spiritus asper

See also: Spiritus asper

English

Etymology

From Latin spīritus asper (literally “rough breath”).

Noun

spiritus asper (plural spiritus aspers)

1. (orthography) A diacritic mark ( ʻ ) in Ancient Greek used to indicate the aspiration of an initial vowel or rho; also used for a similar sound in the Wade–Giles system of romanization for Mandarin Chinese.

   The spiritus asper mark looks like an opening single quote, as in the word εὑρίσκω (heurískõ), the word εὕρηκα (heúrēka), or the word ἕξις (héxis, "habit").

   • 1836 May, “System of Orthography for Chinese words”, in The Chinese Repository‎^[1], volume V, number I, page 27:

     h, as an aspirate, is very frequent in Chinese ; it is generally a stronger aspirate than in English : in the dialects of the south it is often changed into f, in the north into s, or sh. To mark an aspirate after a consonant, we use the Greek spiritus asper in preference to h.

Synonyms

• rough breathing
• dasia, dasy pneuma

Translations

Ancient Greek diacritical mark — see rough breathing

See also

• Citations:ʻ (examples from the Wade–Giles romanization system)
• spiritus lenis

Latin

Etymology

From spīritus (“breath, breathing”) + asper (“rough, harsh”).

Pronunciation

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): [ˈspiː.rɪ.tʊs ˈas.pɛr]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): [ˈspiː.ri.t̪us ˈas.per]

Noun

spīritus asper m (genitive spīritūs asperī); fourth declension

1. spiritus asper

Declension

Fourth-declension noun with a second-declension adjective (nominative masculine singular in -er).

	singular	plural
nominative	spīritus asper	spīritūs asperī
genitive	spīritūs asperī	spīrituum asperōrum
dative	spīrituī asperō	spīritibus asperīs
accusative	spīritum asperum	spīritūs asperōs
ablative	spīritū asperō	spīritibus asperīs
vocative	spīritus asper	spīritūs asperī