Sardinian

Sardinian is a Romance language with about 1.2 million speakers in Sardinia, part of Italy. It is considered the most conservative of the Romance languages and the closest to Latin. It contains words borrowed from Punic, Byzantine Greek, Catalan, Spanish and Italian.

Sardinian is spoken mainly by adults. Many children grew up speaking it at home, but often switch to Italian when they start going to school.

There are four main varieties of Sardinian: Logudorese, Campidanese, Gallurese and Sassarese, and each of them, expect Sassarese, is really a collection of dialects. Some sources classify the main varieties as separate languages, while others see them as dialects.

Sardinian is a descendant of the ancient form of Latin brought to Sardinia by the Romans in 238 BC. Between the 14th and 17th centuries, Catalan and Spanish were the languages of administration in Sardinia. In 1714 Italian became the official and literary language in Sardinia, and the Italian authorities looked down on the Sardinian language.