Were initial voiced stops voiceless in early Latin?

1. Did Latin have aspirated consonants?
2. Did Latin have nasal vowels?
3. Does Latin have silent letters?
4. When was Latin spelling standardized?

Did Latin have aspirated consonants?

The aspirated consonants /pʰ tʰ kʰ/ as distinctive phonemes were originally foreign to Latin, appearing in educated loanwords and names from Greek. In such cases, the aspiration was likely produced only by educated speakers. /z/ was also not native to Classical Latin.

Did Latin have nasal vowels?

Clackson 2008 writes that nasalized vowels in Latin were inherently long and occurred in two positions only: word-final and before a nasal+continuant (p. 77).

Does Latin have silent letters?

In Latin there are FIVE vowel sounds, only. Also, there are a total of ZERO silent letters in Latin. If you see the letter, it means you say the letter. If the letter is not said, it is not written.

When was Latin spelling standardized?

This article contains IPA phonetic symbols.

The Latin alphabet is directly derived from the Etruscan and Greek alphabets. By the late Roman Republic (75 BC), Old Latin had been standardized into Classical Latin used by educated elites.