Editing Romance languages (section)

== Name and languages ==
The term ''[[wikt:Romance|Romance]]'' derives from the Vulgar Latin adverb {{lang|la|romanice}}, "in [[Rome|Roman]]", derived from {{lang|la|romanicus}}: for instance, in the expression {{lang|la|romanice loqui}}, "to speak in Roman" (that is, the Latin [[vernacular]]), contrasted with {{lang|la|latine loqui}}, "to speak in Latin" (Medieval Latin, the [[linguistic conservatism|conservative]] version of the language used in [[abstand and ausbau languages#Roofing|writing and formal contexts]] or as a lingua franca), and with {{lang|la|barbarice loqui}}, "to speak in [[Barbarian]]" (the non-Latin languages of the peoples living outside the Roman Empire).<ref name="Ilari">{{Cite book |last=Ilari |first=Rodolfo |title=Lingüística Românica |publisher=Ática |year=2002 |isbn=85-08-04250-7 |page=50}}</ref> From this adverb the noun ''romance'' originated, which applied initially to anything written {{lang|la|romanice}}, or "in the Roman vernacular".<ref>{{Cite web |title=romance {{!}} Origin and meaning of romance by Online Etymology Dictionary |url=https://www.etymonline.com/word/romance |access-date=2021-03-30 |website=etymonline.com |language=en |archive-date=2021-04-13 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210413200952/https://www.etymonline.com/word/romance |url-status=live }}</ref>

Most of the Romance-speaking area in Europe has traditionally been a [[dialect continuum]], where the speech variety of a location differs only slightly from that of a neighboring location, but over a longer distance these differences can accumulate to the point where two remote locations speak what may be unambiguously characterized as separate languages. This makes drawing language boundaries difficult, and thus there is no unambiguous way to divide the Romance varieties into individual languages. Even the criterion of [[mutual intelligibility]] can become ambiguous when it comes to determining whether two language varieties belong to the same language or not.<ref name="Britannica Online">{{Harvp|Sala|Posner|}}</ref>

The following is a list of groupings of Romance languages, with some languages chosen to exemplify each grouping. Not all languages are listed, and the groupings should not be interpreted as well-separated [[Cladistics#In disciplines other than biology|genetic clades]] in a [[tree model]].
* '''[[Ibero-Romance languages|Ibero-Romance]]:''' [[Portuguese language|Portuguese]], [[Galician language|Galician]], [[Asturleonese language|Asturleonese]]/[[Mirandese language|Mirandese]], [[Spanish language|Spanish]], [[Aragonese language|Aragonese]], [[Judaeo-Spanish|Ladino]];
* '''[[Occitano-Romance languages|Occitano-Romance]]:''' [[Catalan language|Catalan]]/[[Valencian language|Valencian]], [[Occitan language|Occitan]]
* '''[[Gallo-Romance languages|Gallo-Romance]]:''' [[French language|French]]/[[langues d'oïl|Oïl languages]], [[Franco-Provençal language|Franco-Provençal (Arpitan)]];
* '''[[Rhaeto-Romance languages|Rhaeto-Romance]]:''' [[Romansh language|Romansh]], [[Ladin language|Ladin]], [[Friulian language|Friulian]];
* '''[[Gallo-Italic languages|Gallo-Italic]]:''' [[Piedmontese language|Piedmontese]], [[Ligurian (Romance language)|Ligurian]], [[Lombard language|Lombard]], [[Emilian dialects|Emilian]], [[Romagnol dialects|Romagnol]];
* [[Venetian language|'''Venetian''']] (classification disputed);
* '''[[Italo-Dalmatian languages|Italo-Dalmatian]]:''' [[Italian language|Italian]] ([[Tuscan dialect|Tuscan]], [[Corsican language|Corsican]], [[Sassarese language|Sassarese]], [[Central Italian]]), [[Sicilian language|Sicilian]]/[[Southern Italian languages|Extreme Southern Italian]], [[Neapolitan language|Neapolitan]]/[[Southern Italian languages|Southern Italian]], [[Dalmatian language|Dalmatian]] (extinct in 1898), [[Istriot language|Istriot]];
* '''[[Eastern Romance languages|Eastern Romance]]:''' [[Romanian language|Romanian]], [[Aromanian language|Aromanian]], [[Megleno-Romanian language|Megleno-Romanian]], [[Istro-Romanian language|Istro-Romanian]];
* '''[[Sardinian language|Sardinian]]''': [[Campidanese Sardinian|Campidanese]], [[Logudorese Sardinian|Logudorese]]