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Assimil Latein ohne Mühe | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Programs, Books & Tapes |  | |
| Antanas Tetraglot Groupie Lithuania Joined 4844 days ago 91 posts - 172 votes  Speaks: Lithuanian*, English, Russian, German Studies: FrenchB1, Spanish | Message 1 of 8 01 December 2013 at 5:04pm | IP Logged | ||
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It seems that a German-based Assimil Latin course was published about a couple of months ago. No mention of it is available on any of Assimil web-sites that I know, though.
From this commentary one can infer that it is a translation of Le Latin sans peine by Desessard and not of the newer Le Latin by Ducos-Filippi. Has anyone already had an opportunity to look at this book? Is the German translation good/pleasant? Are there many (if any) mistakes in the Latin text? Edited by Antanas on 02 December 2013 at 11:25pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| jondesousa Tetraglot Senior Member United States goo.gl/Zgg3nRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6296 days ago 227 posts - 297 votes Speaks: English*, Portuguese, Japanese, Esperanto Studies: Latin, Mandarin, Spanish | Message 2 of 8 01 December 2013 at 7:20pm | IP Logged | ||
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I haven't reviewed this copy in particular but I know it was reviewed and edited heavily by a teacher I am studying
Latin under now, A. Gratius Avitus. He runs the Schola Latinitatis Universalis which is a web-based program based on Desessard's book. I can tell you that knowing Magister Avitus' detail focused approach to teaching this book is likely the best possible print version of Desessard available. Best of luck to you in your studies!! 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Kronos Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 5293 days ago 186 posts - 452 votes Speaks: German*, English | Message 3 of 8 02 December 2013 at 4:57pm | IP Logged | ||
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Here are the links to the course, on one of the German Assimil websites:
Latein ohne Mühe Details and Look Inside The Latin text on the sample pages, as well as the illustrations, are the same as that of the old French edition except that some longer lines are now broken apart into several lines. The annotations are obviously new and different since this book is targeted at native German speakers. I like the new format better. The old one in French was good, but the new one is clearly better laid out and allows the reader to compare the Latin and corresponding German lines side by side without any difficulty. The audio material is luckily also the newly recorded dual one that was first used for the recent Italian edition of that book - Restituta (reconstructed classical pronunciation) and Ecclesiastica (Italianized 'Church' pronunciation). I am very glad that they chose the older, 1960s, method for the German adaptation, since this has become a textbook classic among many students of Latin. And the language itself is probably not going to be outdated soon, so... 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Antanas Tetraglot Groupie Lithuania Joined 4844 days ago 91 posts - 172 votes Speaks: Lithuanian*, English, Russian, German Studies: FrenchB1, Spanish | Message 4 of 8 02 December 2013 at 11:48pm | IP Logged | ||
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Thanks for your answers, jondesousa and Kronos.
It must be exciting to study Latin under supervision of someone who knows Assimil's Latin text well. I have a copy of the French edition and I'm now at lecture 69. I don't study this book very seriously, just now and then. I purchased it used about 4 years ago. Now it begins falling apart. I wanted to buy a copy of the Italian edition because I needed another copy and those in French were very expensive and not easy to find. But I was put off by the amount of spelling mistakes that were reported in the Italian edition and the sad fact that I don't know much Italian. As I see from the links provided by Kronos, they have reshaped the layout significantly, and added colours, too. The revision lesson (49) has also been almost completely rewritten. Also, instead of one exercise at the end of each lesson, there is now two of them. But you get the same amount of sentences, anyway. Look at the lecture 2. The first exercise of the German edition is the first part of the one and only exercise of the French edition. The second one is the second part where you now must fill in the blanks instead of just understanding as it used to be in the French edition. It seems that the present editor in chief of Assimil could not make-up its mind whether to alter their classic book or to leave it as it was. But none of this diminishes the overall value of the German edition. At last one can buy a new copy of the Desessard's text and in a relatively popular language. (I don't want to say that Italian is not a popular language, but, still, German is much more popular than Italian here in the North-Centre-East of Europe.) My only gripe would be the use of "æ" instead of "ae" (and, I presume, of "œ" instead of "oe"), since I prefer the classical pronunciation. By the way, I did not know that there are two Assimil web-sites in Germany... Edited by Antanas on 02 December 2013 at 11:49pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| jondesousa Tetraglot Senior Member United States goo.gl/Zgg3nRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6296 days ago 227 posts - 297 votes Speaks: English*, Portuguese, Japanese, Esperanto Studies: Latin, Mandarin, Spanish | Message 5 of 8 03 December 2013 at 2:29pm | IP Logged | ||
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I can definitely agree that the Italian edition has many typographical errors as I have both the French and Italian and have found several errors. That being said, my Italian is decent enough and my French and German are both terrible so I don't have much choice.
Also with respect to the "æ" instead of "ae" nomenclature: We are using restored classical pronunciation in Magister Avitus' class and he insists that without properly demonstrating diphthongs instead of hiatus' it is not possible to properly pronounce in classical Latin; consequently, the diphthong "æ" is actually much more correct than using the hiatus "ae" for pronunciation purposes. Best of luck in your studies. You may want to consider Avitus' classes for next year as they are very good and intense. We started the Sermo I/II class about 2.5 months ago and we are already up to Lesson 40. We should be finished the course around June. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Kronos Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 5293 days ago 186 posts - 452 votes Speaks: German*, English | Message 6 of 8 03 December 2013 at 3:02pm | IP Logged | ||
And here is a related short video talk by Magister Avitus: Avitus in colloquio de vivá linguá Latiná per rete docendá 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| jondesousa Tetraglot Senior Member United States goo.gl/Zgg3nRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6296 days ago 227 posts - 297 votes Speaks: English*, Portuguese, Japanese, Esperanto Studies: Latin, Mandarin, Spanish | Message 7 of 8 03 December 2013 at 4:15pm | IP Logged | ||
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If you notice in Magister Avitus' video, he is holding a copy of the original French Desessard course. He swears by this course and I am becoming more and more fond of it myself.
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| Antanas Tetraglot Groupie Lithuania Joined 4844 days ago 91 posts - 172 votes Speaks: Lithuanian*, English, Russian, German Studies: FrenchB1, Spanish | Message 8 of 8 05 December 2013 at 1:13am | IP Logged | ||
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Thanks for your links and explanations concerning the Schola Latinitatis Universalis. If I don't manage to make a more or less significant progress in studying Latin by the next fall, I will probably take Magister Avitus' class.
Desesard's book is indeed very interesting and fun to study. On the other hand, as someone already metioned in this forum, the text in the last third of it or so becomes rather dense. There is a lot of vocabulary to acquire. For example, in his Familia Romana, Ørberg introduces vocabulary and grammar much more slowly. And his audio recordings are more than two times longer than those of Le Latin sans peine. I personally prefer orthography that Ørberg uses (with dashes indicating long vowels, etc.). You can use trema in order to indicate hiatus between two vowels. Otherwise, read it like a diphtong. In this way, one stays closer to the original orthography. But that, of course, is my personal preference. Good luck in your studies. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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