Thanks for an interesting read (and the lecture video link in the comments!). Never met a Latin teacher who could hold a conversation, although one said he had

Thanks for an interesting read (and the lecture video link in the comments!). Never met a Latin teacher who could hold a conversation, although one said he had been to a convention where they dressed up in Roman gear and greeted each other in Latin "SALVETE". I was studying Latin for 4.5 years in secondary education, my summary is it isn't as useful and as logical a language as many claim: there are plenty of tables to memorize, many exceptions to remember, and then advanced texts leave important words implicit (e.g. main verbs). As someone passionate about language and languages, I was initially excited, but quickly disappointed and bored by Latin grammar books and textbooks that taught it. The typically historic texts are mostly war-related (Caesar, De bello gallico). In contrast, Spanish grammar is lean, beautiful and simple. The exceptions are fewer, and somehow one doesn't even need to study much to pick up the essentials for daily communication, one tends to pick it up intuitively (after four years of Latin, I still couldn't "Vamos a la playa" in Latin, but I could say "Vamono" in Spanish after two years - "let's go!", emulating the slang of the Canary Islands where the -s ending is often dropped, to sound more native-like). Ironically, of course, Spanish is a Romance language and therefore derived from Latin. In linguistics, there is an observation that over time, languages simplify and drop cases, conjugations and endings indicating other grammatical systems generally. For instance, English once had a "dual" in addition to singular and plural, which was only used for things with cardinality two (e.g. two apples, a pair of shoes), but this was eventually shed [1,2]. It is important to know more than one language well enough to have conversations and read books, as this totally broadens one's perspective. This is because categorial divisions are done differently in each language and the world is organized differently - along different grammatical dimensions - and the leads to an increased ability to take alternative viewpoints. Learning a second language opens your mind and makes accessible another vast body of books you can read and people you can communicate with. It's vital that this is taught you people in schools, and it's importal to do that well, as later people have insufficient time and focus, and older humans learn much more slowly. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dual_(grammatical_number) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dual_(grammatical_number) [2] https://www.researchgate.net/publication/327510106_The_Loss_of_Dual_Number_in_Old_English https://www.researchgate.net/publication/327510106_The_Loss_...