5 ms·

I'm not a linguist, but I always love finding (possible) examples of hard C in Latin in other languages. For instance "Caesar" is borrowed into German as "Kaise

I'm not a linguist, but I always love finding (possible) examples of hard C in Latin in other languages. For instance "Caesar" is borrowed into German as "Kaiser", and the borrowing of Latin "piscis" into Albanian as "peshk" appears to me as another example of that vestigial hard C.

barrkel 3y ago
And of course Tsar & czar, also from Caesar.
- simiones 3y ago
  Those are using a tz sound, similar to the zz in pizza. It's probably closer to the "s" in English pronunciation of "Caesar" than it is to the K used in Caesar's time.
alberto_ol 3y ago
Another example is Sardinian. From the wikipedia page about the Sardinian phonology: "Preservation of the plosive sounds /k/ and /ɡ/ before front vowels /e/ and /i/; for example, centum ..." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sardinian_phonology https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sardinian_phonology
elnatro 3y ago
Why some Romance languages had the hard C sound lost before e and i?
- linguistics__ 3y ago
  Because of palatalization [0], a very common sound change. 0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palatalization_(sound_change) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palatalization_(sound_change)
  - elnatro 3y ago
    Thanks for the insight!
  - retrac 3y ago
    A similar process is currently ongoing in some English dialects with initial t/d. "Tuesday" and "choose day" are homophones for some British speakers. It may well morph into "shoes jay" within another century or two. Or not. Sound changes tend to follow patterns but they are not really predictable.
    - BrandoElFollito 3y ago
      Thank you, very interesting. Is this across the whole language, or rather localized to some areas (geographic or other). Also as a French walking in the street and saying Tuesday and choose day loud in the street, I got a few curious stares :)
- pmontra 3y ago
  Only when written, of course. In Italian the written letters ce and ci are pronounced with a soft c. There are plenty of words with a hard c (a k) followed by an e or an i. Italian alphabet doesn't have a k character so those sounds are written as che and chi. That is, in Italian ch is the k sound. Most (all?) of the other languages of the area use ch for a soft c.
ycombinete 3y ago
The Caesarea area in Israel is pronounced with the hard C in Hebrew. I wonder if that Latin influence or an artefact of Hebrew itself.
- nivertech 3y ago
  It's not just the name of the city קיסריה [Keisariya], but also the title of the imperor - "Caesar" - קֵיסָר [keisar].
- rolleiflex 3y ago
  Turkish also retains the hard C in some forms, the city of Kayseri in Asia Minor is also from Caesarea. However some of that has been eradicated by the more recent influence of French. An example of that is Julius Caesar, which is Jül Sezar.
- bodhiandphysics 3y ago
  Modern hebrew gets the name from the Mishnaic hebrew name for the city. It's also spelled with a unvoiced glottal in arabic. Note that Israel was in the hellenistic part of the empire, and caesarea was very much a greek speaking city, where there wasn't palatalization of latin c (which was rendered as a kappa). Note russian Czar.
- pravus 3y ago
  My understanding is that both would have been derived from Phoenician which was itself from a Proto-Indo-European origin.
  - bodhiandphysics 3y ago
    No... first hebrew is basically just a dialect of Phoenician, and phoenecian isn't an indo european language! It's semitic, like arabic and Akkadian. Also the name Casesarea is of course from Caesar (the city was founded in honor of Augustus by Herod)
aeortiz 3y ago
That reminds me of "pescatarian" in English, and "pescado" in Spanish: both use a hard C sound.
- jaclaz 3y ago
  The C is always hard before an A, O an U, in Spanish and Italian, the soft one is before E and I. To have the hard C in Italian an H needs to be added, CHE or CHI (while in Spanish that leads to something more like tch).

barrkel 3y ago

And of course Tsar & czar, also from Caesar.

simiones 3y ago
Those are using a tz sound, similar to the zz in pizza. It's probably closer to the "s" in English pronunciation of "Caesar" than it is to the K used in Caesar's time.

alberto_ol 3y ago

Another example is Sardinian. From the wikipedia page about the Sardinian phonology: "Preservation of the plosive sounds /k/ and /ɡ/ before front vowels /e/ and /i/; for example, centum ..." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sardinian_phonology https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sardinian_phonology

elnatro 3y ago

Why some Romance languages had the hard C sound lost before e and i?

linguistics__ 3y ago
Because of palatalization [0], a very common sound change. 0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palatalization_(sound_change) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palatalization_(sound_change)
- elnatro 3y ago
  Thanks for the insight!
- retrac 3y ago
  A similar process is currently ongoing in some English dialects with initial t/d. "Tuesday" and "choose day" are homophones for some British speakers. It may well morph into "shoes jay" within another century or two. Or not. Sound changes tend to follow patterns but they are not really predictable.
  - BrandoElFollito 3y ago
    Thank you, very interesting. Is this across the whole language, or rather localized to some areas (geographic or other). Also as a French walking in the street and saying Tuesday and choose day loud in the street, I got a few curious stares :)
pmontra 3y ago
Only when written, of course. In Italian the written letters ce and ci are pronounced with a soft c. There are plenty of words with a hard c (a k) followed by an e or an i. Italian alphabet doesn't have a k character so those sounds are written as che and chi. That is, in Italian ch is the k sound. Most (all?) of the other languages of the area use ch for a soft c.

ycombinete 3y ago

The Caesarea area in Israel is pronounced with the hard C in Hebrew. I wonder if that Latin influence or an artefact of Hebrew itself.

nivertech 3y ago
It's not just the name of the city קיסריה [Keisariya], but also the title of the imperor - "Caesar" - קֵיסָר [keisar].
rolleiflex 3y ago
Turkish also retains the hard C in some forms, the city of Kayseri in Asia Minor is also from Caesarea. However some of that has been eradicated by the more recent influence of French. An example of that is Julius Caesar, which is Jül Sezar.
bodhiandphysics 3y ago
Modern hebrew gets the name from the Mishnaic hebrew name for the city. It's also spelled with a unvoiced glottal in arabic. Note that Israel was in the hellenistic part of the empire, and caesarea was very much a greek speaking city, where there wasn't palatalization of latin c (which was rendered as a kappa). Note russian Czar.
pravus 3y ago
My understanding is that both would have been derived from Phoenician which was itself from a Proto-Indo-European origin.
- bodhiandphysics 3y ago
  No... first hebrew is basically just a dialect of Phoenician, and phoenecian isn't an indo european language! It's semitic, like arabic and Akkadian. Also the name Casesarea is of course from Caesar (the city was founded in honor of Augustus by Herod)

aeortiz 3y ago

That reminds me of "pescatarian" in English, and "pescado" in Spanish: both use a hard C sound.

jaclaz 3y ago
The C is always hard before an A, O an U, in Spanish and Italian, the soft one is before E and I. To have the hard C in Italian an H needs to be added, CHE or CHI (while in Spanish that leads to something more like tch).