Vanessa
I have studied it for my linguistics tests at university. I have read Perceval from Chretien de troyes. It was one of the best literary experiences of my life alongside Nibelungenlied and Promessi Sposi.
In said test I had to do some work Expecially on French but also study rules of how Latin became a base for all European languages. Like "words with last vowel é were turned into i, è remained e unless preceded by a dittongue which..." and stuff. Complex but nice. Spanish, Portuguese, oc, oil, Provencal, Dalmatian (dead language since the last dalmatian speaker died one century ago) Romanian etc.
Not Italian since we have a test exclusively dedicated to Italian (every region is as complex as another nation since said regions were almost little states until 150 years ago and all of them had a little difference).
That was many years ago but when I was focused on those studies I felt I truly understood how some languages became what they are and some other become something different all from the same start mixed to a regional base.
And, since that year we worked on Chretien, French was the focus.
You would be surprised how much history can change our way of express ourselves today. I still remember one of my discussions with the assistant teacher when I said something about Romanian, which differently from other Roman languages had influences from Turkish, except for Valacchia, since Vlad Tepesh III (known today as Dracul) repelled their invasion fiercely, so population and language never mixed, by fact creating a different variety of Romanian in that region for centuries. All because of a win in a war campaign centuries before.
... So, back to our topic.
