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| Origins | |
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Romance languages are the continuation of Vulgar Latin, the popular sociolect of Latin spoken by soldiers, settlers and merchants of the Roman Empire, as distinguished from the Classical form of the language spoken by the Roman upper classes, the form in which the language was generally written. Between 350 BC and AD 150, the expansion of the Empire, together with its administrative and educational policies, made Latin the dominant native language in continental Western Europe. Latin also exerted a strong influence in southeastern Britain, the Roman province of Africa, and the Balkans north of the Jireček Line.
During the Empire's decline, and after its fragmentation and collapse in the 5th century, varieties of Latin began to diverge within each local area at an accelerated rate, and eventually evolved into a continuum of recognizably different typologies. The overseas empires established by Portugal, Spain and France from the 15th century onward spread their languages to the other continents, to such an extent that about two-thirds of all Romance speakers today live outside Europe.
Despite other influences (e.g. substratum from pre-Roman languages, especially Continental Celtic languages; and superstratum from later Germanic or Slavic invasions), the phonology, morphology, and lexicon of all Romance languages are overwhelmingly evolved forms of Vulgar Latin. However, there are some notable differences between today's Romance langauges and their Roman ancestor. With only one or two exceptions, Romance languages have lost the declension system of Latin and, as a result, have SVO sentence structure and make extensive use of prepositions.
[edit] Tags:Vulgar Latin,Europe,Sociolect,Soldiers,Merchants,The Expansion Of The Empire,Southeastern Britain,The Roman Province Of Africa,Jireček Line,Portugal,Spain,France,Substratum,Continental Celtic Languages,Superstratum,Germanic,Slavic,Phonology,Morphology,Lexicon,Declension,Svo,Prepositions,Romance,Roman Empire,Latin,Balkans,Africa, | |
| Name | |
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The term "Romance" comes from the Vulgar Latin adverb romanice, derived from Romanicus: for instance, in the expression romanice loqui, "to speak in Roman" (that is, the Latin vernacular), contrasted with latine loqui, "to speak in Latin" (Medieval Latin, the conservative version of the language used in writing and formal contexts or as a lingua franca), and with barbarice loqui, "to speak in Barbarian" (the non-Latin languages of the peoples living outside the Roman Empire).[4] From this adverb the noun romance originated, which applied initially to anything written romanice, or "in the Roman vernacular".
The word romance with the modern sense of romance novel or love affair has the same origin. In the medieval literature of Western Europe, serious writing was usually in Latin, while popular tales, often focusing on love, were composed in the vernacular and came to be called "romances".
[edit] Tags:Lingua Franca,Vernacular,Medieval Latin,Conservative,Barbarian,Romance Novel,Medieval Literature,Romances,Verb, | |
| Samples | |
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Lexical and grammatical similarities among the Romance languages, and between Latin and each of them, are apparent from the following examples having the same meaning:
English: She always closes the window before dining.
Latin
(illa) claudit semper fenestram antequam cēnat.
Aragonese
(Ella) zarra siempre a finestra antes de cenar.
Aromanian
(Ea/Nâsa) încljidi/nkidi totna firida ninti di tsinâ.
Asturian
(Ella) pieslla siempre la feniestra/ventana enantes de cenar.
Bergamasque
(Lé) la sèra sèmper sö la finèstra prima de senà.
Bolognese
(Lî) la sèra sänper la fnèstra prémma ed dsnèr.
Catalan
(Ella) tanca sempre la finestra abans de sopar.
Corsican
Edda chjudi sempri u balconu prima di cinà.
Emilian
(Lē) la sèra sèmpar sù la fnèstra prima ad snàr.
Extremaduran
(Ella) afecha siempri la ventana antis de cenal.
Franco-Provençal
(Le) sarre toltin/tojor la fenétra avan de goutâ/dinar/sopar.
French
Elle ferme toujours la fenêtre avant de dîner/souper.
Friulian
Jê e siere simpri il barcon prin di cenâ.
Galician
(Ela) pecha/fecha sempre a fiestra/xanela antes de cear.
Italian
(Ella/Lei) chiude sempre la finestra prima di cenare.
Judaeo-Spanish
Eya serra syempre la ventana antes de senar.
Ladin
(Ëra) stlüj dagnora la finestra impröma de cenè. (badiot) (Ëila) stluj for l viere dan maië da cëina (gherdëina)
Leonese
(Eilla) pecha siempre la ventana primeiru de cenare.
Ligurian
(Le) saera sempre u balcun primma de cenà.
Milanese
(Le) la sara semper sü la finestra prima de disnà.
Mirandese
(Eilha) cerra siempre la bentana/jinela atrás de jantar.
Mozarabic
Ella cloudet sempre la fainestra abante da cenare. (reconstructed)
Neapolitan
Essa nzerra sempe 'a fenesta primma 'e magnà.
Norman
Lli barre tréjous la crouésie devaunt de daîner.
Occitan
(Ela) barra sempre/totjorn la fenèstra abans de sopar.
Picard
Ale frunme tojours l’ creusèe édvint éd souper.
Piedmontese
Chila a sara sèmper la fnestra dnans ëd fé sin-a/dnans ëd siné.
Portuguese
Ela fecha sempre a janela antes de cear/jantar.
Romanian
Ea închide totdeauna fereastra înainte de cinare (a cina).[5]
Romansh
Ella clauda/serra adina la fanestra avant ch'ella tschainia.
Sardinian
Issa serrat semper sa bentana innantis 'e chenare.
Sassarese
Edda sarra sempri lu balchoni primma di zinà.
Sicilian
Idda chiudi sempri la finestra prima i manciari.
Spanish
(Ella) siempre cierra la ventana antes de cenar.
Umbrian
Essa chjude sempre la finestra prima de cena'.
Venetian
Eła ła sara/sera sempre ła fenestra vanti de xenàr/disnar.
Walloon
Ele sere todi li finiesse divant di soper.
Some of the lexical divergence above comes from semantic change: different Romance languages use the same root word with different meaning. Portuguese, for example, has the word fresta, and Spanish fenestra/finiestra (which is a cognate of French fenêtre, Italian finestra, Romanian fereastra and so on, from Latin "fenestra "window"), however it now means "skylight" and "slit" as opposed to "window." The Spanish and Portuguese terms defenestrar and defenestración/defenestração meaning "to throw through a window" or "defenestrate, defenestration", and fenestrado, "replete with windows", also have the same root (but are later derivations from Latin).
Likewise, Portuguese also has the word cear, a cognate of Italian cenare and Spanish cenar, but uses it in the sense of "to have a late supper" in most varieties, while the preferred word for "to dine" is actually jantar (related to archaic Spanish yantar "to eat") because of semantic changes in the 19th century. Galician has both fiestra (from medieval fẽestra which is the ultimate origin of standard Portuguese fresta), and the less frequently used ventá and xanela.
As an alternative to lei (originally the accusative form), Italian has the pronoun ella, a cognate of the other words for "she", but it is hardly ever used in speaking.
Spanish, Asturian and Leonese ventana and Mirandese and Sardinian bentana come from Latin ventus "wind" (c.f. English window, etymologically 'wind eye'), and Portuguese janela, Galician xanela, Mirandese jinela from Latin *ianuella "small opening", a derivative of ianua "door".
Sardinian balcone (alternative for bentana) comes from Old Italian and is similar to other Romance languages such as French balcon, Portuguese balcão, Romanian balcon, Spanish balcón, Catalan balcó and Corsican balconi (alternative for purtellu).
[edit] Tags:Sardinian,Spanish,Portuguese,French,Italian,Romanian,Catalan,Aragonese,Aromanian,Asturian,Corsican,Friulian,Galician,Leonese,Mirandese,Neapolitan,Occitan,Piedmontese,Romansh,Sicilian,Venetian,Walloon,Bergamasque,Bolognese,Emilian,Extremaduran,Franco-provençal,Judaeo-spanish,Ladin,Ligurian,Milanese,Mozarabic,Norman,Picard,Sassarese,Umbrian,Semantic Change,Defenestration, | |
| Vulgar Latin | |
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Main article: Vulgar Latin
There is a lack of documentary evidence about Vulgar Latin for the purposes of comprehensive research, and the literature is often hard to interpret or generalize upon. Many of its speakers were soldiers, slaves, displaced peoples and forced resettlers, more likely to be natives of conquered lands than natives of Rome.
It is believed that Vulgar Latin already had most of the features that are shared by all Romance languages, which distinguish them from Classical Latin, such as the almost complete loss of the Latin case system and its replacement by prepositions; the loss of the neuter gender, comparative inflections; replacement of some verb paradigms by innovations (e.g. the synthetic future gave way to an originally analytic strategy now typically formed by infinitive + evolved present indicative forms of 'have'); the use of articles; and the initial stages of the palatalization of the plosives /k/, /g/, and /t/. Some modern languages, such as Finnish, have similar, quite sharp, differences between their printed and spoken form.
To some scholars, this suggests that the form of Vulgar Latin that evolved into the Romance languages was around during the time of the Roman Empire (from the end of 1st century BC), and was spoken alongside the written Classical Latin which was reserved for official and formal occasions. Other scholars argue that the distinctions are more rightly viewed as indicative of sociolinguistic and register differences normally found within any language.
[edit] Tags:Case System,Neuter Gender,Synthetic,Analytic,Articles,Palatalization, | |
| Fall of the Western Roman Empire | |
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During the political decline of the Western Roman Empire in the fifth century, there were large-scale migrations into the empire, and the Latin-speaking world was fragmented into several independent states. Central Europe and the Balkans were occupied by the Germanic and Slavic tribes, as well as by the Huns, which isolated the Vlachs from the rest of Latin Europe.
British Romance and African Romance, the forms of Vulgar Latin used in southeastern Britain and the Roman province of Africa, where it had been spoken by much of the urban population, disappeared in the Middle Ages. But the Germanic tribes that had penetrated Italy, Gaul, and Hispania eventually adopted Latin and the remnants of Roman culture, and so Latin remained the dominant language there.
[edit] Tags:Decline Of The Western Roman Empire, | |
| Latent incubation | |
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Between the fifth and tenth centuries, the dialects of spoken Vulgar Latin diverged in various parts of their domain, eventually becoming distinct languages[citation needed]. This evolution is poorly documented because the literary language, Medieval Latin, remained close to the older Classical Latin.
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| Recognition of the vernaculars | |
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Between the 10th and 13th centuries, some local vernaculars developed a written form and began to supplant Latin in many of its roles. In some countries, such as Portugal, this transition was expedited by force of law; whereas in others, such as Italy, many prominent poets and writers used the vernacular of their own accord – some of the most famous in Italy being Giacomo da Lentini and Dante Alighieri.
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| Uniformization and standardization | |
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The invention of the printing press apparently slowed down the evolution of Romance languages from the 16th century on[citation needed], and brought a tendency towards greater uniformity of standard languages within political boundaries, at the expense of other Romance languages and dialects less favored politically. In France, for instance, the dialect spoken in the region of Paris gradually spread to the entire country, and the Occitan of the south lost ground.
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| Modern status | |
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Main articles: Latin Europe, Romance-speaking Europe, Latin America, Latin Union, Romance-speaking Africa, and Romance-speaking Asia
Romance languages, 20th century
Number of native speakers of each Romance language, as fractions of the total 690 million
The Romance language most widely spoken natively today is Spanish (Castilian), followed by Portuguese, French, Italian, Romanian, and Catalan, all of which are official languages in at least one country. A few other languages have official status on a regional or otherwise limited level, for instance Friulian, Sardinian and Franco-Provençal in Italy; Romansh in Switzerland; and Galician in Spain.
French, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish, and Romanian are also official languages of the European Union. Spanish, Portuguese, French, Italian, Romanian, and Catalan are the official languages of the Latin Union; and French and Spanish are two of the six official languages of the United Nations.
Outside Europe, French, Portuguese and Spanish are spoken and enjoy official status in various countries that emerged from their respective colonial empires. French is one of the official languages of Canada, many countries in Africa, and some islands in the Indian and Pacific Ocean. It is also the sole official language of Quebec.
Spanish is an official language of Mexico, much of South America, Central America, the islands of the Greater Antilles in the Caribbean (except in Haiti where the official languages are French and Haitian Kreyol, a French creole, and Jamaica, where English and Jamaican Patois are spoken.), and it is the official language of Equatorial Guinea in Africa and is the most spoken Romance language in the world.
Portuguese is the official language of Brazil (reaching almost 190 million, it is the language spoken by half of population of South America that resides in Brazil), five African countries (Angola, Cabo Verde, Guiné-Bissau, Mozambique and São Tomé e Príncipe), and East Timor and Macau in Asia and is the second most spoken Romance language.
Although Italy also had some colonial possessions, its language did not remain official after the end of the colonial domination, resulting in Italian being spoken only as a minority or secondary language by immigrant communities in North, South America, Australia, and African countries like Libya, Eritrea and Somalia. Romania did not establish a colonial empire, but the language is spoken as a native language in Moldova, while it also spread to other countries in rest of Europe, especially the other Romance countries (most notably Italy and Spain), and elsewhere such as Israel, where it is a native language to 5% of the population,[6] and by many more as a secondary language; this is due to the large numbers of Romanian-born Jews who moved to Israel after World War II.[7]
The total native speakers of Romance languages are divided as follows (with their ranking within the languages of the world in brackets):[8][9]
Spanish (Hispanosphere) 47% (2nd)
Portuguese (Lusosphere) 26% (6th)
French (Francophonie) 11% (11th)
Italian 9% (18th)
Romanian 4% (34th)
Catalan 1% (75th)
Others 2%
Catalan is unusual in that it is not the main language of any nation-state, other than Andorra (a European microstate between Spain and France), but nonetheless has been able to compete and even gain speakers at the expense of the dominant language of its primary nation (Spanish); in fact, Catalan is probably the only minority European language whose long-term survival is not under threat.
This is due to a strong belief that the Catalan language is a critical component of the ethnic identity of the Catalan people. This has allowed them to resist the assimilationist urges that are in the process of destroying most of the remaining minority-language communities, even those that have strong government support (e.g. Irish language speakers).
The remaining Romance languages survive mostly as spoken languages for informal contact. National governments have historically viewed linguistic diversity as an economic, administrative or military liability, as well as a potential source of separatist movements; therefore, they have generally fought to eliminate it, by extensively promoting the use of the official language, restricting the use of the "other" languages in the media, characterizing them as mere "dialects", or even persecuting them. As a result, all of these languages are considered endangered to varying degrees according to the UNESCO Red Book of Endangered Languages, ranging from "vulnerable" (e.g. Sicilian and Venetian) to "severely endangered" (most of the Occitan varieties).
In the late 20th and early 21st centuries, increased sensitivity to the rights of minorities have allowed some of these languages to start recovering their prestige and lost rights. Yet it is unclear whether these political changes will be enough to reverse the decline of minority Romance languages.
[edit] Tags:Latin America,Canada, | |
| Classification and related languages | |
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Eastern and Western Romance areas split by the La Spezia-Rimini Line
Main articles: Classification of Romance languages and List of Romance languages
The classification of the Romance languages is inherently difficult, since most of the linguistic area can be considered a dialect continuum, and in some cases political biases can come into play. Nevertheless, according to SIL counts, 47 Romance languages and dialects are spoken in Europe. Along with Latin (which is not included among the Romance languages) and a few extinct languages of ancient Italy, they make up the Italic branch of the Indo-European family.
Latin
Classical Latin
Vulgar Latin
Continental Romance
Sardinian languages
Italo-Western Romance
Eastern Romance
Western Romance
Proto-Italian
Balkan Romance
Dalmatian
Tags:Indo-european,Italic,Italo-western,List,Sil, | |
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