Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Peter Kirk <peterkirk AT qaya.org>]

On 24/02/2004 15:41, Harold R. Holmyard III wrote:

> Dear Peter,
>
>  
>
> > Are you sure? As I understood it, in the first century CE even in ROME
> > the lingua franca was Greek, not Latin, and that Latin was dying out
> > until it was revived under the Flavians. (That explains why Paul wrote
> > his letter to the Romans in Greek.) I suppose that Latin was used by the
> > Romans for official administrative purposes, but that Romans in
> > Palestine would have spoken mostly Greek among one another, The language
> > spoken in the army may have varied from regiment to regiment, and some
> > of the regiment names are recorded, e.g. in Acts 10:1, Cornelius was
> >    
> >
> > from the Italian regiment, and so is more likely to have been a Latin
>  
>
> > speaker - although he probably conversed with Peter in Greek.
> >    
>
> HH: I did not know that, but there seem to be other opinions. ...

OK, there are other opinions. But most of what you quote (including from 
Internet sites which can be very unreliable and partisan) is passing 
comments by people who have simply assumed the point without looking at 
the evidence. I think you should look at proper scholarly studies of 
Rome in the 1st century CE. I don't have any at hand, but I have seen 
references to them. But this list is not the place to discuss this issue.

Even Cicero acknowledged that Greek was a more international language 
than Latin: "Graeca leguntur in omnibus fere gentibus, Latina suis 
finibus, exiguis sane, continentur."

--
Peter Kirk
peter AT qaya.org (personal)
peterkirk AT qaya.org (work)
http://www.qaya.org/