't any doubt about the certainty of the failure of my attempt, but ... I love the lost battles! Noblesse oblige! ..... and I love the Gregorian Chants!)

So here for you Pseudo (it's short! please listen to it ...), 'Non nobis Domine' in an old grain silo!!!!!! it's one of the best things I've found on Internet! please listen to it, it's more than a chant in Latin ... it's beauty.

[Renatus]

1 - The Greek alphabet that we both have painfully studied, actually is a creation of byzantine copysts of the VIII century.

2- The same can be obviously said, for the tonic accentes (acute, grave and circumflex), also they are a later Byzantine creation.

3- I don't enter the problem of the 'source code' of Zosimus because I don't want to be too pedantic.

Taking your numbered points:

1. How is this relevant?

2. How is this relevant?

3. Don't worry about appearing pedantic. If you have a point to make, please make it.

Just to make sure I understand your position, guys... am I right in assuming that you (Diocle) state that "AE" should always be pronounced "EH" (in English sounds) because that is the accurate way to do it, while you, Renatus, defend the argument of two separate sounds for such combination of vowels?

Normally, I would pronounce the Latin diphthong 'AE' as 'eye' but, in this case, it appears not to be a diphthong and, accordingly, I contend that the two vowels should be sounded separately.

[Diocle]

1. How is this relevant? 2. How is this relevant?

You should answer to your own questions, anyway, I'll try to do it for you, follow me:

I wrote:

1 - The Greek alphabet that we both have painfully studied, actually is a creation of byzantine copysts of the VIII century, and this is rilevant because you wrote:

Zosimus mentions Aëtius in Bk. 5.36, wherew his name is spelt Ἀέτιον. ‘Αε’ is not a diphthong in Greek and, therefore, the letters ‘α’ and ‘ε’ should be pronounced individually, ‘ah-et-i-on’

2- The same can be obviously said, for the tonic accentes (acute, grave and circumflex), also they are a later Byzantine creation. And also this is rilevant.

‘Ae’ is a diphthong in Latin, pronounced ‘eye’, and, if that had applied to Aëtius’ name, Zosimus would have spelt it Ἀίτιον, in the same way as he spelt ‘Caesar’ Καίσαρος in Bk. 1.5.

About Zosimus:

I wrote:

3- The fact that the source code of Zosimus is the, Vatican Codex Vaticanus Graecus 156 in the Biblioteca Apostolica:

This was written by four hands, and also has corrections, probably made against the exemplar. The first portion is written by two scribes in the same scriptorium, in the second part of the 10th century, the third in the 11th century, the remainder is written in the hand of the 12th. All portions seem to be copied from the same MS. The marginal scholia are few and unimportant. The text is generally good and satisfactory.

... it clearly shows that a manuscript composed in the X, XI, XII centuries cannot be used to explain the sound of the Latin Pronounciation of the name Aetius in the V century.


... and please try to pronounce the Latin diphthong AE as it should be pronunced, please don't use 3 vowels to represnt 1 sound, it's ..., it's terrible! ... poor Cicero!

[PSEUDO ROMANUS]

Pseudo Romanus, my dear friend, light of my eyes, fratello, compagno, adorato amico, anima mia, creatura divina, spirito eletto, scrigno di sapienza, nobile ingegno, inestimabile tesoro, straordinario esempio di purezza e nobiltà, illustre intelletto, divina sapienza ....

Wow. You have made me fall in love with myself now

you already well know the sound I mean for the Latin diphthong AE

Yes, I thought I got it right, but I just wanted to double check .

So here for you Pseudo (it's short! please listen to it ...), 'Non nobis Domine' in an old grain silo!!!!!! it's one of the best things I've found on Internet! please listen to it, it's more than a chant in Latin ... it's beauty.

It must be because of the genuine delight you exuded in your post when presenting me with that chant, but I can say that this time sort of enjoyed it. Thanks .

On the matter of how to pronounce the form “AE”, I find your (Diocle’s) argument on the elision of the first vowel (A) to make a lot of sense. After all, it’s a very common phenomenon recorded during the evolution of the Latin languages. You know what you’re talking about since you witness the result of that process in your native Italian every day. I’d like to indicate though, to those unfamiliar with this subject, that the same ‘erosion’ of the letter A from the original ‘AE’ Latin combination occurs in the other descendents of the language of ancient Rome. I’ll give a few examples in the three Latin languages I’m more familiar with:



Of course we can add the examples I gave in post 96 of this very thread a long ago to these last ones. Since the Latin languages are derived from Vulgar Latin, which coexisted with the classical (and very artificial, I must say) Roman language, this constitutes evidence that in certain period of time, in different geographical locations within the empire, Old Latin speakers were eliding the letter ‘A’ from the form ‘AE’. Does that mean though that Latin speakers had always done that? Or was it just a phenomenon that came to be at some point in the history of the language? The first alternative is a possibility of course. That’s the position you defend, my friend; and I’d be comfortable with that, actually I was comfortable with it, based on what I established before, until I met with the exceptions to what , at the beginning, appeared to be an unquestionable rule ( I mean the pronunciation of only the last letter of the form ‘AE’). Look at these examples:



In these last two words, there’s no simplification of sounds in the Latin languages, especially in Italian. The form ‘AE’ has definitely become a hiatus where each component has a phonetic value. So, what do we do with this? We can’t say now that the form ‘AE’ has always had one phoneme only, because we have evidence (the last two words) that it’s not so.
I propose that the elision of ‘A’ in this case is a phenomenon that must have taken place before the fall of the WRE when those new variations could travel all over the Empire without any obstacles, and with enough time to settle down among its people. Moreover, I tend to believe that two ways of pronouncing the ‘AE’ form coexisted within the Empire: A-E (as suggested by Renatus) and E (your position, and mine to certain extent). Eventually, the Latin languages adopted the latter form almost totally as we can see today, but some traces of the former managed to survive to date, as we can also see. Finally, I think it’s interesting to note that in other Latin languages, such as Catalan, French, Spanish, Romanian, and Portuguese, except Italian, the name Aetius keeps the ‘AE’ .

[PSEUDO ROMANUS]

I don't know why my examples can't be seen. Here they are Latin Italian French Spanish AESTAS (summer) Estate été estío AESTUARIUM (estuary) estuario estuaire estuario AEDIFICARE (to build) edificare édifier edificar AEGAEUM (Aegean) Egeo Égée Egeo

AER (air) aere air aire AEREUS (aerial) aereo aérian aéreo

[Diocle]

.... You have made me fall in love with myself now

And this has to be considered a wise choice in your case!

Can we advance the hypothesis that probabbly it's the quality of the consonant 'LIQUIDA' following the diphthong, that might play a role in this case?
.... In fact actually AERE and all the composed words using AER-, are the only cases in wich the Latin diphtong AE has a double sound in the spoken Latin used in Italy, and they are really a small group of words, all under the strict dictatorship of the consonant 'R'.

Don't you think we should limit our research only to the examples in which the sound of the ancient Latin diphthong 'AE' is followed by the 'DENTALE' consonant 'T', in all the modern kinds of spoken Latin? ...

[Magister Militum Flavius Aetius]

I think its also worth noting what name Aetius became - as far as I know its "Ezio."

However, in terms of discussing classical latin, the "Ae" is not a dipthong, as Renatus has suggested. The dipthong we know is pronounced as "Aye" or "Eye" would be in english. However, there is differentiation as shown in Greek, and there fore each letter should be pronounced individually. "Eye - ee - shush."

[Diocle]

The vowels AE are ALWAYS a damn diphthong in Latin, Evan!

You know the matter because:

You and the lawyer, both you are using words like 'Eternity' coming form the Latin 'EATERNITAS', so, also for you, Jutes, the old diphthong sounds as it must sound, that is, 'E'-ternity. (the fact that such words have been introduced among you, Jutes and Frisians, by the good old Norman steel, is absolutely irrelevant, o.c.!)

Evan, may I suggest you to be cautious with your Latin teacher, if he ask you if 'AE' is a diphthong in Latin? ... remember Evan: be cautious in your answer .... I want that your Latin carreer goes on, happily! It's an important step, on the way to Chalon! Soooooo, Be cautious ...take your time beating around the bush ... save your arse!

[Magister Militum Flavius Aetius]

You do realize that Aetius isn't latin though? As I have already said, it's Greek.

Aquilus is Latin.

[Diocle]

Latin: 'AE-THERIUS, -A, -UM' => English: 'E-thereal'; and also this 'Ethereal' comes from the Greek, Evan .....

Poor people, they use the Latin diphthong 'AE' everyday without even undestanding what they are doing!

Then .... if we think that all this tragedy is due to a faked duke, a Norman bastard son of a poor laundress!!! We can cearly understand how histroy can be cruel!

[Knonfoda]

I agree with PR on this one, for most of the current Romance languages, I think it sounds like it would have in antiquity.

In Portuguese, it is pronounced Ah-eh-ti-os, but its almost impossible to explain phonetically in English unless you know Portuguese.

The "eh" sounds more like when a British person says the A in A.I - and I say British because Americans tend to pronounced it as Ay or ey. Besides that example, I can't think of any other cases off the top of my head where English speakers pronounce an E that way, which almost always comes across as "Eee".

So if we bear in mind the A.I example with a hard A, and use it in place of the e, I gather the correct way to pronounced it would be Ah-a-ti-os. with the second a sounding more like the hard e does in most Latin derived languages, but which English seems at a loss to replicate.

[Renatus]

You should answer to your own questions

I don't know how I am to answer my own questions when, even now, I am not sure of the point that you are making.

1 - The Greek alphabet that we both have painfully studied, actually is a creation of byzantine copysts of the VIII century, and this is rilevant because you wrote:

The system does not reproduce my quote but you can always refer back to it. However, I still do not get your point. Are you saying that there was no Greek alphabet before the Byzantines invented it? If so, it is plainly nonsense. Either that or there are a lot of fake Greek inscriptions about. If, on the other hand, you are saying that the alphabet devised by the Byzantines does not accurately reflect what went before, you will have to be specific and explain how they may have distorted the pre-existing alphabet and how it is relevant to this discussion. Otherwise, such a statement is no more than special pleading, designed to support your preconceived opinions.

2- The same can be obviously said, for the tonic accentes (acute, grave and circumflex), also they are a later Byzantine creation. And also this is rilevant.

No, this is not relevant. I included accents in my quotations because they are in the text but I made no suggestion (and I make no suggestion) that they affect pronunciation in this case. It is the spelling that dictates the pronunciation.

About Zosimus:
I wrote:
3- The fact that the source code of Zosimus is the, Vatican Codex Vaticanus Graecus 156 in the Biblioteca Apostolica:

... it clearly shows that a manuscript composed in the X, XI, XII centuries cannot be used to explain the sound of the Latin Pronounciation of the name Aetius in the V century.

As I have said, it is the spelling that is important. Am I to take it that you are alleging that Byzantine copyists misrepresented, for their own unexplained purposes, the spelling in the manuscript that they were copying and that, in spelling Aetius with an alpha-epsilon and Caesar with an alpha-iota, they were falsifying Zosimus' text?

... and please try to pronounce the Latin diphthong AE as it should be pronunced, please don't use 3 vowels to represnt 1 sound, it's ..., it's terrible! ... poor Cicero!

I'm sorry; I don't understand. Who is using three vowels anywhere?