How the G Got Its Tail
Saturday November 29, 2008
Have you ever wondered about the form of letters or, more specifically, about the tail on the G? Originally the G was a C, so the regular abbreviation for Gaius Julius Caesar's praenomen was C., not G. Read more about How the G Got Its Tail. Also see How to Read a Roman Name.
Comments
Hi N.S.
Thanks for that, very interesting and useful (see below), just two questions.
1. The tips are numbered from 2 onwards, has number one gone missing or was that just a typo?
2. Does the list of abbreviations only have 12 names or were there others?
A further comment, many years ago I learned how to read Roman numerals (dates etc). This has been extremely useful, people often look in amazement when I am able to read a date off some monument or cornerstone. I see that the list of Roman name abbreviations is going to be memorised next!
Regards,
Hello. Once again, I am up all night reading you. Thanksgiving I spent with you, Rome, Greece, etc., and wrote you a note telling you so. (You are far better than turkey). Can you tell me where to find a dictionary? which tells me how to pronounce Greek words which have already been translated into English ? In the back of my copy of Hesiod’s “Theogony” and “Works And Days,” there is a pronunciation key which taught me a bit of what I wish to know. While reading, I mentally say the words and would like to know that I am doing so properly. For instance: where to put the accent, when to use a long ‘I’ sound rather than a soft one, when to make a hard ‘C’ or ‘K’, when to know a ‘ch’ is pronounced like a ‘K’ in ‘kitchen,’ and also how to pronounce the ‘ch’ in Clearchus.
I don’t even know what to ask for in the bookstore or if my question to you makes any sense !
Thank you,
Lynn Stover
Hi Brian 2 -
Excellent questions about How to Read a Roman Name. The How-to was written a long time ago using an old template. I looked at the HTML and see no place for a missing number 1. I think the “here’s how” must count as 1. I haven’t written many how-tos — either on that old template or the newer one.
As to the initials, they are the most common. The following gives, I think, two more.
Here’s a passage from
The Private Life of the Romans
41. The Praenōmen. The number of names in actual use as praenōmina seems to us preposterously small as compared with our Christian names, to which they in some measure correspond. It was never much in excess of thirty, and in Sulla’s time had dwindled to eighteen. The following are all that are often found in the authors read in school and in college: Aulus (A), Decimus (D), Gāïus (C),1 Gnaeus (CN),1 Kaesō (K), Lūcius (L), Mānius (M’), Mārcus (M), Pūblius (P), Quīntus (Q), Servius (SER), Sextus (SEX), Spurius (S), Tiberius (TI), and Titus (T). The abbreviations of these names vary: for Aulus we find regularly A, but also AV and AVL; for Sextus we find SEXT and S as well as SEX. Similar variations are found in the case of other praenōmina
Hi Lynn-
I hope you found my last set of answers. Please post this question in the ancient/classical history forum. Forum.
I share your difficulties. I recently read an article that said it’s obvious, but the writer doesn’t use my brain since I never know whether a Greek e is long or short unless I look it up in a Greek dictionary and can’t translate Greek transcribed into English, so I’m not the right person to answer this. To some extent the pronunciation of Greek names in English depends on country of origin. We have dicussed the pronunciation of specific Greek names in the forum. There seems to be a standard in the U.S. and either a single European one or different ones in continental Europe and the UK.
Smyth’s Greek Grammar says no Greek accent can stand further back than the antepenult. Ultimate is final syllable, penult is the one that is almost (paene) the ultimate. Antepenult is the one before (ante) the second to last. If the final syllable is long, the accent can’t fall on the antepenult. A diphthong (but not ai or oi, usually) would be an example of a long final syllable. As you can see it’s a pretty complicated topic. It could generate interesting discussion and, possibly, answers, in the forum.