The consul of the year B. C. 260 was C. Duilius, who in that year gained his celebrated naval victory over the Carthaginians; the inscription, therefore, engraved on the pedestal of the Columna Rostrata, which was erected in commemoration of that event, may be considered as a contemporary monument of the language.[[62]] Some alterations were probably made in its orthography at a period subsequent to its erection, for it was rent asunder from top to bottom by lightning A. U. C. 580,[[63]] and is supposed not to have been repaired until the reign of Augustus, for the restoration of a temple built by Duilius was begun by that emperor and completed by Tiberius.[[64]] The principal peculiarities to be observed in this inscription are, that the ablatives singular end in d, as in the words Siceliad, obsidioned; c is put for g, as in macistratos, leciones; e for i, as in navebos, ornavet; o for u, as in Duilios, aurom; classes, nummi, &c., are spelt clases, numei, and quinqueremos, triremos, quinresmos, triesmos. This monument was discovered A. D. 1565, in a very imperfect state, but its numerous lacunæ were supplied by Grotefend.
About sixty years after the date of this epitaph,[[65]] the Senatus-consultum, respecting the Bacchanals, was passed.[[66]] This monument was discovered A. D. 1692, in the Calabrian village of Terra di Feriolo, and is now preserved in the Imperial Museum of Vienna.[[67]]
There is scarcely any difference between the Latinity of this inscription and that of the classical period except in the orthography and some of the grammatical inflexions. The expressions are in accordance with the usage of good authors, and the construction is not without elegance. Nor is this to be wondered at when it is remembered that, at the period when this decree was published, Rome already possessed a written literature. Ennius was now known as a poet and an historian, and many of the comedies of Plautus had been acted on the public stage.
Having thus enumerated the existing monuments of the old Roman language and its constituent elements, it remains to compare the Latin and Greek alphabets, for the purpose of exhibiting the variations which the Latin letters have severally undergone.
The letters then may be arranged according to the following classification:—
| { | Soft | P | C K or Q, | T. | |||
| Consonants | { | Mutes | Medial | B | G | D. | |
| Aspirates | F (V) | H | |||||
| Liquids | L, M, N, R. | ||||||
| Sibilants | S, X. | ||||||
| Vowels | A, E, I, O, U. | ||||||
Owing to the relation which subsists between P, B, and F or V, as the soft medial and aspirated pronunciation of the same letters, P and B, as well as F and V, in Latin, are the representatives or equivalents of the Greek F sound (φ and Ϝ,) and V also sometimes stands in the place of β. For example (1,) the Latin fama, fero, fugio, vir, &c., correspond to the Greek φημή, φέρω, φεύγω (Ϝ)Ἄρης. (2.) Nebula, caput, albus, ambo, to νεφέλη, κεφαλή, ἀλφός, ἄμφω. Similarly, duonus and duellum become bonus and bellum; the transition being from du to a sound like the English w, thence to v, and lastly to b. The old Latin c was used as the representative of its corresponding medial G, as well as K; for example, magistratus, legiones, Carthaginienses were written on the Columna Rostrata, leciones, macistratus, Cartacinienses. The representative of the Greek κ was c; thus caput stands for κεφαλή: the sound qu also, as might be expected, from its answering to the Greek koppa (Q,) and the Hebrew koph (ק,) had undoubtedly in the old Latin the same sound as C or K, and, therefore, quatio becomes, in composition, cutio; and quojus, quoi, quolonia, become, in classical Latin, cujus, cui, colonia. This pronunciation has descended to the modern French language, although it has become lost in the Italian. A passage from the “Aulularia”[[68]] of Plautus illustrates this assertion, and Quintilian[[69]] also bears testimony to the existence of the same pronunciation in the time of Cicero.
The aspirate H is in Latin the representative of the Greek Χ, as, for example, hiems, hortus, and humi correspond to χείμων, χόρτος, χάμαι, whilst the third Greek aspirated mute Θ becomes a tenuis in the mouths of the early Latins, as in Cartaginienses, and the h sound was afterwards restored when Greek exercised an influence over the language as well as the literature of Rome.
The absence of the th sound in the old Latin is compensated for in a variety of ways; sometimes by an f, as fera, fores, for θήρ and θύρα.
The interchanges which take place between the T and D, and the liquids L, N, R, can be accounted for on the grammatical principle,[[70]] which is so constantly exemplified in the literal changes of the Semitic languages, that letters articulated by the same organ are frequently put one for the other. Now D, T, L, N are all palatals, and in the pronunciation of R also some use is made of the palate. Hence we find a commutation of r and n in δωρον, donum; æreus, æneus; of t and l in θώρηξ and lorica; d and l in olfacio and odere facio, Ulysses and Οδυσσεύς; r and d in auris and audio, arfuise, and adfuisse.