444 ANNUAL REGISTER, 1800. 



language, of course, could not be 

 so much transformed as to be mate- 

 rially different from that of the com- 

 mon people. The language of Plau- 

 tus's comedies was the language of 

 the learned as well as of the popu- 

 lace; and although there occur in 

 them many expressions which are 

 not usual with the other Roman 

 authors, yet they are far from being 

 so numerous as would be sufficient 

 to cause an essential difference. — 

 There is not a sufficient number of 

 worksof other authors of that epocha 

 extant to enable us to prove that 

 the particular words and expres- 

 sions, occurring in Plautus, were 

 used exclusively by the populace. 



We cannot, indeed, deny that, 

 when the Romans had conquered 

 all Italy, and Rome had become 

 the general resort of all Italian na- 

 tions, the language of the Romans 

 underwent a very great and striking 

 alteration; but it cannot thence be 

 concluded that there had been form- 

 ed among the people a language 

 totally different from that of the 

 learned. All the nations of Italy 

 Proper, excepting those of Great 

 Greece, had in fact only one lan- 

 guage, distinguishing themselves 

 from each other only by the differ- 

 ence of dialect; therefore they did 

 not bring with them to Rome a 

 language essentially different from 

 that of the Romans. Having culti- 

 vated the arts and sciences long be- 

 fore the Romans, their dialects 

 could not but be more copious and 

 harmonious than the Roman dialect; 

 consequently they also could pro- 

 duce no other alteration in the lan- 

 guage of the Romans, but what 

 contributed to enrich and refine it. 

 The first reformers of the Roman 

 language were Livius Andronicus, 

 NsEvius, Ennius, Ctecilius, Statius, 



Pacuvius, and L. Accius, who all 

 had been born and educated in dif- 

 ferent provinces of Italy, and were 

 as well understood at Rome, as in 

 the places of their nativity ; for, at 

 that time, even the Bruttians, in- 

 habiting the most distant part of 

 Calabria, spoke a language, not es- 

 sentially different from that of the 

 Romans. 



I cannot, therefore, conceive how 

 by means of the conflux of many 

 Italian nations at Rome, there could 

 be produced a language totally dif- 

 ferent from that of the ancient Ro- 

 mans, unless this difference had 

 been brought about by the learned. 

 However the learned may refine a 

 language by their writings, they 

 cannot possibly transmute it entire- 

 ly. Their writings, if not compo- 

 sed in the language of the people, 

 would have been as unintelligible 

 as hieroglyphics and riddles. A 

 language of the learned, wholly 

 differing from that of the people, 

 cannot possibly have existed. It is 

 said to have been the language of 

 the senate, of the comitia, the fo- 

 rum, the tribunals of justice, of the 

 laws, the generals of the armies, 

 the priesthood, and of all legal com- 

 pacts, without being generally un- 

 derstood by the people. An idea 

 more absurd than this cannot pos- 

 sibly be conceived. The necessity 

 of a competent knowledge in the 

 Latin language was so indispensa- 

 ble and essential to a Roman sub- 

 ject, that whole foreign nations 

 substituted it in the room of their 

 vernacular language. 



If any one should object, that the 

 Romansleamed the Latin language 

 of the grammarians and rhetoricians, 

 we need but to observe that they 

 applied to them for instruction only 

 in order to be initiated into the ele- 



