Why is Spanish referred to as a Romance Language?
Is French and Italian the only other Romance Languages?
2007-02-06 08:58:11 · 6 answers · asked by ashley r 1 in Society & Culture ➔ Languages
Romance languages have nothing to do with the term "romance" it comes from Rome, the former empire, and they had the language of Latin. Latin is the root of all 8 Romance languages, they were all under Roman rule at the time and they adapted Latin, but other cultures mixed into it, thats why romance languages have many similar words (cognate)
2007-02-06 09:00:04 · answer #1 · answered by Anonymous · 6⤊ 1⤋
The word "Romance" as it applies to languages comes from the Old French 'romancer' meaning "to speak in Roman fashion." The late linguist Mario Pei mentions this in his popular book "The Story of Language" (1949, 1960).
Since Latin was the language of the Romans and the parent language of French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese and Romanian they all came to be called Romance languages based on that Old French word.
Sardinian and Romanian have so many archaic Latin features that there are a few linguists who prefer to classify them as "Italic" rather than Romance. They argue that a true "Romance" language is based mostly on Late Latin features (from the 4th century onward) rather than early Latin features. However, this view has yet to be accepted by the majority of Romance linguists.
French and Italian probably have the greatest number of Late Latin features, follwed by Catalán, Portuguese and Spanish. For example Spanish tocar, Italian toccare and French toucher (to touch) all come from a Late Latin form *toccare (a word possibly of Celtic origin) while Romanian has a atinge from the Classical Latin *tingere.
2007-02-06 17:17:04 · answer #2 · answered by Brennus 6 · 4⤊ 0⤋
It's derived from Latin, the original Romance language--from Rome.
French and Italian...and I think Portugese and Romanian. I'm not completely sure.
2007-02-06 09:02:01 · answer #3 · answered by Anonymous · 5⤊ 0⤋
because they are rooted in latin (the language of the roman empire)
2007-02-06 09:00:54 · answer #4 · answered by Shellular Kellular 6 · 8⤊ 0⤋
becasue it comes from the rome empire.
2015-03-17 05:24:03 · answer #5 · answered by Guadalupe 1 · 1⤊ 0⤋
all of those rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr's
2007-02-06 09:05:12 · answer #6 · answered by C 3 · 1⤊ 8⤋