Nota linguistica sul nuovo poculum da Caere

This paper closely examines a text found at Caere and made known by Marina Micozzi in the Proceedings of this Con- ference (Venerus.pocolu). The inscription presents a fairly accurate ductus at the mouthpiece of a black-glazed ceramic vessel. Although the text is a brief one, it exhibits linguistically interesting features. Besides the mark of the genitive {-us} < {-os}, alternating in apophony with {-is} < {-es} (which was later standardized in Late Republican Latin), the shift of ancient /o/ to /u/ in final syllable (poculu) is of particular significance. An examination of the documentation supports a possible chronology of the inscription between the end of the 4th and, more likely, the first decades of the 3rd century BCE, matching the chronology of the funerary equipment to which the vase belongs. The brief evidence, moreover, confirms the suspicion that the phenomenon of /o/ > /u/ in final syllable was older than commonly believed so far. Given that in the case of both the Fucino epigraph and our Ceretan vase the irradiation of Roman cultural and linguistic pat- terns is evident, one might conclude that the phenomenon had already taken place in the speech of the Urbs around 300 B.C. and was spreading to the surrounding areas, albeit net of graphic archaisms that would persist throughout the 3rd century B.C.