The most contrasting Latin languages?
Which two Latin (Romance Languages) do you consider being in a strong contrast?
Portuguese and Spanish are in a very low contrast. (More similar)
Italian and Romanian, also in a low contrast (More similar)
French is a good candidate as is already isolated.
In other words, the less mutually intelligible OFFICIAL Romance languages.
(lets don’t get involved in dialects or Catalan, Romansh, etc)
Portuguese – Italian?
French- Romanian?
Spanish-French?
Portuguese and Romanian are probably the most different ones, but still they are closer to each other than English with respect to the rest of Germanic languages. French is not isolated, on the contrary, it is the central Romance language since France has boundaries with Italy and Spain. Romanian is isolated since Romania is surrounded by non Latin countries.
You are correct from a Geographical point of view.
We are supposed to consider a linguistic point of view.
France has boundaries with Italy indeed, but not paradoxically, Romanian and Italian are more similar than Italian and French.
French and Spanish are the most different. French and Italian look similar enough when you read them, and Portuguese has a nasal element like French. Spanish and Portuguese are famously similar, and Spanish has a large Moor/Arabic influence. That leaves Spanish out. Spanish also sounds a bit more aggressive than the other Romance languages do to me.
Sorry, I forgot about Romanian. Hmm... it also seems different and you could argue that Romanian and French are the most different from the others.
Colette, French and Spanish belong to the same subbranch within the Romance language: Gallo-Iberian Romance languages. But who cares what experts say, it's better to come here and spit whatever stupidity you want. Even it's a question of common sense that Romanian and French are surely more different than Spanish and French because of evident geographical reasons.
within the Romance *family*
Dude, go spit your hatred in another direction. I was giving my opinion -- you take yours. At least you finally became brave enough to sign your name. There's a first for everything... Most of your Latin brethren prefer the moniker "Guest."
Your opinion lacks any value when it's against any serious and scientific study. You can't come here and say: Spanish and French are the most different Romance languages because I want to say that. If Spanish and French belong to the same subbranch it's for a good reason, not because they are the most different languages in the Romance family. I think that even you can understand that.
French and Romanian are probably the furthest apart. This is my opinion based on studying French, Spanish, Portuguese and Italian. I am studying Romanian now when I have time (pre-learning it, actually). I find its distance and its familiarity almost captivating. Look at these two simple examples.
floare-a=the flower, feminine. The article is at the end.
codru-l=the forest, masculine. The article is at the end.
There are other aspects of grammar I find fascinating and I am not a grammar lover.
Spanish, Italian, & Portugese remain similar in both writen and spoken... French a little bit apart and Romanian very further apart.
It depends on how you view romance languages. I tend to see them as similar with differences. Other people see the differences as HUGE and minimize the similiarites.
"French a little bit apart and Romanian very further apart."
Wrong!
Romanian is closer to Italian southern dialects (Sicilian, Calabrian) than any other Romance language.
Sicilian, Calabrian and Romanian are so close, that some linguists believed in a Southern Italian migration to the Balkan region. Historically unproven fact.
Sicilian-Romanian similarity:
Sicilian- La Sicilia si cumponi di 9 pruvincî e havi un tutali di 390 cumuna
Romanian-Sicilia se compune din 9 provinci si are un total de 390 comune
Sicilian-La Sicilia fu chiamata di li Greci "Trinacria",
Romanian-Sicilia fu chemata de Greci "Trinacria",
Sicilian-Lu primu dizziunariu talianu fu fattu di un sicilianu
Romanian-Prim-ul dictionariu Italian fu facut de un Sicilian
Sicilian-Lu Polu Nord è unu dî dui poli magnetici
Romanian-Polu Nord e unu din doi poli magnetici
*in Romanian translation some words are regionalisms (as in Sicilian)
In Sicilian masculine gender words end in U Feminine in A Plural in I – same in Romanian.
Romanian is not distant at all - Is closer to Sicilian and southern Italian dialects than any other Romance language, despite being 1400 km apart.
Why so closely related? Because Romanian and Sicilian were the first languages that evolved from Latin.