Do people still speak Latin in everyday life?

Question

In Vatican City they still speak Latin, but is it only for religious purposes? Do the people who live in Rome speak Latin in there everyday life? I want to know if I learn to speak Latin then will I be able to use it in Rome?

Answer 1

Like you said, if you live in Vatican City, you'd use it with some frequency, but it isn't a spoken language today.

Also, the Latin we learn in school is not the Latin that was actually spoken by ancient Romans, which is what we call "vulgar Latin." The Latin we learn in school (if you are unfortunate enough to have to learn Latin) is closer to the ecclesiastical Latin used by the Catholic Church. It was the "proper" Latin that was used in formal settings (like the Roman Senate, for example, and in the literature from the era that we still have). Vulgar Latin and Classical Latin were actually fairly different. Romance Languages are derived from Vulgar Latin, if you want to get technical.

For some time, Latin was used as sort of the international language, the lingua franca, in Europe to communicate with people from other European countries in academic and governmental settings. That's why a lot of treatises and the like that we read from great thinkers of the Enlightenment and the Renaissance were written in Latin (Descartes and Newton, for example, wrote their major works in Classical Latin). Today, some call English the international language, mostly for commercial purposes.

And unless you're speaking to a priest, you'll probably get some funny looks and snickers if you try to speak to a 21st Century Roman in Latin.

Answer 2

How To Speak Latin

Answer 3

This Site Might Help You.

RE:
Do people still speak Latin in everyday life?
In Vatican City they still speak Latin, but is it only for religious purposes? Do the people who live in Rome speak Latin in there everyday life? I want to know if I learn to speak Latin then will I be able to use it in Rome?

Answer 4

I was in the Vatican a few months ago and I didn't hear any Latin. I'm pretty sure the signs weren't in Latin, even the ones in several languages telling you not to wear shorts.
The pope and the cardinals and priests there probably sometimes have private conversations in Latin, since they would have that language in common and not necessarily any other.

People in Rome speak Italian, which is derived from Latin but has changed over the centuries.

On another note, I encountered a woman on-line who was trying to raise her daughter speaking Latin from birth. She said she and other Latin speakers sometimes went to Latin conferences.

Answer 5

Latin is a dead language. It is an official language of Vatican City, and the priests probably speak it to each other if they have no other language in common, but that is the only place in the world it would be actually be spoken on any sort of regular basis. The modern-day Romans speak Italian. They would not understand Latin very well, even though Italian evolved from it. It would probably be worse than trying to speak Shakespearean English. When I was in high school my Latin teacher said that there was a seminary where they spoke it because everyone was from different countries and they had no other language in common. But that was an exception; it would not normally have been spoken, but for the language barrier.

Answer 6

People speak Italian in Rome. Although there is or use to be a Scandinavian country that has radio broadcasts in Latin. Don't remember if it was ecclesiastical pronunciation or regular.

Answer 7

This asker needs a lesson in multiple-choice strategy. Even if the asker had never heard of Latin, anyone who doesn't know that German, Polish, and Spanish are in current use needs a lot more help than Yahoo! answers can give.

Answer 8

Kinda. All of the "romance" languages are derived from Latin. Italian and Spanish included.

Answer 9

I think they call Latin a dead language for a reason. People in Rome speak Italian, and as stated Latin is used in the Vatican, but not in everyday life. However, Latin is the root language of many other languages and learning it will without a doubt improve your vocabulary skills and come in handy when learning languages like French, Italian, or Spanish.

Answer 10

No, but I went to church the other day and they gave the service in Latin (parts of it)