Talk:Spread of the Latin script

In Ethiopia Oromo people use Oromo language that is written with Latin script

It seems that Ethiopia should be light green not grey on the world map https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oromo_language — Preceding unsigned comment added by Uscbino (talk • contribs) 20:42, 25 February 2023 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion

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• Kazakhstan’s transition to the Latin script.webm

Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 05:03, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Include percentage of world population which uses Latin script

Greatder (talk) 03:36, 2 April 2022 (UTC)

Feel welcome to contribute yourself - just use reliable sources. I suppose it's difficult to get to one number as people in many countries with different scripts do tend to use the Latin script in some contexts - such as when they are texting (e.g., Serbia), sometimes in advertising, or when they are writing English in professional and educational contexts (e.g., India). Then again there are countries that officially use the Latin script, but have a mostly illiterate population (e.g., South Sudan, Niger...). Bommbass (talk) 09:17, 2 April 2022 (UTC)

Romanian

@Super Dromaeosaurus Hi, I saw you removed most of the Romania section with the note POV pushing. No written Romanian in 1439 that we know of. Inaccurate history too. As the creator of this article, I'm a bit surprised, but you may well be right that I haven't properly represented Romanian linguistic history.

I based the claim that Romanian was written in the Latin script until 1439 on the Descriptio Moldaviae (1714) of Dimitrie Cantemir as it was cited on Dutch Wikipedia, but that may well be inaccurate, and an inappropriate use of WP:PRIMARY source material. I assure you I didn't mean to push any POV, but I'll concede that I have not be careful in verifying this information by checking more reliable modern sources.

For the rest, I based myself on Kamusella 2008; is that an unreliable or in accurate source? Because I see the Modern Romanian article broadly saying the same thing: there was a Transylvanian School within Austria-Hungary, and there were linguists such as Ion Heliade Rădulescu in Wallachia and Moldavia. I don't understand why you removed that part. Good day. NLeeuw (talk) 14:02, 7 April 2024 (UTC)

Hi, thanks for starting this thread. Apologies for the comment, I imagined it had been some Romanian IP or something that added that info. I tried to find the cited info in Descriptio Moldaviae before removing and the year 1439 is not mentioned, at least in numeral form, I also couldn't find anything about the council of Florence. The first known and dated text in Romanian is Neacșu's letter, written in 1521 in Cyrillic.

As for the other info, I removed it because the context of Romanians using Cyrillic was not historically accurate so I didn't think it would make sense to keep the rest considering the scope of the article. Increasingly influenced by Russia as the Greek Byzantine Empire declined and was gradually conquered by the Ottoman Empire in the 15th century, the Eastern Orthodox Church had begun promoting the Slavic Cyrillic. is not correct, Cyrillic had been used in Moldavia and Wallachia for Old Church Slavonic for administration and liturgy before the fall of Constantinople if I am not mistaken, it's not like the fall of the city represented that much of a cultural shock as the Byzantine Empire had already been in decline for quite some time. Also Russian influence over Romania was not very notable by the 15th century. It is illogical to attribute a supposed drop of the Latin alphabet in Romania to a change in the balance of power between the two major Orthodox states as neither of them used the Latin alphabet (or any Orthodox nation at that time).

Everything after that sentence may be restored completely, and a sentence could be added from Kamusella briefly explaning the use of Cyrillic in Romania before nationalism. I am not fond of Kamusella because if I remember correctly he included in one of his works an inaccurate view that Romanians adopted their Roman-derived self-designation during the rise of nationalism, but I won't take a position on the matter, so he can be kept. Super Ψ Dro 14:30, 7 April 2024 (UTC)

I see that Kamusella does mention Neacșu's letter. I was going to add info about it myself but I can't see pages 204-205 which from what I see have important context. Also he calls the letter the first document "in Wallachian" (page 206). Weird. Super Ψ Dro 14:33, 7 April 2024 (UTC)

@Super Dromaeosaurus Thanks for your response! Yes, I also remember Kamusella being inaccurate somewhere else, but I don't recall the details. At any rate, I'm glad to be standing corrected on the use of Cyrillic and Latin scripts in Romanian-language writing in medieval and early modern times. I did not actually know that Church Slavonic was commonly used in administration and church affairs at the time; I assumed it was some intermediate form between medieval Latin and modern Romanian, but written in Cyrillic. I learn new things on Wikipedia every day!

Nevertheless, that doesn't seem to have anything to do with "Russia" [sic] after the 1453 fall of Constantinople; Muscovy was still at war with itself (Muscovite War of Succession) and barely had any influence over what we now call Moldova and Romania. At the time, the great power in the region would still have been Lithuania/Poland (which did use Ruthenian / Chancery Slavonic in administration). I'm not sure how I ended up writing that sentence. I know so much more about Eastern European linguistic, cultural and political history now than I did back in 2017. I guess rewriting this section was long overdue, so it's good that you took the initiative. NLeeuw (talk) 20:22, 7 April 2024 (UTC)

Right, I forgot Russia wasn't Russia back then. If you want to read more on the usage of Church Slavonic in Romania, we have an article about it, though not very developed: Church Slavonic in Romania. As for the intermediate form between medieval Latin and modern Romanian, that was Common Romanian, though quite considerably before any Romanian state was founded, or before any text in Romanian as far as we know.

Feel free to ask me for help for rewriting the section if you need it, I can help by finding sources and adding information. Regards, Super Ψ Dro 20:42, 7 April 2024 (UTC)

Fascinating! I hadn't read either article ever before. Now that you mention it, I have recently written an article about the Khlebnikov Codex, which appears to have some notes on it in Cyrillic Church Slavonic, written by "logothete Vitolt Maroc of the Moldavian land" around 1610. I already wondered why a high official in the Principality of Moldavia at the time would have been writing in Church Slavonic instead of Romanian, but your answer makes sense. NLeeuw (talk) 03:34, 8 April 2024 (UTC)

I've got the quote right here: Several notes on the verso of the final folio confirm the southwestern provenance of the copy: "Написася бысть сия книга повелением божьим до манасты [...]" (unfinished), and below: "есть теперь его милости пага Витолта Мароца логофета земли Молдавскои," and further: "Витолть локофет земли Молдавскои сию книгу украл был и отца наместника у Стецького на месте Кросник." Kloss, Boris (2007). "Copies of the Hypatian Chronicle and Their Textology". Harvard Ukrainian Studies. 29 (1). Translated by DiMauro, Giorgio. Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute: 129–147. JSTOR 41304504. I've got a photocopy of it right here (bottom half of the left side): https://nlr.ru/manuscripts/dep/img/manuscripts/IzoCatalogue/0B66BF7C-C91B-42AF-B168-4D3721CA8153/397.jpg I can hardly read it, but Kloss' transcription appears to be correct.

Now, the first and third sentence were evidently written by Ruthenians (which today we would call Ukrainians), but the second was written by this Moldavian (Moldovan) official in Cyrillic Church Slavonic, not in Romanian (let alone in the Latin script). So they wrote the same language and script, despite speaking different languages in everyday life. Apparently, that was not so strange in the early 17th century? NLeeuw (talk) 04:10, 8 April 2024 (UTC)

Yes, this was common. Church Slavonic, and also Greek at some point (during the Phanariotes, unsure if also before or after), was for centuries the language of administration. Per Moldavia's article it started getting replaced by Romanian in the 16th century. I assume the case was the same in Wallachia. Thanks for showing this interesting case. I have to admit I have always been confused as to how did one of the biggest nations in Europe (+25 million people) have such a poor and late linguistic development in history. Many tiny nations had their language centuries attested before ours (it's enough to look at List of languages by first written account and see for example Ossetian attested 400 years earlier). Super Ψ Dro 10:31, 8 April 2024 (UTC)

@Super Dromaeosaurus One of my colleagues at work, who specialises in IT, is originally from Bârlad in Romanian Moldavia. I told her today that I learnt yesterday (thanks to you!) that Cyrillic Church Slavonic used to be the language of administration there, and she knew that! I thought I was supposed to be the historian lol.

It is indeed a comparatively late linguistic development, but that isn't "good" or "bad" or anything; it's just historical coincidence. My own native language, Dutch, has changed a lot more in the past 500 years than English has, for example. That comes with its own problems. I find it easier to read 16th-century English than 16th-century Dutch haha. Meanwhile, Icelandic has barely changed from Old Norse in 1000+ years in writing (although a lot in pronunciation).

I suspect that the relative geographic-linguistic isolation of speakers of Common Romanian, between mostly Slavonic and also Magyar speaking neighbours, and a Greek-speaking religious centre in Constantinople, has made it difficult for the spoken language of the common people to find relevance amongst the cultural and political elite for a longer time than, say, Middle Dutch, which was geographically connected to a huge dialectal continuum in Germany/Austria/Switzerland, England/Scotland, and further Scandinavia (important naval trading partners). Latin and French as elite languages fell out of fashion earlier in the Low Countries than Church Slavonic in Romanian-speaking areas, probably mostly due to the fact that those Germanic-speaking neighbours also had a developed native literary tradition, and the languages were largely mutually intelligible.

As for population sizes, I think we should keep in mind that they have grown enormously since the 19th century. The Netherlands went from 2 to 16 million people in 200 years, but that's still a far cry from France, which has always had strong linguistic influence on the Low Countries. The fact that there are about 25+ million Romanian speakers in Romania and Moldova today may therefore not say much either. The fact that the Romanian principalities were surrounded by mostly Slavonic-speaking populations is probably key to why Church Slavonic persisted so long in administration.

Lastly, that List of languages by first written account has a lot of contestable claims in it. Honestly, I have never heard of Malbergse Glossen in c.510 or the mid-5th-century Bergakker inscription before. These sound like WP:FRINGE claims. The 11th-century Hebban olla vogala is traditionally regarded as the first attestation of "Old Dutch", but it might also be Old English or some really odd West Flemish. Other claimants are the Wachtendonck Psalms (10th century) and the Old Saxon Baptismal Vow (9th century), but scholars (and nationalists) will argue endlessly over whether these are really "Dutch" or rather Franconian or Saxon or some other non-Dutch German dialect. In the end, I think it's a bit arbitary and unimportant. It's not a game who can have the "oldest" language. I'd much rather learn from what has survived than making it a silly contest. NLeeuw (talk) 17:24, 8 April 2024 (UTC)

Nice, we really are everywhere. I myself am another Romanian abroad :). Yes much of what you say might have been the reason. In my opinion geography might have had an influence too. Modern Romania borders the Eurasian steppe, and it was subject to invasions for centuries. I imagine the Pechenegs, Cumania or the Golden Horde, which controlled Moldavia and Wallachia for centuries, were not particularly cultural hubs. Transhumance, practiced for a long time by Romanians, is likely another reason.

I imagine the case with Dutch would be harder to determine. As I've understood, the line between Dutch and other Germanic variants was pretty blurry in early times. Yes, you're right it is not a competition. I agree with your more productive and embracing view. Super Ψ Dro 19:36, 8 April 2024 (UTC)