I studied Latin for three years; Scottish Gaelic for two years; then German, Italian and French (spoken and written) and several other languages written, including their forms from the time of Rome on. So I can answer with a bit of first-hand knowledge. Scholars have debated this question for centuries. So I'm sure there will be another person who can find websites to disagree with me; but I do speak from experience.

No one really knows what ancient Latin sounded like. This is why there is a big debate between teachers of Classical pronunciation, and Ecclesiastical pronunciation, which is simply Latin spoken with the native accent of the speaker. Ecclesiastical pronunciation will vary depending on whether the speaker is German, or Spanish, etc.

The pronunciation debate is why it's difficult to tell what Latin originally sounded like, so that's why picking the modern language that sounds closest to it is so hard.

One thing I can tell you is that if you've ever heard Scottish or Irish Gaelic, and then heard French, you can immediately hear how French sounds very much like Latin being spoken with a strong Gaelic accent, mixed with a bit of German here and there! And in fact, that reflects the traditional ethnic mix of France very well. It was inhabited by Celts, whom the Germanic invaders pushed to its edges and across the sea to Britain. Then the Romans colonized it and left behind their language (and vineyards).

The language that is closest to Latin is Romanian. They've kept a lot of the sentence and word structures, and just dropped a lot of "s" endings, so that they now end in vowels.

Here's a video of one of their most famous singers, Cleopatra Stratan. The album this is from was released when she was 3; but she'd turned 4 by the time this video was shot:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kNLXjXxj3J8

Permalink | Report