Page:Outlines of European History.djvu/628

 534 Outlines of European History The Ger- manic lan- guages derived from the dialects of the German barbarians The Romance languages derived from the spoken Latin In order to understand how it came about that two languages, the Latin and the native speech, were both commonly used in all the countries of western Europe all through the Middle Ages, we must glance at the origin of the modern languages. These all fall into two quite distinct groups, the Germanic and the Roma7ice. Those German peoples who had continued to live outside of the Roman Empire, or who, during the invasions, had not set- tled far enough within its bounds to be led, as were the Franks in Gaul, to adopt the tongue of those they had conquered, natu- rally adhered to the language they had always used; namely, the particular Germanic dialect which their forefathers had spoken for untold generations. From the various languages used by the German barbarians, modern German, English, Dutch, Swedish, Norwegian, Danish, and Icelandic are derived. The second group of languages developed within the terri- tory which had formed a part of the Roman Empire, and includes modern French, Italian, Spanish, and Portuguese. It has now been clearly proved, by a very minute study of the old forms of words, that these Romance languages were one and all derived from the spokeji Latin, employed by the soldiers, merchants, and people at large. This differed considerably from the elaborate and elegant written Latin which was used, for example, by Cicero and Caesar. It was undoubtedly much simpler in its grammar and varied a good deal in different regions; a Gaul, for instance, could not pronounce the words like a Roman. Moreover, in conversation people did not always use the same words as those employed in books. For example, a horse was commonly spoken of as cabalhcs, whereas a writer would use the word equus it is from cahaUus that the word for " horse " in Spanish, Italian, and French is derived (caballo, cavallo, chevaT). As time went on the spoken language diverged farther and farther from the written. Latin is a troublesome speech on account of its complicated inflections and grammatical rules,