Latin as Lingua Franca in the Austrian Empire?

Could Latin have been introduced as lingua franca & language of all round government albeit slowly in Austria circa 1850. Would Latin be neutral enough for the various communities and old & noble enough for the aristocrats to be accepted? Or is it far too late to go back to latin? (I seem to recall it still being the language of administration in Hungary at least up until the reign of Joseph II) Thanks!!
 
By the 1850's, Latin was all but phased out of all diplomatic circles in favor of regional languages. Its use as the language of administration throughout much of Europe before the 1700's was mostly due to the influence of the Roman Catholic Church during that time. In the 1850's, I feel it is too late to revive Latin.
 
Could Latin have been introduced as lingua franca & language of all round government albeit slowly in Austria circa 1850. Would Latin be neutral enough for the various communities and old & noble enough for the aristocrats to be accepted? Or is it far too late to go back to latin? (I seem to recall it still being the language of administration in Hungary at least up until the reign of Joseph II) Thanks!!

Actually, I think it could. It's one (easy) way around the whole mess of languages problem. Hungarians don't want German, Croats don't want Hungarian, everyone already is at least vaguely familiar with Latin anyway (due to the Mass being Latin, and everyone but the Serbs being RC).

What you probably need is for the Hungarians to get taken down a peg, and the minor nationalities to be recognized for their loyalty. As a start.
 

Zlorfik

Banned
Actually, I think it could. It's one (easy) way around the whole mess of languages problem. Hungarians don't want German, Croats don't want Hungarian, everyone already is at least vaguely familiar with Latin anyway (due to the Mass being Latin, and everyone but the Serbs being RC).

What you probably need is for the Hungarians to get taken down a peg, and the minor nationalities to be recognized for their loyalty. As a start.
I think French would be a better bet then
To be fair, that is (a form of) Latin
 
I think French would be a better bet then
To be fair, that is (a form of) Latin
French is a language of a foreign country and of a old enemy, German would be more accepted even by minorities, BTW French is one of the Romance language most distant from Latin.
 
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Zlorfik

Banned
if we assume, like the guy I was quoting did, that the ethnic groups reject german and each others' languages as our POD, then french is a more likely choice than latin.
 
The Romanians aren't RC either.

In addition, a large minority of Hungarians are Protestant.

French is a language of a foreign country and of a old enemy, German would be more accepted even by minorities, BTW French is one of the Romance language most distant from Latin.

French was the major diplomatic language of the time period. It wasn't perceived as strictly the language of France.
 
Latin was one of the main administrative languages of the Austrian Empire up to about 1850, alongside German. IIRC, it was phased out in Croatia after 1848, for example. I am under the impression that it was more a matter of keeping it in place than introducing it, at least east of Vienna.
 
In addition, a large minority of Hungarians are Protestant.



French was the major diplomatic language of the time period. It wasn't perceived as strictly the language of France.
Of course, but this trend was changing, there are no incentives for poor people to learn French in Austria if you don´t want to go to France, Switzerland or Belgium.

I think that Austria could survive as multi-ethnic state even without a national special language, afterall Switzerland doesn´t have one.
 
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