Patterns of Vowel Reduction in Latin: Phonetics and Phonology

On The Mergers Of Latin Close‐Mid Vowels

“…In order to account for the irregularities and to provide a phonologically plausible explanation for the reduction, Rix () proposes that, instead of being reduced directly to the resulting vowels i and e , medial vowels were first reduced to schwa ( ə ); at a later stage, the reduced vowels were reinterpreted as the already existing neighbouring full vowels, which remained in the accented syllables. Rix's scheme is followed, for example, by Meiser (: 66f), but it was elaborated and extended by Nishimura (, , , ). In closed syllables and before r , ə always turns into e (e.g.…”

“…In general, Nishimura (: 222) explains most of the exceptions in this seemingly haphazard variation as spelling difficulties. He also points out that compelling evidence for the reduction of i is lacking, leading him to conclude that the corner high vowels ĭ and ŭ did in fact not participate in the schwa‐reduction (Nishimura : 223–7), despite obvious counter‐examples such as capitis (< *caput‐is , gen.sg. of caput ), pontvfex ( CIL I² 1488) pro pontifex (< *ponti‐fak‐s ), which must then be explained otherwise .…”

“…of caput ), pontvfex ( CIL I² 1488) pro pontifex (< *ponti‐fak‐s ), which must then be explained otherwise . In any case, he suggests that orthographic confusions involving < i >, < e >, < v > and < o > are probably due to the cramped articulatory space around ĭ , ŭ and ə/ɵ (Nishimura : 232). We, however, find this suggestion somewhat problematic: unreduced i and u are maximally differentiated from each other by two distinctive features (front vs. back, unrounded vs. rounded), and thus difficult to confuse.…”

“…In recent years, the earlier history of the Latin vowel system (e.g. Nishimura 2010aNishimura , 2010bNishimura , 2011Sen 2012), the transition of Latin into Romance languages (e.g. Maiden et al 2011Maiden et al , 2013Ledgeway 2012;Loporcaro 2015), the sociolinguistics of Latin (e.g.…”

“…In recent years, the earlier history of the Latin vowel system (e.g. Nishimura , , ; Sen ), the transition of Latin into Romance languages (e.g. Maiden et al.…”