So Latin spread pretty well across Europe, being the basis of almost every language there, but how come it didn’t take as strong a hold in the Middle East? It’s not as if the Romans were never there, and they lingered there far longer than they did in Europe. Was it just a matter of a stronger preexisting culture, or did the Arabs have something to do with it? What happened here?
Lots of great comments in here (I’ve really enjoyed it all, so great question!)
If you decide to dig in a little deeper, there’s a great podcast called The History of English Podcast by Kevin Stroud.
While it’s the history of English, since you can’t separate English from Latin (plus the other PIE languages) nor from history itself, he ends up covering a lot of general history and languages.
The History of English Podcast