Ecclesiastical Latin Alphabet and Pronunciation

In the Middle Ages, Latin was only for the educated. Due to the prominence of the Roman Catholic Church at the time, Latin primarily served religious purposes. The Catholics decided that Latin as it applied to their churches would sound best with an Italian accent, so they took Latin and made their own dialect of it, known as Ecclesiastical Latin or Church Latin. This Ecclesiastical Latin dialect differs significantly from classical dialects.

VOWELS

• a - ah, like father (never like the ey sound in say)
• e - eh, like red (never like the ey sound in say)
• i - ee, like feed (never like the ih sound in pin)
• o - o from the back of your throat, like orb (never like the oh sound in go)
• u - oo, like soon (never like the uh sound in sun)
• y - ee, like feed

Note that Ecclesiastical Latin has no long or short vowels.

CONSONANTS

• b - b, like by
• c - ch, like chair, when before e, ae, oe, i, and y. Otherwise it makes a k sound, like car.
• d - d, like dad
• f - f, like fun
• g - j, like giraffe, when before e, ae, i, and y. Otherwise it makes a g sound, like go.
• h - k, like car, only in the words nihil and mihi (and their compounds). Otherwise it is silent.
• j - y, like yes (never like the j sound in jam)
• k - k, like car
• l - l, like love
• m - m, like may
• n - n, like nut
• p - p, like pun
• q - only before u, qu makes a kw sound like quiet
• r - slightly rolled r
• s - s, like say
• t - t, like tell
• v - v, like vase
• x - ks, like box
• y - ee, like feed
• z - dz, like ads

LETTER COMBINATIONS

With a few exceptions, diphthongs were usually pronounced with each vowel sounded separately.

• ae - eh, like red
• cc - t-ch, like cat chase
• ch - k, like chrome
• ei - ey, like hey, only in an interjection. Otherwise, each vowel was sounded separately.
• gn - ny, like nyoom
• oe - eh, like red
• sc - sh, like shack
• th - t, like time
• ti - tsee, like Patsy, before a vowel and after any letter except s, t, and x.
• xc - ksh, before e, ae, oe, i, and y.

Note that j was added to the Latin alphabet (as opposed to the classical alphabet) in the Middle Ages. Medieval Latin speakers avoided blending the sounds of any two letters, instead preferring to emphasize both letters. They would often replace the diphthong ae with the letter e (e.g. classical familiae became medieval familie). Occasionally they would exchange single consonants with double consonants (e.g. classical Africa became medieval Affrica) and then pronounce both consonants separately. Likewise, double consonants were often contracted to single consonants.