Romance languages

Introduction & Top Questions
General considerations
- Origins and distribution
- Classification methods and problems
Languages of the family
Latin and the development of the Romance languages
- Latin and the protolanguage
- The postclassical period
  - The emergence of Romance
  - The language of religion and culture
  - Latin in non-Romance languages
- The development of the Romance languages
  - Romance glosses to Latin texts
  - The beginning of Romance literature
  - The standardization of the Romance languages
Linguistic characteristics of the Romance languages
- Typology
- Phonology
  - Vowels
  - Consonants
- Grammar
  - The reduction of inflectional endings
  - The loss of the case system
  - The emergence of articles
  - The survival of verbal inflection
- Syntax
  - The reduction of the subjunctive
  - Conditional clauses
- Morphology
- Vocabulary
  - Latin inheritance
  - Pre-Romance borrowings
  - Later Latin borrowings
  - Vocabulary variations
Orthography

References & Edit History Quick Facts & Related Topics

Images & Videos

Thematic map of Europe showing the distribution of Romance languages, with different colors representing areas where Spanish, Portuguese, Catalan, French, Occitan, Provencal, Franco-Provencal, Italian, Sardinian, Romanian, and Rhaetian are spoken. Striped areas indicate regions where bilingualism is common. The map highlights the primary Romance language regions in southwestern, southern, and eastern Europe, including the Iberian Peninsula, France, Italy, Switzerland, Romania, and parts of the B

The letters A, B, and C appear in white lettering on a green chalkboard background superimposed with a world map.

World map highlighting countries where French is an official language in dark pink, including France, much of central and western Africa, parts of Canada, Belgium, Switzerland, Madagascar, and several island territories. Lighter pink indicates regions where French is widely spoken but not official, such as parts of North Africa and Southeast Asia.

Spanish language

Italic languages

Thematic map of Eurasia showing the approximate geographic distribution of Indo-European language families, each represented by a different color. Areas include Celtic in western Europe, Germanic in northern and central Europe, Romance in southwestern Europe, Slavic in eastern Europe and Russia, and Indo-Iranian languages in South Asia. Non-Indo-European language regions and areas of common bilingualism are also indicated.

At a Glance

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Romance languages summary

Related Questions

Thematic map of Europe showing the distribution of Romance languages, with different colors representing areas where Spanish, Portuguese, Catalan, French, Occitan, Provencal, Franco-Provencal, Italian, Sardinian, Romanian, and Rhaetian are spoken. Striped areas indicate regions where bilingualism is common. The map highlights the primary Romance language regions in southwestern, southern, and eastern Europe, including the Iberian Peninsula, France, Italy, Switzerland, Romania, and parts of the B — Romance languages Distribution of Romance languages in Europe.

Romance languages

Also known as: Romanic languages

Written by

Rebecca PosnerAll

Fact-checked by

Britannica Editors

Romance languages, group of related languages all derived from Vulgar Latin within historical times and forming a subgroup of the Italic branch of the Indo-European language family. The major languages of the family include French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, and Romanian, all national languages. Catalan also has taken on a political and cultural significance; among the Romance languages that now have less political or literary significance or both are the Occitan and Rhaetian dialects, Sardinian, and...

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