pronounciation of 'scientia'

[Scott Coutts]

Hi!

see-EN-tee-uh or see-EN-she-uh?

Thanks.

[Evertjan.]

Scott Coutts wrote on 11 jun 2003 in alt.language.latin:
> see-EN-tee-uh or see-EN-she-uh?

Not by far in classical Latin, me thinks:

s-K-ee-eh-n-t-ee-ah

using a kind-of English phonetics.

The C was first a K

The T just a T

--
Evertjan.
The Netherlands.
(Please change the x'es to dots in my emailaddress)

[Alex]

Scott Coutts <scott....@med.monash.edu.au> wrote:
> Hi!
> see-EN-tee-uh or see-EN-she-uh?

skee-EN-tee-uh (classic) or skee-EN-tsee-uh (medieval)

--
Alex
tamm at cs dot helsinki dot fi

[Robert Stonehouse]

On Wed, 11 Jun 2003 15:16:07 +1000, Scott Coutts
<scott....@med.monash.edu.au> wrote:

>Hi!
>
>see-EN-tee-uh or see-EN-she-uh?

In classical Latin, skee-EN-tee-a.
In English, sigh-EN-sher.

[David Monks]

I would query the final "uh" of skee-EN-tsee-uh.

Why not skee-EN-tee-ah?

David

"Alex" <chec...@for.email.invalid> wrote in message
news:bc6kl0$1b9$1...@oravannahka.helsinki.fi...

[John Sullivan]

In message <3ee6c7eb...@news.cityscape.co.uk>, Robert Stonehouse
<ew...@bcs.org.uk> writes

In "church" Latin, certainly in England in the 1950s to 1970s

She - EN - tsee - uh

--
John Sullivan

[Alex]

David Monks <dm...@tiscali.fr> wrote:
> I would query the final "uh" of skee-EN-tsee-uh.

> Why not skee-EN-tee-ah?

I basically meant the same sound, but spelled it 'uh', since that is
what the original poster did. Describing just about any sound is very
hard in written English. For example, 'ne' might be described as 'nay'
by some, but it certainly doesn't rhyme with (the English word) 'say'.

[Matthew Montchalin]

On Wed, 11 Jun 2003, David Monks wrote:
|I would query the final "uh" of skee-EN-tsee-uh.
|
|Why not skee-EN-tee-ah?

Most Americans have an uncontrollable urge to make the last syllable
long, but if you can keep it short, then so much the better. In other
words, a short 'ah' is better than a long 'ah.' But Americans tend
to hear a short 'ah' as though it were an 'uh' sound because they
are so unfamiliar with it.

[David Monks]

I note with interest, Matthew.

Nevertheless, I believe that the vowels are important, especially if one is
making an attempt to imitate how we suppose Latin to have sounded. Latin's
daughters, Italian, French and Spanish, to my knowledge, are much more
particular about vowel pronunciation that English. Final, unnaccented
vowels do not tend to get the 'schwa' treatment. I'm not aware of any
reason why Latin would have behaved differently.

I do think your point about short and long vowels is important, but surely
even a short vowel remains true to its sound quality, unless the schwa is
invoked.

David

Matthew Montchalin" <mmon...@OregonVOS.net> wrote in message
news:Pine.LNX.4.44.030611...@lab.oregonvos.net...

[Robert FISHER]

Scott Coutts wrote:
> Hi!
>
> see-EN-tee-uh or see-EN-she-uh?
>

> Thanks.
>

In ASCII IPA (or, at least, my attempt at it):

/skientia/
/skientja/
/Sientsia/
/SjenSja/

I can imagine all of those (and some other combinations besides) being
considered correct by somebody at some time. I aim for the first, myself.

--
Robert FISHER verbum exsum pax Robertus PISCATOR

[Mark J. Reed]

On Wed, Jun 11, 2003 at 02:21:10PM +0100, David Monks wrote:
> I do think your point about short and long vowels is important, but surely
> even a short vowel remains true to its sound quality, unless the schwa is
> invoked.

An "uh" is not necessarily a schwa. It's a full vowel that can be stressed,
as in the word "butter", and the closest thing American English has to
a Latin short A. A schwa is really any of several allophonic lax,
indistinct vowels, often written "uh" in fauxnetic English; it is
similar to an unstressed version of "uh" in most contexts (closer to "ih"
in others), but still distinct from it.

In any case, here's my take on "scientia":

Reconstructed Classical: "skih-YEN-tih-yuh" [skI'jENtIjV] (full "uh")

Late Latin/Ecclesiastical: "she-YEN-tee-yah" [Si'jEntijA]

Anglicized: "sigh-EN-chuh" [sAI'jEntS@] (schwa "uh")

-Marcus

[Richard Sere]

in article bc76pk$c93$1...@news.tiscali.fr, David Monks at dm...@tiscali.fr
wrote on 6/11/03 8:21 AM:

> Latin's
> daughters, Italian, French and Spanish, to my knowledge, are much more
> particular about vowel pronunciation that English. Final, unnaccented
> vowels do not tend to get the 'schwa' treatment.

French is the exception. A final -e is silent, at least in most cases,
unless you're from southern France.

Take the present tense conjugation of the verb parler: je parle/tu parles /
il parle/ils parlent; all four different forms have an identical final sound
-l. I have noticed that people even from norther France do pronounce the
final -e when they are upset. I remember a movie where a sister was trying
to get her younger brother to 'stop' bothering her and she said 'arrête'
with a nice schwa after the -t.

[Scott Coutts]

Well, I'm Australian, so I meant 'uh' as in 'up'

[Scott Coutts]

Ok, there's been a few different pronounciations listed here! This is
why I thougth it was pronounced in the way I attempted to phonetically
spell it originally.

I'm a scientist, so I pronounced the 'scien' part of it as in 'science',
but a little different, with 'si' as a short 'i', like 'tip'.

The 'tia' part I wasnt sure about because sometimes, in English, the 't'
is hard and sometimes it's like a 'shh' as in 'evolution'

Lastly, I'm Australian, the 'uh' is a short 'uh' as in 'up'.

so I guess I could also have written it like this:

si-en-ti-uh

said as in 'sienna' with an extra 'ti' in there (:
All 'i' sounds being very short, as in 'tip'.

[Tuomo Sipola]

> see-EN-tee-uh or see-EN-she-uh?

Non. Dic [ski'entia] ut scriptum est.

-Tuomo