What was the dominant language in Medieval Europe?

Question

Was there a "lingua Franca" in those days?

Answer 1

The dominant written language was Latin without a doubt, but the spoken language is much different. It was what we would call "Archaic English or Old English" today.

The spoken language was a mixture of German, Celtic, Latin and Nordic dialects. If you were to read Old English writing today, you'd scarcely be able to understand it as it's very hard to read let alone pronounce the words. Thankfully, they wrote in Latin for the most part, which is a rather easy language to learn and understand now so being a historian is infinitely easier. (Unless you want to do Doctorate work on Medieval Europe, then you have to pass those annoying oral and written Latin proficiency tests). But I digress, hope this answers your question.

If you want to see how they spoke, check out the article at www.wikipedia.org on Old English. Near the bottom they have the Lord's Prayer in Old English and a few other lines...their history is a little off in the article, but the language is spot on.

Answer 2

Various French and German dialects in the vernacular, bt Latin among the Church clergy and the few literate people, maybe the lords too.

Answer 3

Latin. Important reason for predominance is that latin was the language of the Church and the bible was written in Latin

Answer 4

It was Latin.

Answer 5

wasnt it latin?