Ancient Italy has a deep lit. history.............

100 BC-150 AD — Classical Latin. Guys like Cicero, Caesar, Vergil, and Tacitus write masterpieces of Latin literature. Also, Ovid writes a book on how to pick up women at the gladiator shows. The literary language becomes fixed and gradually loses touch with the ever- changing popular language known today as Vulgar Latin.

200-550 — Late Latin. Some varieties of literature adhere closely to the classical standard, others are less polished or deliberately closer to the popular speech (e.g., St. Jerome's translation of the Bible into Latin—the Vulgate). The western half of the empire is falling to pieces, but the Greek-speaking east, which is still in good shape, keeps using Latin in official contexts until the end of this period.

600-750 — Latin has become a dead language. Few people in the west outside of monasteries can read. The spoken languages of Italy, France and Spain change rapidly. Monks, particularly in Ireland, read and write classical Latin and preserve ancient texts as well as church documents. The Roman Catholic church continues to use Late Latin in the liturgy, though they eventually decide to deliver homilies in the local popular language. The Byzantines still call themselves Romans but have given up on the Latin language.