Latin literature includes the essays, histories, poems, plays, and other writings written in the Latin language. Beginning around the 3rd century BC, it took two centuries to become a dominant literature of Ancient Rome, with many educated Romans still reading and writing in Ancient Greek, as late as Marcus Aurelius (121–180 AD). Latin literature was in many ways a continuation of Greek literature, using many of the same forms.
Latin was the language of the ancient Romans, but it was also the lingua franca of Europe throughout the middle ages, so Latin literature includes not only Roman authors like Cicero, Vergil, Ovid and Lucretius, but also includes European writers after the fall of the Empire from religious writers like St. Augustine (354–430 AD), to secular writers like Francis Bacon (1561-1626) and Spinoza (1632–1677).
Read more about Latin Literature: Characteristics of Latin Literature, Latin in Translation
Famous quotes containing the words latin and/or literature:
“It is worth the expense of youthful days and costly hours, if you learn only some words of an ancient language, which are raised out of the trivialness of the street, to be perpetual suggestions and provocations. It is not in vain that the farmer remembers and repeats the few Latin words which he has heard.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“A people’s literature is the great textbook for real knowledge of them. The writings of the day show the quality of the people as no historical reconstruction can.”
—Edith Hamilton (1867–1963)