the classification of the dialect of Mauretania Caesariensis. There is additional evidence both from commentary and metrical inscriptions for confusion over syllable length and stress resulting from the collapse of vowel length distinctions. In another passage, Augustine writes that a sound change which was criticized by grammarians was to lengthen formerly short stressed vowels in words like cano ("to sing'), e.g. as [ˈkaːnɔ] instead of [ˈkanoː]. Consentius makes a similar remark that Africans tended to mispronounce piper ("pepper") with the formerly short stressed syllable lengthened, e.g. [ˈpiːpɛr] instead of [ˈpɪpɛr], while also shortening formerly long unstressed syllables, as in orator with short o, e.g. [ɔˈraːtɔr] instead of [oːraːtɔr]. Herman also finds evidence metrical inscriptions from the 1st-4th centuries AD for the lengthening of short stressed vowels and shortening of long unstressed vowels, which could point to an earlier loss of contrastive vowel length than in Rome. Adams' analysis of 3rd century poems from Bu Njem written by Italian and African soldiers seem to reflect a dialectal contrast in the vowel systems of the two regions, with the Italian Avidius writer preserving Classical prosody and the African Iasucthan displaying vowel length distinction loss (given that Iasucthan is assumed to have been a native Latin speaker.) Berber vocabulary The Polish Arabist tried to reconstruct some sections of this language based on 85 lemmas mainly derived from Northwest African toponyms and anthroponyms found in medieval sources. Due to the historical presence in the region of Classical Latin, modern Romance languages, as well as the influence of the Mediterranean Lingua Franca (that has Romance vocabulary) it is difficult to differentiate the precise origin of words in Berber languages and in the varieties of Maghrebi Arabic. The studies are also difficult and often highly conjectural. Due to the large size of the North African territory, it is highly probable that not one but several varieties of African Romance existed, much like the wide variety of Romance languages in Europe. Moroever, other Romance languages spoken in Northwest Africa before the European colonization were the Mediterranean Lingua Franca, a pidgin with Arabic and Romance influences, and Judaeo-Spanish, a dialect of Spanish brought by Sephardi Jews. Scholars are uncertain or disagree on the Latin origin of some of the words presented in the list, which may be attributed alternatively to Berber language internal etymology. Scholars believe that there is a great number of Berber words, existing in various