87
votes
What language did Gaius Julius Caesar speak with Cleopatra?
Most likely Greek. This is the only language which we know they definitely had in common, and both were highly proficient in it.
High-born Romans learnt Greek and Julius Caesar was no exception:
...
- 108k
50
votes
Accepted
Why is this Latin text black but the Latin numerals are red?
The present day structure (Marian column (Prague)) is intended to be a very precise reconstruction of the original one built in 1650 that was torn down in 1918, when the original inscription was ...
- 80.8k
41
votes
Why is AD in Latin and BC is in English?
The third answer at Guardian is perhaps useful:
Anno Domini was first used by the church in England in the seventh century and came to be used in secular legal documents at a time when they, like ...
MCW♦
- 32.3k
34
votes
Accepted
Why does Romanian culture have Latin influences?
Romania was the ancient Roman province of Dacia. Under Roman rule, the province was systematically colonised and developed. It has been theorised that these Roman settlers, intermingling with ...
- 97.4k
31
votes
Accepted
Why isn't there a single trace of Germanic influence in Iberian Languages?
(Note that there are definitively many traces of Germanic influence on Spanish/Portuguese. For example, as @AlbertYago's pointed out, the Iberian vocabulary contains several Germanic imports; ...
- 97.4k
25
votes
Accepted
Constantine the Great created the Chi-Rho from the Greek word for "Christ". Why choose Greek over Latin, even though he was Roman?
The short answer is that Constantine didn't create the Chi-Rho Christogram. There is evidence that it was already being used before Constantine, but he certainly raised the symbol's prominence after ...
- 77.3k
23
votes
Accepted
Why did Latin disappear so completely in Britain after the Romans left?
The short answer is, of course, that Latin didn't completely disappear from Britain at the end of the Romano-British period. However, the use of Latin did decline much more than in Britain than it did ...
- 77.3k
21
votes
Accepted
What did the Romans call black people (sub-Saharan)?
Ancient Romans used the word Aethiops/Aethiopem which was derived from Greek Αἰθίοψ (Aithíops).
But the other answer isn't right when it says that the word Aithiops had no meaning except for the ...
- 2,732
21
votes
Did average church-goers understand mass in Latin?
Literate people can carry dual-language missals. My father did first communion in the old rite. Even as a child/young teen, he could follow the gestures, context and more or less the Latin sound/text, ...
- 4,100
20
votes
Accepted
What do these terms in Caesar's Gallic Wars mean?
It is, perhaps easier to understand when compared with a map:
image source Wikimedia CC BY-SA 4.0
Now, Caesar's meaning should be a little more clear. When he says:
"The Belgae rises from the ...
- 77.3k
20
votes
Accepted
What was the first college in an English-speaking country to use Latin in their motto?
The oldest universities in today's English-speaking world are Oxford and Cambridge, having mottoes Dominus illuminatio mea, "The Lord is my light", and Hinc lucem et pocula sacra, "From here, light ...
- 27.6k
20
votes
Accepted
Is 'quartodecimo omnium sanctorum' the same as 'Nov XIV' on this Latin grave inscription?
It does seem a coincidence that they all died in November, but this coincidence has been made into something of a joke.
In the first place the reverend gentleman himself died on November 1st which is ...
- 1,149
18
votes
Accepted
Which is the earliest surviving inscription of "SPQR"?
Whether or not there are any surviving SPQR initials inscriptions from the time of the Roman Republic is unclear. For inscriptions, the earliest use of these initials seems to have been on coins from ...
- 108k
18
votes
Accepted
What place was called [in Latin] Audomaropolitanus?
Audomaropolitanus is actually the adjectival form, and it means "of Audomaropolis." So you'd want to look for that. Latin Wikipedia identifies it as Saint-Omer, in northern France.
- 1,027
17
votes
Why does Romanian culture have Latin influences?
In addition to the excellent answer by Semaphore, there are some details about why Romania kept a much stronger character of the Latin culture and language, compared with surrounding countries.
The ...
- 271
15
votes
Why is AD in Latin and BC is in English?
It remains unclear at the moment exactly how and why, nor even exactly when, the dating system was named popularly in English language and then kept that way while the years after the year 1 in the ...
- 80.8k
12
votes
Did average church-goers understand mass in Latin?
It varied in degree depending on the period and the location.
As explained in this podcast on the emergence of Romance languages from Patrick Wyman's Tides of History, the line between Latin and the ...
- 23.2k
11
votes
Accepted
What does the abbreviation "adhib." mean in historiography or archival science?
It is short for adhibendum. I think the English equivalent would be something along the lines of "annex" or "appendix". As in, "Appendix B, Vol II, Proceedings of the School Conference of 1891".
I ...
- 97.4k
10
votes
Polite forms of address in Ancient Rome
Since posting this question, I've begun reading Latin Forms of Address from Plautus to Apuleius by Eleanor Dickey OUP 2002,and the question is considerably more complex than I ever dreamt! For ...
- 7,941
9
votes
Why did Latin disappear so completely in Britain after the Romans left?
(This answer is intended as a complement to Sempaiscuba's.)
The British experience is not as unique as you may think, as there were many other places where Vulgar Latin died out after the collapse of ...
- 656
9
votes
How long did Latin survive in Bavaria?
There were two Roman provinces that encompassed part of modern Bavaria: Raetia and Noricum.
In both the ancient population primarily were herders and loggers, not farmers. So they weren't ...
- 118k
9
votes
When did Latin cease to be an important language for international scholarly communication?
To expand the answer of b.Lorenz with few examples: it was a slow process, and the speed in various areas was very different. Some examples. Proceedings of St. Petersburg Academy (mid 18th century) ...
- 38.5k
8
votes
Why does Romanian culture have Latin influences?
Disclaimer: I am not a historian, however I do have a passion for history, and have researched some of the theories regarding the origins of my language and culture. If my answer doesn't meet H SE ...
- 194
8
votes
Did the passage from Latin to English, in England, help science flourish?
This question has no definite answer because there was no alternative. In the period between 17th and 19th century all science everywhere in Europe switched from the Latin to the native languages. ...
- 38.5k
7
votes
Accepted
When were both minuscule and majuscule letters used for the first time in the same Latin manuscript?
I'd say Half-Uncial (3rd Century AD) and Carolingian (9th Century AD) scripts; as it says in the Wikipedia text for the latter,
Clear capital letters and spaces between words – norms we take for
...
- 2,266
6
votes
What did the Romans call black people (sub-Saharan)?
In my earlier answers on similar questions,
What are some examples of racism in pre-modern literature?
How did people categorize each other in the middle ages, how did racism work?
I expressed the ...
- 38.5k
6
votes
What does this symbol in the title page illustration of the "Margarita Philosophica" mean?
It is a cursive form of π (the Greek letter 'pi'), as it is in the manuscript of Thucydides you also posted.
The three-headed and winged figure is Philosophy (as it says in the round border above her:...
- 61
6
votes
When did Latin cease to be an important language for international scholarly communication?
It come about at different times in different subjects, for example Latin names of conditions and anatomical objects are still used in medical science. It generally happened in the 18th and 19th ...
- 4,364
6
votes
Why isn't there a single trace of Germanic influence in Iberian Languages?
The accepted answer is very good at giving context and explaining the difference of the Iberian languages with England (where a Germanic language replaced previous romance and Celtic languages) and ...
- 3,629
6
votes
Can anyone render this passage from Lorenzo Valla's original Latin translation of Herodotus into modern text?
Aegyptios autem, qua p(er)suasum habent ignem animatam beluam esse, et o(mn)ia quae nascuntur (nanciscitur) de uorare (devorare): et post(quam) deuorando (devorando) fuerit expleta, una cum ipsa re ...
- 80.8k
Only top scored, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible