Romance languages are a group of languages that developed from Latin and are spoken in places that were once part of the Roman Empire. They include French, Italian, Portuguese, Romanian, and Spanish. Other Romance languages are Catalan of northeastern Spain and Provencal of southeastern France. The group also includes the Sardinian dialect and Rhaeto-Romanic dialects from certain parts of Switzerland and the Tyrol region of western Austria and northern Italy.
Latin was the official language of the Roman Empire. The word romance comes from a Latin adverb that referred to speakers of Latin who were said to “fabulare romanice,” which means “to speak in the Roman way.” These people spoke one of two forms–classical Latin or vernacular Latin. The educated classes spoke classical Latin. The common people spoke vernacular Latin. Romance languages developed from vernacular Latin spoken in certain conquered European countries that became Roman provinces. This vernacular Latin adopted words and features of pronunciation from the languages of the conquered countries. For example, the vernacular Latin word caballus (horse) became cheval in French, cavallo in Italian, and caballo in Spanish.
The Romance languages developed from the many dialects of vernacular Latin over several centuries. The earliest evidence of Romance languages appeared in the 800’s. By the late 1200’s, much literature was written in the Romance languages. So many literary works centered on the topic of love that they became known as romances. The word romance meaning an affair of the heart comes from this usage.
