Acadēmīa:Latin conventions

This page explains the conventions for texts written in Latin. In general, the Acadēmīa follows a spelling convention based on current usage. Cases of doubt and deviations are documented and clarified here.

Letters

v and j

The letters v,j should be used to distinguish them from u and i. Deviating from this:

• the compounds "su", "gu", and "qu" should not be written as "sv", "gv", and "qv".
• j should not be doubled, if it is between two vowels (e.g. cūjus not cūjjus)
• In poetic texts or texts with metrical clauses, words should be written as the meter suggests (e.g., "Italjam" instead of "Italiam" in Virgil, Aeneid v. 2).

Macrons

To avoid homographs (e.g., "nōvī" vs. "novī"), macrons should be used consistently. Breve, however, which can be found in some older dictionaries, is not preferred. The following points should be noted:

• Macrons should be set as they most commonly appear. Iambic shortenings should not appear in the lemma, but can appear in written text.

Sonus medius

The sonus medius is usually rendered as i, but can also be written as u. (documentum vs. docimentum). There are no fixed rules.

Word spelling

In general, attested and/or more commonly used forms should be preferred.

Archaic words

Archaizing forms may appear in the text, but generally should not be used as headings or lemmas.

cum/quum/quom

We recommend writing "cum" if it is used as a preposition, and "quum" if it is used as a conjunction. This also makes the etymological proximity to forms like "quondam" etc. more visible. The archaizing use of "quom" is also permitted.

Compound spelling

Words (or morphemes) should always be written together as the Latin word accent suggests. In unclear cases or cases with multiple spellings, all spellings are acceptable.

Elisions

Elisions are usually not represented (e.g. tē amō not t'amō). We therefore recommend e.g. magnō opere instead of magnōpere.

Enclitics

Enclitics are always connected with the word to which they are attached.

Compositions

Phonetic changes that happen in composites should be made visible in the writing (e.g. conlegere not cumlegere). This does not apply to words in which both forms are common or in usage (e.g. inlustris vs. illustris).

Punctuation

Main clauses

Main clauses are separated by a period, exclamation mark or question mark. If two main clauses are closely related, a semicolon can also be set. For better readability, we advise against the use of commata.

Subordinate clauses

Subordinate clauses are separated with commata. Since non-finite clauses (e.g. AcI, PC) are not true subordinate clauses, they should not be separated by commata.

Appositions

Simple appositions are either not set or separated by an comma. If the apposition consists of a sentence or the apposition becomes too long, it is better to use long dashes.