Writing Essays for Latin Class?

So my last post was in regards to why one should take Latin. I also mentioned that I was a Classics major. If you read that post, then you know I get a lot of questions regarding my field of study. Well, my focus is on Ancient Rome and Greece. I focus on those two languages, but mainly Latin. I read texts and analyze them. We also need to write essays regarding these ancient texts. You may ask, “what is there to write about? You're just reading a book in a dead language.” Let me tell you, there's much more to that.

Writing an essay about Latin texts is more than an over-glorified book report on something that is written in a dead language. In fact, the essay that I have to write that is due later tonight at midnight is in regards to obtaining lost books. I have to write about how Latin texts are produced throughout the years, starting from the past.

You see, there was not advanced technology nor printing press back in Classical times. Everything was written by hand for approximately 100,000 Romans. I bet you cannot imagine the struggles of doing that. Well, remember we har human, and there are mistakes in those copies of books (i.e. misspelled words, “typos,” forgotten lines, etc.)

Then there are the private books, which mean that only one copy (the original one) was produced. In medieval times, the singular books of authors were being hunted down. When they were obtained, the person or persons who found the original copy can make a vast amount of money doing so. Mind you, Latin was no longer a wide form of communication in medieval times. It was dead. So once you found a lost book, it was soon to be translated and distributed for quite a bit of money.

“But what is the point of studying this?” you may ask. Well, it emphasizes my belief in saving endangered languages. If we lose more languages in the world, lost scriptures written in a dead language would not be able to translated and history is lost. It would instead be exploited and used for profit. Saving endangered languages will prevent such and keep a culture's history alive. Latin may not have survived, but we know so much knowledge of it that we can honor its past.