My friend Scott asked the following question:
When did Latin palatize C before a front vowel? I note from the historical linguistics book you sent that almost all Romance languages do this in one form or another, except Sardinian, which kept the /k/ value here. Did Caesar refer to himself with a /k/, or had this shift already happened?
My answer, of the top of my head, was that Gaius Iulius almost certainly pronounced Caesar with the /k/ sound. In support of which I found this , via Google, which indicates that he might have pronounced it with a slightly softened /k'/. When I got home I was able to consult Palmer's The Latin Language:
Posted by joshua at January 12, 2005 10:49 PMThe palatalization of c took place much later [than the 2nd
century], there being no unequivocal evidence until the sixth century. In Classical Latin this sound was pronounced as a plosive [k] in all positions. Before i^ (i with a circumflex beneath) and somewhat later before i and e, the consonant was palatalized and a glide sound developed[kj]. The next stage is postulated as [tj], which developed as above to ts, the convergence of ci and ti being apparent from the confusion of orthography: nuncius, amicicia, tercium, nacione, and conditio, solatium, intcitamento seems to imply an affricate pronunciation [ts] or [tf], but the treatment varies in different parts of the Romance territory. It is noteworthy that the more archaic dialectics of Sardinian have remained immune from this palatalization. - pp. 158