What are examples of Vulgar Latin?

In Spanish, for example, Vulgar Latin fungus (accusative fungum), “fungus, mushroom”, became Italian fungo, Catalan fong, Portuguese fungo and Spanish hongo, with the F > H that was usual in Spanish (cf. filius > Spanish hijo, “son” or facere > Spanish hacer, “to do”).

Was Vulgar Latin written?

“Vulgar Latin” was the primarily unwritten, colloquial form. Rare written evidence for Vulgar Latin is found in some plays (in the dialog) and informal writing like inscriptions or graffiti. But even then, because it is written, it is arguably a mix of Classical Latin and Vulgar Latin, not “pure” Vulgar Latin.

What is Vulgar Latin?

Definition of Vulgar Latin : the nonclassical Latin of ancient Rome including the speech of plebeians and the informal speech of the educated established by comparative evidence as the chief source of the Romance languages.

How is Vulgar Latin different?

What is Vulgar Latin, and how does it differ from Classical Latin? The answer usually given is that Vulgar Latin was the language of the people, while Classical Latin, coming down to us as a literary language, was closer to how the elite spoke.

Is Tuscan a language?

Standard Italian is based on Tuscan, specifically on its Florentine dialect, and it became the language of culture throughout Italy due to the prestige of the works by Dante Alighieri, Petrarch, Giovanni Boccaccio, Niccolò Machiavelli, and Francesco Guicciardini.

What is a popular Italian legend?

We take a look at some of the strangest and most interesting of Italian legends – from the origins of a mystical rainbow lake to the mystery of a Roman king’s missing treasure. The Legend of the Rainbow Lake.

When was the Vulgar Latin Bible written?

The Vulgate, St. Jerome ’s translation of the Bible (385–404 ce ), and some of the works of St. Augustine (354–430 ce) are among Christian works written in Vulgar Latin.

Where did the term Vulgar Latin come from?

The modern usage of the term Vulgar Latin dates to the Renaissance, when Italian thinkers began to theorize that their own language originated in a sort of “corrupted” Latin that they assumed formed an entity distinct from the literary Classical variety, though opinions differed greatly on the nature of this “vulgar” dialect.

What are the phonological features of Vulgar Latin?

Among other phonological features of Vulgar Latin, probably the most striking is the loss of the system of long and short vowels. On the whole, long vowels became tense and short vowels lax, resulting in a wholesale change in the rhythm of the language. In the texts there is evidence of the confusion of ĭ and ē and…

Is Vulgar Latin a Romance language?

In an even more restrictive sense, the name Vulgar Latin is sometimes given to the hypothetical proto-Romance of the Western Romance languages: the vernaculars found north and west of the La Spezia-Rimini Line, France, and the Iberian peninsula; and the poorly attested Romance speech of northwestern Africa.