Biography
I read Literae Humaniores (Classics) at Oxford, before doing an MPhil and DPhil in Comparative Philology and General Linguistics. I came to Cambridge in 2010 as a Research Fellow at Peterhouse, and then a Research Associate in the Classics Faculty, before being appointed Lecturer in 2016, Senior Lecturer in 2020, and Professor in 2025.
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
2025. Latin scrĭptus in the Senatus Consultum de Bacchanalibus (CIL 12.581). Glotta 101, 33-6
2025. Usum loquendi populo concessi (Cic. Orat. 160): voiceless aspirates in Latin. In Paolo Di Giovine & Marco Mancini (eds.), Lingua e storia. Walter Belardi a cento anni dalla nascita. Atti del convegno internazionale, Roma, 14-15 dicembre 2023, 221-38. Rome: Editrice ‘Il Calamo’
2024. Does orthographic variation preclude standardisation? Transactions of the Philological Society 122, 488-95
2024. Priests, oxen, and the Indo-European taxonomy of wealth in the Iguvine Tables. In Jenny Larsson, Thomas Olander & Anders Richardt Jørgensen (eds.), Indo-European Interfaces. Integrating Linguistics, Mythology and Archaeology, 249-74. Stockholm: Stockholm University Press
2024. Raoul Zamponi & Nicholas Zair. L’iscrizione (sud)picena della stele di Mondolfo. Proposta di una nuova lettura. Studi Etruschi 86, 394-9
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
