Colloquia are books in Latin for teaching the Latin language as though it were alive and spoken. They are Latin books in the form of scripted conversations.

In the Renaissance, scholars became aware of an ancient student Latin textbook, given the rather unfortunate name of the Hermeneumata; (We have no idea what the Romans called it). This is a conversational manual for Greeks studying Latin (or Romans studying Greek).

The text that survives dates from the year 200 AD. This Latin and Greek textbook gives little daily conversations about familiar things, like waking up, dressing, going to school and so on.

This student textbook also included bilingual Latin fables, and stories from Roman and Greek mythology.

Scholars during the time of the great Latin revival deliberately set out to copy this methodology, and from the late 1400's, right through to the early 1900's, a large number of dialogues and student level readers were written.

They cover a wide range of ability levels. Some, like those of Comenius, Corderius and Erasmus were extremely famous and widely used in schoolrooms and universities for hundreds of years.

Reference Bibliography

Massebieau: Les Colloques Scolaires du Seizième Siècle et leurs auteurs (1480-1570)

Abelard: Dialogus inter philosophum, Judaeum et Christianum

Adler: A Practical Grammar of the Latin Language teaches Latin through micro dialogues. LEVEL: BEGINNER

Alexius Albanus Dialogus (2001)

Anon: Le guide du voyageur; ou, Dialogues en françois & en latin

Anon: Latin Dialogues, collected from the best Latin Writers

Anon: Colloques ou Dialogues Latin, English, German, French, Italian

Baarland: Dialogi XLII ... Item Augustini Reymarii dialogus de ludo chartarum Barlandi

Bhagavad-Gita, id est Thespesion melos, sive Almi Krishnae et Arjunae

Balboni and Neri: Colloquia Latino Sermone Conscripta (Colloquia with an Italian facing translation)

Capellanus: Do You Speak Latin? (Latin and German)

Castellio: Dialogorum Sacrorum

Comenius: Schola Ludus

Corderius: Colloquies (Hoole)

Corderius: Colloquies (Latin - German)

Corderius: Colloques (Latin - French)

Corvinus: Latina Idioma

Corvinus: Admodum utiles Dialogi Scholastici et Pueriles

Dolet: Dialogus de Imitatione Ciceroniana adversus Desiderium Erasmum Roterodamum

Deodatus: Speculum Veritatis, Sive Colloquium inter Hebraeum, & Georgium Deodatem

Donatus: Donatus Novus

D'Ooge: Colloquia Latina

Duncan: Praetextata Latine Loquendi Ratio

Erasmus: Colloquia Familiaria Nonnulla Selecta (Clarke)

Fabri: Dialogi physici: in qvibvs de motu terrae disputatur

Fontanus: Hortulus Puerorum

Galileo: Dialogus de systemate mundi

Grapheus: Latinissimae Colloquiorum Formulae Ex Terentii Comoediis Selectae

Haffner: Dialogus inter amatorem veritatis et discipulum Lullianae doctrinae

Hanthaler: Exercitationes Faciles de Numis Veterum

Heyden: Formulae Puerilium Colloquiorum

Hoole: Childrens talke, English and Latine, etc. Pueriles Confabulatiunculæ

Hutteni, Ulrich Dialogi Huttenici

Kerbeck: Colloquium inter quendam Calvinistam et rev. Patrem A. Kerbeck

Leech, John Four Colloquies (At end of A Booke of Grammar,, 1650) LEVEL: BEGINNER

Longueuil: Dialogus De Avibus et earum nominibus Graecis, Latinis & Germanicis

Massoch: A Practical Teacher of the Latin Language in Dialogues

Milton Valente: Ludus Primus ( A Latin reader with some colloquia) LEVEL: BEGINNER

Milton Valente: Ludus Secundus ( A Latin reader with some colloquia)

Milton Valente: Ludus Tertius ( A Latin reader with some colloquia)

Milton Valente: Ludus Quartus ( A Latin reader with some colloquia)

Mosellanus: Paedologia

Muys: Podalirius Redivivus, Sive Dialogus inter Podalirium & Philiatrum

Nicolaus: Dialogos

Parent: Dialogus inter Hippocratem, Paracelsum et Theomisonem

Patrick and Piazza: Colloquia Cottidiana LEVEL: BEGINNER

P.K. The Scholar's Instructor. A Latin Speaking Book. LEVEL: BEGINNER

Pontanus: Progymnasmata Latinitatis sive Dialogi

Pontanus: Colloquia Sacra

Pontanus Actius Dialogos

Popo: Colloquia

Rowbotham, John Lectiones Latinae LEVEL: INTERMEDIATE

Ruddimann: Matho; sive cosmotheoria puerilis, dialogus

Salazar: Ad Exercitia Linguae Latinae Dialogi Tres

Sauveur: Colloquia Caesariana

Savonarola: Dialogus Inter Spiritum et Animam

Schottenius: Colloquia Sive Confabulationes Tyronum Literatorum

Schwieder: Latine Loquor

Sergardi: Quinti Sectani dialogus contra criticas Philodemi animadversiones

Sewall: The Latin Speaker: Easy Dialogues

Stevenson: Early Scholastic Colloquies

Torrentinus: Collocutiones Duorum Puerorum

Vives: Linguae Latinae Exercitatio

Waschiczek: Dialogus Inter Clericum Et Militem

Wilby: How to Speak Latin