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Italic languages

 

Indo-European languages spoken in the Apennine Peninsula (Italy) during the 1st millennium BC, after which only Latin survived. Traditionally thought to be a subfamily of related languages, these languages include Latin, Faliscan, Osco-Umbrian, South Picene, and Venetic. Latin, the language of Latium and Rome, began to emerge as the predominant language as early as the 3rd century BC. By AD 100 it had replaced all dialects (except Greek) between Sicily and the Alps. Until then, Oscan dialects were most widely spoken; Umbrian, in central Italy, was closely related to Oscan. Venetic was spoken in the region of Venice. These languages were written in various alphabets, including the Greek and Latin alphabets and modified versions of the Etruscan.

For more information on Italic languages, visit Britannica.com.

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Columbia Encyclopedia: Italic languages
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Italic languages, subfamily of the Indo-European family of languages that may be divided into two groups. The first group consists of the ancient Italic languages and dialects that were once spoken in Italy. The most important of these were Latin, Faliscan, Oscan, and Umbrian; Latin was the only one to survive antiquity (see Latin language). From Latin are derived the Romance languages, which in turn comprise the second (or medieval and modern) group of the Italic subfamily; they include Catalan, Sardinian, French, Italian, Portuguese, Occitan, Rhaeto-Romanic, Romanian, and Spanish. The ancient Italic languages, with the exception of Latin, are now preserved chiefly in inscriptions, although occasional references in ancient authors and a number of proper and place names furnish added evidence. Latin, however, is amply recorded in numerous literary works as well as in inscriptions. The earliest existing inscription in an Italic language is in Latin and goes back to the 5th or 6th cent. B.C. At first the use of Latin was limited to Rome and the area around it, but the Romans spread their language throughout Italy and eventually over their vast empire. Faliscan, which is closely related to Latin, was once prevalent in an area in S Etruria, which is N of Rome. It is thought that people speaking Latin and Faliscan first entered and settled in Italy before or about 1000 B.C. and that the speakers of Oscan and Umbrian probably arrived somewhat later. Umbrian, which was current in the region of Umbria in central Italy NE of Rome, was superseded by Latin in time. Oscan was spoken in central and S Italy and NE Sicily. It too was finally absorbed by Latin. In general, the texts and records of the ancient Italic languages, including Latin, are written in alphabets that can be traced back to the Greek alphabet, often by way of the Etruscan alphabet. See Indo-European.

Bibliography

See J. Whatmough, The Foundations of Italy (1937); R. S. Conway, The Italic Dialects (2 vol., 1897, repr. 1967).


WordNet: Italic language
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Note: click on a word meaning below to see its connections and related words.

The noun has one meaning:

Meaning #1: a branch of the Indo-European languages of which Latin is the chief representative
  Synonym: Italic


Wikipedia: Italic languages
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Italic
Geographic
distribution:
Originally Italy, today mainly southern Europe, maximum extent world-wide intermittent
Genetic
classification
:
Indo-European
 Italic
Subdivisions:
Osco-Umbrian, formerly Sabellic
ISO 639-5: itc
Iron Age Italy.svg

Approximate distribution of languages in Iron Age Italy during the sixth century BC.

Indo-European topics

Indo-European languages (list)
Albanian · Armenian · Baltic
Celtic · Germanic · Greek
Indo-Iranian (Indo-Aryan, Iranian)
Italic · Slavic  

extinct: Anatolian · Paleo-Balkans (Dacian,
Phrygian, Thracian) · Tocharian

Indo-European peoples
Albanians · Armenians
Balts · Celts · Germanic peoples
Greeks · Indo-Aryans
Iranians · Latins · Slavs

historical: Anatolians (Hittites, Luwians)
Celts (Galatians, Gauls) · Germanic tribes
Illyrians · Italics  · Cimmerians · Sarmatians
Scythians  · Thracians (Dacians)  · Tocharians
Indo-Iranians (Rigvedic tribes, Iranian tribes) 

Proto-Indo-Europeans
Language · Society · Religion
 
Urheimat hypotheses
Kurgan hypothesis
Anatolia · Armenia · India · PCT
 
Indo-European studies

The Italic subfamily is a member of the Indo-European language family. It includes the Romance languages derived from Latin (Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, French, Romanian, etc.), and a number of extinct languages of the Italian Peninsula, including Umbrian, Oscan, Faliscan, and Latin itself.

In the past various definitions of "Italic" have prevailed. This article uses the classification presented by the Linguist List (see under External links below): Italic includes the Latin subgroup (Latin and the Romance languages) as well as the ancient Italic languages (Faliscan, Osco-Umbrian and two unclassified Italic languages, Aequian and Vestinian). Venetic (the language of ancient Venice), however, is regarded as unclassified Indo-European, despite its influence on the modern Italian of the region.

In the extreme view, Italic did not exist, but the different groups descended directly from Indo-European and converged because of geographic contiguity. This view stems in part from the difficulty in identifying a common Italic homeland in prehistory.

Contents

Phonetic changes

A partial list of regular phonetic changes from Proto-Indo-European to Proto-Italic:

  • Palatovelars merged with plain velars
    • k
    • ɡʲʱɡʱ
    • ɡʲɡ
  • Voiced labiovelars unround or lenite
    • ɡʱʷɡʱ
    • ɡʷɡ or w
  • Voiced aspirates become first unvoiced, then fricativize
    • ɸf
    • θ
    • ɡʱx
  • sθ before r; unchanged elsewhere
  • p before in following syllable (e.g. Latin quinque 'five' from PIE *penkʷe); unchanged elsewhere
  • Resonants and remaining stops (m n l r w b d ɡ p t k kʷ) unchanged

Further changes occurred during the evolution of the individual Italic languages, in Latin for example f, θb, d between vowels and θf at the beginning of a word.

Branches

The Italic family has two known branches and two unclassified languages:

The ancient Venetic language, as revealed by its inscriptions (including complete sentences), was also closely related to the Italic languages and is sometimes even classified as Italic. However, since it also shares similarities with other Western Indo-European branches (particularly Germanic), some linguists prefer to consider it an independent Indo-European language.

The Italic languages are first attested in writing from Umbrian and Faliscan inscriptions dating to the 7th century BC. The alphabets used are based on the Old Italic alphabet, which is itself based on the Greek alphabet. The Italic languages themselves show minor influence from the Etruscan and somewhat more from the Ancient Greek languages.

As Rome extended its political dominion over the whole of the Italian Peninsula, Latin became dominant over the other Italic languages, which ceased to be spoken perhaps sometime in the 1st century AD. From Vulgar Latin the Romance languages emerged.

References

  • Pulgram, Ernst (1958). Tongues of Italy, Prehistory and History. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. 
  • Rix, Helmut (2003), "Ausgliederung und Aufgliederung der italischen Sprachen", in Bammesburger, Alfred; Vennemann, Theo (in German), Languages in Prehistoric Europe, Indogermanische Bibliothek 3, Heidelberg: Winter, pp. 147-172, ISBN 3-8253-1449-9 

See also

External links


 
 
Learn More
Faliscan (language)
Oscan (language – in history)
Umbrian (language – in history)

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Britannica Concise Encyclopedia. Britannica Concise Encyclopedia. © 2006 Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. All rights reserved.  Read more
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