Nuntii Latini is the name of several news services that broadcast in Latin.

Finnish Nuntii Latini

The Finnish Nuntii Latini was a Finnish news service broadcast in Latin between September 1989 and June 2019 by the Finnish national broadcaster Yle (Radiophonia Finnica Generalis) on the Yle Radio 1 channel. The name Nuntii Latini is Latin for Latin News[1] or News in Latin.[2]

Station output

There was a five-minute long weekly broadcast of recent world news and human interest.[3] The program was eventually made available on the Internet and had about 40,000 listeners according to RTÉ in 2019,[3] compared to 75,000 reported by the BBC in 2006.[4] Articles were usually alternately read by a male and female announcer, in Latin. Pronunciation was, for the most part, "classical" and listeners could follow a written transcript of news items. A "Glossarium programmatis" was provided for each program translating 6 to 10 of the key Latin terms into Finnish, English, and German.

The program was founded by Tuomo Pekkanen, a professor of Latin.[1] As of 2013, Laura Nissinen was one of the announcers.[5] The program has been described as one of several ways in which Finland has been a bastion of Latin, such as the translation of the works of Elvis Presley into Latin by Finnish academic Jukka Ammondt.[3]

Shutdown

In November 2017, Yle announced that they would be shutting down the broadcast in December of that year.[6] Yle cited the availability of other Latin-language media on the internet as one of the reasons for the shutdown.[7] Another reason was the difficulty in finding suitable replacements for the programme's ageing producers.[3] The announcement resulted in a public campaign to save the program.[2] More than 3,000 listeners wrote to the station in protest, resulting in the show being extended through 2019.[8] The final broadcast was on 14 June 2019.[9]

External links

References

  1. ^ a b Tagliabue, John (2013-04-08). "Latin Makes an Appearance on Finnish Radio. News at VI". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2019-02-23.
  2. ^ a b Tanner, Jari (2017-12-29). "Global outcry saves Latin news show broadcast from Finland". The Seattle Times. Retrieved 2019-02-23.
  3. ^ a b c d "Finnish broadcaster ends Latin news bulletins". RTÉ News. 24 June 2019. Retrieved 25 June 2019.
  4. ^ "Finland makes Latin the King". BBC News. 24 October 2006.
  5. ^ "First Person: Laura Nissinen 'I read the news in Latin'". Financial Times. 2013-07-05. Retrieved 2019-02-23.
  6. ^ "Nuntii Latini – News in Latin one last time". Latinitium. Retrieved 2019-02-23.
  7. ^ "Yle's Nuntii Latini to be broadcast for the last time in late December". yle.fi. Retrieved 2019-02-23.
  8. ^ Gledhill, Ruth. "Latin radio show saved after more than 3000 listeners write in". The Tablet. Retrieved 2019-02-23.
  9. ^ Meriläinen, Ari (11 June 2019). "News in Latin – created by fluke and lasted thirty years". Yle. Retrieved 14 June 2019.
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