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I've seen the languages' names like lingua Latīna and lingua Hispānica, but I've read that it's more common to say Latīne and Hispāne. I was wondering if someone had a list of the languages in Latin, since I haven't found in anywhere on internet.

I prefer the adverb ones (those that end in -e) but all way to say it are accepted.

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  • Are you asking for a list of language names, or details on different ways to say a language name?
    – Draconis
    Commented Apr 30, 2018 at 22:39
  • A list, if possible. Commented Apr 30, 2018 at 22:42
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    Welcome to Latin.SE! You may want to specify two or three languages whose Latin names you want to know, or ask for a method/rule to get some/most of them. Open lists are usually difficult questions to answer, and less people are willing to answer them
    – Rafael
    Commented Apr 30, 2018 at 22:48
  • Also, in order to get @Draconis to know about your answer, tagging him will trigger a notification. This is not needed if the addressee is the author of the question/answer being commented
    – Rafael
    Commented Apr 30, 2018 at 22:51
  • Relevant question one and two.
    – cmw
    Commented Dec 28, 2023 at 0:41

1 Answer 1

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The language names are adjectives in Latin. From Hispanicus you get lingua Hispanica and the adverb Hispanice. The name of the language itself is lingua Hispanica ("the Spanish language"), but typically the best choice for "in Spanish" is the adverb Hispanice. The other forms of the adjective can come in handy, too; languages are simply described differently in Latin than in English. What you need is a list of adjectives.

To get started, I recommend taking a look at names of countries in Latin. The list in the answer includes the adjectives, so you can easily find what it means to speak Danice or Polonice. Of course not all country names are associated with a language and there are languages whose names are not related to a country.

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  • The one gotcha with this approach: French in neo-Latin is Francogallice. Commented Jul 23, 2018 at 9:07
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    @NickNicholas According to the linked list France is called Francogallia, so the name of the language is in line with the country. But I wouldn't be surprised if it was also called Francia.
    – Joonas Ilmavirta
    Commented Jul 23, 2018 at 13:19
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    Francia on la.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francia, but Francogallia redirects to it. Sorry, I hadn't seen Francogall- refer to the country before. Commented Jul 23, 2018 at 15:30

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