Vowel Syncope in ancient Italy

Author(s)

Jasmim Sedie Drigo

• Document type: Master's Dissertation
• Press: São Paulo.
• Institution: Universidade de São Paulo (USP). Faculdade de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (FFLCH/SBD)
• Defense date: 2016-05-16

Examining board members

José Marcos Mariani de Macedo; Patricia Prata; Mario Eduardo Viaro

• Advisor: José Marcos Mariani de Macedo

Abstract

Latin and Sabellic are languages that have many parallels, for they belong to the same Indo-European branch, the Italic branch. An interesting and intriguing phonological similarity between these languages is vowel syncope, because is a recurring phonological process. Until a few decades ago, scholars believed not to be possible to analyze properly the conditions under which syncope occurs in Latin, because they are very complex. However, more recent researches show that this is somehow possible, though the analysis is difficult. The occurrence of vowel syncope in Sabellic seems to be less complex than in Latin. In Sabellic, the phonological environments in which syncope occurs are more limited, but the difficulty to understand the meaning and etimology of some Sabellic words make this analysis also tough. The aim of this research was to limit as much as possible the phonological environments of syncope in Latin and in Sabellic and to understand the correlations that can be made among the examples of the corpora. Although it would be interesting to analyze all cases based on the same premises, this is very difficult, for the data do not allow it. The correlations that can be made are basically just etymological, because the way it works and the results are different according to each language and each time they existed. (AU)

• FAPESP's process: 13/09069-3 - Syncope in the languages of Ancient Italy
• Grantee: Jasmim Sedie Drigo
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Master