Periodic Reporting for period 1 - GISARC (Greek in Sicily after the Roman Conquest)
Berichtszeitraum: 2022-10-01 bis 2024-09-30
The project investigated the impact of Roman domination on the Greek language in Sicily through the analysis of the epigraphic texts and the application of a sociolinguistic perspective. When Sicily fell under Roman control around the third century BCE, Greek was the hegemonic language in the region; under Roman domination, Latin gradually infiltrated Sicily and acquired prestige as the language of administration and official contexts, as well as becoming widely used in private contexts as an increasing number of Latin speakers settled in the island. The questions of the survival of Greek in this area under Roman domination and of its interaction with Latin has been long debated: however, a comprehensive examination of the full epigraphic record, taking into account the historical context and conducted in the light of modern sociolinguistic theory, had not been previously attempted. The project considered the full corpus of epigraphic texts from Sicily dating between ca. 250 BCE and ca. 400 CE and offered an innovative interdisciplinary approach, combining linguistic analysis and investigation of historical and archaeological data within the theoretical frameworks of sociolinguistics. The project specifically aimed to: assess language choice and linguistic variation in different typologies of text; describe the effects of contact between Greek and Latin in the epigraphic texts; assess the impact of Roman domination on epigraphic culture; and compare data from different areas of Sicily and combine linguistic evidence with historical and archaeological data. The project was intended to fill a major gap in the scholarship of both Roman Sicily and of ancient bilingualism in general, and to function as a pilot study in its innovative comprehensive and multidisciplinary approach.
The project analysed over 2000 epigraphic texts dating between ca. 250 BCE and ca. 400 CE in relation to language contact, multilingualism, language choice and prestige, and epigraphic culture. On the basis of this analysis, patterns of language choice have been identified in relation to different contexts (typologies of text) as well as dynamics of language contact between Greek and Latin with regard to individual areas. An innovative open access, interactive and interoperable digital resource has been under development for the dissemination of the results of this analysis. As part of the project, an international workshop entitled “Investigating ancient multilingualism in an epigraphic corpus: the case of Roman West. Methodology, perspectives and digital tools", was held at Ca’ Foscari on 12th-13th October 2023, with the aim of promoting discussion and networking among linguists, historians, epigraphists and digital epigraphists on the topics of language contact in epigraphic corpora and digital corpora as research tools.
The project has been innovative in its comprehensive and multidisciplinary approach. It has been the first study on language contact in Roman Sicily to have carried out a systematic analysis of the full corpus of epigraphic texts and to have approached multilingualism in this epigraphic corpus in its complexity, considering matters such as epigraphic culture alongside linguistic phenomena. The development of an interactive digital tool that would make available the results of this analysis and promote a comprehensive appreciation of the texts has been ambitious and innovative. This tool would enable searches of both language contact features and features related to contact between epigraphic cultures, as well as offering a contextualisation of the data. The workshop “Investigating ancient multilingualism in an epigraphic corpus: the case of Roman West. Methodology, perspectives and digital tools", held at Ca’ Foscari on 12th-13th October 2023 and attended by around 70 people (in-presence and online), made a significant contribution to the promotion of a multidisciplinary approach within the community of researchers working on multilingual epigraphic corpora by bringing together linguists, epigraphists and historians to discuss issues of methodology. The workshop also succeded in delivering a roundtable discussion among researchers working on the development of digital epigraphic corpora, who addressed the potential of these new tools and issues of interoperability, as well as aims and objectives in the short and in the longer term. Dissemination of the results of the project has been severely impacted by the early termination of the Grant Agreement.