Eastern Lombard language
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 |
This article or section is in need of attention from an expert on the subject. WikiProject Linguistics or the Linguistics Portal may be able to help recruit one. |
 |
This article may require cleanup to meet Wikipedia's quality standards. Please improve this article if you can. (June 2007) |
 |
This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding reliable references. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (May 2007) |
| Eastern Lombard | ||
|---|---|---|
| Spoken in: | Italy | |
| Total speakers: | ~1,500,000 | |
| Language family: | Indo-European Italic Romance Italo-Western Western Gallo-Iberian Gallo-Romance Gallo-Italic Lombard Eastern Lombard |
|
| Language codes | ||
| ISO 639-1: | none | |
| ISO 639-2: | roa | |
| ISO 639-3: | lmo – Lombard language | |
| Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. | ||
Eastern Lombard is a group of related varieties, spoken in the eastern side of Lombardy, mainly in the provinces of Bergamo, Brescia and Mantua, in the area around Crema and in a part of Trentino.
In Italian-speaking contexts, Eastern Lombard is often generically called a "dialect". This is often incorrectly understood as to mean a dialect of Italian, which actually is not the case. Eastern Lombard and Italian are different languages and are not mutually intelligible.
As per today, Eastern Lombard does not have any official status either in Lombardy or anywhere else: the only official language in Lombardy is Italian.
Contents |
[edit] Classification
Eastern Lombard is a Romance language and belongs to the Gallo-Italic branch. Its position on the language family put in evidence that it is genetically closer to Occitan, Catalan, French, etc. than to Italian.
[edit] Geographic distribution
Eastern Lombard is primarily spoken in the east side of Lombardy (Northern Italy), in the territories of the provinces of Bergamo and Brescia, in the northern side of the province of Mantua and in the area around Crema. The varieties spoken in these regions are generally mutually intelligible for speakers of neighbouring areas but this is not always true for distant peripheric areas. For instance, an inhabitant of the alpine valleys of Bergamo can be hardly understood by a peasant of the plains of Mantua. Differences include either lexical, grammatical and phonetic aspects.
[edit] Phonology
The following notes are essentially based on the variety of Eastern Lombard spoken in Brescia. The basic principle are generally valid also for the other varieties but local discrepancies can be found.
Eastern Lombard has 9 vowels and 20 consonants.
[edit] Consonants
| bilabial | labio- dental |
dental | alveolar | post- alveolar |
palatal | velar | labio- velar |
|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| plosive | p b | t d | k g | |||||
| nasal | m | n | ɲ | |||||
| trill | r | |||||||
| fricative | f v | s z | (ʃ) | |||||
| affricate | ʧ ʤ | |||||||
| approximant | j | w | ||||||
| lateral approximant | l | ʎ |
• The voiced consonants /b/, /d/, /g/, /v/, /z/, /ʤ/ never occur at the end of a word. This phenomenon, common to other languages (German, Dutch, Russian), is called final devoicing.
• The phoneme /ʧ/ is pronounced [j] before consonant. This never occurs inside a word as the segment /ʧ/+consonant doesn't exist in Eastern Lombard. Conversely, it occurs when /ʧ/ is in a final position in a word preceding another word beginning with a consonant. For example:
i è nacc vià - [iɛnajˈvja] = they have gone away
• The approximants /j/ and /w/ are distinct phonemes from the vocalic sounds /i/, /u/. This can be seen in the following examples:
/kwat/=how much
/kuˈat/=brooded
/pjat/=flat
/piˈat/=bitten
• Locally, the sound [s] is replaced by the sound [h]. This mainly happens in the prealpine valleys of the provinces of Bergamo and Brescia, thus Brescia is pronounced [ˈbrɛhɔ] instead of [ˈbrɛsɔ]1.
• The phoneme /ʃ/ is used uniquely for loanwords, often coming from Italian. For example:
scià /ʃiˈa/ = to ski (from the Italian 'sciare')
Notes:
- 1. Actually, even in areas where this phenomenon is the rule, there are some interesting exceptions to take in account.
- Words like grasie (eng. thanks) are never pronounced [ˈgrahje]. At present, indeed, the most common pronunciation is [ˈgrasje] but a more genuine outcome (and often preferred by aged people) would be [ˈgrahʧe].
- Other examples for this feature:
- licensià (to dismiss, to fire) -> [liʧenˈsja] / [lehenˈʧa]
- cristià (christian) -> [crisˈtja] / [crihˈʧa]
- pasiù (passion) -> [paˈsju] / [pahˈʧu]
[edit] Assimilation
Regressive assimilation at word boundary is common in Eastern Lombard. Assimilation can be complete or partial.
Complete assimilations occurs when two occlusive sounds fall in contact. In this case the first occlusive is completely absorbed by the second and the resulting sound has all the features of the second consonant but remarkably lengthened. For example:
el ga fat pàla [ɛlgafaˈpːalɔ]
l'è tròp calt [ˌlɛtrɔˈkːalt]
el gat bianc [ɛlgaˈbːjaŋk]
The same phenomenon occurs when an occlusive consonant precedes a nasal or a liquid consonant. For example:
en gat négher [ɛŋgaˈnːegɛr]
l'è tròp mis [ˌlɛtrɔˈmːis]
so ché strac mórt [soˌkestraˈmːort]
Complete assimilation can also occur when an occlusive precedes a fricative. For example:
l'è nit vért [ˌlɛniˈvːert]
When a sequence nasal-occlusive falls in contact with another occlusive or a fricative, the first occlusive is completely elided and the nasal undergoes to a partial assimilation. In this case no lengthening occurs. For example:
el ga 'l sanc blö [ɛlˌgalsamˈblø]
l'è lonc fés [ˌlɛloɱˈfes]
But when an occlusive precedes a [z], assimilation involves both consonants and the result is an affricate sound:
l'è nit zó ècc [lɛˌniʣːoˈɛʧ]
l'è tròp zalt [ˌlɛtrɔˈʣːalt]
The phoneme /n/ can undergo assimilation in accord with the articulation point of the following consonant. Thus, the /n/ in /-nk-/ and /-ng-/ is a velar [ŋ], the /n/ in /-nv-/ or /-nf-/ is a labiodental [ɱ]. The phoneme /n/ never occurs before p and b, where /m/ is used instead.
Assimilation takes place also when the two sounds occur in contiguous position but pertain to different words, i.e.:
en ca [ɛŋˈka] - (a dog)
vàghen fò [ˌvageɱˈfɔ] - (hurry up)
l'an pasàt [ˌlampaˈsat] - (the last year)
[edit] Vowels
Eastern Lombard has 9 vocalic sounds:
| IPA | Description | Example | Italian | English |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| i | Close front unrounded vowel | sic /sik/ | cinque | five |
| e | Close-mid front unrounded vowel | sét /set/ | sete | thirst |
| ɛ | Open-mid front unrounded vowel | sèc /sɛk/ | secco | arid |
| a | Open front unrounded vowel | sac /sak/ | sacco | sack |
| o | Close-mid back rounded vowel | ciót /tʃot/ | chiodo | nail |
| ɔ | Open-mid back rounded vowel | sòc /sɔk/ | ceppo | stump |
| ø | Close-mid front rounded vowel | söt /søt/ | asciutto | dry |
| y | Close front rounded vowel | mür /myr/ | muro | wall |
| u | Close back rounded vowel | mur /mur/ | gelso | mulberry |
Only three vocalic phonemes are allowed for the final syllables when unstressed:
the phoneme /a/ uniquely for open syllables.
the phonemes /o/ and /e/ both for open and closed syllables.
Other vocalic sounds in final syllables can be found in loanwords.
The final sound of the word caàj (horses) is actually the approximant consonant /j/.
Locally, the phoneme /a/ is pronounced [ɔ] when it appears as last sound of the word in an unstressed syllable (actually slightly closer than the phonemic /ɔ/). For example: [ˈlynɔ] (moon),
[sɛtɛˈmanɔ] (week).
[edit] Unstressed vowel system reduction and local variability
The vowel system for the unstressed vowels is reduced if compared to the stressed vowels one.
In the urban Brescian variety for example [ɔ] and [o] no longer contrasts. This means that for the word robà (to steal) both pronunciations [roˈba] or [rɔˈba] are allowed and almost no difference is noticed by speakers. In addition, a further variant [ruˈba] is also possible. In this case, a difference is noticed by speakers but it is considered as a local variant and intelligibility is absolutely not compromised.
Again, the sound [u] replaces the sounds [o/ɔ] when the stressed vowel is /i/ or /u/, see the section on vowel harmonization described below.
The sounds [e] and [ɛ] also no longer contrast in unstressed syllables, therefore the word vedèl (calf) can be pronounced [veˈdɛl] or [vɛˈdɛl] indifferently. In this case also, [e/ɛ] is replaced by [i] in case of vowel harmonization. In other environments the interchange between [e/ɛ] and [i] is not accepted at the same degree of [o/ɔ] and [u]: an hypothetical variant [viˈdɛl] would be felt as a disagreeable pronunciation even if not completely contrastive (there are no mimimal pairs).
The contrast between the sounds [y] and [ø] is also eliminated and [y] replaces [ø] in case of vowel harmonization.
In conclusion, it is possible to say that only five contrastive vowel qualities are found in unstressed syllables:
[o/ɔ,(u)], [ø,(y)], [a], [e/ɛ], [i]
(but with the [i] not completely separated from [e/ɛ])
Some examples:
molà [moˈla] (to let go, to release)
mölà [møˈla] (to grind)
malàt [maˈlat] (sick)
pelàt [peˈlat] (bald)
milà [miˈla] (Milan)
The situation for other Eastern Lombard varieties however can be different, in fact the rules of the unstressed vowel system varies according to the area.
In Franciacorta for example (province of Brescia) the sound [o] and [ø] are regularly replaced by [u] and [y] in pretonic position.
mulà (Franciacortan) instead of molà (Brescian)
Ruàt (Rovato, nameplace) instead of Roàt
Üspedalèt (Ospitaletto, nameplace) instead of Öspedalèt
Since in unstressed position these vocalic sounds are not contrastive, these local variants do not compromise reciprocal intelligibility.
[edit] Vowel harmonization
Eastern Lombard shows a regressive harmonization process involving the vocal height feature. When the stress falls on a closed vowel (/i/ or /u/) the preceding vowels shifts their height feature to the closest grade.
The vowel /a/ is not affected by this process and acts as opaque vowel blocking the harmonization process.
This phenomenon affects all the words independently from the function the word covers. So we have harmonization either in nouns, adjectives, verbs end so on.
As the diminutive and augmentative are formed with the suffix -ì and -ù (feminine -ìna and -ùna) respectively, this process is easily observable in nouns:
cortèl (knife)
curtilì (small knife)
curtilù (big knife)
This phenomenon should not be confused with the reduced distinctive importance of the unstressed vowels. An hypothetic variant cortelì is felt as incorrect.
As said before, the vowel /a/ acts as opaque vowel and blocks the harmonization process:
fontàna (fountain)
fontanì (small fountain)
öspedàl (hospital)
öspedalì (small hospital)
but vowels that comes after the /a/ are still affected:
mortadèla (type of Italian sausage)
mortadilìna
In these cases variants like funtanì, üspedalì (but not üspidalì) or murtadilìna are accepted (or locally preferred) but fall under the normal unstressed vowel variability.
Verbs are affected by this process in their conjugation, where the inflection contains a stressed /i/ (there are no verbal suffixes containing a stressed /u/).
córer (infinitive of to run)
córe (I person singular indicative present)
curìt (past participle)
curif (II person plural indicative present)
curìef (II person plural indicative imperfect)
béer (infinitive of to drink)
bée (I person singular indicative present)
biìt (past participle)
biìf (II person plural indicative present)
biìef (II person plural indicative imperfect)
öler (infinitve of to want)
öle (I person singular indicative present)
ülìt (past participle)
ülìf (II person plural indicative present)
ülìef (II person plural indicative imperfect)
Adjectives formed with the suffix -ùs (feminine -ùza) also observe this rule:
póra (fear)
purús (fearful person -masculine-)
purúza (fearful person -femenine-)
[edit] Orthography
Since Eastern Lombard is still principally an oral language, a commonly accepted orthography has never been established.
Actually, in the past few years there has been an increasing production of texts (mainly light comedies and poem collections) but each author still follows their own writing rules.
In recent times, the problem of the orthography of the Bergamasque dialect has been faced up by the cultural society Ducat de Piassa Pontida. A translation of Andersen's tales was published in 2003, following Ducat's rules.
Also, lately, place name road panels have appeared with the bilingual version of the place name (Italian and local dialect), which seems to suppose a certain effort of standardization but a widely accepted orthography seems still quite distant.
The most problematic and controversial issues seem to be the representation of the intervocalic /s/ and /z/ (rendered by different authors with -ss-, -s- or -z-) and the final /tʃ/ vs. /k/ (rendered with -cc, -c or -ch).
This article follows the rules of the Italian orthography, with the following exceptions:
[edit] Writing of vowels
Diacritical marks are utilised for vocalic sounds to distinguish /e/ from /ɛ/ and /o/ from /ɔ/ in stressed syllables.
Also, umlaut is adopted to represent the rounded vowels /ø/ and /y/.
| Letter | sound |
|---|---|
| a | /a/ |
| é | /e/ |
| è | /ɛ/ |
| i | /i/ |
| ó | /o/ |
| ò | /ɔ/ |
| u | /u/ |
| ü | /y/ |
| ö | /ø/ |
Note that accent is also used to indicate the stressed syllable in non-monosyllabic words.
Since unstressed vowels are less distinctive, it is not necessary to discriminate the open/close quality. This means that you can pronounce the word vedèl (calf) as [veˈdɛl] or [vɛˈdɛl] indifferently without compromising the comprehension.
[edit] Writing of consonants
The digraph -cc is used at the end of the word to represent the sound /ʧ/ (in other positions this sound is rendered by means of the usual Italian orthography rules).
A consonant sequence that is peculiar to Lombard is formed by a voiceless alveolar fricative and voiceless postalveolar affricate, in IPA: [-sʧ-]. This article adopts the convention of representing this sound as s·c, although other texts can follow different traditions (so, you may find, for the same sound, s'c or s-c or even the ambiguous sc).
This sequence, which is absent in Italian, can occur at the beginning of word, as in s·cèt (son, boy) /sʧɛt/; in the middle, as in brös·cia (brush) /ˈbrøsʧa/; or at the end, as in giös·cc (correct, adjective plural) /ˈʤøsʧ/.
The sequence /-sʤ-/ is also present in Eastern Lombard and not in Italian and is represented in this article with the sequence of signs -sgi-, like in:
bàsgia /ˈbasʤa/ - (large bowl)
sgionfà /sʤonˈfa/ - (inflate)
[edit] Grammar
Eastern Lombard is similar to other Romance languages. The word order of Eastern Lombard is SVO and it has moderate inflection system: verbs are declined in mood, tense and aspect and agree with the subject. Nouns can be masculine or feminine and have a singular or plural form. Adjectives and pronouns agree with the corresponding nouns. It has prepositions and hardly any case marking.
[edit] Literature
The oldest known text written in Eastern Lombard dialect are fragments of a laud known as Mayor gremeza il mund no pothevela ancor aver, a manuscript found in Bovegno (Trompia valley), and dating from the XIV century, but the work known as Massera da bè (the good housewife, XVI century) also deserves a mention.
Anyway it is somewhat significant that the most important and internationally renown work in Eastern Lombard actually is not a written text but a movie. In 1978 Ermanno Olmi won the Golden Palm at the Cannes Film Festival with L'albero degli zoccoli (The Tree of the Wooden Clogs), a movie entirely recited in Bergamasque.
As per today, literary production has increased in volume and mainly consists in light comedies and poem collections, (Angelo Canossi is a remarkable example for the Brescian dialect poetry) even if, according to: Ph.Blondeau: Les dialectes et la conscience linguistique dans la provincie de Bergame, PhD thesis, Sorbona University, Paris III, many authors claim that Eastern Lombard tongue is declining in quality, in its capability of expressing complex situations, emotions and of coping with a more complex syntax: this fact agrees with the general decline of the whole Lombard language.
[edit] Examples
The following tale is in Brescian (the variety of Eastern Lombard spoken in city of Brescia)
La mèrla.
I mèrli, 'na ólta i ghìa le pène biànche, ma chèl envéren lé l'éra stàt en bèl envéren e lé, la mèrla, la gà dìt: "Zenér de la màla gràpa per tò despèt gó i uzilì 'ndela gnàta". A lü, 'l Zenér, gh'è nìt adòs 'n pó de ràbia, e 'l gà dìt: "spèta mèrla che te la faró mé adès a té, e se te sét biànca mé te faró ègner négra". E pò dòpo 'l gà dit: "Dù ghe i ó e giü 'n prèstet el töaró e se te sét biànca, mé te faró ní négra". E alùra 'l gà fàt nì fò 'n frèt che se n'ìa mài vést giü compàgn.
Lé la mèrla la saìa piö che fà cói sò uzilì ndèla gnàta, e isé l'è nàda a rifügiàs endèla càpa del camì; dré al camì va sö 'l föm e lùr i uzilì i è déentàcc töcc négher, e quànche i è nicc fò de là, la mèrla la gh'ìa mìa piö le pène biànche, ma la ghe i éra négre. Alùra Zenér, töt sudisfàt, el gà dìt: "Tò mèrla, che te l'ó fàda mé staólta: se te se stàda biànca mé t'ó fàt ní négra e isé te làset lé de seghetà a tiràm en gìr.
Phonetic transcription (IPA)
[iˈmɛrli naˈoltɔ iˈgiɔleˌpɛneˈbjaŋke maˌkɛlɛɱˌverɛnˈle lerɔˌstatɛmˈbɛlɛɱˌverɛn ɛˌlelaˈmɛrlɔlagaˈdit: zeˈnerdelaˌmalɔˈgrapɔ ˌpertɔdeˈspɛt ˌgojuziˈliˌndelɔˈɲatɔ aˈly lzeˈner ˌgɛnitaˈdɔsemˌpodeˈrabja ˌɛːlgaˈdit ˈspɛtɔˌmɛrlɔ kɛtɛlafaˌroˈmeaˌdɛsaˈte ɛsɛtɛˌseˈbːjaŋkɔ ˌmetɛfaroˌɛɲɛrˈnegrɔ ɛpɔˈdɔpolgaˌditaˌmɔ ˌdugɛˈjo ɛʤyˌmprɛstetɛltøaˈro ɛsɛtɛˌseˈbːjaŋkɔ ˌmetɛfaˌroniˈnegrɔ ɛaˈlurɔ lgaˌfaːniˌfɔˈɱfrɛt kɛsɛˌniamaiˌvesʤycomˈpaɲ]
[ˌlelaˈmɛrlɔ lasaˌiɔpjøkeˈfakojˌsɔuziˌlindɛlɔˈɲatɔ, ɛiˈse ˌlɛnadɔˌarifyˈʤasɛnˌdɛlɔˌkapɔdɛlkaˈmi ˌdrealkaˈmivasølˈføm ɛˈlurjuziˈli jɛdeɛnˈtajˌtøjˈnegɛr ˌkwaŋkɛjɛˌnijfɔdeˈla laˈmɛrlɔlaˌgiɔmiɔˌpjøleˌpɛneˈbjaŋke malagɛˌjerɔˈnegre aˈlurɔ zeˈner tösːudisˈfat elgaˈdit ˈtɔˌmɛrlɔ kɛtɛloˌfadɔˈmestaˌoltɔ sɛtɛseˌstadɔˈbjaŋkɔ ˌmetofaˌnːiˈnegrɔ ɛiˈse tɛlasɛˈlːe dɛsegeˈta atiˌramenˈʤir]
Non-literal translation: The she-blackbird.
Once upon a time blackbirds had white feathers, but in that time the winter had been mild and a she-blackbird scorned January saying: "Bad-headed January, in spite of you I have got a brood in my nest. Hearing this, January got angry and he said: "Just wait a bit you she-blackbird, I will fool you and I will turn you from white into black" Then he said: "I have got two, and I will borrow one1, and I will turn you from white to black." And he brought forth a cold as never had been before.
The she-blackbird did not know how to cope with her brood in the nest, so she sheltered in the hood of a chimney, and the smoke turned all the birds black; so when they came out the blackbirds did not have white feathers anymore, but black ones. And January, very happy, said: "This time it was me to fool you, blackbird: you were white and I turned you black, this will teach you to stop teasing me.
Notes
1 - "I have got two, and I will borrow one" - It refers to the days. After a popular tradition, January 30th and 31st and February 1st are called I dé de la Mèrla and are expected to be the most cold of the winter.
Another version of the same tradition makes I dé de la Mèrla fall at the last three days of January. This last is actually a little more widespread and was also told to children to have them remember that February has 28 days explaining this with the fact that January borrowed one from February to be able to chill the blackbird.
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
- Orbilat - An interesting site more for western lombard, but the map of the distribution of the two main varieties is noteworthy.
- Poetry in Eastern Lombard from 1902 (in Italian)
- Copy of the original dictionary Bresciano - Italiano (work in progress, in Italian)
- a Casiratese-Italian vocabulary, a dictionary for the Bergamasque (Casirate d'Adda) dialect, in Italian.
- A Dictionary for the Camunic variant of Eastern Lombard.
- A collection of comedies in Bergamasque
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
