Rome, Italy

Last week, I visited Rome on a school trip organised by the Latin department. It was an incredible experience as I learnt a lot about not only the Latin language and Roman culture, but also I had the experience to learn and use some Italian.

Over the next few days I am going to write posts about the following:

·         Diary of days 1-4

·         Latin Language

·         Italian Language 

Day 1

Museo Nazionale Romano – This museum was built and opened in the 19^th century and includes antiques from between the 5^th century BC and the 3^rd century AD. On the ground floor is a collection of statues from the late Roman Republic, for example, the famous Via Labicana Augustus. This statue is significant because it demonstrated that Augustus was not only the head of the republic, but also closely related to the church. On the first floor is a collection of mosaics and wall paintings, including some from the villa of Livia (Augustus' wife). In my opinion, the most impressive of these was a vast painting of a garden, which extended on all four walls. The painting has been preserved incredibly well and it includes vivid trees and flying birds, showing their wealth.

Coliseum (Flavian Amphitheatre) - Construction began under the emperor Vespasian in 70AD and was finished within 10 years by Emperor Titus. There are 80 archways leading into the centre: many would have been used by the public to find their seats, a few by the gladiators and one larger arch dedicated to the emperor. The emperor also had his own seating with places for family members and close friends. The gladiators and nights would have been seated near the bottom, with the public sat above them. The common women would have been seated near to the top.

Actors, grave diggers and former gladiators were not allowed to go to the coliseum at all. Although generally speaking, slaves would have been banished from the coliseum, some slaves were present to operate the awning system. We can see where the awnings would have been secured in square holes in the stone at the top of the building and the awning would have covered the majority of the seating, making it much cooler.

The arena itself was 83 by 48m. Its name came from the Latin for sand (arena) as sand would have been applied to the floor often in order to soak up sweat and blood from the floor. Underneath the arena is the hypogeum, which consists of a maze of tunnels, used to store the animals. Many different events were held at the coliseum including gladiator shows, animal hunts and the arena was flooded for mock sea battles.

Roman Forum – the forum would have been a central part of Roman life as it was the venue for markets, public speeches and criminal trials. The forum is situated very close to the coliseum, between the Palatine and Capitoline hills. There are many fabulous remains in the forum, including the Arch of Septimius Severus.

The Arch of Septimius Severus is 23m high and has three arched passageways. The arch was built in 203AD to commemorate the emperor and his two sons, Caracalla and Geta. The central scene shows the concordia between them and other family members. However, after the death of Severus, his two sons became joint emperors, until Caracalla had his brother assassinated. After this he ensured that all mention of Geta was eradicated, including in the arch. This can be seen especially in the inscription, which only talks about Caracalla:

IMP (eratori) CAES(ari) LUCIO SEPTIMIO M(arci) FIL(io) SEVERO PIO PERTINACI AUG(usto) PATRI PATRIAE PARTHICO ARABICO ET / PARTHICO ADIABENICO PONTIFIC(i) MAXIMO TRIBUNIC(ia) POTEST(ate) XI IMP(eratori) XI CO(n)S(uli) III PROCO(n)S(uli) ET / IMP(eratori) CAES(ari) M(arco) AURELIO L(ucii) FIL(io) ANTONINO AUG(usto) PIO FELICI TRIBUNIC(ia) POTEST(ate) VI CO(n)S(uli) PROCO(n)S(uli) [P(atri) P(atriae) / OPTIMIS FORTISSIMISQUE PRINCIPIBUS / OB REM PUBLICAM RESTITUTAM IMPERIUMQUE POPULI ROMANI PROPAGATUM / INSIGNIBUS VIRTUTIBUS EORUM DOMI FORISQUE S(enatus) P(opulus)Q(ue) R(omanus)

To the Imperator Caesar Lucius Septimius, son of Marcus, Severus Pius Pertinax Augustus, father of his country, conqueror of the Parthians in Arabia and Assyria, Pontifex Maximus, with Tribunician powers 11 times, triumphing general 11 times, consul 3 times, and proconsul; and to the Imperator Caesar Marcus Aurelius, son of Lucius, Antoninus Augustus Pius Felix [=Caracalla], with tribunician powers 6 times, consul, proconsul, father of his country—**the best and bravest of princes**—on account of the republic restored and the empire of the Roman people increased by their outstanding virtues at home and abroad, the Senate and the Roman people dedicate this arch.

** This phrase was substituted for one that probably read:  ET P(ublio) SEPTIMIO L(ucii) F(ilio) GETAE NOB(ilissimo) CAES(ari). The translation reads: “and to Publius Septimius, son of Lucius, Geta, most noble Caesar"

Text and transcription sourced from: http://archive1.village.virginia.edu/spw4s/RomanForum/GoogleEarth/AK_GE/AK_HTML/MA-020.html

David Crystal at Cheltenham Literature Festival 2013

I was incredibly lucky to get tickets to see Mr Crystal at both of his talks at this year’s literature festival – firstly on pronouncing Shakespeare and secondly about his new book ‘Wordsmiths and Warriors: The English-Language Tourist's Guide to Britain’.

The first talk was given by David and Ben Crystal. Ben, his son, is a leading actor at the Globe Theatre, most famous for encouraging people to use ‘original pronunciation (OP)’ when acting Shakespeare.

OP is the way in which we expect actors to have spoken in the theatres when Shakespeare was being performed. But how do we know what they would have sounded like?

1)      Rhyming

When many Shakespearean texts are spoken in modern Received Pronunciation, many of the rhymes do not work. This reduces the effect and therefore makes some people question his talent, but at the time, the vast majority of them would have worked. This allows linguists to compare a range of different words which were known to rhyme and find the most likely sound. For example, in sonnet 116:

If this be error and upon me proved,

I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

Although nowadays, ‘proved’ and ‘loved’ is a very tenuous half rhyme, when the sonnet was written, they would have rhymed perfectly. We can work out which pronunciation has changed, since  Ben Johnson wrote a grammar reference book at around the same time. In this, he stated that ‘o’ is pronounced short and he made a list of words for which this rule applied, including the words proved and loved. Therefore proved would have sounded like modern day ‘loved’.

This is Ben Crystal acting the sonnet in both Received Pronunciation and OP:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bt7OynPUIY8

 

2)      Spelling

In Romeo and Juliet when Mercutio observes that Queen Mab’s whip has a ‘lash of film’. But the word ‘film’ is spelt ‘philome’ in the first folio and many other written documents. This allows us to conclude that the word must have had two-syllables, rather like in the modern Irish ‘filum’.

3)      Puns

David crystal used the example, ‘From forth the fatal lines of these two foes'. This takes on a whole new meaning when you understand that ‘lines’ and ‘loins’ were pronounced identically. Therefore, in many cases working out the two meanings of puns gives us a better idea of how the words were pronounced in order to make the joke work.

Using OP does not only affect the spectators, but also the actors. After they have finished the laborious task off learning the accent, their acting style is said to change completely. They are able to act as their characters would have, more earthy and fighty. In fact, the language difference made many actors, such as Bette Bourne change completely as she 'became a totally different woman'.

But there are more benefits, since our language derived from OP, all of the listeners are able to pick out their accent from it, making the theatre seem more intimate. An example was when David Crystal went up to a group of teenage boys and asked what they thought. They said ‘wicked’, and after asking why, a boy with a strong Cockney accent said ‘well, they’re talking like us’. Although clearly they weren’t talking in the London accent, the boys either picked out phonetic similarities or found it more accessible that the actors weren’t speaking ‘posh’ Received Pronunciation.

Therefore, using OP in Shakespeare’s productions not only is a great way to transport us back to how it may have been like, it allows us to understand and appreciate his work more and make Shakespeare more accessible.

 

‘Wordsmiths and Warriors: The English-Language Tourist's Guide to Britain’

If you are interested in science, you'll visit museums. If you are interested in art, you'll visit exhibitions. But where should we go, when we are interested in language? This is the question that David Crystal sets out to answer in his new book. He stated that there will be many places that changed or influenced the English language within 20km of where you live.

This is true for the audience of the lecture, as taking Cheltenham as his starting point, he directed us down south to North Nibley in Southern Gloucestershire. This is the place where William Tyndale, one of the first bible translators into English, was born. Translating the bible was strictly prohibited in Tyndale’s time and therefore his books were burned, with only two remaining. However, you will have heard the phrase ‘the sign of the times’, which although was in the King James Bible, these words were taken directly from Tyndale’s edition. On the top of a hill stands a monument dedicated to Tyndale, with an inscription saying ‘in grateful remembrance of William Tyndale, translator of the English bible, who first caused the new testament to be printed in the mother tongue of his countrymen, born near this spot he suffered’. Although this recognition is not as much as he deserves, Crystal was very happy to see his work appreciated.

There are many other fascinating places that have shaped the language that we speak today, which may be located near you. Therefore, if you are interested in language (and why would you be reading this if you weren’t), this book is for you.

Language development in the brain

A new breakthrough has been made concerning language development in children. Researchers at King’s College London and Brown University took brain scans of over 100 children to identify the levels of myelin in their brain.

Myelin is an insulating material that forms a sheath around the axon of neurons. The material increases the speed of impulses in the brain and the spinal cord. The increase of myelin is part of the maturation and development of language. In theory, the more sheath, the messages are sent more rapidly and therefore children have more language abilities.

A link between language and the frontal left cortex has been established for many years. As part of my EPQ, I conducted a dichotic listening experiment to investigate this further and concluded that over 80% of my subject has specialisations in their left hemisphere. Due to this link, scientists expected to find more myelin in the frontal left hemisphere. As hypothesised, they did discover that the levels of myelin were asymmetric as the left hemisphere has a denser amount of myelin. However, the study shows that the levels of myelin increased at the same rate in both hemispheres from the age of 1 – showing that the increased amount of myelin was already there. This shows that the amount of myelin may not account for the increased language ability in children, but shows the importance of the child’s environment.

The scientists also found that the myelin had a stronger influence on language until they were 4 years old and that after the 4 year old marker, the levels of myelin remained mostly constant. This explains how children learn their first language so quickly and how children are more able to become fluent in a second language than an adult. This suggests that there is a ‘critical period’ (Chomsky) for language. This also sheds a new light on Piaget’s theory of the different developmental stages that children go through. The first two are:

·         Up to 2 years old - sensory motor stage

·         2-7 years old - preoperational from stage

Piaget specified that the first stage depends greatly on social environment and exposure to language so the brain begins to become asymmetrical. If a child is in the right environment, the frontal lobes increase in size greatly. During the next stage, both Wernicke’s and Broca’s area are said to develop most, however the brain growth slows down after half way through this stage.

These hypotheses are reinforced to a certain extent by this new research, showing that the environment that children grow up in are very important, that the brain develops (as the levels of myelin increase) and that the critical period for language is about four years old.

As quoted from Dr Sean Deoni from Brown University:

"This work is important as it is the first to investigate the relationship between brain structure and language across early childhood and demonstrate how this relationship changes with age." 

To read more visit: http://news.brown.edu/pressreleases/2013/10/language

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-24446292