Francesco Filelfo, Letter to Lorenzo Medici (Part 15)
As it was, among the Athenians, one thing to speak Attic and another to speak grammatically, so too the same difference may be observed among the Romans, that there is one mode for Latinity, and another for literature, but it is nevertheless a small distinction. This is obvious from the nouns which are found in both the fourth and second declensions.
For, words like ornatus, tumultus, senatus, victus, and many others of this sort have genitives, grammatically speaking, which end in –us, as huius ornatus, huius tumultus, huius senatus, huius victus, though they are declined in Latin as ornatus ornati, tumultus tumulti, senatus senati, and victus victi.
In the same way, nouns of the fifth declension will for the most part take, according to the grammarians, nominatives in –es and genitives in –ei, as for example barbaries barbariei, segnities segnitiei, duricies duriciei, mollicies molliciei, but in actual Latin use, the nominative ends in –a and the genitive in the diphthong –ae, as barbaria barbariae, segnitia segnitiae, duricia duriciae, mollicia molliciae.
Bearing on this, one may observe in actual Latin the use of the word nex in the nominative, which the rules of the grammarians prohibit.
The grammarians would also argue that the word sponte is in the ablative and lacking all of the other cases. But Cornelius Celsus shows that actual Latin uses the word differently, when he writes in the first book of his Art of Medicine, ‘A healthy person, who is in good health and in possession of their own will, should bind himself to no set rules.’
So, I say, Latin speech is common and known to all, but literary speech is not so. But while it is primarily restricted to the educated and the learned, yet it is such that it can correct and nourish Latin speech which has become degraded.”
Et ut apud Athenienses aliud erat attice loqui, aliud grammatice, eadem quoque differentia fuit apud Romanos, ut alia esset latinitatis ratio, et litteraturae alia, sed ea tamen admodum parva: quod patet in iis nominibus quae et in quarta reperiuntur et in secunda declinatione.
Nam ornatus, tumultus, senatus, victus multaque huiusmodi emittunt grammatice genitivos in – us, ut huius ornatus, huius tumultus, huius senatus, huius victus, cum latine declinentur ornatus -ti, tumultus -ti, senatus -ti et victus victi.
Et eodem modo quintae declinationis nomina secundum grammaticos emittunt, maiore ex parte, rectos in -es et genitivos in -ei, ut barbaries barbariei, segnities segnitiei, duricies duriciei, mollicies molliciei, quae in recto, secundum latinitatem, desinunt in -a et in genitivo in -ae diphtongon, ut barbaria barbariae, segnitia segnitiae, duricia duriciae, mollicia molliciae.
Ad haec latine reperitur nex in casu nominativo, quod grammaticorum praecepta prohibent.
Et sponte grammatice ablativum habere volunt, caeteris autem casibus carere. At latinitatem aliter eo uti ostendit Cornelius Celsus, qui libro primo suae artis medicae ita ait: “Sanus homo, qui et bene valet et suae spontis est, nullis obligare se legibus debet”.
Latinus, inquam, sermo et vulgaris erat et omnibus cognitus, litteralis vero non ita prorsus, sed viris peritis ac doctis duntaxat, caeterum talis qui depravatam latinitatem et emendaret et aleret.
