Roman

Roman town (1990 pop. 78,749), NE Romania, in Moldavia, at the confluence of the Prut and Siretul rivers. Sugar refining and the manufacture of building materials are the chief industries. The town was founded in the late 14th cent. by the ruling prince of Moldavia.

ROMAN.
1. Both with and without an initial capital: relating to the upright style of typeface that dominates texts in English (of which this volume is an example) and many other languages, and that derives from the LETTER shapes used in ancient Rome; Roman type or lettering: a text printed in Times Roman; a mixture of Roman and Gothic; substituting italic for roman.

2. The Roman ALPHABET: Malay can be written in both Roman and Arabic. When the characters of another WRITING system are transliterated into Roman, they are said to be Romanized or, more commonly, romanized. Systems of romanization include Wade–Giles and Pinyin (‘classifying sound’) for Chinese and Hepburn and romaji (‘Roman letters’) for Japanese. See CHINA, JAPAN, TRANSLITERATION.

Roman pert. to (native or inhabitant of) ancient Rome XIII; pert. to (adherent of) the Roman Catholic Church XVI; (typogr.) based on the characteristic form of the ancient Roman inscriptions. ME. Romein, -ain — (O)F. Romain — L. Rōmānus, f. Rōma Rome; later assim. in sp. to L.; preceded by OE. Romane, -an sb. pl.; see -AN.
So R. Catholic XVII. Based on the official L. title of the Roman Church, Ecclesia Romana Catholica ęt Apostolica, ‘Roman Catholic and Apostolic Church’.