That the real genesis of the Latin and doubtless also of the other Italian languages was anterior to this period, and that even at its commencement the Latin language was substantially an accomplished fact, is evident from the fragments of the Twelve Tables, which, however, have been largely modernized by their semi-oral tradition.  They contain doubtless a number of antiquated words and harsh combinations, particularly in consequence of omitting the indefinite subject; but their meaning by no means presents, like that of the Arval chant, any real difficulty, and they exhibit far more agreement with the language of Cato than with that of the ancient litanies.  If the Romans at the beginning of the seventh century had difficulty in understanding documents of the fifth, the difficulty doubtless proceeded merely from the fact that there existed at that time in Rome no real, least of all any documentary, research.

Technical Style

On the other hand it must have been at this period, when the indication and redaction of law began, that the Roman technical style first established itself—­a style which at least in its developed shape is nowise inferior to the modern legal phraseology of England in stereotyped formulae and turns of expression, endless enumeration of particulars, and long-winded periods; and which commends itself to the initiated by its clearness and precision, while the layman who does not understand it listens, according to his character and humour, with reverence, impatience, or chagrin.

Philology

Moreover at this epoch began the treatment of the native languages after a rational method.  About its commencement the Sabellian as well as the Latin idiom threatened, as we saw,(25) to become barbarous, and the abrasion of endings and the corruption of the vowels and more delicate consonants spread on all hands, just as was the case with the Romanic languages in the fifth and sixth centuries of the Christian era.  But a reaction set in:  the sounds which had coalesced in Oscan, -d and -r, and the sounds which had coalesced in Latin, -g and -k, were again separated, and each was provided with its proper sign; -o and -u, for which from the first the Oscan alphabet had lacked separate signs, and which had been in Latin originally separate but threatened to coalesce, again became distinct, and in Oscan even the -i was resolved into two signs different in sound and in writing; lastly, the writing again came to follow more closely the pronunciation—­the -s for instance among the Romans being in many cases replaced by -r.  Chronological indications point to the fifth century as the period of this reaction; the Latin -g for instance was not yet in existence about 300 but was so probably about 500; the first of the Papirian clan, who called himself Papirius instead of Papisius, was the consul of 418; the introduction of that -r instead of -s is attributed to Appius Claudius, censor in 442.  Beyond doubt the re-introduction of a more delicate