Latin

• Latin was the language of Ancient Rome.
• The basis for the Latin script was the Greek Alphabet which led to the Latin Alphabet.

Latin Alphabet

• The Latin Alphabet is the same as the English Alphabet, except that it had only 21 letters. ‘J’, ‘U’ and ‘W’ are missing and ‘Y’ and ‘Z’ were added later. ‘V’ was used for both ‘V’ and ‘U’.
• The Latin Alphabet was based on the Etruscan and Greek Alphabet, and was used to write the Latin Language.

Direction of writing in Latin

• Written Latin reads from left to right.
• However, Ancient Greek and Phoenician and Egyptian read from right to left.
• It was the Greeks who introduced a change in the direction of writing and also wrote in both directions, known as Boustrophedon.

A Dead Language

• The Western Roman Empire officially ended in 476 CE and was replaced by non Latin speaking Rulers.
• The Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantine Empire (384-1453 CE) continued to speak Latin until it was officially replaced by the Greek Language in 610 CE by Heraclius.
• Latin was eventually replaced by the Romance Languages, which evolved between 200-900 CE.

Latin in the Roman Catholic Church

• Latin was adopted as the Language of the Early Christian Church.
• In the Catholic Church, The Mass was conducted in Latin for almost two thousand years until the 1960’s, when it was replaced by vernacular languages.
• Ecclesiastical Latin is still the lingua franca of the Roman Catholic Church.
  • Vetus Latina (200-382 CE).
    • These were the early Christian Bible Texts which were written in Latin.
  • Vulgate (382 CE – today)
    • The Vetus Latina was then revised in 382 CE into common Latin (Vulgar Latin) by St. Jerome (347-420 CE).
    • It has remained the standard Latin Bible Text still used by the Catholic Church today.