Romanian (româna)
Up to 30 million people are currently speaking Romanian. 20 million live in Romania (90 percent of the population); 3 million in the Republic of Moldova (where it is the official language), and about 1 million in neighbouring countries (Ukraine, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Serbia and Montenegro, Bulgaria and Greece). There are also significant communities of Romanian language speakers in countries like Canada, United States, Germany, Israel, Australia, New Zealand, Italy and Spain.
Romanian is the only Eastern Romance language. Most words in Romanian vocabulary (about 75 percent) are of Latin origin. That is why Romanian shares approximately 70 percent of its vocabulary with the other Romance languages, mostly Italian and French, followed by Sardinian, Catalan, Portuguese, Romansh, and Spanish. Over the centuries, Romanian has also borrowed many words from its Slavonic neighbours, from German, Hungarian, Turkish, French and, more recently, from English.
Special features of Romanian
Up to 30 million people are currently speaking Romanian. 20 million live in Romania (90 percent of the population); 3 million in the Republic of Moldova (where it is the official language), and about 1 million in neighbouring countries (Ukraine, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Serbia and Montenegro, Bulgaria and Greece). There are also significant communities of Romanian language speakers in countries like Canada, United States, Germany, Israel, Australia, New Zealand, Italy and Spain.
Romanian is the only Eastern Romance language. Most words in Romanian vocabulary (about 75 percent) are of Latin origin. That is why Romanian shares approximately 70 percent of its vocabulary with the other Romance languages, mostly Italian and French, followed by Sardinian, Catalan, Portuguese, Romansh, and Spanish. Over the centuries, Romanian has also borrowed many words from its Slavonic neighbours, from German, Hungarian, Turkish, French and, more recently, from English.
Special features of Romanian
- The Romanian alphabet is based on the Latin alphabet, and has five additional letters (these are not diacriticals, but letters in their own right): ă, î, â, ş, and ţ. The Romanian alphabet is basically phonetic (with one exception: â - used inside the words - and î - used at the beginning or the end - both represent the same sound). The sounds denoted by letters are largely similar to Italian.
- Romanian is the only Romance language that has the definite article attached to the end of the noun (as with North Germanic languages!) instead of being a separate word in front of it: a man = un om, the man = omul.
- Unlike the other Romance languages, Romanian has retained a case system and has three genders: masculine, feminine and neuter, keeping the neuter gender from Latin (nouns of this gender use the masculine form for the singular and the feminine form for the plural).
- Romanian has the same four groups of verbs as Latin. There is no sequence of tenses nor strict rules regarding their use or word order.