Posted: Thu Apr 21, 2005 9:12 pm
I gave you guys one and you didn't get it, huh? I thought somebody would have pointed out the similiarity between Latin locos, loca and Spanish locos, loca.
Brazilian dude
Brazilian dude
I wasn't even allowed to take Latin, having chosen science. So I asked my old classmate the Latin professor if I was correct in remembering the phrase as "papam habemus", and linked him to the Languagelog comment on Cardinal Estevez' pronuciation (www.langagelog.com, abour 2/3 down).I declined to take Latin.
-Tim
Another view: the Swedish RC archbishop would have preferred the quite common name "Bengt" for an official Swedish name, but had to admit that all previous Benedicts have been Benedictus in Sweden.The word order 'habemus papam' is the normal one, but the reverse one is, from a linguistic point of view, equally correct. 'H' was pronounced very feebly in the Latin of antiquity, and disappeared totally in the Romance languages. So, Estevez' pronunciation is perfectly expected and correct as a modern Latin pronunciation.