page_title: Languages of Europe
section_title: Romance
hierarchical_section_title: Languages of Europe / Indo-European languages / Romance
caption_attribution_description: Aragonés: Arias d'Europa on son presents os pueblos que parlan luengas neolatinas. العربية: لغات رومنسية. Asturianu: Mapa de les llingües romances n'Europa nel sieglu XX.[23]. Български: Разпространението на романските езици в Европа. Català: Mapa de les llengües romàniques d'Europa. Cebuano: Mga sinultian nga Romansa, 20th c. Corsu: Le lingue rumanze in Europa. Čeština: Románské jazyky v Evropě ve 20. století. Deutsch: Die heutige Ausbreitung romanischer Sprachen in Europa. Die italienische Sprache und italienische Dialekte (12-22) sowie die anderen romanischen Sprachen in Süd- und Westeuropa. Dolnoserbski: Romaniske rěcy w Europje we 20. stolěśu. English: Romance languages in 20th century Europe. Esperanto: Latinidaj lingvoj en Eŭropo dum la 20-a jarcento. Español: Mapa de las lenguas románicas con su distribución actual en Europa. Mapa de las lenguas romances en Europa en el siglo XX.[46] [47]. Euskara: Erromantze hizkuntzen egungo hedapena Europan. Français&#160;: Carte linguistique de répartition des langues romanes en Europe au XXe siècle. Gaelg: Ny çhengaghyn Romanagh 'sy 20-oo eash. Interlingua: Mappa con le distribution del linguas romanic. Ido: Lokado di Romania, la teritorii ube Latinida lingui en Europa parolesas. Íslenska: Rómönsk tungumál í Evrópu á 20. öld. Italiano: La «Romania continua». 日本語: Romance languages, 20th century. Ladino: Las linguas romanses en Evropa. Македонски: Романски јазици. Nederlands: De Romaanse talen in Europa gedetailleerd. De Romaanse talen. Polski: Współczesny zasięg języków romańskich w Europie. Języki romańskie używane w Europie. Piemontèis: Le lenghe romanze an Euròpa. Português: Línguas românicas na Europa do século XX. Română: Limbi latine în Europa secolului XX. Sardu: Su sardu (num. 26) in sa carta de sas limbas romanzas. Српски / srpski: Lingvistička mapa romanojezične Evrope 20. stoleća Sicilianu: Lucalizzazzioni dî lingui rumanzi nta l'Europa. Vèneto: mapa de łe łengue romanse in Eoropa. West-Vlams: Romaansche toaln 'n dag va vandoage. 中文: 罗曼语族在欧洲的分布图.
context_page_description: Most languages of Europe belong to the Indo-European language family.
  Out of a total European population of 744 million as of 2018, some 94% are native speakers of an Indo-European language; within Indo-European, the three largest phyla are Romance, Slavic, and Germanic with more than 200 million speakers each, between them accounting for close to 90% of Europeans. Smaller phyla of Indo-European found in Europe include Hellenic, Baltic, Albanian, Indo-Aryan, and Celtic.
  Of the approximately 45 million Europeans speaking non-Indo-European languages, most speak languages within either the Uralic or Turkic families. Still smaller groups account for less than 1% of the European population between them. Immigration has added sizeable communities of speakers of African and Asian languages, amounting to about 4% of the population, with Arabic being the most widely spoken of them.
  Five languages have more than 50 million native speakers in Europe: French, Italian, German, English, and Russian. While Russian has the largest number of native speakers, English has the largest number of speakers in total, including some 200 million speakers of English as a second or foreign language.
context_section_description: Roughly 215 million Europeans (primarily in Western and Southern Europe) are native speakers of Romance languages, the largest groups including
  French (c. 72 million),
  Italian (c. 65 million),
  Spanish (c. 40 million), 
  Romanian (c. 24 million),
  Portuguese (c. 10 million),
  Catalan (c. 9 million),
  Sicilian (c. 5 million, also subsumed under Italian), 
  Venetian language (c. 4 million),
  Galician (c. 2 million),
  Sardinian (c. 1 million),
  Occitan (c. 500,000), besides numerous smaller communities.
  The Romance languages are descended from varieties of Vulgar Latin spoken in the various parts of the Roman Empire in Late Antiquity. Latin was itself part of the (otherwise extinct) Italic branch of Indo-European.
  Romance languages are divided phylogenetically into Italo-Western, Eastern Romance (including Romanian) and Sardinian. The Romance-speaking area of Europe is occasionally referred to as Latin Europe.
  We can further break down Italo-Western into the Italo-Dalmatian languages (sometimes grouped with Eastern Romance), including the Tuscan-derived Italian and numerous local Romance lects in Italy as well as Dalmatian, and the Western Romance languages. The Western Romance languages in turn separate into the Gallo-Romance languages, including French and its varieties (Langues d'oïl), the Rhaeto-Romance languages and the Gallo-Italic languages; the Occitano-Romance languages, grouped with either Gallo-Romance or East Iberian, including Occitan, Catalan and Aragonese; and finally the West Iberian languages (Spanish-Portuguese), including the Astur-Leonese languages, Galician-Portuguese, and Castilian.
caption: Romance languages, 20th century.
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