Does anyone know of a decent textbook/grammar for Vulgar Latin and/or Venetian? Thank you in advance.
I don’t believe there is one. As Vulgar Latin was not a written language all we have are reconstructions from the later Romance languages and some evidence here and there in late Latin writings. This website is one of the most informative I’ve found on the subject, especially if you are familiar with Latin: http://www.nativlang.com/romance-languages/?e=0
As you’ll be aware, vulgar latin is not easy to reconstitute, since it so rarely shows its head above water. And it must have differed widely according to time and place—so an amorphous entity as well as a mostly invisible one. I expect it’s understudied, not being of primary concern either to classicists or to modern language people. There must be late latin scholars who interest themselves in it, but the only late latinists of my acquaintance are more interested in the grammarians, prescriptivists one and all, who bore me to tears and mention instances of vernacular only for the purpose of condemning them. Of course Venetian has vulgar latin behind it, but whether it can be traced back to any particular variety of it I rather doubt. But I’m very ignorant, and (like calvinist, I now see) I don’t even know of any book on vulgar latin. I wish I did.
Btw, how much longer will Venetian last, do you think? It has many more speakers than Welsh, which after attempts at extermination by the English is now on seemingly successful life support, but still, given the rate at which languages are disappearing and the pressure that Italian must exert, …
I remember when I was growing up, the people of Veneto would speak their dialect(s) more frequently than we did ours (Ferrarese). Even university professors would speak it. After all, Venetian has an illustrious literary tradition. Just think of Goldoni. However, Veneto, like the rest of Italy but especially the north, is demographically imploding. Immigrants might pick up a word or an expression, but not the language as a whole. Hence Venetian is going the way of the dodo like Latin, I’m afraid.
Vulgar Latin =/= *Proto-Romance (the putative ancestor of the later Romance languages).
You won’t find a textbook on it, it’s not something you learn as a language, but there are a number of discussions and grammars.
First, histories of the language. Meillet’s “Esquisse d’une histoire de la langue latine” is great. Out of date (1930s!) and stuff but will wonderful. The old book by Palmer, “The Latin Language”, has a chapter dedicated to Vulgar Latin. There’s a new book by Clackson and Horrocks. It’s…well its up to date but only “ok” in that it’s less exhaustive than previous treatments. But the chapter on Lat. in late antiquity is great.
Grammatical treatments. Most of these are old like Grandgent’s “Introduction to Vulgar Latin”. Joszef Herman’s “Vulgar Latin” is about 60 years younger than the former and very accessible: it’s easy to find, usually cheap, and well laid out with some interesting methodological discussions.
Specific treatments: This is where you hit gold. In particular you want to follow the work of J Adams. He’s produced specifically on a finite case study (“The Vulgar Latin of the Letters of Claudius Terentianus” in book, stuff on Vindolanda in article) and historically grounded phenomena like “The regional differentiation of Latin”. You might need a background in one or two of the above books first though.
Venetian: no real idea, sorry.
Scribo is of course correct that Vulgar Latin and Proto-Romance are distinct. I think the website I referenced actually covers Proto-Romance, since it’s basically reconstructions from the Romance languages. Proto-Romance is more of a theoretical linguistic construct, whereas Vulgar Latin is the common spoken variety/varieties of Latin as distinct from the somewhat artificial language of literature which we call Classical Latin.
The two are often confused (by myself as well). Which exactly are you interested in?
Mostly in Venetian.
I spoke with a medieval historian the other day, and she told me that the only materials for Venetian are in Italian. And really, it would make sense for me to start there.