Source
r/latin•
SlimeStack

Any guesses on the pronunciation scheme of Historia Regum Britanniae?

Pronunciation & Scansion

I recently discovered this pseudohistorical account and I thought it was quite interesting that it starts off with a British spin on the myth of Aeneas. I was born in England so I thought it would be fun to try out something closer to home, and if anyone can give any insight regarding how British people used Latin at the time that would be great.

It was written in 1136 AD in Britain, so it's quite far removed from the classical period. It's also pre-Renaissance, which I understand means Latin was simply inherited and influenced by local languages and dialects rather than people studying the reconstructed pronunciation like how most of us first learn Latin now. Would this cause Geoffrey of Monmouth to use a heavily British pronunciation scheme with things like Vs and stress, or did it still mostly resemble how Romans would have used the literary language from the republic era up through late antiquity?

Posted Dec 8, 2019, 1:58 PM UTC

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Handsomeyellow47•

Well, the former suggestion is the obvious one, isn’t it ? The classical pronunciation we use is pretty modern and only dates back to the 19th century. It’s since then been gradually replacing every other traditional pronunciation scheme. It’s taken over English’s almost entirely. This would have been originally read in an English Pronunciation that resembles Late Old English-Early Middle English, and suprisingly that would may have been actually closer to Classical Latin that the modern one !

6
SlimeStackOP•

Thanks for that.

What kind of features would bring early middle English closer to classical Latin? Would they have distinguished vowel lengths for instance?

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Handsomeyellow47•

Yeah, vowel length being distinguished is one of the things that would have made it closer. Also actually pronouncing H aswell.

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SlimeStackOP•

Quid significat littera 'H'? Illam litteram nescio!

I'll be sure to take vowel lengths into consideration; it's useful to memorize them anyway. Thanks.

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VerySecretCactus•

suprisingly that would may have been actually closer to Classical Latin that the modern one

Meaning what? That restored classical is less similar to classical pronunciation than theirs was?

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Handsomeyellow47•

No I meant Modern English pronunciation is less similiar to Classical pronunciation than what may be been used in the middle ages

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Durendal_et_Joyeuse•

This isn't something that we can really answer with confidence. There are a few things to consider. First, Geoffrey of Monmouth was part of a small clerical class that could read and understand Latin. The degree to which they actually spoke it out loud is limited to certain settings. Clerics of different vernacular backgrounds may have used Latin to communicate (this was certainly the case in university communities, such as the Latin Quarter of Paris slightly later on), but the most common circumstances in which these Latinate individuals would have spoken the language were in liturgical or other church-related settings.

To that end, it's hard to discern to what degree there was a "British-type" of pronunciation, since clerics of different linguistic origins often learned Latin from each other. This is not at all to say that a person's vernacular knowledge would have had no influence on the way they pronounced Latin words. It is simply not something we can be sure about. There are lots of little clues in written texts, such as the way poems rhymed or how writers from certain regions added phonetic spellings to Latin words, but you're not going to be able to answer this question in any sort of systematic way.

This is doubly complicated by the fact that Geoffrey of Monmouth's biography is not entirely evident. He may have had some Welsh connections. He may have had Norman connections.

Also, I want to point out that Latin wasn't "inherited" during the Middle Ages. People had to actively study and teach it in order to know it.

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SlimeStackOP•

Inherit was poor wording on my part - I was trying to say the pronunciation was passed down through studying under local teachers and communities without any real attempt to return to the 'original' pronunciation in any sort of a scientific way like we try to do now, leading to the varieties that the Renaissance wanted to put a stop to.

Very insightful post though, thank you. So basically all we can say is that it was based on classical Latin but probably had some indiscernible influence from whatever Geoffrey's circumstances were too?

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Durendal_et_Joyeuse•

So basically all we can say is that it was based on classical Latin

The concept of "Classical Latin" is entirely a construct created by Renaissance and later scholars to refer to an elite literary Latin, contentiously based on Cicero as a model. Latinate individuals in the Middle Ages might have learned the language from a literary rather than a spoken context, but that is not to say the Latin they were using was by any means static or based on a certain version that we call "Classical Latin." There were lots of changes, innovations, and local/circumstantial varieties throughout medieval Europe.

I would in fact argue that it was patristic Latin (what Renaissance scholars deemed to be decidedly not Classical Latin) that had the greatest influence on medieval Latinity. Even this is more applicable to certain genres of Latin writing. Try switching from Geoffrey of Monmouth to Hugh of St. Victor to Petrus Comestor to a local charter to a papal bull to a Mediterranean notarial record...

There were lots of different "Latins" that existed throughout the medieval Latin world.

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SlimeStackOP•

I meant more the general literary Latin that would have ended up in Geoffrey's Latin education rather than specifically Cicero.

Thanks for the clarification though, it's interesting to know how diverse Latin usage was. I'm looking to get a couple of books of the Aeneid done then I want to expand into different kinds of medieval and renaissance texts.

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Caesar95•

Essex chav

2
TheApiary•

He almost definitely had a British pronunciation scheme, and not the way that you learn Latin in a classical Latin class today. But British accents in 1136 didn't sound like British accents now, so it didn't just sound like the "Romanes eunt domus" guy

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SlimeStackOP•

Is there an official scheme documented anywhere, or is it best to check out how early middle English sounded (something I'm interested in learning about anyway) and just imagine how that would have influenced Latin pronunciation?

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Jefffrommonmouth•

You could have just asked, you know.

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SlimeStackOP•

Risi!

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StevenBollinger•

The Normans had invaded England in 1066, and French would remain the vernacular of the ruling class until the 14th century. Geoffrey was Welsh, and it's not entirely certain whether his first language was English, French or Welsh.

"if anyone can give any insight regarding how British people used Latin at the time that would be great"

A lot of very good 12th-century Latin writing from the British-Norman empire remains. There are some historians who are much more serious than Geoffrey, such as Orderic Vitalis, Henry of Huntington and William of Malmesbury. John of Salisbury is an outstanding 12th-century Classicist. A good place to look for Medieval texts, mostly historical texts, from and/or pertaining to Great Britain is the so-called Rolls Series.

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SlimeStackOP•

So we can only really assume that it was read somewhere between how ancient Romans read it and how middle age English, Welsh or French people interpreted it with their L1 interfering and evolution over time.

I'm more into mythology and epic so I have a feeling I'll be getting my fill of British stuff in middle English more than anything, but I'll make a note of those works too if I want more British Latin. Thanks!

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StevenBollinger•

I'm more into mythology and epic

For the Arthurian legends, Geoffrey and Chretien de Troyes are two of the big early sources. Chretien wrote in French not long after Geoffrey, he invented the whole idea of the Holy Grail (Sorry, Dan Brown fans, but he did.).

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letycherus•

Considering the Normans, and considering the far-reaching influences French had on the British folke and their usage, I am inclined to believe they spoke Latin as they would French, which they pronounced fairly well with a slight but noticeable English ring to their usage.

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SlimeStackOP•

Yeah before I made this thread I didn't consider French influence at all. It seems quite reasonable to think that he was more influenced by French than the middle English we associate with Chaucer.

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letycherus•

If you take the time to listen to a performance of Chaucer's poetry, and then compare it to really any recording of the French language being spoken you'll notice that etymologically French words have kept their Gallic prononciation.

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Molendinarius•

We have an eighteenth century phonetic transcription available. I made a video of it some years ago. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_bGSb_S2z00 Now, this won't help a lot, as it postdates the Great Vowel Shift, but it might give an indication of what Latin may have sounded like, though in 1136 the pronunciation may have been closer to restored classical, probably stress based rather than vowel length based.

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