Post by greenemperor on Dec 16, 2012 12:11:16 GMT -5
I find there is a lot of ignorance about the Romanian language. There's people who think it is Slavic or has been totally reconstructed using French and Italian models. This is not true.
At one point the number of Slavic words might have slightly outnumbered the Latin but Slavic itself is not a language. If you divide all the Slavic borrowings up into Old Church Slavic, Bulgarian, Serbian, and Ukrainian then percentage for each is less than the Latin.
Also, 80 percent of the words used in common speech come from Latin. Just as most of the words in English common speech come from Germanic, although English has a large Latin superstratum. But because English has a large Latin superstratum does not make it a Latin language- most of the words that make up the common speech and the grammar are all from Germanic. The same goes for Romanian- just because it has a large Slavic superstratum does not make it a Slavic language.
Romanians don't to justify adding new Latin words to their language and getting rid of Slavic words because lots of other countries have done the same thing. Hungarian only inherited 250 basic words from Finno-Ugric but in the 17th and 18th centuries many neologisms were formed from these basic words. Turkish got rid of Arabic and Iranian inflluence. Bulgarian took new Slavic words from Russian. Greek got rid of Turkish words.
Many of the new Latin words entered the Romanian language through writers and poets. The same thing happened in England and France- writers and poets borrowed new Latin words that eventually became entrenched in the language. How is Romanian any different?
Finally, the grammar of Romanian is purely based on Latin, and the old Balkan sprachbund, from which it inherited the article -ul /e
meaning "the". The basic syntax of the language has not been affected by any other language. In fact, many linguists believe it to be the Romance language which is grammatically closest to Latin.
At one point the number of Slavic words might have slightly outnumbered the Latin but Slavic itself is not a language. If you divide all the Slavic borrowings up into Old Church Slavic, Bulgarian, Serbian, and Ukrainian then percentage for each is less than the Latin.
Also, 80 percent of the words used in common speech come from Latin. Just as most of the words in English common speech come from Germanic, although English has a large Latin superstratum. But because English has a large Latin superstratum does not make it a Latin language- most of the words that make up the common speech and the grammar are all from Germanic. The same goes for Romanian- just because it has a large Slavic superstratum does not make it a Slavic language.
Romanians don't to justify adding new Latin words to their language and getting rid of Slavic words because lots of other countries have done the same thing. Hungarian only inherited 250 basic words from Finno-Ugric but in the 17th and 18th centuries many neologisms were formed from these basic words. Turkish got rid of Arabic and Iranian inflluence. Bulgarian took new Slavic words from Russian. Greek got rid of Turkish words.
Many of the new Latin words entered the Romanian language through writers and poets. The same thing happened in England and France- writers and poets borrowed new Latin words that eventually became entrenched in the language. How is Romanian any different?
Finally, the grammar of Romanian is purely based on Latin, and the old Balkan sprachbund, from which it inherited the article -ul /e
meaning "the". The basic syntax of the language has not been affected by any other language. In fact, many linguists believe it to be the Romance language which is grammatically closest to Latin.