Interesting Facts about the Romanian Language

The Romanian language has been a critical part of Romanian history for many, many years.

With its beginning in Eastern Romance languages, it has since developed and changed into a more sophisticated tongue that is spoken in a few areas around the world.  Much like other languages, the development of Romanian has sparked the interest of many world-wide linguists.

The Republic of Moldova

As linguists have studied the Romanian language, they have also consulted all of the Moldovan languages.  Through extensive research, linguists have essentially determined that Romanian and Moldovan are practically the same tongue.  With that being said, the Republic of Moldova (in recent history) has asserted that their language is completely unique and has its own identity making it quite distinct from the Romanian language.  This topic of discussion has been the source of many debates and conflicts within the Republic of Moldova.

The Classification of the Language

As like the majority of other languages, Romanian is derived solely from Latin and it was classified as a Romance language.  To be more specific, Romanian was derived from the type of Latin that was spoken in an ancient province of Rome called Dacia.  Unfortunately in 106 AD, the Dacians were conquered by the Romans and they began influencing the residents of Dacia with the Vulgar Latin language.  Eventually, Latin became the primary language for governments and businesses throughout Dacia which would eventually develop into Romanian.

Phonology and Grammar

One of the most interesting aspects of the Romanian language is that it has an incredibly distinct type of grammar and phonology in comparison to other languages that are also classified as Romance languages.  Various historians have speculated about how this occurred and they believe that it was due to the fact that Romanian was developed quite far away from other Romance languages.  Also, the communication between the Romanians and Slavic-speaking individuals may have had a large influence on the development of the language.

Primary Dialects

Although the Romanian language is commonly classified as “Romanian” there are actually 4 primary dialects in the language.  Aromanian, Megleno-Romanian, Daco-Romanian, and Istro-Romanian.  These languages carry on throughout various countries including Serbia, Albania, Greece, Kosovo, and Bulgaria.  In regards to Istro-Romanian, it is exclusively spoken on the Istrian Peninsula in Croatia.

Romanian is a language that has been studied for thousands of years.  With its interesting history of development, it is known as one of the most interesting languages for linguists to study.