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Romance Languages
I'm sorry. This was posted in the wrong place.....
The Romans invaded many parts of Europe and made people speak their language. What are all the Romance languages? I know about English, Spanish, Portuguese and Italian. Is French a Romance language?
Yes, French is Romance language, also Romanian and many other languages spoken by smaller grups like Catalan, Sicilian, Sardinian, Occitan, Romansh.....
"English is not a Romance language."
What is it then? Didn't the Romans invade Britain?
Yes, English was born as German language but now it is a transgender Romance Language.
Spanish is a romance language yes.
French is not a romance language. It is so non-romantic! There are not sexual feelings during listening to that language. English is a romance language, but not of heterosexual romance. Italian - very romantic. I see red roses when I think of it!
Romance languages are spoken in Portugal, Spain, France, Italy, Romania, Switzerland, Luxembourg and Belgium and many other countries in the world. Romance languages descend from Latin, spoken in the Roman Empire. English, dutch, german, norwegian, danish, swedish and icelandic are german languages. English borrowed many roman words, such as vice versa, aquarium, museum and so many others to qualify and classify for instance fauna and flora. They all use the Latin alphabet to write plus one or two more to complement their language.
cheers
<<"English is not a Romance language."
What is it then? Didn't the Romans invade Britain? >> The Romans did occupy Britain, but they did not leave a linguistic/cultural legacy there. All that remains of them is some architecture and roads. The native population at the time was comprised of Celts. Celts held on to their native languages--the ancestors of Cornish, Welsh, Gaelic, etc. After the Romans pulled out of Britain, the ancestors of the English (largely speakers of modern English, Scots, and somewhat extinct Yola) invaded and either wiped out the native population of Celts, pushed them to the fringes of the Isles, or assimilated them into their germanic Sprachraum. There was no contact between them and the previous occupying Romans--they never even saw each other. The germanic invasions represent a complete replacement [clean slate] of the previous linguistic and cultural situation in Britain, similar to the replacement of Roman by Slavic in the areas of the Balkan peninsula (modern Serbia, Croatia, etc). So there is a 'Break' in the history of Britain: it was at one time Roman, and then a new period ensued where it was Gemanicised--the period in which it still exists today. No continuum. Oftentimes, it's easy for people to think that because BRITAIN was once a Roman outpost, that somehow the ENGLISH have Roman roots--not necessarily true. That would be an inaccurate assumption.
Is it true that king Arthur was a nobleman of roman descent and he and fought , along with the celts ,against anglo-saxon invaders? I heard something like that.
<<Yes, English was born as German language but now it is a transgender Romance Language. >>
English superficially might resemble romance languages, but this is where the deception ends. Anyone who has studied Latin and English will immediately conclude that English is not descended from Latin. No where close.
Arthur, in legend, was either Roman-British fighting against the invading Anglo-Saxons or one of the Angles at war with the Saxons.
He was probably based on a Celtic-warlord fighting against the Anglo-Saxons (not Roman) but chances are, the guy was merely a literary evolution from Celtic god to Anglo-Saxon hero.
There's a large number of Romance languages, although not all of them are well-known. The famous examples are Spanish, Italian, French, Portuguese, and, to a lesser extent, Romanian. (Many people have heard of Romanian, but might not know it's a Romance language.) But there are other, more obscure examples. For example, in Spain, there are also Catalan, Valencian, and Galician. (Apparently, the Valencians and Galicians squabble over whether their languages are the same or not.) In Spain, they also speak Basque, but Basque is not a Romance language; as far as we know, it's completely unrelated to any other language.
French may not look very Latin-like in some ways... a lot of Latin words were changed beyond recognition by processes such as elision. For instance, the Latin verb "stare" became "être", which doesn't look much like the original verb, whereas the Spanish and Italian versions -- estar and stare, respectively -- are more recognizable. French also has a distinct phonology and prosody. So for a Romance language, it's pretty different... it probably has to do with influence from the native tongues of the Gauls. But it was a Latin-based language with Gaulish influence, rather than a Gaulish language with Latin influence. As for whether English is a Romance language, whether languages are considered "related" or not is not determined by vocabulary, but where the language historically comes from. English was around long before a significant number of Latin words were imported, and the fundamental basics of the language have not changed due to the importation of Latin words. It's quite possible to write entire sentences in native English words, and they will sound simple and natural -- in other words, they'll sound English. But if you do the same with English words derived from Latin, it's more likely to sound stilted and unnatural. On the other hand, the fundamentals of the Romance languages are Latin in origin, even though the languages no longer grammatically resemble Latin very much. For instance, even the most basic and simple verbs in Romance languages, like "be" and "go", are derived from Latin. - Kef |