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Encyclopedia entry: ROMANCE LANGUAGES
- Article from:
- Concise Oxford Companion to the English Language
- Author:
Copyright© Concise Oxford Companion to the English Language 1998, originally published by Oxford University Press 1998. (Hide copyright information)
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ROMANCE LANGUAGES
[From Medieval Latin
romancium/romancia
a Latin vernacular language, from
Romanicus
of Roman origin], sometimes
Romanic languages
.
Languages
descended from the
LATIN
of the Roman Empire, such as
FRENCH
and
SPANISH
.
Identifying the languages
The number of Romance languages varies according to the criteria used to establish them, such as: (1) Status as a national language, in which case there are five (French,
ITALIAN
,
PORTUGUESE
, Romanian, and Spanish/Castilian) or six if Romansch or Rhaeto-Romanic (a language of Switzerland) is included. (2) Possession of a literary tradition, in which case there are nine (the above, plus Catalan, Gallego (in Spain), and Occitan (including ...