Research
I'm interested in the history and development of classical languages, especially their phonology and morphology, and the writing systems used to represent them; I focus in particular on the Italic languages, including Latin, Oscan, Umbrian and South Picene. I've also worked on aspects of the (pre-)history of Celtic languages, and the reconstruction of Proto-Indo-European. I welcome enquiries from potential graduate students who may be interested in working on topics of this sort.
Publications
Monographs
2023. Orthographic Traditions and the Sub-elite in the Roman Empire: CUP
2016. Oscan in the Greek Alphabet. Cambridge: CUP
2012. The Reflexes of the Proto-Indo-European Laryngeals in Celtic. Leiden & Boston: Brill
Edited volumes
2020. James Clackson, Patrick James, Katherine McDonald, Livia Tagliapietra & Nicholas Zair (eds.), Migration, Mobility and Language Contact in and around the Ancient Mediterranean. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Selected articles
2023. Katherine McDonald & Nicholas Zair. Linguistic resistance to Rome: a re-appraisal of the epigraphic evidence. In Jaś Elsner & Daniel Jolowicz (eds.), ‘Articulating Resistance Under The Roman Empire’, 29-48. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
2022. Ranjan Sen & Nicholas Zair. Liquid polarity, positional contrast, and diachronic change: clear and dark /r/ in Latin. Diachronica 39, 409-48
2021. Word-final -s in Ennius’ Annales: a sociolinguistic approach. Journal of Latin Linguistics 20, 265-84
2020. Rupert Thompson & Nicholas Zair. “Irrational lengthening” in Virgil. Mnemosyne 73, 577–608
2020. The Mamertini in Messina: mobility, migration and mercenaries. In James Clackson, Patrick James, Katherine McDonald, Livia Tagliapietra & Nicholas Zair (eds.), Migration, Mobility and Language Contact in and around the Ancient Mediterranean, 156-70. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
2019. Moreed Arbabzadah & Nicholas Zair. Notes on a British Curse Tablet from Red Hill, Ratcliffe-on-Soar (Nottinghamshire). Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik 212, 172-9
2019. Reconstructed forms in the Roman writers on language. Language and History, Latest Articles, 1-20. Available online at https://doi.org/10.1080/17597536.2019.1649856
2018. On the relative sonority of PIE /m/. Indo-European Linguistics 6, 271-303
2018. Latin bardus and gurdus. Glotta 94, 311-18
2017 Katherine McDonald & Nicholas Zair. Changing script in a threatened language: reactions to Romanisation at Bantia in the first century BC. In Mari Jones & Damien Mooney (eds.), Creating Orthographies for Endangered Languages, 291-304. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
2017. The origins of -urC- for expected -orC- in Latin. Glotta 93, 255-89
2016. Vowel weakening in the Sabellic languages as language contact. Indogermanische Forschungen 121, 295-316
2015 Katherine McDonald, Livia Tagliapietra and Nicholas Zair). New readings of the multilingual Petelia curse tablet. Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik 195, 157-64
2015. Old Irish gniid 'makes, does', Middle Welsh gweinydaf ‘serve’ and i-presents. Zeitschrift für Celtische Philologie 62, 213-222
