• the Latin familia must be translated as "household" rather than as "family", since neither classical Greek or Latin had a word corresponding to modern-day family?
• the species name of South Africa's Eastern Cape Blue Cycad (pictured), horridus, is Latin for 'sticking out' or 'prickly', after the plant's stiff, spiny leaflets?
• it took a musicologist 12 years to reconstruct the missing portions of the only copy of English Renaissance composer Martin Peerson's Latin motets so they could be published and recorded?
• the Latin poem Carmen Priami features an artificially archaic language as a reaction to the Hellenizing trend in Latin poetry led by Ennius?
• the Classical Academy Charter School of Clifton, a chartered middle school that requires students to learn three years of Latin and to study Literary classics, has been recognized as a Blue Ribbon School?
• the name of the Azeri settlement Ramana, with natural gas vents where Zoroastrians still hold fire rites, might, according to conjecture, be derived from Roma, the Latin word for Rome?
• the main languages of Renaissance in Poland were Polish and Latin, and that the leading Polish poet of that period, Jan Kochanowski, is regarded as a great Slavic poet?
• the book Commentarii de Bello Civili, written by Julius Caesar, is staple reading among students of Latin?
• in the Latin poem De vetula, its supposed author Ovid renounces adultery?
• despite plagiarizing a Chinese-French-Latin dictionary ordered by Napoleon, Chrétien-Louis-Joseph de Guignes went on to become a member of the French Academy of Sciences?
• Matthias Bernegger in 1635 translated Galileo Galilei's Dialogo from Italian into Latin?
• Joseph Breitenbeck was sued by a parish church for implementing the Vatican II reform of changing the language of the Mass from Latin to English?
• Jordan's Municipality of Salt derives its name from the Latin saltus meaning valley of trees as there is much greenery in the area?
• Lithuania's name was recorded in chronicles by its Latinized Slavic name form Litua, for the first time in 1009?
• Araneagryllus is named from a combination of the Latin aranea meaning "spider" and gryllus meaning "cricket"?
• Quốc ngữ, the Vietnamese alphabet in general use today, was established by the 1651 trilingual Latin-Portuguese-Vietnamese dictionary Dictionarium Annamiticum Lusitanum et Latinum?
• ignorantia juris non excusat is Latin for the legal doctrine, "ignorance of the law is no excuse"?
• Johann Sebastian Bach wrote around 200 cantatas in German but only one, Gloria in excelsis Deo, BWV 191, in Latin?

Facts on topics related to Latin

Roman Empire

• archaeological digs have greatly expanded knowledge of the history of Swindon, uncovering artefacts from separate Roman, Bronze and Iron Age settlements in the area?
• sandstone blocks used in the construction of St John's Church, Crosscanonby, Cumbria, England, might originate from a former Roman building?
• Argentoratum was an important military Roman outpost on the Rhine, and was rebuilt six times?
• Byzantium under the Komnenoi was the Medieval continuation of the Roman Empire, and played a key role in the history of the Crusades in the Holy Land?
• Gaius Pontius, the Samnite general and victor at the Battle of the Caudine Forks, is believed to be an ancestor of the Roman governor of Judea Pontius Pilate?
• Gessius Florus became the Roman procurator of Judea due to his wife's friendship with Emperor Nero's wife Poppaea?
• Lucceius Albinus had just been appointed Roman procurator and was still on his way to take office in Judea when the High Priest of Israel took advantage of the lack of imperial oversight to assemble a Sanhedrin and had James, the brother of Jesus stoned without Roman authorization?
• Moduin, a poet of the Carolingian Renaissance, characterises his era as a rebirth of "Golden Rome"?
• Portlethen Moss is an acidic bog that played a role in stopping the Roman advance in Scotland and whose traversal was used in the Bishops' Wars?
• a word square found in Mamucium (pictured), a Roman fort in Manchester, may be one of the earliest examples of Christianity in Britain?

Ancient Rome

• ancient Roman brides sat in the lap of Mutunus Tutunus before marriage?
• neoclassical Italian sculptor Giuseppe Ceracchi portrayed George Washington with a Roman haircut and a toga?
• Tarquin the Proud modified the Roman festival of Compitalia to include the sacrifice of children's heads, but upon his expulsion, Brutus substituted heads of garlic and poppies instead?
• wine from the Greek island of Chios, prized in both classical Greece and ancient Rome, was according to mythology the first red wine?
• Cividade de Terroso (map pictured) was one of the main fortified cities of the Castro culture, a stone civilization in Iberia, eventually destroyed by the Romans?
• Eddie Hasha's (pictured) death led to board track racing being compared to Roman gladiators, contributing to the sport's demise?
• Halotus was an Ancient Roman royal servant who, despite being a prime suspect in the poisoning of Claudius in 54 AD, was granted royal stewardship by Galba in 68 AD, even when the public was calling for his death?
• Jewish pirates from Joppa raided traders between Rome and Alexandria, interrupting Rome's grain supply during the First Jewish–Roman War?
• Mavia was an Arab queen who in 378 AD personally led her troops out of southern Syria in revolt against Roman rule?
• Monte Testaccio (pictured) in Rome is an artificial hill, 35 m (115 ft) high and 1 km (3,300 ft) in circumference, consisting entirely of the fragments of 53 million ancient Roman amphorae?

Roman Republic

• Gaius Iunius Bubulcus Brutus, a three-time Roman consul in the 4th century BCE, was the first plebeian to build a temple in the Roman Republic?
• Lucius Volumnius Flamma Violens (The Raging Flame) was the first plebeian consul of the Roman Republic?
• the Conflict of the Orders which supposedly occurred in the ancient Roman Republic may not have actually happened?
• the Sicilian revolt caused so many slaves to leave mainland Rome that the Vestal Virgins prayed for the desertion to stop?
• the work of Cornificia, a Roman poet of the first century BC, was read for centuries, but has since been lost entirely?

Medieval Latin

• the Anglo-Norman Latin text De obsessione Dunelmi is the first-known history of an English earldom?
• the earliest European term for "cannon" was the Medieval Latin word "bombardum", and that "cannon" itself came from the Latin word canna, meaning a tube?
• the medieval French monk Reginald of Canterbury wrote a long Latin epic poem on Malchus, a Syrian saint whose life was originally recorded by Saint Jerome?
• the medieval poet Frithegod is best known for his Breviloquium Vitae Wilfridi, a Latin poem on the life of St Wilfrid that's been called "one of the most difficult Latin poems written in pre-conquest England"?

Roman numerals

• U.S. judge Charles Crookham held a mock funeral for Roman numerals when they were retired from use in state pleadings?

Latin language

• Emil Schreiner, whose 1871 Latin grammar book out-competed that of Johan Peter Weisse, later moved to appoint Weisse as a professor?
• in 1887, Marius Nygaard co-published a Latin-Norwegian dictionary which is still in use?
• the specific epithet of the mushroom species Crepidotus versutus is derived from the Latin word meaning "clever"?
• the Libellus de Medicinalibus Indorum Herbis, a book of Aztec herbal remedies in Latin, was returned to Mexico by Pope John Paul II after more than four centuries of changing hands in Europe?