• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.21 no.4
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• pp.658-667
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• 2021

Our study aimed to analyze and reinterpret, by an acoustic approach, the descriptions of the 18th century prosody and introduce the figurative pronunciation system, which is the International Phonetic Alphabet pioneer. Our methodology compares and analyzes grammars and documents on the transcription system and restructures the prosodic structure. It is certain that the 18th century grammarians widely accepted the prosody theories made by Arnauld & Lancelot of the seventeenth century. In particular, grammar scholars accepted the dichotomous classification of the accent structures as prosodic and oratorical accents. The prosodic accent has a relation to intonation, and the oratorical accent has as its key elements intonation and intensity. Regarding the temporal structure, the lengthening of the final syllable was observed systematically by grammarians of the 18th century. This time structure is similar to that of today. Therefore, we can conclude that the final elongation, an essential characteristic of the modern French accent, has already played an imbued role in 18th century prosody. Despite this, the 18th century grammarians did not assign it the status of accent, as it was a stereotype that matches accent with intonation.