I had to have a quiet chuckle at the education secretary’s plans to spend £4m on teaching Latin to the sons and daughters of the hoi polloi (Cartoon, 1 August). My first thought was, why not ancient Greek? Then I wondered how the “fortunate” 40 state schools would be selected. And then – simply, why? Is there a pent-up demand by secondary school students to learn Latin while more useful modern languages are struggling to get enough takers to fill a class?
I have the dubious distinction of having passed O-grade Latin back in the mid-1960s while I was at a local secondary school in Edinburgh. It could be an entertaining way to get “the tawse” by conjugating the Latin verb for “to love” as “Amo, amas, amat, amamus, adaddymus and ababymus”, but otherwise it was a waste of time. I had wanted to learn German.
I have been required, during my undistinguished civil service career, to give evidence at various courts and tribunals, and to listen to smug, private school legal types wearing periwigs and batman gowns, regularly peppering their showman banter with badly accented bits of Latin such as “sine die” and “ipso facto”. Latin is a dead language, requiescat in pace.
Bob Ross
Mill Hill, London
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