The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1895-03-21
THE ROMANCE 14NGU4o Els.
Lecture by w. Fl. Bishop in the Meohan
les Course.

Lecture by w. II. Bishop in the Meohar
les Course.
North Sheffield hall was completely
filled Tuesday evening with large au
dience to listen to the tenth lecture il
the Mechanics course by William Hen.
ry Bishop on "The Rise Of the Ro.
nance Languages"
Among the principal Romance Ian
| guages he included the French, Span
ish, Italian, the old Provencal, the Por-
tugese and the Roumanian, wittrseve-
raj kindred dialects The classic Pro
vencal, the language of the gay, old
Troubadours, he said, had been a dead
| language for a great many years. 1t
had modern representative, however.
This is the language spoken in the
south of France, in the district which
centers around the old city Of Au-
VERNE, which was the capital of Pro
vence. Three thousand people outside
of France speak the French tongue
In Brittany Celtic dialect is spoken
and the Basque language is another
language. which has always been a
mystery to philologists He then spoke
Of Rome as the center from which they
had all come. Rome was at first
mere village on the Palestine hills, but
had gradually conquered its petty
neighbors in petty contests until they
had gained possession of entire Italy,
whence its sway had extended over the
world The whole circle of lands then
known had become thoroughly Latin
lied and Romanized When the pro-
vince of Gaul at length yielded before
the invasions of the barbarians it had
been under the sway OF Rome for four
and one-half centuries, It. had excel
lent roads and beautiful buildings,
which to-day excite the admiration Of
the traveller. The provinces furnished
men of eloquence and literature. The
two Senecas, Martial and Quintillian,
were from Spain, But Italy itself
finally succumbed before the agrees
sions of the barbarians. The year 476
of our era witnessed the final snuffing
out of the Roman empire. The barba-
rians had very few words. Their vo-
cabulary was limited. They brought
to the Romance language just what we
would expect, names used in war and
the chase, names of trees, animals, etc.
But when the barbarians came in con-
tact with the Romans they did not
learn the Latin of literature and the
classes. Indeed, it is recorded
that they heaped many indignities on
the upper classes because they were
not physically developed so as to make
desirable slaves. Lawyers especially
were considered so mischievous a class
that their tongues were cut out and
their mouths We're sewed up So the
barbarians gained their knowledge of |
Latin from the lower classes, and so |
became familiar with the col
ouuial and slangy Latin words They |
five of the six Latin cases |
and left only the accusative. The Ital- |
Ian is the purst and most direct de- |
5cendant of the Latin. 1T has a smooth |
and rythmical flow and delights in |
vowel endings. If 1t finds C before in |
he Latin it invariably makes a tt.
The Portuguese, which is sometimes
considered dialect of the Spanish, is
,eally more archaic and nearer to the
italian. French has departed the far
hest from the Latin and is the syno-
lym of all that is bright and gay.