Western Languages: AD 100-1500
Wolff, Philippe

Softcover, $12.95
ISBN 0-84212-276-2
Phoenix Press, 2003.
201 pages.

"When did men stop speaking Latin?

How did the actions of society or religion influence vocabulary? What effect did the conquest of the Anglo-Saxon countries by William the Conqueror and his French-speaking knights have on language?

Speech and writing play a fundamental part in man’s activities. Social life is inconceivable without some system of signs enabling us to communicate with each other, and language is chief among these signs. The actual language of the manuscript is also one of the richest sources of information on the past. It gives us the opportunity to make contact with documentary material produced not by a few fairly intelligent and representative individuals, but by the ‘articulate masses’.

From Cicero to Gutenberg, Western Languages AD 100 – 1500 shows how it is impossible to claim any real understanding of the development of the West without knowing about the development of its languages."

Cover art: The Tower of Babel by Abel Grimmer 1604 (Bridgeman Art Library)