Indebtedness of German Language to Latin. 
41 
for them so long that they despised their own tongue. Therefore, when 
patriotic men endeavored to reform and enoble the German, they found 
so many Latin technical expressions embedded in the language that 
their learned German looked like a rough cast of the universal lan- 
guage rather than native German. Though the German of the six- 
teenth century is thoroughly German, yet its rudeness and lack of 
form clearly shows that without the aid of the educated language 
no real refinement of taste is possible. Had not the thirty years’ war 
nipped this effort at reform in the bud, the history of the German 
language would have been different. But the popular element of the 
language disappeared in the distress of that devastating war. The 
intellectual life was impoverished, even selfconsciousness died out, 
and the Germans, perhaps pardonably, turned to their neighbors for 
inspiration in language and poetry, preferably to France, a daughter 
of the Latin, whence came foreign words for all phases of life. The 
court, the nobility, in fact all of the upper classes vied with each 
other in speaking French. Poetry, which had been consecrated to 
the German tongue, now followed the new mode and adopted loan 
words in masses. Patriotic people again took up the battle for the 
purification of their language and have accomplished much in this 
way and are still doing an excellent work. 
The real formation of the modern German is, however, to be found 
in the efforts of Maximilian and his chancel to improve their lan- 
guage. Ecks’ Catholic bible (Ingolstadt, 1537), which formed the 
basis of Luther’s translation, shows clearly the significance 0 of this 
movement as it is the result (in language at least) of Maximilian’s 
efforts. Luther wisely used the results that had been achieved be- 
fore his time in his efforts to form a universal German, and we know 
the result of his life’s work. 
It will be seen from the above slight sketch that the dominance of the 
Latin in church and state has been a constant menace to the German, 
and has given it a new character by the introduction of foreign ele- 
ments both in the vocabulary and grammar. The examination of 
Simon Rote’s Freundwoerterbuch (1571) will convince any one that 
the German had been mutilated. If we compare Rote’s Dictionary 
with the unfinished dictionary of Luther, it will be found that the 
former contains five hundred Latin words to one hundred in the 
latter, and a comparison of Eck’s translation of the bible will show 
that Luther has substituted a large number of good German words 
for the loan words of Eck. 
The following table will show the indebtedness of the various 
periods to the Latin : 
