This is a remarkable story combining history religion politics and literature to show how latin emerged from a welter of rapidly changing dialects to become a language rich in poetry drama history and philosophy and then spread throughout the western world from the levant to britain from scandinavia to north africa. It even goes into some forward thinking ways to approach latin as a language in the world today and beyond glad i read it now to find an actual linguistic history of latin read more one person found this helpful helpful report abuse richard l lillis 50 out of 5 stars a classic. Yet to offer a brief summary latin story of a world language outlines the changing uses of the latin language from its first literary attestations to the present day after an introduction and overview of the books main themes chapter 1 the book is arranged chronologically. 1 latin as a world language 1 2 the language of the empire 41 3 europes latin