Gallo-Italic languages

The Gallo-Italian or Gallo-Italic languages constitute the majority of the languages of northern Italy. They are Piedmontese, Lombard, Emilian-Romagnol and Ligurian, although there is some doubt about the position of the latter due to a number of special characteristics. The Venetian language is usually considered one of the Italo-Dalmatian languages; however, some publications define it as Gallo-Italian.^[2]

The Gallo-Italian languages have characteristics both of the Gallo-Romance languages to the northwest (including French and Occitan) and the Italo-Dalmatian languages to the south (including Italian). Examples of the former are the loss of all final vowels other than -a; the occurrence of lenition; the development of original /kt/ to /jt/ (and often later to /tʃ/); and the development of front rounded vowels (e.g. the change of /u/ to /y/). Examples of the latter are the use of vowel changes to indicate plurals, in place of /s/; the widespread occurrence of metaphony of stressed vowels, triggered by original final /i/; and the development in some areas of /tʃ/ instead of /ts/ as the result of palatalisation of original /k/ before e and i.

As a result, there is some debate over the proper grouping of the Gallo-Italian languages. They are sometimes grouped with Gallo-Romance,^[3] but other linguists group them in Italo-Dalmatian.^{[4][5][6][7][8]}

Geographic distribution

Traditionally spoken in Northern Italy, southern Switzerland, San Marino and Monaco, most Gallo-Italian languages have given way in everyday use to Standard Italian. The vast majority of current speakers are bilingual with Italian. These languages are still spoken by the Italian diaspora in countries with Italian immigrant communities. Ligurian is formalised in Monaco as the Monégasque dialect (Munegascu).

General classification

• Gallo-Italian
  • Piedmontese
  • Ligurian
  • Lombard
    • Western Lombard dialect
    • Eastern Lombard dialect
  • Emilian-Romagnol language
    • Emilian dialect
    • Romagnol dialect
  • Gallo-Italic of Sicily
  • Gallo-Italic of Basilicata

Phonology

The Gallo-Italian languages differ somewhat in their phonology from one language to another, but the following are the most important characteristics, as contrasted with Standard Italian:^[9]

Vowels

• Most Gallo-Italian languages have lost all unstressed final vowels except /a/, e.g. Lombard òm "man", füm "smoke", nef "snow", fil "wire", röda "wheel" (Italian uomo, fumo, neve, filo, ruota). They remain, however, in Ligurian, with passage of -o to -u, except after n; e.g. ramu, rami, lüme, lümi "branch, branches, light, lights" (Italian ramo, rami, lume, lumi), but can, chen /kaŋ, keŋ/ "dog, dogs" (Italian cane, cani).
• u /u/ tends to evolve as ü /y/, as in French and Occitan, as in Lombard füm (Italian fumo "smoke") and Ligurian lüme, Piedmont lüm (Italian lume "light"). In some parts, e.g. southern Piedmont, this has further developed into /i/, e.g. fis (Italian fuso), lim (Italian lume "light"). In some mountainous parts of Piedmont, however (e.g. Biellese, Ossolano), this development was blocked before final /a/, leading to masculine crü (Italian crudo "raw") but feminine cru(v)a (Italian cruda).
• Metaphony is very common, affecting original open stressed è /ɛ/ and ò /ɔ/ when followed by /i/ or sometimes /o/ (operating before final vowels were dropped). This leads at first to diphthongs ie and uo, but in many dialects these progress further, typically to monophthongs i and ö /ø/. Unlike standard Italian diphthongization, this typically operates both in open and closed syllables, hence in Lombardy (where typically /i/ but not /o/ triggers metaphony) quest (Italian questo "this") vs. quist (Italian questi "these").
• Stressed closed é /e/ and sometimes ó /o/, when occurring in an open syllable (followed by at most one consonant) often diphthongized to /ei/ and /ou/, as in Old French; e.g. Piedmont beive (Italian bere < *bévere "to drink"), teila (Italian tela "cloth"), meis (Italian mese "month"). In Piedmont, /ei/ developed further into either /ɛ/ or /i/, e.g. tèla /tɛla/ < *teila (Italian tela "cloth"), sira (Italian sera "evening"), mis (Italian mese "month").
• Stressed /a/ in an open syllable often fronts to ä /æ/ or è /ɛ/.

Consonants

• Lenition affects single consonants between vowels. Voiced /d/ and /g/ drop; voiced /b/ becomes /v/ or drops; unvoiced /t/ and /k/ become voiced /d/ and /g/, or drop; unvoiced /p/ becomes /b/, /v/, or drops. /s/ between vowels voices to /z/. /l/ between vowels sometimes becomes /r/, and this /r/ sometimes drops. Double consonants are reduced to single consonants, but not otherwise lenited. /n/ becomes velarized to /ŋ/. These changes occur before a final vowel drops. After loss of final vowels, however, further changes sometimes affect the newly final consonants, with voiced obstruents often becoming voiceless, and final /ŋ/ sometimes dropping. Liguria, especially in former times, showed particularly severe lenition, with total loss of intervocalic /t/, /d/, /g/, /b/, /v/, /l/, /r/ (probably also /p/, but not /k/) in Old Genoese, hence müa (Latin matura "early"), a éia e âe? (Italian aveva le ali? "did it have wings?"; modern a l'aveiva e ae? with restoration of various consonants due to Tuscan influence). In Liguria and often elsewhere, collapse of adjacent vowels due to loss of an intervocalic consonant produced new long vowels, notated with a circumflex.
• Italian palatoalveolar /tʃ/ and /dʒ/ are often reduced/assibilitated to /s/ and /z/, respectively. This typically does not occur in Lombardy, however, and parts of Liguria have intermediate /ts/ and /dz/.
• Italian /kj/ from Latin /kl/ is further palatalized to /tʃ/; similarly /gj/ from Latin /gl/ becomes /dʒ/. In Liguria, /pj/ and /bj/ from Latin /pl/ and /bl/ are affected in the same way, e.g. Ligurian cian (Italian piano "soft") and giancu (Italian bianco "white").
• Latin /kt/ develops variously into /jt/ or /tʃ/ (contrast Italian /tt/).

Isolated varieties in Sicily and in Basilicata

Varieties of Gallo-Italian languages are also found in Sicily, corresponding with the central-eastern parts of the island that received large numbers of immigrants from Northern Italy, called Lombards, during the decades following the Norman conquest of Sicily (around 1080 to 1120). Given the time that has lapsed and the influence from the Sicilian language itself, these dialects are best generically described as Gallo-Italic. The major centres where these dialects can still be heard today include Piazza Armerina, Aidone, Sperlinga, San Fratello, Nicosia, and Novara di Sicilia. Northern Italian dialects did not survive in some towns in the province of Catania that developed large Lombard communities during this period, namely Randazzo, Paternò and Bronte. However, the Northern Italian influence in the local varieties of Sicilian are marked. In the case of San Fratello, some linguists have suggested that the dialect present today has Provençal as its basis, having been a fort manned by Provençal mercenaries in the early decades of the Norman conquest (bearing in mind that it took the Normans 30 years to conquer the whole of the island).

Other dialects, attested from 13th and 14th century, are also found in Basilicata, more precisely in the province of Potenza (Tito, Picerno, Pignola and Vaglio Basilicata), Trecchina, Rivello, Nemoli and San Costantino. Because these have the same merger of Latin vowels that Dalmatian and Romanian languages do, they may be classified as Eastern Romance languages rather than as Gallo-Italic.^[10]

Comparisons

References

Sources

• Bernard Comrie, Stephen Matthews, Maria Polinsky (eds.), The Atlas of languages : the origin and development of languages throughout the world. New York 2003, Facts On File. p. 40.
• Stephen A. Wurm, Atlas of the World’s Languages in Danger of Disappearing. Paris 2001, UNESCO Publishing, p. 29.
• Glauco Sanga: La lingua Lombarda, in Koiné in Italia, dalle origini al 500 (Koinés in Italy, from the origin to 1500), Lubrina publisher, Bèrghem
• Studi di lingua e letteratura lombarda offerti a Maurizio Vitale, (Studies in Lombard language and literature) Pisa : Giardini, 1983
• Brevini, Franco – Lo stile lombardo : la tradizione letteraria da Bonvesin da la Riva a Franco Loi / Franco Brevini – Pantarei, Lugan – 1984 (Lombard style: literary tradition from Bonvesin da la Riva to Franco Loi )
• Mussafia Adolfo, Beitrag zur kunde der Norditalienischen Mundarten im XV. Jahrhunderte (Wien, 1873)
• Pellegrini, G.B. "I cinque sistemi dell'italoromanzo", in Saggi di linguistica italiana (Turin: Boringhieri, 1975), pp. 55–87.
• Rohlfs, Gerhard, Rätoromanisch. Die Sonderstellung des Rätoromanischen zwischen Italienisch und Französisch. Eine kulturgeschichtliche und linguistische Einführung (Munich: C.H. Beek'sche, 1975), pp. 1–20.
• Canzoniere Lombardo – by Pierluigi Beltrami, Bruno Ferrari, Luciano Tibiletti, Giorgio D'Ilario – Varesina Grafica Editrice, 1970.

See also

• Gallo-Italic of Sicily
• Languages of Italy
• List of languages in Europe / Languages of Europe
• Romance plurals