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When I was at University studying history (among other subjects) our medieval history professor was fluent in reading, writing and speaking Latin. Having studie

When I was at University studying history (among other subjects) our medieval history professor was fluent in reading, writing and speaking Latin. Having studied the language in school (with more than mediocre outcome) I was in awe. My command of the language was that bad that I had to do certification at university studying the language again for three semesters. He, having read and written Latin professionally for many years was from another realm. He once explained that the foreword of editions of primary medieval sources were done in Latin by everyone doing the editions as then these forewords would not have to be translated as everybody studying medieval sources would by trade be fluent in Latin.

aspenmayer 5y ago
> He once explained that the foreword of editions of primary medieval sources were done in Latin by everyone doing the editions as then these forewords would not have to be translated as everybody studying medieval sources would by trade be fluent in Latin. Now we just drop a PGP public key block in there and call it a day.
madaxe_again 5y ago
I had Latin beaten into me for just over a decade of my childhood, and dropped it at 15, as soon as it was permitted. I hated it with a passion - endless declensions, recitations of stodgy poetry, copying and translation of texts so dull that it was normal for half the boys to fall asleep in class - usually swiftly adjusted with a board eraser or a meter rule kept for the purpose. There were no textbooks per se - just leatherbound copies of various literature, filled with the bored scrawlings of generations of schoolboys, which were usually far more interesting than the text itself. As an adult, I find what I learned extremely useful, again and again. I moved to Portugal a bit over two years ago without a jot of Portuguese or Spanish to my name - just some rusty French, similarly imprinted by my Victorian schooling - however I rapidly realised that I could get away with speaking Latin with a Portuguese sound and be understood, as I pieced in the actual modern language, palimpsest-like, over the Latin. It allowed me to go from non-speaker to amply conversational in under a year, and knowing the underlying grammar and much of the vocabulary has similarly unlocked Spanish and Italian for me. I’ve even found that Mirandese, a dialect that native Portuguese speakers find quite impenetrable, has been no more of a challenge than Portuguese - less so, in fact, as it largely comprises vulgate Latin. The cognates in all of the Romance languages are profligate, and having Latin as a root from which to grow the various trunks has, I feel, given me insight into Latin as she was spoke, as it were, as hearing the incidences in common words between all provides a bridge to what the commonality in sound is, and how Latin may have actually sounded. It’s also a delight to be able to walk around Roman ruins and museums and rattle off translations of inscriptions and writings, but I digress. I hope that the teaching of Latin has improved since my day (80’s/90’s), as it’s an incredible tool to have in one’s arsenal, but to say I was unenthused by their pedagogical approach would be an understatement.
- teamonkey 5y ago
  I also studied Latin at school around the same time, was bored by it, but also found it useful when living abroad and needing to learn a language. However, I don't think this is particular to Latin. In fact, Latin was the only grammatical teaching that I had at school. Vocabulary and phrases were considered more important than grammar, for all modern languages including English. When taking lessons as an adult, my French teacher told me to forget everything I'd learnt; I needed to go back and learn the structure and conjugations and grammar like native French speakers do at school. That was where I found Latin had a benefit. If I had actually been taught properly at school, however, I don't think I would have found it so beneficial. It would simply have been another, less practical language.
  - KineticLensman 5y ago
    > In fact, Latin was the only grammatical teaching that I had at school. Almost the same. I only did Latin for two years but found the the grammar concepts I learned in Latin were much richer than I got in five years of French.
  - denton-scratch 5y ago
    > Latin was the only grammatical teaching that I had at school Me too. Perhaps that's why I value my Latin training (which I flunked). Maybe it's learning grammar that is desirable, not learning Latin per se (pardon the Latin). They say learning Latin makes it easier to learn other (European?) languages. Perhaps it's learning grammar that is really what helps.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- sdoering 5y ago
  In school I didn't get it. The way it was taught was (at least to me) making it more difficult to understand anything about the grammar and the structure of the language. In university I had a great teacher. She was able to show (with colored pens) the way Latin declinations are being constructed. I only had to understand the pattern and could re-/deconstruct from there. Same with sentence structure were she taught us how to parse sentences and think of them in terms of math formulas with lots of brackets and how to ensure that ever open bracket is being closed again and how to find the main sentence first and start from there. 4 hours a week of intensive schooling and about 20 - 30 hours of homework (next to my regular course work).
Bayart 5y ago
For all my years of learning Latin and Greek in school, it all went over my head. Declensions remained impenetrable as I couldn't instinctively map them to any patterns. In my case it extended to Spanish, which I found impossible to comprehend and articulate a sentence in because of a complete lack of interest for the classes I was taught the language in. A few years after school I took to reading Medieval Latin and found it quite easy. Not so much because the Latin itself bears the traces of Romance, but because I wanted to read Latin. As it happens my Spanish is now decent and Greek is coming along.

aspenmayer 5y ago

> He once explained that the foreword of editions of primary medieval sources were done in Latin by everyone doing the editions as then these forewords would not have to be translated as everybody studying medieval sources would by trade be fluent in Latin. Now we just drop a PGP public key block in there and call it a day.

madaxe_again 5y ago

I had Latin beaten into me for just over a decade of my childhood, and dropped it at 15, as soon as it was permitted. I hated it with a passion - endless declensions, recitations of stodgy poetry, copying and translation of texts so dull that it was normal for half the boys to fall asleep in class - usually swiftly adjusted with a board eraser or a meter rule kept for the purpose. There were no textbooks per se - just leatherbound copies of various literature, filled with the bored scrawlings of generations of schoolboys, which were usually far more interesting than the text itself. As an adult, I find what I learned extremely useful, again and again. I moved to Portugal a bit over two years ago without a jot of Portuguese or Spanish to my name - just some rusty French, similarly imprinted by my Victorian schooling - however I rapidly realised that I could get away with speaking Latin with a Portuguese sound and be understood, as I pieced in the actual modern language, palimpsest-like, over the Latin. It allowed me to go from non-speaker to amply conversational in under a year, and knowing the underlying grammar and much of the vocabulary has similarly unlocked Spanish and Italian for me. I’ve even found that Mirandese, a dialect that native Portuguese speakers find quite impenetrable, has been no more of a challenge than Portuguese - less so, in fact, as it largely comprises vulgate Latin. The cognates in all of the Romance languages are profligate, and having Latin as a root from which to grow the various trunks has, I feel, given me insight into Latin as she was spoke, as it were, as hearing the incidences in common words between all provides a bridge to what the commonality in sound is, and how Latin may have actually sounded. It’s also a delight to be able to walk around Roman ruins and museums and rattle off translations of inscriptions and writings, but I digress. I hope that the teaching of Latin has improved since my day (80’s/90’s), as it’s an incredible tool to have in one’s arsenal, but to say I was unenthused by their pedagogical approach would be an understatement.

teamonkey 5y ago
I also studied Latin at school around the same time, was bored by it, but also found it useful when living abroad and needing to learn a language. However, I don't think this is particular to Latin. In fact, Latin was the only grammatical teaching that I had at school. Vocabulary and phrases were considered more important than grammar, for all modern languages including English. When taking lessons as an adult, my French teacher told me to forget everything I'd learnt; I needed to go back and learn the structure and conjugations and grammar like native French speakers do at school. That was where I found Latin had a benefit. If I had actually been taught properly at school, however, I don't think I would have found it so beneficial. It would simply have been another, less practical language.
- KineticLensman 5y ago
  > In fact, Latin was the only grammatical teaching that I had at school. Almost the same. I only did Latin for two years but found the the grammar concepts I learned in Latin were much richer than I got in five years of French.
- denton-scratch 5y ago
  > Latin was the only grammatical teaching that I had at school Me too. Perhaps that's why I value my Latin training (which I flunked). Maybe it's learning grammar that is desirable, not learning Latin per se (pardon the Latin). They say learning Latin makes it easier to learn other (European?) languages. Perhaps it's learning grammar that is really what helps.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
sdoering 5y ago
In school I didn't get it. The way it was taught was (at least to me) making it more difficult to understand anything about the grammar and the structure of the language. In university I had a great teacher. She was able to show (with colored pens) the way Latin declinations are being constructed. I only had to understand the pattern and could re-/deconstruct from there. Same with sentence structure were she taught us how to parse sentences and think of them in terms of math formulas with lots of brackets and how to ensure that ever open bracket is being closed again and how to find the main sentence first and start from there. 4 hours a week of intensive schooling and about 20 - 30 hours of homework (next to my regular course work).

Bayart 5y ago

For all my years of learning Latin and Greek in school, it all went over my head. Declensions remained impenetrable as I couldn't instinctively map them to any patterns. In my case it extended to Spanish, which I found impossible to comprehend and articulate a sentence in because of a complete lack of interest for the classes I was taught the language in. A few years after school I took to reading Medieval Latin and found it quite easy. Not so much because the Latin itself bears the traces of Romance, but because I wanted to read Latin. As it happens my Spanish is now decent and Greek is coming along.