Allen Sidney W. Accent and Rhythm: Prosodic Features of Latin and Greek: A Study in Theory and Reconstruction

Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1973. — 412pp.In Vox Latina and Vox Graeca Professor Allen was concerned primarily with the pronunciation of the individual vowels and consonants of classical Latin and Greek. In this major work he analyses in depth and in detail all the prosodic features of these languages: length of vowels and quantity of syllables, accent, pitch, stress and 'rhythm', with special attention to their manifestations in verse. The description and explanation of such features raise theoretical problems of very general importance and Professor Allen devotes the first part of the book to the establishment of the phonetic principles required as a frame of reference for the specific discussions of Latin and Greek. Parallels are cited from a number of other languages, including English. This is a book of permanent importance for students of classical languages and literatures and also for metricians, phoneticians and general linguists.