okay.
Yves Cortez
"Several authors at the end of the Roman empire from the 3rd to the 6th century mentioned that Latin was still well understood by the masses. For example, Pope Gregor the Great assumed as late as 600 that his sermons written in classical Latin were understood by the simple people; everything speaks for the fact that only in the 8. Century Classical Latin and the Romance languages were noticed as different languages. As epochal date the council of Tours in the year 813 is often considered, on which it was decided to permit from now on lectures in „the people languages “since the believers would understand no more Latin.
At the same time when Romance languages emerged, between 6.th and 8.th Century Germanic mass invasions by settlers, colonists and warriors were at a maximum level. So it must be assumed that the genesis of Romance must be closely linked to the Germanic invasions. No hypothetical Proto-Italian is needed."
-- Bon résumé de la théorie classique... et des problèmes qu'elle pose.
Il paraît difficile de croire que les langues romanes émergent seulement au 7e siècle. Cela paraît impossible pour une quantité de raisons:
. 1 - Elles apparaissent avec un ensemble de caractéristiques grammaticales similaires entre elles, mais très distinctes du latin. L'Europe est alors en pleine désorganisation, la seule organisation cohérente qui reste est l'Eglise, qui utilise et propage son latin. Dans ces conditions il aurait été logique que les langues romanes tendent à s'aligner sur le modèle latin. Or c'est le contraire qui arrive.
. 2 - De toutes façons, supposer que le latin parlé aurait pu évoluer jusqu'à devenir méconnaissable à ce point en moins de 3 siècles est insensé. Aucune langue n'a jamais changé à ce rythme. Surtout en présence d'une norme écrite aussi solide que pouvait l'être le latin ecclésiastique.
. 3 - Un grand nombre de mots latins, même très courants, sont censés avoir simultanément disparu de toutes les langues romanes. Par contre, d'autres mots d'origine supposée celtique ('changer', 'battre') puis germanique ('guerre', "orgueil', 'blanc' etc.) se seraient implantés parallèlement, avec un bel ensemble. Il y a là quelque chose d'incompréhensible: comment, à la suite des invasions germaniques, une miraculeuse harmonie d'ensemble aurait fait que pratiquement le même stock de mots aurait été transmis par les Francs aux Gaulois, par les Lombards aux Italiens, par les Wisigoths aux Ibères? C'est absurde.
L'hypothèse de Cortez est parfois outrancière dans son exposé, mais a le mérite de proposer une approche féconde, apte à déboucher sur des scénarios vraisemblables.
Le latin "bien compris des masses" dont parle Grégoire le Grand devait être comme le "vieux castillan" des Cartularios de Valpuesta, c.à.d. un latin très simplifié, rendu compréhensible grâce à une syntaxe calquée du roman et l'inclusion de termes grammaticaux vernaculaires.
At the same time when Romance languages emerged, between 6.th and 8.th Century Germanic mass invasions by settlers, colonists and warriors were at a maximum level. So it must be assumed that the genesis of Romance must be closely linked to the Germanic invasions. No hypothetical Proto-Italian is needed."
-- Bon résumé de la théorie classique... et des problèmes qu'elle pose.
Il paraît difficile de croire que les langues romanes émergent seulement au 7e siècle. Cela paraît impossible pour une quantité de raisons:
. 1 - Elles apparaissent avec un ensemble de caractéristiques grammaticales similaires entre elles, mais très distinctes du latin. L'Europe est alors en pleine désorganisation, la seule organisation cohérente qui reste est l'Eglise, qui utilise et propage son latin. Dans ces conditions il aurait été logique que les langues romanes tendent à s'aligner sur le modèle latin. Or c'est le contraire qui arrive.
. 2 - De toutes façons, supposer que le latin parlé aurait pu évoluer jusqu'à devenir méconnaissable à ce point en moins de 3 siècles est insensé. Aucune langue n'a jamais changé à ce rythme. Surtout en présence d'une norme écrite aussi solide que pouvait l'être le latin ecclésiastique.
. 3 - Un grand nombre de mots latins, même très courants, sont censés avoir simultanément disparu de toutes les langues romanes. Par contre, d'autres mots d'origine supposée celtique ('changer', 'battre') puis germanique ('guerre', "orgueil', 'blanc' etc.) se seraient implantés parallèlement, avec un bel ensemble. Il y a là quelque chose d'incompréhensible: comment, à la suite des invasions germaniques, une miraculeuse harmonie d'ensemble aurait fait que pratiquement le même stock de mots aurait été transmis par les Francs aux Gaulois, par les Lombards aux Italiens, par les Wisigoths aux Ibères? C'est absurde.
L'hypothèse de Cortez est parfois outrancière dans son exposé, mais a le mérite de proposer une approche féconde, apte à déboucher sur des scénarios vraisemblables.
Le latin "bien compris des masses" dont parle Grégoire le Grand devait être comme le "vieux castillan" des Cartularios de Valpuesta, c.à.d. un latin très simplifié, rendu compréhensible grâce à une syntaxe calquée du roman et l'inclusion de termes grammaticaux vernaculaires.
<<<
. 1 - Elles apparaissent avec un ensemble de caractéristiques grammaticales similaires entre elles, mais très distinctes du latin. L'Europe est alors en pleine désorganisation, la seule organisation cohérente qui reste est l'Eglise, qui utilise et propage son latin.
>>>
Modern historians state that Europe was not in full desorganization but that, in the contary, its self inflicted desorganization by the Romans themseves was prevented by the Germanic successors. Germanics did not destruct the Roman empire but instead tried to save as many of the Roman structures as possible and to substuitute themselves to the Roman administration. Doing this, they also tried to preserve Latin as a written and spoken language. The saveguard of the writing system was successful, but the preservation of the spoken Latin was only partly successful, since the classical language was too different from Germanic and some kind of Creole language emerged from the mix of German and Roman population.
<<<<
Dans ces conditions il aurait été logique que les langues romanes tendent à s'aligner sur le modèle latin. Or c'est le contraire qui arrive.
>>>
Logic and wishful thinking are different things
<<<
. 2 - De toutes façons, supposer que le latin parlé aurait pu évoluer jusqu'à devenir méconnaissable à ce point en moins de 3 siècles est insensé. Aucune langue n'a jamais changé à ce rythme. Surtout en présence d'une norme écrite aussi solide que pouvait l'être le latin ecclésiastique.
>>>
Christian ecclésiastic structures were not constantly present. Monastery structures had to be reinvented several times, at least in the Year 600 (Columban) and 800 (Carolinian Renaissance). Furthermore, analphabetisme was omnipresent, even in monasteries, so the power of written Language over spoken Language was not important enough. In 842 the writing had to be adapted to the spoken.
<<<
. 3 - Un grand nombre de mots latins, même très courants, sont censés avoir simultanément disparu de toutes les langues romanes. Par contre, d'autres mots d'origine supposée celtique ('changer', 'battre') puis germanique ('guerre', "orgueil', 'blanc' etc.) se seraient implantés parallèlement, avec un bel ensemble. Il y a là quelque chose d'incompréhensible: comment, à la suite des invasions germaniques, une miraculeuse harmonie d'ensemble aurait fait que pratiquement le même stock de mots aurait été transmis par les Francs aux Gaulois, par les Lombards aux Italiens, par les Wisigoths aux Ibères? C'est absurde.
>>>
It´s not absurde if Creolization took place. If a Language is affected so deeply by a large number of foreign non-native speakers, a lowest common denominator is fixed and quickly adopted by a large number of people. Romance was probably defined by the first inter-lingua or esperanto that was created and spread by the most influencial people, probably the Frankish-Burgundian-Gothic-Lombard nobility who intermarried frequently.
. 1 - Elles apparaissent avec un ensemble de caractéristiques grammaticales similaires entre elles, mais très distinctes du latin. L'Europe est alors en pleine désorganisation, la seule organisation cohérente qui reste est l'Eglise, qui utilise et propage son latin.
>>>
Modern historians state that Europe was not in full desorganization but that, in the contary, its self inflicted desorganization by the Romans themseves was prevented by the Germanic successors. Germanics did not destruct the Roman empire but instead tried to save as many of the Roman structures as possible and to substuitute themselves to the Roman administration. Doing this, they also tried to preserve Latin as a written and spoken language. The saveguard of the writing system was successful, but the preservation of the spoken Latin was only partly successful, since the classical language was too different from Germanic and some kind of Creole language emerged from the mix of German and Roman population.
<<<<
Dans ces conditions il aurait été logique que les langues romanes tendent à s'aligner sur le modèle latin. Or c'est le contraire qui arrive.
>>>
Logic and wishful thinking are different things
<<<
. 2 - De toutes façons, supposer que le latin parlé aurait pu évoluer jusqu'à devenir méconnaissable à ce point en moins de 3 siècles est insensé. Aucune langue n'a jamais changé à ce rythme. Surtout en présence d'une norme écrite aussi solide que pouvait l'être le latin ecclésiastique.
>>>
Christian ecclésiastic structures were not constantly present. Monastery structures had to be reinvented several times, at least in the Year 600 (Columban) and 800 (Carolinian Renaissance). Furthermore, analphabetisme was omnipresent, even in monasteries, so the power of written Language over spoken Language was not important enough. In 842 the writing had to be adapted to the spoken.
<<<
. 3 - Un grand nombre de mots latins, même très courants, sont censés avoir simultanément disparu de toutes les langues romanes. Par contre, d'autres mots d'origine supposée celtique ('changer', 'battre') puis germanique ('guerre', "orgueil', 'blanc' etc.) se seraient implantés parallèlement, avec un bel ensemble. Il y a là quelque chose d'incompréhensible: comment, à la suite des invasions germaniques, une miraculeuse harmonie d'ensemble aurait fait que pratiquement le même stock de mots aurait été transmis par les Francs aux Gaulois, par les Lombards aux Italiens, par les Wisigoths aux Ibères? C'est absurde.
>>>
It´s not absurde if Creolization took place. If a Language is affected so deeply by a large number of foreign non-native speakers, a lowest common denominator is fixed and quickly adopted by a large number of people. Romance was probably defined by the first inter-lingua or esperanto that was created and spread by the most influencial people, probably the Frankish-Burgundian-Gothic-Lombard nobility who intermarried frequently.
'guest' : « You show here your true motivation. There is more "evidence" for a germanic origin of guerre than of P.I.>Italic mystery>romance. I can't believe you greg. You talk about knowledge, but you hope for a dream... Quit your foolishness! ».
Le problème n'est pas de "croire" ou de "ne pas croire" : les croyances n'ont aucune valeur quand il s'agit de raisonner. Tu peux croire à l'hypothèse germanique si ça te fait plaisir : ça ne me dérange pas le moins du monde. Mais tant que tes croyances ne sont pas fondées, elle ne peuvent être opposables au cours d'une discussion argumentée.
Zorro : « But inventing some mysterious proto-Italian is definitively too hazardous. Attributing the break of evolution to the linguistic impact of migrating Germanic peoples seems more senseful. »
Pourquoi ?
'Guest' : « The question is, when and how vulgar Latin was created and where it comes from? »
Et la question subsidiaire : les langues romanes contemporaines sont-elles issues d'un système linguistique distinct de celui du latin (mais apparenté) ?
Proof : « At the same time when Romance languages emerged, between 6.th and 8.th Century Germanic mass invasions by settlers, colonists and warriors were at a maximum level. So it must be assumed that the genesis of Romance must be closely linked to the Germanic invasions. No hypothetical Proto-Italian is needed. »
Je paraphrase ton explication pour la transposer à une autre thématique : l'opposition entre croyance géocentrique et connaissance héliocentrique.
— À l'époque ou Dieu créa le Monde, entre six et sept mille ans avant JC, la Terre était déjà bien installée au centre de l'Univers. On peut donc supposer que la création divine était étroitement liée au géocentrisme. L'hypothèse de l'héliocentrisme est superflue.
Le problème n'est pas de "croire" ou de "ne pas croire" : les croyances n'ont aucune valeur quand il s'agit de raisonner. Tu peux croire à l'hypothèse germanique si ça te fait plaisir : ça ne me dérange pas le moins du monde. Mais tant que tes croyances ne sont pas fondées, elle ne peuvent être opposables au cours d'une discussion argumentée.
Zorro : « But inventing some mysterious proto-Italian is definitively too hazardous. Attributing the break of evolution to the linguistic impact of migrating Germanic peoples seems more senseful. »
Pourquoi ?
'Guest' : « The question is, when and how vulgar Latin was created and where it comes from? »
Et la question subsidiaire : les langues romanes contemporaines sont-elles issues d'un système linguistique distinct de celui du latin (mais apparenté) ?
Proof : « At the same time when Romance languages emerged, between 6.th and 8.th Century Germanic mass invasions by settlers, colonists and warriors were at a maximum level. So it must be assumed that the genesis of Romance must be closely linked to the Germanic invasions. No hypothetical Proto-Italian is needed. »
Je paraphrase ton explication pour la transposer à une autre thématique : l'opposition entre croyance géocentrique et connaissance héliocentrique.
— À l'époque ou Dieu créa le Monde, entre six et sept mille ans avant JC, la Terre était déjà bien installée au centre de l'Univers. On peut donc supposer que la création divine était étroitement liée au géocentrisme. L'hypothèse de l'héliocentrisme est superflue.
greg:
__________
Zorro : « But inventing some mysterious proto-Italian is definitively too hazardous. Attributing the break of evolution to the linguistic impact of migrating Germanic peoples seems more senseful. »
Pourquoi ?
________
Why? One point is that the following fact:
"Several authors at the end of the Roman empire from the 3rd to the 6th century mentioned that Latin was still well understood by the masses. For example, Pope Gregor the Great assumed as late as 600 that his sermons written in classical Latin were understood by the simple people; everything speaks for the fact that only in the 8. Century Classical Latin and the Romance languages were noticed as different languages. As epochal date the council of Tours in the year 813 is often considered, on which it was decided to permit from now on lectures in „the people languages “since the believers would understand no more Latin. "
...is consistent only with a genesis of Romance around and after 600. An earlier and widely used Proto-Italian is in contradiction with this fact. Pope Gregor the Great would have had knowledge of the vernacular language being another language than Latin. Evaluating the sources (e.g. Pope Gregor´s more than 800 letters that have survived all the centuries) is the best way to get some knowledge of ancient linguistic processes.
__________
Zorro : « But inventing some mysterious proto-Italian is definitively too hazardous. Attributing the break of evolution to the linguistic impact of migrating Germanic peoples seems more senseful. »
Pourquoi ?
________
Why? One point is that the following fact:
"Several authors at the end of the Roman empire from the 3rd to the 6th century mentioned that Latin was still well understood by the masses. For example, Pope Gregor the Great assumed as late as 600 that his sermons written in classical Latin were understood by the simple people; everything speaks for the fact that only in the 8. Century Classical Latin and the Romance languages were noticed as different languages. As epochal date the council of Tours in the year 813 is often considered, on which it was decided to permit from now on lectures in „the people languages “since the believers would understand no more Latin. "
...is consistent only with a genesis of Romance around and after 600. An earlier and widely used Proto-Italian is in contradiction with this fact. Pope Gregor the Great would have had knowledge of the vernacular language being another language than Latin. Evaluating the sources (e.g. Pope Gregor´s more than 800 letters that have survived all the centuries) is the best way to get some knowledge of ancient linguistic processes.
Zorro : « Several authors at the end of the Roman empire from the 3rd to the 6th century mentioned that Latin was still well understood by the masses. »
Et alors ? Je comprends bien l'allemand mais je ne suis pas germanophone. D'autre part, peux-tu communiquer les citations de ces auteurs stp ?
Zorro : « For example, Pope Gregor the Great assumed as late as 600 that his sermons written in classical Latin were understood by the simple people; everything speaks for the fact that only in the 8. »
Pratiquement personne parmi les peuples romanophones ne parlait le latin classique au VIIe siècle. C'est une chose de savoir réciter le Pater Noster en version originale par habitude. C'en est une autre, pour un paysan romain ou un serf normand, de pouvoir discuter avec sa femme et ses enfants dans une langue étrangère comme le latin classique...
Et alors ? Je comprends bien l'allemand mais je ne suis pas germanophone. D'autre part, peux-tu communiquer les citations de ces auteurs stp ?
Zorro : « For example, Pope Gregor the Great assumed as late as 600 that his sermons written in classical Latin were understood by the simple people; everything speaks for the fact that only in the 8. »
Pratiquement personne parmi les peuples romanophones ne parlait le latin classique au VIIe siècle. C'est une chose de savoir réciter le Pater Noster en version originale par habitude. C'en est une autre, pour un paysan romain ou un serf normand, de pouvoir discuter avec sa femme et ses enfants dans une langue étrangère comme le latin classique...
Sermons are not like Pater Noster recited by habitude, but relatively complicated texts written in order to inform and educate the simple people. For this purpose Gregor has simplified classical Latin, but he did not had to use any Proto-Italian-Romance in the year 600 to make people understand his sermons. So Romance did not exist yet in 600. Supposing that many people were bilingual Latin/Proto-Romance is too hypothetical for me, even today Romance speakers tend to be monolingual.
One thing I think you guys here are forgetting is that often a whole range of speech varieties can coexist at the same time within a given population, which may very greatly with respect to how progressive they are, while at the same time being thought of as being the same even if there is a large amount of internal variation. There very well may have been a large range of speech forms in coexistance at the same time, ranging from ones that were quite close to classical Latin to ones that were already thoroughly Romance in character, and even if one *spoke* a given variety of such does not mean that one does not *understand* others (both more conservative and more progressive).
Consequently, one can speak of "Latin" as still being spoken, and while most people would probably speak forms that were already post-proto-Romance in everyday life the classical Latin used in church may easily still have been intelligible and not yet consciously thought of as a foreign language. Furthemore, just because something has become archaic does not mean that it is no longer intelligible, so hence classical Latin may have remained relatively intelligible to the general public long after it stopped actually being regularly spoken. This is important because what can be thought of as Proto-Romance likely far predated the date when Latin's being spoken by the general public was "officially" recognized as having ended (basically the third Council of Tours in 813 and the Oath of Strasbourg). Mind you that such recognition is also a matter of official acceptance rather than linguistic reality, and actual loss of crossintelligibility probably predated the third Council of Tours, and Latin having become clearly archaic probably far predated that.
Consequently, one can speak of "Latin" as still being spoken, and while most people would probably speak forms that were already post-proto-Romance in everyday life the classical Latin used in church may easily still have been intelligible and not yet consciously thought of as a foreign language. Furthemore, just because something has become archaic does not mean that it is no longer intelligible, so hence classical Latin may have remained relatively intelligible to the general public long after it stopped actually being regularly spoken. This is important because what can be thought of as Proto-Romance likely far predated the date when Latin's being spoken by the general public was "officially" recognized as having ended (basically the third Council of Tours in 813 and the Oath of Strasbourg). Mind you that such recognition is also a matter of official acceptance rather than linguistic reality, and actual loss of crossintelligibility probably predated the third Council of Tours, and Latin having become clearly archaic probably far predated that.
I accept that around 600 there might have been two coexisting languages, emerging Proto-Romance and vanishing Latin. But such a coexistance cannot have lasted more than 700 years, as some suporters of the Proto-Italian language state.
I would not call it "two coexisting languages", as much as a old conservative high register and a new progressive low register while long coexisted, but with the low register slowly but surely diverging from and displacing said high register. The roots of what can be called Romance can be easily dated back into the period generally called "classical" or "post-classical", with clear differences between "classical Latin" and "Romance" vocabulary already existing, Romance-type phonological changes already emerging (such as /au/ > /o/), and changes in inflection (such as the loss of the accusative /m/). Yet at that time such certainly couldn't be called "different languages" but merely different registers of the *same* language. Yet at the same time, the last register-type variations associated with classical Latin versus Romance clearly lasted into the period were Latin is generally considered as no longer having been spoken, as shown by the lack of definite articles in the Gallo-Romance used in the Strasbourg oaths (while the development of the definite article in Romance almost certainly far predated the Strasbourg oaths).
As for the "two coexisting languages" idea, with Romance being descended from a non-classical Italic source rather than classical Latin, one thing that should be remembered is that Low Latin (that is, pre-proto-Romance) had far more outside language contact that classical Latin, and there is no real reason to assume that such really started only during the later Imperial period. Consequently, even earlier Low Latin probably had more interaction with the other languages spoken on the Italian peninsula, which would imply that it likely had more influence from them - particularly in the form of substratum influence as Latin replaced other languages on the Italian peninsula. Thus, it can only be presumed that even early on Low Latin probably had non-Latin Italic influence rather than have arose purely from classical Latin alone. Yet at the same time, that does not give any reason to believe that Low Latin was specifically *genetically* non-Latin in identity, rather than simply having had a mixture of non-Latin Italic influences over the years.
Travis: "...simply having had a mixture of non-Latin Italic influences over the years. "
The question remains: where the hell is this phantastic "non-Latin Italic" language coming from, where are the proofs?
The question remains: where the hell is this phantastic "non-Latin Italic" language coming from, where are the proofs?
>>The question remains: where the hell is this phantastic "non-Latin Italic" language coming from, where are the proofs?<<
Ahemm... there were certainly other Italic languages other than Latin which Latin replaced during the Republic period, particularly Faliscan, Oscan, and Umbrian...
Ahemm... there were certainly other Italic languages other than Latin which Latin replaced during the Republic period, particularly Faliscan, Oscan, and Umbrian...