I read with interest a recent Talking Point on the fate which has befallen our national language and I remembered an old Latin saying: Nec Caesar super grammaticos.

This is a small nation with its own national language which stands proudly among the official languages of the EU. It survived all the powers that were whose remnants, besides in history books, we can still find in some words which are naturalised in our parlance.

And now, at the whims of the Council for the Maltese Language we have been told that not abiding by its rules, as if adding insult to injury, one could also be penalised.

As for me, I still continue to follow the orthography of Guzé Aquilina, the Oxford scholar who made us proud of this unique national heritage.