The Latin Alphabet
You already use it. Every letter on this page came to English through Latin, which is why the alphabet is the one part of learning Latin that costs you nothing.
What will surprise you is what is missing. The Romans had 23 letters, not 26. There is no J, no U and no W, and two letters are doing two jobs each.
The 23 letters
| Letter | Classical sound | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| A a | /a/, /aː/ | Short as in British cup, long as in father. |
| B b | /b/ | |
| C c | always /k/ | Never soft. Cicero is KIH-keh-ro. |
| D d | /d/ | |
| E e | /e/, /eː/ | Short as in bed, long like ay in say without the glide. |
| F f | /f/ | |
| G g | always hard /ɡ/ | As in go, never as in gem. |
| H h | /h/, lightly | Weak, and often dropped in speech. |
| I i | /i/ or /j/ | Vowel "ee", or consonant "y". Both. |
| K k | /k/ | Very rare. Kalendae and little else. |
| L l | /l/ | |
| M m | /m/ | Nasalised and weak at the end of a word. |
| N n | /n/ | |
| O o | /o/, // | Short as in British pot, long like o in go without the glide. |
| P p | /p/ | |
| Q q | /k/ | Always followed by u: qu is /kw/. |
| R r | trilled /r/ | Rolled, as in Italian. |
| S s | always /s/ | Never the z-sound of English rose. |
| T t | /t/ | |
| V v | /u/ or /w/ | Vowel "oo", or consonant "w". Both. |
| X x | /ks/ | |
| Y y | /y/ | Greek loanwords only. |
| Z z | /z/ | Greek loans only. Doubled between vowels (gaza). Church Latin: /dz/. |
I and V do double duty
This is the piece that actually matters, and it explains most of what looks odd in an inscription.
I is both the vowel i and the consonant y. In iustus the first letter is a consonant, pronounced YOOS-toos. Medieval scribes eventually split the consonant off and gave it a tail, which is where J comes from, so iustus became justus.
V is both the vowel u and the consonant w. So was said WEH-nee, WEE-dee, WEE-kee, and the same letter is the u in urbs. U is the later split of that pair, and W is literally a double-u, invented for Germanic languages centuries after Rome.
Which is why a Roman inscription reads IVLIVS, this course prints Iulius, and some textbooks print Julius. Same word.
Modern editions vary. Most print u and v separately because it is easier to read, and many keep i for both jobs. Neither is wrong; know what you are looking at.
The two pronunciations
Nobody warns beginners about this, and then they find they have been mixing two systems for a year.
| Restored classical | Ecclesiastical | |
|---|---|---|
| c before e, i | /k/ - key | /tʃ/ - church |
| g before e, i | /ɡ/ - go | /dʒ/ - gem |
| v | /w/ - wet | /v/ - van |
| ae | /ai/ - eye | /e/ - bed |
| ti + vowel | /ti/ | /tsi/ |
| Caesar | KYE-sar | CHEH-sar |
| veni | WEH-nee | VEH-nee |
Restored classical is the scholarly reconstruction of educated speech around the first century BC. Use it for Cicero, Caesar and Virgil.
Ecclesiastical is the Italianate pronunciation of the Church, and it is what choral singers use. Use it for the Vulgate, for medieval Latin and for anything you are going to sing.
Neither is wrong. What you should not do is drift into a mixture by accident, which is the default outcome of learning from written material without ever deciding.
Vowel length changes the word
Latin vowels come in long and short, and the difference is not decorative: it distinguishes words and it drives poetry.
(short i) - a book
(long i) - free
The macron marking length is a modern teaching aid; Romans did not write it. Textbooks and dictionaries use it, inscriptions and most editions do not, and this course does not print macrons yet, so look a word up in a dictionary when its length matters. It matters in three places: telling apart pairs like the ones above, case endings such as the ablative -ā (below), and finding the stress in words of three or more syllables.
It matters more than it looks. Rosa with a short final a is the subject; rosā with a long one is the ablative. In prose you have the endings around it to disambiguate. In verse the whole metre is built on length rather than stress, which is why Latin poetry scans in a way English poetry does not.
Stress
Latin stress is regular and worth learning as a rule rather than word by word.
- Two syllables: stress the first. RŌma, AMor.
- Three or more: stress the second-to-last if it is heavy, meaning its vowel is long or two consonants (or x) follow it; otherwise stress the third-to-last.
a--cus (second-to-last is long, so it takes the stress)
fe-NES-tra (second-to-last has a short e, but s and t follow it, so it is heavy and takes the stress)
DO-mi-nus (second-to-last is short and open, so the stress moves back)
That second rule is the only fiddly thing on this page, and it is the reason knowing vowel length pays off.
What to take away
- 23 letters. No J, no U, no W.
- I is both i and y; V is both u and w. J and U are medieval splits of them.
- C and G are always hard in classical pronunciation. Caesar begins like kite.
- Choose classical or ecclesiastical deliberately, and stay in it.
- Vowel length distinguishes words and governs both stress and metre.