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When speakers of different languages meet they often develop some contact language or pidgin containing elements of both languages. Surely speakers of Greek and Latin met in the antiquity at several places (e.g., sea ports or the border between Latin speaking Italy and the Greek speaking stretch of land around Naples) and probably there were some contact languages.

My question is: Are there any fragments of such contact languages attested?

Sir Cornflakes
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    Excellent question! It stands to reason that such a creole should have existed somewhere, to some extent. But the Greeks probably felt very superior and all about their language, and the Romans really didn't like non-standard language, so they probably resisted wider application of creoles, and we have little or no evidence left. – Cerberus Oct 21 '18 at 04:16
  • I can think of potential sources like grafitti, votive offerings, or maybe some lines in a comedy play. – Sir Cornflakes Oct 22 '18 at 10:30
  • Yes, exactly. It will be hard to find if you don't know what to look for, exactly, but I'm sure some people must have researched the subject? – Cerberus Oct 22 '18 at 16:42
  • Surely the Greeks would have just made them speak Greek... – Bryan Lockett Jan 30 '19 at 21:03
  • @Cerberus: those Greeks who "felt very superior" and those Romans who "really didn't like non-standard language" would surely not generally be the people who were actually trying to do everyday business with the foreigners at the ports. – Colin Fine Mar 03 '19 at 11:01
  • @ColinFine: Not the porters nor the stevedores! But the port officials may be. It's quite possible for some kind of calque to have existed in southern Italy, where both ethnic groups lived in the same city. But it probably never developed into anything that could be used officially and leave literary evidence...so graffiti and the like might be a good place to look, rather than port documents. – Cerberus Mar 03 '19 at 22:56
  • @Cerberus: absolutely. But however the sailors and porters managed to communicate, I doubt if many of them could write even graffiti. – Colin Fine Mar 03 '19 at 23:38
  • @ColinFine: Hmm why wouldn't they? And the people living together in the cities? – Cerberus Mar 04 '19 at 22:23
  • @Cerberus: maybe I'm wrong. This Wikipedia article says that "Until recently it was thought that the majority of people were illiterate in ancient times. However, recent work challenges this perception" – Colin Fine Mar 04 '19 at 23:12
  • @ColinFine: Ah, I misread your earlier comment. A question about literacy would be quite interesting! – Cerberus Mar 04 '19 at 23:25

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J.N.Adams discusses this in Bilingualism and the Latin language. According to the author, there are examples of imperfect Greek and Latin by second language speakers, but not evidence of a pidgin language.

Scott Brown
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