<p>I'm extremely interested in learning either ancient Greek or Latin. Do any of you have experience with either language? Which one is "better"? :-P I'd really be interested in one that had some national competitions and the like once I became fluent in them, since I don't have a chance at mathematics competitions xD</p>
<p>Neither one is offered at my high school, so that can't help me make my decision. It'd be entirely self-studied (unless I somehow participate in EPGY OHS, although not sure if they offer classical languages either.)</p>
<p>Yeah, the help with other languages is one of the main reasons I wanted to study Latin, since we have a mandatory 3 years of French or Spanish at my school.</p>
<p>Guess I’ll start looking for some good Latin resources online :)</p>
As a Classics major, I have extensive experience with both. </p>
<p>I personally find Greek to be much, much more interesting. The grammar is more complicated, and the literature is much more enjoyable (Herodotus, Aeschylus, Plato, the Bible, etc.). </p>
<p>BUT</p>
<p>Latin would be considerably easier to learn on your own, so it would be the language I would recommend. Wheelock’s grammar is arguably the best place to start.</p>
<p>As for the Latin/French/Spanish question, I’d go with Latin. I’ve only taken Latin and French (well I took a year of Spanish in 2nd grade, but I don’t remember any of that and I hated it) but every day I walk into my French class I wish I had gone for a fourth year of Latin. It is fun to go out with my sister and speak French together, it’s fun to get really high scores on the National French Exam, but I miss Latin.</p>
<p>Latin is awesome, and though I haven’t studied it I hear it’s harder. Both were once mandatory at my school, but Greek was eventually made optional and then quickly died out. Greek verbs have way more principal parts. Also, while I think Greek would help you a lot with knowing some higher-level English words (like say, aposiopesis, which is, by the way a completely and totally useless word. Try to find a situation where you can use it, just try.) Latin is going to help you more with learning other languages later. Unless the only modern language you want to know is today’s Greek, go with Latin.</p>
<p>Some of the oldest versions of the Old Testament and virtually all of the New Testament were written in Greek. Greek, not Latin, was the lingua franca of the eastern Mediterranean for over a thousand years.</p>
<p>mckyle, I decided to take Spanish (I also decided to take French for a couple of years in elementary school. I forget which ones). But this wasn’t a “class.” I went to a Montessori school, there were no classes. It was just an after school thing. Our teacher thought we were young enough for her to not tell us what many words mean and have us learn, like immersion, and we probably were, but we had been inculcated into speaking English and into certain methods of language learning (or at least I had), so we rejected a lot of these methods. She did, however, have delicious mint candies.</p>
<p>I know when I started taking French, all the stuff I had learned came back. I wonder how long it would take my Spanish to come back. . . .</p>
<p>But that sentence is so generic, mckyle. You could stick any old word in there and it would work.</p>