# How did the Roman Empire function language-wise? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [June 1, 2011, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-the-roman-empire-function-language-wise/583992 "2011-06-01T18:53:06Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 19\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Tamerlane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tamerlane/32/7602_2.png) [@Tamerlane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tamerlane)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2011, 3:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-the-roman-empire-function-language-wise/583992/21 "2011-06-02T03:39:35Z")
> [@clairobscur](#): > > Also, many other languages survived the Roman conquest : Aramean in the middle-east (itself a former Lingua Franca), Coptic in Egypt, Berber in North Africa (still widely spoken nowadays), etc… And _possibly_, [Greek in Italy](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Griko_language), though I think the consensus these days is leaning towards modern Greek-speakers in Italy as being descended from later Byzantine settlement. ---
**Author:** ![code\_grey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f4b2a3/32.png) [@code\_grey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/code_grey)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2011, 5:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-the-roman-empire-function-language-wise/583992/22 "2011-06-02T05:11:29Z")
> [@Chimera](#): > > Almost no conquest was “genocidal”. In some cases masses of people were pushed about by invaders, but you’d have to provide some strong cites that they were ever just completely wiped out by invaders. right, “genocidal” was the wrong word on my part. Probably more of “gendercidal”, as in the men killed off and women having children from the new gang on the block. But in terms of language and culture it is a good mechanism for abolishing or at least heavily damaging the national culture and sense of distinctness of the defeated nation. E.g. that happened to the Veneti, courtesy of Ceasar. [Veneti (Gaul) - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veneti_%28Gaul%29) ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2011, 5:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-the-roman-empire-function-language-wise/583992/23 "2011-06-02T05:59:42Z")
> [@Derleth](#): > > **clairobscur** : OK, that makes sense, but it does make me more interested in when, as **Chronos** said, Greek became the majority language of the city of Rome itself. I don’t think Greek ever became the majority language of the city of Rome, and I don’t think Cicero ever gave Greek speeches in Rome to a Roman audience, or at least, not a lower class Roman audience. He gave speeches in Greece and Asia Minor in Greek, and when he was learning rhetoric, he gave speeches in Greek, because he had Greek tutors. Valerius Maximus actually mocks Romans who give speeches in Greek, saying that in the old days, Roman magistrates were dignified, and one of the signs of that was that they would even speak Latin to Greeks, and force Greeks to only speak through an interpreter, wherever they went. They "believed that the in every matter, the Greek cloak should be subject to the Roman toga, and they felt it would be disgraceful if the might and prestige of the Empire were to be sacrificed to the sweet attractions of literature. But then, to honor Molon, Cicero’s tutor, the Senate let him address them in Greek. ---
**Author:** ![Askance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/askance/32/8281_2.png) [@Askance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Askance)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2011, 6:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-the-roman-empire-function-language-wise/583992/24 "2011-06-02T06:05:40Z")
> [@Derleth](#): > > **clairobscur** : OK, that makes sense, but it does make me more interested in when, as **Chronos** said, Greek became the majority language of the city of Rome itself. Greek was never the majority language in the city of Rome itself - “widely spoken” is not the same thing, and frankly fairly disputable even at that. Widely spoken amongst the elite, certainly. The western empire spoke Latin almost exclusively; after Greece was conquered and absorbed into the empire Greek (as the language of the first realm the Romans conquered which was more culturally sophisticated than they were) became fashionable for the elite to speak (and remained so in, for instance, England up until after WWII) but in no wise was it a majority language. The eastern empire however spoke Greek overwhelmingly until the end. One of the great questions of linguistic history is why the peoples of the western Roman empire ended up speaking Latin-based (Romance) languages after Rome fell, despite being entirely occupied by German-speaking tribes (the sole exception being the British Isles). Whereas when the eastern Roman empire fell Greek disappeared within a couple of generations. On these topics I can thoroughly recommend the marvellous books \*\*The Empire of the Word \*\* and **Ad Infinitum** by Nicholas Ostler. ---
**Author:** ![clairobscur](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/839c29/32.png) [@clairobscur](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/clairobscur)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2011, 7:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-the-roman-empire-function-language-wise/583992/25 "2011-06-02T07:10:45Z")
> [@Askance](#): > > One of the great questions of linguistic history is why the peoples of the western Roman empire ended up speaking Latin-based (Romance) languages after Rome fell, despite being entirely occupied by German-speaking tribes (the sole exception being the British Isles). Whereas when the eastern Roman empire fell Greek disappeared within a couple of generations. . Doesn’t seem that mysterious to me regarding the western empire. Even though they ruled, the Germanic people were a minority, and besides latin-based languages being spoken by the majority, Latin was the language of the church, the language used in writing, the prestigious language of the former empire. I hardly see germanic languages dissapearing as surprising. In fact, they rather kept being spoken for a surprisingly long time, IMO. As for why it didn’t happen in Great Britain, some personnal guesses : it was much less romanized in general and latinized in particular than Gaul (in fact I’m not sure if even at the height of the Empire a significant part of the population spoke Latin in Britannia), was christianized later, didn’t use writing as much as southern europe, so probably nobody had much use for Latin to begin with. Reguarding Greek, I didn’t know it dissapeared so quickly. Two generations? Really? It being superceded by Arabic isn’t that surprising, given that the latter became the language of religion, culture, law and politics (and besides the now arab-speaking areas were conquered earlier, and were using local languages, so forgetting the now mostly useless Greek was logical), but being replaced easily by Turkish in Anatolia is indeed a bit strange. ---
**Author:** ![clairobscur](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/839c29/32.png) [@clairobscur](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/clairobscur)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2011, 7:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-the-roman-empire-function-language-wise/583992/26 "2011-06-02T07:18:08Z")
Oh, and by the way, what is the opinion of the author of the book you’re recommending on the issue? ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2011, 7:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-the-roman-empire-function-language-wise/583992/27 "2011-06-02T07:30:41Z")
> [@clairobscur](#): > > Reguarding Greek, I didn’t know it dissapeared so quickly. Two generations? Really? It being superceded by Arabic isn’t that surprising, given that the latter became the language of religion, culture, law and politics (and besides the now arab-speaking areas were conquered earlier, and were using local languages, so forgetting the now mostly useless Greek was logical), but being replaced easily by Turkish in Anatolia is indeed a bit strange. The interior of Anatolia was never really very heavily populated, and a lot of interior Anatolia was tribal, with people who didn’t really speak Greek as their native language anyway. Cappadocian and Pontic Greece closer to the coast of Anatolia survived until the 20th Century, when a lot of the Greek speakers in Turkey were massacred and a lot of the survivors expelled to Greece under the terms of the Treaty of Lausanne. ---
**Author:** ![Raguleader](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/258eb7/32.png) [@Raguleader](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Raguleader)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2011, 8:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-the-roman-empire-function-language-wise/583992/28 "2011-06-02T08:15:02Z")
Regarding Greek and the Romans, I understand that the idiom “It’s all Greek to me,” meaning that something is unintelligible to the speaker, comes from a Latin phrase meaning “I can’t understand it, it’s Greek.” Amusingly enough, I also found that there is a phrase in several Eastern European language meaning mostly the same thing, which translates as “It looks like a Spanish Village.” And a Spanish phrase that translates as “It appears to be Chinese.” But I digress. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2011, 9:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-the-roman-empire-function-language-wise/583992/29 "2011-06-02T09:38:53Z")
I think it is almost impossible that persons posted to the various provinces would not have had at least a passing familiarity with the vernacular, maybe not political appointees, but long service professionals; it is a staple of good governance. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2011, 4:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-the-roman-empire-function-language-wise/583992/30 "2011-06-02T16:06:30Z")
> [@AK84](#): > > I think it is almost impossible that persons posted to the various provinces would not have had at least a passing familiarity with the vernacular, maybe not political appointees, but long service professionals; it is a staple of good governance. The Empire didn’t really worry much about good governance, and, outside of the army, didn’t really have many long service professionals in the provinces. The only real professional administrators the empire had were the Imperial Household slaves and freedmen, and they generally stayed in the imperial court and handled administration there. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2011, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-the-roman-empire-function-language-wise/583992/31 "2011-06-02T16:19:05Z")
The big weakness of the imperial system was that each provincial governor regarded his assignment as a temporary post, to be exploited in whatever way seemed best, because sooner or later you’d be off to another job. This was done on purpose to prevent governors from consolidating power in a province and making it a private kingdom, but it also had obvious drawbacks. ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2011, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-the-roman-empire-function-language-wise/583992/32 "2011-06-02T16:44:34Z")
> [@Captain\_Amazing](#): > > The Empire didn’t really worry much about good governance, and, outside of the army, didn’t really have many long service professionals in the provinces. The only real professional administrators the empire had were the Imperial Household slaves and freedmen, and they generally stayed in the imperial court and handled administration there. Empires don’t last very long without them. Good Governance is NOT equal to governance which is beneficial for the governed. The Romans needed to have efficient systems in place; which minimized the risk of uprisings. The ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2011, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-the-roman-empire-function-language-wise/583992/33 "2011-06-02T16:57:34Z")
> [@robert\_columbia](#): > > I recall learning that there were Latin dialects in the Empire days, and that the Romance languages (French, Spanish, Italian, etc.) arose from those common dialects rather than the “educated” court Latin. > > I wonder about the other languages matter. Would Roman garrisons or posts have Germanic or Celtic interpreters? The Romans came into major contact with people speaking those languages. I once read that people like the Franks felt they were speaking Latin. The evolution of a language is a gradual process and they didn’t realize how much the language they were speaking was different from what the classical Romans had spoke. It was ironically attempts to restore Latin that ended up killing it. There was enough scholarship during the Carolingian Empire for people to realize their Latin had changed. So they tried to restore Latin to its classical form by publicizing classical Latin texts. But the contemporary language was too entrenched to be changed and all the scholars achieved was to make people realize they were speaking a different language. ---
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2011, 5:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-the-roman-empire-function-language-wise/583992/34 "2011-06-02T17:38:45Z")
> [@Chimera](#): > > As my cite to show otherwise, I give you [Cheddar Man](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheddar_Man). Worst. Superhero. Ever. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2011, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-the-roman-empire-function-language-wise/583992/35 "2011-06-02T21:11:30Z")
> [@AK84](#): > > Empires don’t last very long without them. > > Good Governance is NOT equal to governance which is beneficial for the governed. > The Romans needed to have efficient systems in place; which minimized the risk of uprisings. > > The That may be, but I can’t think of many Roman imperial officials that filled that role. The Romans usually let local elite govern in their name. Every province had a governor and his staff, but the governor and his staff didn’t generally exercise much power outside the capital, except in certain “important” provinces, and army garrisons stationed at various places around the province. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2011, 1:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-the-roman-empire-function-language-wise/583992/36 "2011-06-03T01:37:26Z")
> [@Captain\_Amazing](#): > > That may be, but I can’t think of many Roman imperial officials that filled that role. The Romans usually let local elite govern in their name. Every province had a governor and his staff, but the governor and his staff didn’t generally exercise much power outside the capital, except in certain “important” provinces, and army garrisons stationed at various places around the province. I once heard a historian say that a Roman official in the provinces had three duties: collect taxes, fill troop quotas, and prevent disorder. ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2012, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-the-roman-empire-function-language-wise/583992/37 "2012-02-05T17:14:37Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > I once heard a historian say that a Roman official in the provinces had three duties: collect taxes, fill troop quotas, and prevent disorder. That very well describes bureaucracy in any area. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2012, 5:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-the-roman-empire-function-language-wise/583992/38 "2012-02-05T17:52:49Z")
And keep the zombies at bay! ---
**Author:** ![constanze](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f9ae1b/32.png) [@constanze](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/constanze)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2012, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-the-roman-empire-function-language-wise/583992/39 "2012-02-05T18:07:41Z")
> [@Capitaine\_Zombie](#): > > -I suppose the civil servants sent by Rome to oversee Roman regions were totally proficient in Latin, but what about the local ones they had to use? And did the Roman administrative body sent on the various territories of the Empire able to master (or chosen because of their mastery of) foreign languages? The Romans coined the phrase of “Divida et imperia” on how to deal with conquered nations, which subsequent colonial administrators copied. Part of that is that everybody who wants to deal with the new overlords needs to learn the language of the overlords, in this case, Latin. Learning the local language for the roman officials - why bother? If the locals didn’t understand what their overlords were telling them, that was their problem, the Romans would follow up with the consequences. Initially translators could also be used. Part was also that, although the Romans did have bureaucratic and written stuff, it still was far less than today, so local people didn’t need to interact with the Romans daily in school, but rather seldom. > [@](#): > > -Did Rome expect everybody to speak Latin (and if not, how much of a trouble was it in those times to not understand the language of a land you had to deal with. In our days, it would sound like a very serious chore, but I never see the issue being mentioned as a big problem by historians or chroniclers of that time)? Yes, the Romans expected the foreign Barbarians to learn their language, esp. for subjugated people. Today we no longer have official colonies, but pretend to be on equal footing, so demanding that everybody speaks English instead of using translators is not comparable to the attitudes back then. Remember that Latin was the second lingua franca after Greek, which got its status not because of Greek military conquering everything, but out of practical considerations - most educated people learnt it, so it served as language of understanding, so more people learnt it. (And translators used it as intermediary language). When Latin was finally replaced after the Middle Ages, French for courts and diplomacy took its place, and today it’s English due to trade and internet. > [@](#): > > In a lot of portrayals of the Roman Empire, it seems you can roam around under Roman ruled regions and everybody is fluent in Latin. How much of that is true? > It seems weird to me. I cant get my head around it, I’ve always had that view of Middle Ages travellers that they had to resort to just a few common words understandable by everyone (my view of the Lingua Franca), I have trouble seeing why people would be that much more educated during Roman times. I don’t understand why it’s difficult to accept it. First, most people didn’t travel at all, they stayed in their local village their whole life. Soldiers got conscripted and moved with the army, so let’s not count them. Travellers were mostly traders, who were quite interested in knowing as many languages as possible for trading. Other travellers were religious people or philosophers and students, going from one place to the next, who would also know at least Latin. Second, most people din’t go to school back then, and were illiterate, but that didn’t mean they were limited to speaking one language - traders would learn languages orally (they might know how to write to do bookkeeping). Third, you’ve got the necessity the wrong way around: it’s not that people who travelled all spoke Latin, it’s that people who didn’t speak Latin didn’t travel alone, but with an interpreter. And most people didn’t travel alone, either, but in a group for protection - in which case one leader can interpret and show the way for a whole caravan of 2 dozen people from the same area. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-the-roman-empire-function-language-wise/583992.md?page=1)