Latin quiz

BBC has a quiz on Latin words used in English...

Latin used to be taught in schools....now we only teach "modern" languages. However, Latin teaches us roots, both historical and linguistic.

If you learn Spanish, you learn Spanish culture.

If you learn Latin, you learn the roots of Spanish and French culture, the roots of Medicine, the roots of many English words (via Norman French) and the roots of western Civilization.

I am not an expert at language, but I speak several poorly, and am fascinated by how languages express things differently.

And on reading one book on Tolkien by one of his fellow professors of Linguistics made me realize not merely the linguistic roots of LOTR, but of how linguistic roots of towns and roads tell us history.

In the USA of course, most of us know where our town names come from, but rarely think of it.

When I grew up in Philadelphia, a nearby street was Limekiln pike which had street signs saying TPK...but tpk, i.e. turnpike? Yes, it was once a turnpike, and there were once limekilns nearby...This portion of Limekiln Pike was an extension of the original segment established in 1693 to provide a thoroughfare between Old York Road and the limekilns of Thomas Fitzwater in Upper Dublin Township.Alas, I never got to dig into history much more than that...

Similarly, in medicine, we incorporate names into our craft...for example, Legioneer's disease comes of course from the American Legion convention in Philadelphia...but daily we use names of organs and illnesses which have history, but alas how many of us know where such names come from...

Jacob Grimm, call your office...