The Seven Communities (Cimbrian: Siben Komoin, German: Sieben Gemeinden, Italian: Sette Comuni) were a group of municipalities in the Veneto region that spoke the Cimbrian language, a dialect of Upper German, as their native tongue.
The municipalities are located on a high plateau northwest of Vicenza. They consist of:
The seven communities formed together into a loose commonwealth in 1310. They were historically under the suzerainty of the Milanese House of Visconti and then under the Republic of Venice. Under both they enjoyed wide cultural and political autonomy in exchange for their loyalty. The autonomous status came to an end with the Napoleonic Wars and the demise of the Serenìsima in 1807.
Due to the high pressure from the Italianization from fascists such as Ettore Tolomei and the government of Benito Mussolini did the Cimbrian language eventually almost completely disappear and become extinct. Only in Robàan and its district Mittebald/Toballe (Mittewald, Mezzaselva) has Cimbrian survived.
Robàan has the cultural institute "Agustin Prunner" which is a repository of the Cimbrian culture and cooperates with other linguistic enclaves in Lusern, Fersental, Sappada, Sauris, the Thirteen Communities and Timau. Vestiges of the once dominant language are family and place names, which are mostly still Cimbrian.