The Latin Language

History of the Latin Language:

Latin is a member of the Italic languages family and its alphabet emerged from the Old Italic alphabets, which were derived from the Etruscan, Greek, and Phoenician scripts.
Historical Latin came from the prehistoric language of the Latium region, where Roman civilization first developed.
Latin has been influenced by Celtic dialects, the non-Indo-European Etruscan language, and the Greek in some Greek colonies of southern Italy.
Surviving Roman-era Latin literature consists of Classical Latin pieces, which emphasise polished and highly stylized literary language texts.
The spoken Latin language differed somewhat in grammar, tone, and vocabulary and is referred to as Vulgar Latin.
Latin was the language of the Roman Catholic Church and later of the Carolingian Holy Roman Empire.
Latin was the dominant language of European learning, literature, and academia through the middle ages and the early modern period.
The classical period of Latin includes the authors of Early Latin, Golden Age, and Silver Age.
The Romance languages, a major branch of the Indo-European language family, comprise all languages that descended from Latin.
Ecclesiastical Latin is a broad term referring to the Latin language as used in documents of the Roman Catholic Church, its liturgies, and during some periods the preaching of its ministers.
Medieval Latin, the literary and administrative Latin used in the Middle Ages, exhibits much variation between individual authors.
Renaissance Latin is a name given to the Latin written during the European Renaissance in the 14th-16th centuries, particularly distinguished by the distinctive Latin style developed by the humanist movement.The Remaking of Latin: From Humanist Latin to Contemporary Latin
Humanist Latin was a movement in the 14th to 16th centuries that sought to revive the Latin language as it was used in ancient Rome.
Humanist Latin sought to purge written Latin of medieval developments in its orthography and vocabulary, insisting on the use of ancient Latin from the Roman period.
Humanist Latin was largely successful in education, with schools teaching humanistic spellings and encouraging the study of selected texts, largely to the exclusion of later Latin literature.
Humanist Latin was an elegant literary language but became much harder to use in writing about law, medicine, science, or contemporary politics while observing all of the humanists' norms of vocabulary purging and classical usage.
Latin continued to be significantly used in education, academia, government, and literature through the 1500s and 1600s, and was a central part of education into the mid-twentieth century.
Modern scholarly and technical nomenclature, such as in zoological and botanical taxonomy and international scientific vocabulary, draws extensively from New Latin vocabulary.
Contemporary Latin includes the use of single words in taxonomy and the fuller ecclesiastical use in the Catholic Church.
The Proto-Italic inherited all ten of the early post-Proto-Indo-European simple vowels, but Old Latin had a stress accent on the first syllable of a word, causing steady reduction and eventual deletion of many short vowels in non-initial syllables.
Humanist Latin largely preserved all of the simple vowels of Proto-Italic in initial syllables, but more vowel reduction of short vowels occurred in non-initial syllables.
PIE syllabic resonants *m̥, *n̥, *r̥, *l̥ generally become em, en, or, ol in Latin.
The Indo-European voiced aspirates bʰ, dʰ, gʰ, gʷʰ first devoiced in initial position, then fricatized in all positions.
Word-internal *-bʰ-, *-dʰ-, *-gʰ-, *-gʷʰ- evolved into Proto-Italic β, ð, ɣ, ɣʷ, with fricatives defricatizing, giving b, d ~ b, g ~ h, g ~ v ~ gu in Latin.Development of Labiovelars and S-Rhotacism in Indo-European Languages
The Labiovelars *kʷ, *gʷ, *gʷʰ developed into v/w in most circumstances, becoming gu after a nasal and g next to other consonants.
The sequence *p *kʷ assimilates to *kʷ *kʷ, an innovation shared with Celtic.
The sequences *ḱw, *ǵw, *ǵʰw develop identically to *kʷ, *gʷ, *gʷʰ.
Initial *dw- becomes b-, thus compensating for the dearth of words beginning with *b in PIE.
Indo-European s between vowels was first voiced to [z] in late Proto-Italic and became r in Latin and Umbrian, a change known as rhotacism.
Early Old Latin documents still have s [z], and Cicero once remarked that a certain Papirius Crassus officially changed his name from Papisius in 339 b.c.
Before another r, dissimilation occurred with sr [zr] becoming br (likely via an intermediate *ðr).
The development of Labiovelars and S-Rhotacism produced many alternations in Latin declension.
The Labiovelar *gʷʰ developed much like non-initial *-gʷʰ, becoming v/w in most circumstances, but gu after a nasal and g next to other consonants.
The sequence *kʷ remains as qu before a vowel, but reduces to c/k/ before a consonant or next to a u.
The sequence *p *kʷ assimilates to *kʷ *kʷ, an innovation shared with Celtic.
The sequences *ḱw, *ǵw, *ǵʰw develop identically to *kʷ, *gʷ, *gʷʰ.

The Latin Language

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Questions and Answers

What is the name given to the Latin language as used in documents of the Roman Catholic Church, its liturgies, and during some periods the preaching of its ministers?

Which language family does Latin belong to?

What is the name given to the movement in the 14th to 16th centuries that sought to revive the Latin language as it was used in ancient Rome?

Which Latin style is distinguished by the distinctive Latin style developed by the humanist movement during the European Renaissance in the 14th-16th centuries?

What is the name given to the literary and administrative Latin used in the Middle Ages, which exhibits much variation between individual authors?

Which language(s) influenced Latin in some Greek colonies of southern Italy?

What is the name given to surviving Roman-era Latin literature that consists of Classical Latin pieces, which emphasise polished and highly stylized literary language texts?

Which period of Latin includes the authors of Early Latin, Golden Age, and Silver Age?

Which languages comprise all languages that descended from Latin?

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