A Companion to the Latin Language

Latin, the lingua franca of the ancient Romans, flourished long after the demise of the mighty empire. In fact, for a dead language, Latin went on to achieve an elevated stature unmatched by few living languages –– its cultural cachet evidenced through countless terms and phrases utilized in Western law, medicine, religion, and science. To celebrate this extraordinary legacy, A Companion to the Latin Language offers a comprehensive account of the evolution of Latin from its Indo–European origins to its modern–day usage. Internationally renowned classicists, linguists, and Latin language specialists offer contributions on topics such as Latin language sources; the linguistic structure of Latin; the idioms and styles characteristic of a range of Latin literary registers; and the social and political contexts of the language.

Unmatched in breadth of coverage and scholarly rigor, A Companion to the Latin Language presents the most thorough and up–to–date consideration of the rich complexities and enduring legacy of the Latin language available today.

List of Illustrations viii

Notes on Contributors x

Abbreviations of Ancient Authors and Works xiv

Abbreviations of Modern Sources xx

Symbols Used xxiv

Linguistic and Other Abbreviations xxv

1 Introduction 1
James Clackson

PART I Sources 7

2 The Latin Alphabet and Orthography 9
Rex Wallace

3 Latin Inscriptions and Documents 29
James Clackson

4 Latin Manuscripts and Textual Traditions 40
Bruce Gibson

5 Romance Languages as a Source for Spoken Latin 59
Roger Wright

PART II The Language 81

6 The Sounds of Latin: Phonology 83
Matthew McCullagh

7 Latin Prosody and Metrics 92
Benjamin W. Fortson IV

8 The Forms of Latin: Inflectional Morphology 105
James Clackson

9 Latin Syntax 118
Geoffrey Horrocks

10 Latin Vocabulary 144
Michèle Fruyt

11 Word–Formation in Classical Latin 157
Michèle Fruyt

12 Latin Particles and the Grammar of Discourse 176
Caroline Kroon

PART III Latin Through Time 197

13 The Historical Background to Latin within the Indo–European Language Family 199
Benjamin W. Fortson IV

14 Archaic and Old Latin 220
John Penney

15 Classical Latin 236
James Clackson

16 Late Latin 257
J.N. Adams

17 Medieval Latin 284
Greti Dinkova–Bruun

18 Neo–Latin 303
David Butterfield

PART IV Literary Registers of Latin 319

19 The Language of Roman Comedy 321
Wolfgang de Melo

20 The Language of Latin Epic and Lyric Poetry 344
Rolando Ferri

21 The Language of Latin Verse Satire 367
Anna Chahoud

22 The Language of Roman Oratory and Rhetoric 384
J.G.F. Powell

23 The Language of Latin Historiography 408
Christina Shuttleworth Kraus

24 Epistolary Latin 426
Hilla Halla–aho

25 Latin as a Technical and Scientific Language 445
Thorsten Fögen

26 Legal Latin 464
J.G.F. Powell

27 Christian Latin 485
Philip Burton

PART V Latin in Social and Political Contexts 503

28 The Social Dialects of Latin 505
James Clackson

29 Latin and Other Languages: Societal and Individual Bilingualism 527
Alex Mullen

30 Language Policies in the Roman Republic and Empire 549
Bruno Rochette

31 Latin Inside and Outside of Rome 564
Giovanbattista Galdi

References 582

Index Locorum 619

Index 627

James Clackson is University Senior Lecturer in Classics at the University of Cambridge.  He is the author of Indo–European Languages (2007) and The Linguistic Relationship between Armenian and Greek (1994).  He is co–author of The Blackwell History of the Latin Language (with Geoffrey Horrocks, Wiley–Blackwell 2007), and co–editor of Indo–European Word Formation (with Birgit Anette Olsen, 2004), and Natural Composition in Indo–European Languages (with Torsten Meißner, 2002).