The Italic Dialects

Published in 1897, this two-volume work by Robert Seymour Conway (1864-1933), classical scholar and comparative philologist, later Hulme Professor of Latin at the University of Manchester, aims to shed light on the origins of the Latin language and Roman institutions by careful examination of the dialects and customs of Rome's neighbours. The second volume provides an outline of the grammar of the Italic dialects, the surviving remains of which were collected in the first volume. There are six dialect alphabets given, followed by a sketch of their accidence and syntax. The first appendix discusses the Oscan measures of the mensa ponderaria at Pompeii; a second gives alien, doubtful or spurious inscriptions. The bulk of the volume consists of indexes of geographical and personal names, a glossary of the dialect words, and an index of Latin words used in the work.