Latin and Persian

Latin carries the full weight of classical antiquity: its literature, law, philosophy, and rhetoric formed the intellectual backbone of European culture for more than a millennium, and reading it in the original remains one of the most demanding and rewarding ways to engage with that inheritance. Persian, meanwhile, is one of the great classical and modern literary languages of the world, with a poetic tradition of extraordinary richness and a contemporary significance across Iran, Afghanistan, and Central Asia that makes it one of the more strategically important languages a student can study.

At the University of St Andrews, this four-year full-time programme develops your expertise in both languages and the civilisations they express. In Latin, you will read original texts in prose and verse, working from careful linguistic analysis to broader literary and cultural interpretation. You will develop the capacity to handle complex arguments and to understand how classical texts have shaped and continue to inform Western thought.

In Persian, you will build both linguistic proficiency and deep engagement with the literary and cultural traditions of the Persian-speaking world, from medieval poetry to modern prose. The programme includes a year abroad, giving you the opportunity to deepen your engagement with Persian language and culture through immersive experience.

The combination of classical and modern languages is genuinely unusual and produces graduates with distinctive capabilities. The skills developed across the two disciplines, close reading, cultural analysis, linguistic precision, and comfort with different ways of organising thought and knowledge, are transferable across a wide range of careers.

Graduates pursue paths in academia, translation, diplomacy, the civil service, journalism, international organisations, law, and publishing. Postgraduate routes in classics, Middle Eastern studies, modern languages, and related fields are natural progressions for those who wish to continue their studies.