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Posted on Tuesday, June 16th, 2009 at 5:18 pm

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Has Latin Died A Death?

Only a few decades ago, it was normal for pupils at public and grammar schools in the UK to learn Latin. Nowadays, the number of schools offering it as a subject has declined dramatically. But is it really fair to say that Latin is dead?

Latin was the language of ancient Rome and as the Roman Empire expanded, so the language spread too. Its influence is still strong today, although most people are unaware of how important it has been and continues to be, even in today's society.

Browse through any legal textbook and you'll find plenty of Latin terminology. For example,'sub poena' literally means 'under the penalty of' and is a writ issued commanding the presence of a defendant to answer the matter alleged against him. Or 'status quo' which exactly translates as 'the state in which' and means the 'existing state of affairs'. To an outsider it can seem little more than mumbo jumbo, but these Latin phrases have very exact and specific meanings in law and no barrister would get far without an in depth understanding of them.

Similarly the scientific and medical spheres are rich with Latin names and descriptions. Once doctors used to write prescriptions in Latin and some of the terms survive today. 'Nil per os' sometimes shortened to NPO means 'nothing by mouth' and the abbreviation 'ac' is short for 'ante cenam' and means 'before a meal'. English adjectives such as 'ocular' and 'pectoral' come from the original Latin nouns 'oculus' and 'pectus' and respectively mean to do with the eye or the chest. This type of terminology is regularly used by doctors to describe parts of the body.

The English language owes a huge debt to Latin. Not only does it use the same alphabet, but the roots of thousands of its words come from the ancient language. Without the Latin originals, English would have no such terms as 'aquatic', 'desire' or 'fortunate'. And what of the everyday abbreviations such as 'eg' ('exempli gratia') and 'pm' (post meridian')? How many people use these regularly, without understanding the real meaning behind them?

Until the 1960's, services in the Roman Catholic Church in the UK were routinely spoken in Latin. Modernisation changed all that, but it is still possible to hear Mass said in Latin in some Catholic churches in the UK and many people find great beauty and comfort in the archaic phrases. Latin is still the official language of the Catholic Church.

An understanding of Latin will be a great advantage to a student of modern European languages. It is the cornerstone of Spanish and French and other Western 'romance' languages such as Portuguese, Romanian and Catalan. Latin is acknowledged as being a difficult language to learn and anyone who has mastered its many different noun declensions and verb forms will have a head start when it comes to learning any of the 'romance' languages which have descended from Latin.

So, rather than saying Latin is dead, the term 'in active retirement' might be more appropriate!

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