Italian (italiano, pronounced [itaˈljaːno] ⓘ, or lingua italiana, pronounced [ˈliŋɡwa itaˈljaːna]) is a Romance language of the Indo-European language family that evolved from the Colloquial Latin of the Roman Empire. [6] Italian is the least divergent language from Latin, together with Sardinian (meaning that Italian and Sardinian are the most conservative Romance languages).