# How close is the Roman dialect of Italy to Latin



## bubbyx

Just wondering, since the Roman dialect is spoken in Rome. It must have some sort of special relationship with Latin  (both classical and vulgar). What are the similarities between Roman dialect and Latin? Also, does the Roman dialect have any prestige in modern Italy? Do Italians look up to Rome and it's inhabitants? Do they see them as descendents of the Roman Empire?


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## Ben Jamin

bubbyx said:


> Just wondering, since the Roman dialect is spoken in Rome. It must have some sort of special relationship with Latin  (both classical and vulgar). What are the similarities between Roman dialect and Latin? Also, does the Roman dialect have any prestige in modern Italy? Do Italians look up to Rome and it's inhabitants as descendents of the Roman Empire?


Already in the imperial time the original Romans were just a little elite among slaves, retired soldiers, immigrants from other parts of Italy and the whole Roman Empire.  In the early middle ages the city was depopulated, and populated again in later times, by people from different parts of Italy, so claiming one's origins from the genuine old Romans would be far fetched. The same can be said of the language, there is no special reason for which the city should speak a dialect closer to Latin than other parts of central Italy. Actually the most "Latinate" Italian "dialect" (now classified as a language) is spoken in Sardinia.


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## bubbyx

Yes the fact that the city has been depopulated or received immigrants etc may be true, but does this change the perception of the city? I mean many westerners look up to Rome as the cradle of western civilisation and the people who live in Rome (or even Italians from all of Italy) are generally considered the closest to the ancient Romans who lived there. Even though this may not be a scientific fact.  Just like how we assume that the people who live in Greece are descendents of Ancient Greece, Chinese descendent of ancient China, Scandinavian descendents of Vikings etc even though many events in history have changed that. 

Anyway this thread is not about whether the modern Romans are descendents of ancient Romans or not, but about the relationship between the Roman dialect and Latin. And also about how Italians see Rome and modern Romans. I am not saying that Roman dialect is the closest to Latin, nor that it is special comparing to other Romance languages. I am just saying that I suspected a special relationship, since it is spoken in Rome, and this may not be true. That is why I opened this thread to compare Roman dialect and Latin. Also I am not asking whether modern Romans are descendents of ancient Romans, I am just wondering how Italians see Rome, Romans and Roman dialect and whether they make any connection between them and the Roman Empire of the past.


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## Ben Jamin

bubbyx said:


> I am not saying that Roman dialect is the closest to Latin, nor that it is special comparing to other Romance languages. I am just saying that I suspected a special relationship, since it is spoken in Rome, and this may not be true. That is why I opened this thread to compare Roman dialect and Latin. Also I am not asking whether modern Romans are descendents of ancient Romans, I am just wondering how Italians see Rome, Romans and Roman dialect and whether they make any connection between them and the Roman Empire of the past.



You wrote "It must have some sort of special relationship with Latin  (both classical and vulgar)". What kind or relationship to Latin do you expect then, if not linguistic?
By the way, the Sicilian dialect is said to be strongly influenced by immigrants from northern Italy in the early Middle Ages.


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## bubbyx

Yes I meant linguistic, but this doesn't mean that my opinion is right. It is normal to assume something like that since the dialect is spoken within the city itself. This is why I opened the thread for comparison. I was simply interested in the relationship between Roman dialect and Latin 

Thank you for replying by the way!


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## Ben Jamin

bubbyx said:


> Yes I meant linguistic, but this doesn't mean that my opinion is right. It is normal to assume something like that since the dialect is spoken within the city itself. This is why I opened the thread for comparison. I was simply interested in the relationship between Roman dialect and Latin
> 
> Thank you for replying by the way!


I am not a specialist in Italian language, but I have read about Italian dialects and languages, and never found anything about a special relationship between the Roman dialect of today and Latin.


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## Nino83

bubbyx said:


> What are the similarities between Roman dialect and Latin?



There are not special similarities between the Roman dialect and Latin. The Roman dialect is a Romance language, like Italian, Tuscan, Neapolitan, Sicilian and so on. 
Italian dialects spoken south of the La Spezia-Rimini are mutually intelligible (some more, some less) and very similar. 



bubbyx said:


> Also, does the Roman dialect have any prestige in modern Italy?



Like any other dialect. As far as I know, the most used accents in filmography are: Romano, Siciliano, Milanese, Napoletano. 



Ben Jamin said:


> By the way, the Sicilian dialect is said to be strongly influenced by immigrants from northern Italy in the early Middle Ages.



Really? In what?


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## fdb

bubbyx said:


> Also, does the Roman dialect have any prestige in modern Italy? Do Italians look up to Rome and it's inhabitants? Do they see them as descendents of the Roman Empire?



The standard Italian written language is based on the older form of the dialect of Florence.


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## Gezedka

Not much acquainted with Italian dialects. But knowing the history of Rome, it is very unlikely that they could keep any original accent, vocabulary or any linguistic feature from Latin any better than other regions of Italy. The city was devastated, abandoned and cleansed many times and the 'patrician' classes left for safe havens long before the alleged 'Germanic Invasions'. On one occasion, after a plague, the population was reduced from 500,000 to some 500. After that, and keeping its status as administrative capital city, it has been massively populated by new ruling classes and armies, and impoverished migrants. You might be luckier looking for Latin heritage in the quiet province than in Rome. Now, as for prestige, pride and the rest of your question, everybody is entitled to their own beliefs and myths... . My impression is that every Italian feels proud of their heritage in the same extent and no one would differentiate themselves when thinking of Ancient Rome, even if they are not from modern Rome. As said, that has been my experience so far.


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## Ben Jamin

Nino83 said:


> There are not special similarities between the Roman dialect and Latin. The Roman dialect is a Romance language, like Italian, Tuscan, Neapolitan, Sicilian and so on.
> Italian dialects spoken south of the La Spezia-Rimini are mutually intelligible (some more, some less) and very similar.
> 
> 
> 
> Like any other dialect. As far as I know, the most used accents in filmography are: Romano, Siciliano, Milanese, Napoletano.
> 
> 
> 
> Really? In what?


Really.


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## Nino83

Ben Jamin said:


> Really.



Can you explain your statement? 
Phonology? Vocabulary? Grammar?


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## Ben Jamin

Nino83 said:


> Can you explain your statement?
> Phonology? Vocabulary? Grammar?


See here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sicilian_language


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## Nino83

Ahhh. 
If we speak of the Norman influence (only on vocabulary), it's ok. 
If we speak of the "Lumbard" influence, well, most of those (few) words are common to all Italian dialects (suocero, cognato, figlioccio, orbo, onde). 
It's too little to say that Sicilian language was "strongly influenced by immigrants from northern Italy". 

Phonology and grammar (as well as 98% of vocabulary) are equal to those of the other dialects spoken south of the La Spezia-Rimini line.


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## bubbyx

Gezedka said:


> The city was devastated, abandoned and cleansed many times and the 'patrician' classes left for safe havens long before the alleged 'Germanic Invasions'. .



Interesting. Where did the Patrician classes go for safe havens?


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## Ben Jamin

Gezedka said:


> ... long before the alleged 'Germanic Invasions'.


Alleged "Germanic Ivasions", hm, interesting. Do you believe in the existence of the alleged "Julius Ceasar", "alleged Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus Nero" and many others then?


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## ahvalj

http://roma.andreapollett.com/S8/dialect.htm
http://it.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dialetto_romanesco
From what I see, the modern Romanesque dialect is generally more advanced than the literary language based on the medieval Florentine dialect. On the other hand, some characteristics of the Tuscan dialects were either not codified as literary (gorgia, explained as an Etruscan trait) or developed later (other peculiarities of the consonantism): http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuscan_language

In the Romance philology the situation with Florentine and Roman dialects is often regarded as a classical illustration of the case when the dialect of the homeland is more derived than some of the dialects spoken by descendants of early assimilated speakers of a totally alien language (Etruscans).


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## Nino83

ahvalj said:


> From what I see, the modern Romanesque dialect is generally more advanced than the literary language based on the medieval Florentine dialect. On the other hand, some characteristics of the Tuscan dialects were either not codified as literary (gorgia, explained as an Etruscan trait) or developed later (other peculiarities of the consonantism)



Yes, the Italian language is the most conservative. 

focu(m) (Classical Latin) --> foco (Vulgar Latin) --> foco (Romanesque) --> focu (Sicilian) --> foco [fɔ*h*o] (Tuscan) --> fuoco (Italian)
mandāre (Classical Latin) --> mandare (Vulgar Latin) --> mandare (Italian and Tuscan) --> ma*nn*ari (Sicilian) --> ma*nn*à (Romanesque) 

It depends from word to word, but in general, from a grammatical point of view, all Italian dialects are quite different from Classical Latin and are very similar to each other.


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## fdb

Nino83 said:


> focu(m) (Classical Latin) --> foco (Vulgar Latin) --> foco (Romanesque) --> focu (Sicilian) --> foco [fɔ*h*o] (Tuscan) --> fuoco (Italian)



I do not know what you mean with your little arrows. Surely you are not claiming that Tuscan comes from Sicilian.

"fuoco" is Old Tuscan, [fɔho] is modern Tuscan.


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## Nino83

fdb said:


> I do not know what you mean with your little arrows.



I ordered these words form the most similar to the least similar to Classical Latin. 
I didn't intend to say that Tuscan comes from Sicilian, absolutely  (I thought it was clear...)


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## Ben Jamin

ahvalj said:


> From what I see, the modern Romanesque dialect is generally more advanced than the literary language based on the medieval Florentine dialect.


Why do you call it "advanced"? Do you mean "better developed",  "better"?


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## ahvalj

Ben Jamin said:


> Why do you call it "advanced"? Do you mean "better developed",  "better"?


_advanced_ is an antonym of _conservative_


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## Gezedka

Ben Jamin said:


> Alleged "Germanic Ivasions", hm, interesting. Do you believe in the existence of the alleged "Julius Ceasar", "alleged Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus Nero" and many others then?



Certain Germanic tribes were already on Rome's payroll. They were called _foederati_. Research on the state of economy, immigration and public health if you still believe Rome was defeated by a concerted alliance of Germanic peoples.


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## Gezedka

bubbyx said:


> Interesting. Where did the Patrician classes go for safe havens?



The equestrian classes had business and public positions all across the Roman Empire. After the 170s and 270s pandemics, people stayed close to their investments and working places and rented out their villas. Just pick Italian wealthy families from the Middle Ages and try to track back their ancestors to any gens from Latio. You can use the Wikipedia for that. You won't find many links. They more likely intermarried with local overlords and other financially powerful families.


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## Hulalessar

ahvalj said:


> _advanced_ is an antonym of _conservative_



I think I prefer _innovative_.


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## ahvalj

Hulalessar said:


> I think I prefer _innovative_.


_advanced/conservative_ are standard terms taken from the evolutionary biology

_advanced:_ much evolved from an early ancestral type <bees and other _advanced_ insects> <_advanced_ traits> (http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/advanced)


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## Ben Jamin

ahvalj said:


> _advanced/conservative_ are standard terms taken from the evolutionary biology
> 
> _advanced:_ much evolved from an early ancestral type <bees and other _advanced_ insects><_advanced_ traits> (http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/advanced)


But "advanced" has usually a connotation of "improved" which is unfortunate inlinguistics.


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## berndf

ahvalj said:


> _advanced_ is an antonym of _conservative_


In historical linguistics, the antonym of _conservative_ is _innovating_.

_Advanced _makes little sense as a term in this context.


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## ahvalj

berndf said:


> In historical linguistics, the antonym of _conservative_ is _innovating_.
> 
> _Advanced _makes little sense as a term in this context.


It will mean as much and as little as in the evolutionary biology as soon as people forget about current ideological fashion (AKA political correctness) and start thinking scientifically. These two terms mean absolutely the same. Just don't ascribe positive or negative connotations to the degree of changes a certain language exhibits.


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## berndf

ahvalj said:


> It will mean as much and as little as in the evolutionary biology as soon as people forget about current ideological fashion (AKA political correctness) and start thinking scientifically. These two terms mean absolutely the same. Just don't ascribe positive or negative connotations to the degree of changes a certain language exhibits.


No it doesn't. It only makes sense in the context of purpose-directness of an evolution. And this is not the case here. Italian phonology is not better/worse, more primitive/more advanced, more this or more that than Latin phonology, it is just different. The term _advanced_ makes only sense in relation to a hypothetical end point of the evolution of Romance languages.

In how far _advanced _makes sense as a term in evolutionary biology is a different matter and is not relevant here.


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## ahvalj

The evolutionary biology doesn't discuss the directedness of the evolution either, at least not in the mainstream. Moreover, we often have no idea why a certain evolutionary change turns out more advantageous for its bearers.

The terms we are discussing are aimed to reflect the amount of changes counted from a certain starting point. _Primitive/conservative_ or _advanced/innovative_ are just synonyms of _near_ and _far_ on the evolutionary tree: _conservative_ and _innovative_ describe the rate of changes, whereas _primitive_ and _advanced_ describe the result, both pairs being just ways to describe the evolutionary distance of a particular aspect of organism or language.


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## bearded

As a matter of fact, in the Roman dialect there are some features which are 'directly' inherited from Latin, e.g. in the conjugation of verbs:
avemo (we have), Lat habemus - Italian: abbiamo
venimo (we came),Lat. venimus - Italian: venimmo
amamo (we love),  Lat. amamus - Italian: amiamo.
There also rare traces of ancient Latin pronunciation, e.g. amichi (pronounced ameeki), as in 'li amichi mia' (my friends) which make us think of the Latin pronunciation of c+i as ki before the palatization.
Anyhow, modern Roman ('romanesco') is strongly influenced by Southern Italian dialects, which originally reflected how Latin was pronounced by peoples of Southern Italy (Osci, Samnites, etc.), and - as has been correctly said before - the most conservative among Italian dialects are nowadays the Sardinian dialects.  In some Sardinian dialects, you can even form  sentences that are at the same time Latin ones, like ''teneba(t) duo panes in sportula'' (he had two breads in his bag).


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## fdb

bearded man said:


> As a matter of fact, in the Roman dialect there are some features which are 'directly' inherited from Latin, e.g. in the conjugation of verbs:
> avemo (we have), Lat habemus - Italian: abbiamo
> venimo (we came),Lat. venimus - Italian: venimmo
> amamo (we love),  Lat. amamus - Italian: amiamo.



We discussed this very question recently here:
http://forum.wordreference.com/showthread.php?t=2891809
The consensus was that the generalisation of the originally subjunctive ending -iamus is a peculiarity of Tuscan. The retention of -amus, -emus, -imus is not restricted to Romanesco.


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## bearded

You are right, fdb.  The retention of those verbal endings (-amus -emus - imus) is common to other Italian dialects as well.


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## bubbyx

I wonder why Roman dialect did not gain as much prestige as Venetian and Florentine dialect


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## bearded

bubbyx said:


> I wonder why Roman dialect did not gain as much prestige as Venetian and Florentine dialect


Mainly for cultural reasons (literature in Florentine...) and because the Florentine dialect was/is so clear, that most Italians understood/understand it without difficulty.


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## berndf

bearded man said:


> Mainly for cultural reasons (literature in Florentine...)


The fact that it is the language of Dante certainly helped to make it the prestige dialect.

At the time of Dante, where the modern literary language started to emerge, the prestige of Rome as a city was exceptionally low: The city was run down, the Roman infrastructure that was never seriously maintained had become unusable and the administration was particularly corrupt, even for Italian standards where loyalty to the interests of his own family has always been much more important that a magistrate's loyalty to his constituency. That was why the pope fled the city and went to Avignon.



bearded man said:


> ... and because the Florentine dialect was/is so clear, that most Italians understood/understand it without difficulty.


Such ex post explanations always make me wary. Is a dialect adopted as standard because it is so easily understood or is it so easily understood because it had been adopted as standard register and everybody is accustomed to it?


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## merquiades

bearded man said:


> You are right, fdb.  The retention of those verbal endings (-amus -emus - imus) is common to other Italian dialects as well.


I am surprised there was no intent to reestablish -amo, -emo, -imo as the standard conjugation.  It obviously is closer to the original Latin than -iamo for all three verb groups.


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## berndf

merquiades said:


> I am surprised there was no intent to reestablish -amo, -emo, -imo as the standard conjugation. It obviously is closer to the original Latin than -iamo for all three verb groups.


Why would that matter to modern speakers? Do you as a modern English speaker feel any urge to revive the old _-eth _third singular conjugation just because it is closer to Old English?


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## merquiades

berndf said:


> Why would that matter to modern speakers? Do you as a modern English speaker feel any urge to revive the old _-eth _third singular conjugation just because it is closer to Old English?


On occasion I just might use an -eth.  He who giveth, taketh away. 
In the 15-17th century many many older forms that had fallen out of use in Spanish were reinstated out of a sincere desire to bring the language in line with Latin and recorrect what was considered wrong.  I assumed in that timeframe with a similar cultural climate Italians would have followed suit. But then again I've noticed fewer latinisms in Italian or relatinizing attempts.  The tendency is always to simplify.  Just at some point of time they decided to get rid of many apostrophes.
If _parlamo, bevemo, finimo_ were commonplace in most regional dialects, plus it was the official successor to -amus,-emus, -imus, and the verb type -are, -ere, -ire was clearly seen,  I don't see any reason why someone would not have tried to reinstate it and get rid of the universal -iamo, if not now, at least in Renaissance/ Baroque time.


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## Nino83

merquiades said:


> In the 15-17th century many many older forms that had fallen out of use in Spanish were reinstated out of a sincere desire to bring the language in line with Latin and



and they introduced a lot of irregularities, like "hecho"/"perfecto"  

(I don't know if the "cto"/"cho" was a regular process and if "perfecto" is a learned word. Do you know something more about it?).


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## berndf

merquiades said:


> In the 15-17th century many many older forms that had fallen out of use in Spanish were reinstated out of a sincere desire to bring the language in line with Latin and recorrect what was considered wrong. I assumed in that timeframe with a similar cultural climate Italians would have followed suit. But then again I've noticed fewer latinisms in Italian or relatinizing attempts. The tendency is always to simplify. Just at some point of time they decided to get rid of many apostrophes.
> If _parlamo, bevemo, finimo_ were commonplace in most regional dialects, plus it was the official successor to -amus,-emus, -imus, and the verb type -are, -ere, -ire was clearly seen, I don't see any reason why someone would not have tried to reinstate it and get rid of the universal -iamo, if not now, at least in Renaissance/ Baroque time.


True, this happened in French as well. That's why you have _book=li*v*re_ but _free=li*b*re_. But this usually only affects individual words and not basic morphemes like present tense conjugations. I don't think grammarians would have so much influence, not even in French.


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## merquiades

berndf said:


> True, this happened in French as well. That's why you have _book=li*v*re_ but _free=li*b*re_. But this usually only affects individual words and not basic morphemes like present tense conjugations. I don't think grammarians would have so much influence, not even in French.


In Spanish final unaccented -e had been dropped from most words by the end of the middle ages.  This can be seen in "Cantar del mio Cid" for example.  The -e was very actively restored to verb forms during the renaissance.  The reinstating was successful with verbs and also pronouns, but less so with nouns, especially after -r and -d.


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## berndf

merquiades said:


> The reinstating was successful with verbs and also pronouns, but less so with nouns, especially after -r and -d.


And where has this reinstatement survived?


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## merquiades

berndf said:


> And where has this reinstatement survived?



All -er verbs for example now have final -e.  Today the conjugation is _tiene, viene, hace, dice_.... not _tien, vien, haz, diz_.   The -e of le is never dropped anymore either: _dígole_ not _dígol_.   For nouns... _part_ became _parte_, but _paz_ not _pace_, _pared_ not _parede_.


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## killerbee256

merquiades said:


> All -er verbs for example now have final -e.  Today the conjugation is _tiene, viene, hace, dice_.... not _tien, vien, haz, diz_.   The -e of le is never dropped anymore either: _dígole_ not _dígol_.   For nouns... _part_ became _parte_, but _paz_ not _pace_, _pared_ not _parede_.


 Hmmm _tien, vien, haz, diz _rather resemble their portugues counter parts _tem, vem, faz, diz_. Was there no "Restoration" movement in Portugal?


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## bubbyx

merquiades said:


> All -er verbs for example now have final -e.  Today the conjugation is _tiene, viene, hace, dice_.... not _tien, vien, haz, diz_.   The -e of le is never dropped anymore either: _dígole_ not _dígol_.   For nouns... _part_ became _parte_, but _paz_ not _pace_, _pared_ not _parede_.



I think the restoration made Spanish sound better 

Spanish verb conjugations are very close to latin, I wonder why they didn't try to make it closer during the restoration? For example amamos can be restored to amamus? Amais becomes Amatis? They don't sound that much different anyway. Now that I think of it, Spanish is like slurred Latin sometimes :as vida instead of vita etc reminds me of how American English speakers pronounce water instead of the English pronunciation. Also Spanish tends to drop Latin intervocalic consonants like creer instead of credere which reminds me of English slangs :as


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## Nino83

killerbee256 said:


> Hmmm _tien, vien, haz, diz _rather resemble their portugues counter parts _tem, vem, faz, diz_. Was there no "Restoration" movement in Portugal?



I think all depends on pronunciation. If these "e" are pronounced, then the "restoration" can work but if they are not pronounced this restoration simply makes written language different from the spoken language. 

In Portuguese those "e" are not pronounced, neither in Brazil nor in Portugal, and final "e" in other words can be elided in Portugal but is clearly pronounced (with an _) in Brazil (which is the country having more population). So we have "verdade" in Portuguese but "verdad" in Spanish._


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## bearded

berndf said:


> Is a dialect adopted as standard because it is so easily understood or is it so easily understood because it had been adopted as standard register and everybody is accustomed to it?



I think the former is the case: adopted as standard because it is/was so easily understood, as well as for literary-prestige reasons as I wrote before.  The Florentine dialect had been  well and easily understood long before it was adopted as standard register. An example: comedies by the well-known playwright Goldoni were written in Venetian dialect - which in the 18th century still was the official language and the standard register in the Republic of Venice. But some characters in those comedies came to Venice from other parts of Italy, and when they spoke the Florentine dialect, inhabitants of Venice could understand them without problems.  Florentine already had an immense cultural prestige and was well understood, but was not yet the standard register in Italy.


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## bearded

bubbyx said:


> I wonder why Roman dialect did not gain as much prestige as Venetian and Florentine dialect


 As I explained before, mainly because there was not - during all of the Middle Ages -a comparable literature or cultural tradition in Rome with respect to Florence.
Anyhow, nowadays the Florentine dialect has partly deviated from its original form and pronunciation, so that in Florence today you can find the Italian language (standard) and the Florentine dialect (similar to Italian, but not identical - especially in pronunciation: e.g. initial c pronounced h in certain conditions....). 
And for the 'defense' of the Roman speech, I would like to add that there is a sort of proverb defining which is the very best Italian pronunciation, which sounds _''lingua toscana in bocca romana'' _(Tuscan language as spoken by a Roman mouth).


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## Nino83

I add that probably Florentine dialect was understood also because it just was the standard in literature, so all Italian writers were accustomed to it. 
As bearded said, there was also a phonetic reason (Tuscan/Roman pronunciation was well understood).


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## bubbyx

bearded man said:


> As I explained before, mainly because there was not - during all of the Middle Ages -a comparable literature or cultural tradition in Rome with respect to Florence.
> Anyhow, nowadays the Florentine dialect has partly deviated from its original form and pronunciation, so that in Florence today you can find the Italian language (standard) and the Florentine dialect (similar to Italian, but not identical - especially in pronunciation: e.g. initial c pronounced h in certain conditions....).
> And for the 'defense' of the Roman speech, I would like to add that there is a sort of proverb defining which is the very best Italian pronunciation, which sounds _''lingua toscana in bocca romana'' _(Tuscan language as spoken by a Roman mouth).



Does this mean Italians look up to the Roman pronunciation? Would you say Roman accent is considered attractive/desirable? Also do Italians think of modern Romans as descendents of ancient Romans?


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## berndf

bubbyx said:


> Does this mean Italians look up to the Roman pronunciation? Would you say Roman accent is considered attractive/desirable? Also do Italians think of modern Romans as descendents of ancient Romans?


I think you have a slightly distorted view who the "ancient Romans" were. Already during the existence of the Roman Empire, since the end of the period we today call the _Principate _in the early 3rd century, the identity of being "Roman" wasn’t attached to the city any more. The imperial court was first in Milan and later the Eastern court in Constantinople and the Western court in Ravenna and the Senate, who stayed in Rome, was effectively reduced in power it a kind of city council. In the last period of the empire, the city had little more importance than being the seat of the Papacy.

The Italian identity of being the decedents of the ancient Romans never had too much to do with the city itself.


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## bearded

bubbyx said:


> Does this mean Italians look up to the Roman pronunciation? Would you say Roman accent is considered attractive/desirable? Also do Italians think of modern Romans as descendents of ancient Romans?


I would say that there is nowadays an Italian standard pronunciation valid for all of Italy, and Roman accent is close to it but not identical.  No regional accent in Italy corresponds to the standard accent at 100%, but the Roman accent is very clear and - together with Florentine accent and the accent of other regions in Central Italy (Umbria...) - it belongs to the local speeches that are nearest to the standard language.  In addition, many TV programmes are produced in Rome, so the Roman accent is well-known all over Italy due to TV movies...  The situation of the language in Italy is complicated, as in all regions you have to distinguish between accent and dialect.  Italians speaking the language with their own regional accent will be understood everywhere, if on the contrary someone speaks a dialect, he will not be understood by all Italians.
As for the Romans, ancient Romans conquered a big empire, and soldiers and administrators settled down everywhere in it, consequently a bit of Roman blood is present in almost all of Europe and Northern Africa and other places... And so much mingling with original Italian populations (Etruscans, Gauls, Osci, Volsci, Samnites, Sabini) and so many invasions and foreign dominations (Langobards, Franks, Normans, later Spaniards, Frenchmen) have taken place in Italy over the centuries, that no Italians - not even Romans - can affirm to be the only authentical descendants of ancient Romans.


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## berndf

bearded man said:


> I think the former is the case: adopted as standard because it is/was so easily understood, as well as for literary-prestige reasons as I wrote before. The Florentine dialect had been well and easily understood long before it was adopted as standard register. An example: comedies by the well-known playwright Goldoni were written in Venetian dialect - which in the 18th century still was the official language and the standard register in the Republic of Venice. But some characters in those comedies came to Venice from other parts of Italy, and when they spoke the Florentine dialect, inhabitants of Venice could understand them without problems. Florentine already had an immense cultural prestige and was well understood, but was not yet the standard register in Italy.


I am still sceptical. In the 18th century, the Toscan based language of Dante and Boccacio had long been established as the literary prestige dialect even if it wasn't official language yet in Venice and many other Italian states. You would still assume familiarity with that language by educated people who attended performances of his theatre and opera works.

I agree, though, that from a phonological perspective, this language has many advantages, an evenly spaced set of 7 vowels and no diphthongs and well distinguished consonants. Still, I think familiarity is more important for easy understanding. Take, e.g., the urban Swiss German dialects as they are spoken in Zürich or Basel that are not so laden with very local dialect expressions as rural dialects; Germans unfamiliar with Swiss German hardly understand a single sentence; it is even difficult to recognize as a German dialect at all. After exposure to it for several weeks, just for a listening and not actively learning it, you wonder why you ever had difficulties understanding it.


----------



## merquiades

killerbee256 said:


> Hmmm _tien, vien, haz, diz _rather resemble their portugues counter parts _tem, vem, faz, diz_. Was there no "Restoration" movement in Portugal?


 Final -_n(e)_/-_n(o)_ had a particular evolution in Portuguese due to nasalization:  _Pan(e) > pão, san(o) > são_ (written with til or m), so it's hard to reinstate Latin final vowels when so much has been changed. It's like the initial _f_- which had become _h_- in Spanish, you can succeed in imposing the Latin origins in learned words like _fondo/hondo, forma/horma_ but such common words like _hacer_ and _hablar_ were lost cases.  Other than that you are right there are many -_er_ verbs in Portuguese that lack the final vowel that is now always present in Spanish:  _quer_ (_quiere_) comes to mind as well.  Besides these examples in nasalization and certain -er verbs I tend to think Portuguese as conservative.  In many other cases the -_e_ is present in writing though mute, like the -_dade_ endings and other -_er_ verbs like _escreve, come_ or a pronoun like _ele_. Rather than reinstating, I think they weren't ever lost.  Spanish went through a stage when they were taken off, then put back on.



berndf said:


> I agree, though, that from a phonological perspective, this language has many advantages, an evenly spaced set of 7 vowels and no diphthongs and well distinguished consonants..


  Standard Tuscan does have diphthongs.  Think of _buono_, and _pietra_.  Many regional dialects lack them though.


----------



## Nino83

merquiades said:


> In many other cases the -_e_ is present in writing though mute, like the -_dade_ endings and other -_er_ verbs like _escreve, come_ or a pronoun like _ele_.



But in Brazil it is pronounced. Portuguese orthography is made for both variants. I think that, if Portuguese weren't spoken in Brazil, probably Portuguese orthography would have been similar to Spanish orthography. 



merquiades said:


> *Standard* Tuscan does have diphthongs.  Think of _buono_, and _pietra_.  Many regional dialects lack them though.



It depends. Modern Tuscan had diphthongs but contemporary Tuscan (dialect) has monophthongs.


----------



## berndf

merquiades said:


> Standard Tuscan does have diphthongs.  Think of _buono_, and _pietra_.  Many regional dialects lack them though.


Buono = /ˈbwɔno/


----------



## merquiades

Nino83 said:


> But in Brazil it is pronounced. Portuguese orthography is made for both variants. I think that, if Portuguese weren't spoken in Brazil, probably Portuguese orthography would have been similar to Spanish orthography.


 I doubt Brazilian pronunciation was taken into account in spelling until very recent times.  That was determined in Coimbra and Lisbon. 


> It depends. Modern Tuscan had diphthongs but contemporary Tuscan (dialect) has monophthongs.


  Can you give me an example of how these diphthongs have become monophthongs? 


			
				Berndf said:
			
		

> Buono = /ˈbwɔno/


  Yes, diphthongs always have a [w] or [j] element to them.  Triphthongs have both.


----------



## berndf

Not at all. Buono contains no more a diphthong than "warm".


----------



## Nino83

merquiades said:


> Can you give me an example of how these diphthongs have become monophthongs?



"I dialetti marginali (aretino-chianaiolo, garfagnino e versiliese, elbano) presentano, in luogo dei dittonghi ascendenti /wɔ/ (*poi monottongato a /ɔ/ nel toscano centrale*) e /jɛ/, i corrispondenti medio-alti /o/ e /je/." 

"Toscano centrale" is contemporary Florentine. 

http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/dialetti-toscani_(Enciclopedia_dell'Italiano)/ 

Buono = /ˈbɔno/


----------



## merquiades

berndf said:


> Not at all. Buono contains no more a diphthong than "warm".



Italian has both rising and falling diphthongs.  When _i_ or _u_ precede another vowel they are pronounced together with the first element reduced to [j] or [w] and rising into the following vowel.  See this article.  





> I dittonghi ascendenti possibili sono:
> 
> /ja/ come in piano
> /je/ come in ateniese
> /jɛ/ come in biella
> /jo/ come in fiore
> /jɔ/ come in piove
> /ju/ come in più
> /wa/ come in guado
> /we/ come in quello
> /wɛ/ come in guerra
> /wi/ come in suino
> /wo/ come in liquore
> /wɔ/ come in nuoto



Contrary to Romance languages English only has falling diphthongs, not rising ones. _W_ and _y_ are full consonants when preceding a vowel sound: _yellow, wallow_ and semi-vowels in a falling diphthong afterwords: _boy_ or _bow_.


----------



## Angelo di fuoco

Nino83 said:


> I think all depends on pronunciation. If these "e" are pronounced, then the "restoration" can work but if they are not pronounced this restoration simply makes written language different from the spoken language.



In Spanish, the restoration worked not only for vowels, but also for consonants: "respeto" - "respecto". In this case, the restoration in writing was followed by restoration in speech.



Nino83 said:


> In Portuguese those "e" are not pronounced, neither in Brazil nor in Portugal, and final "e" in other words can be elided in Portugal but is clearly pronounced (with an _) in Brazil (which is the country having more population). So we have "verdade" in Portuguese but "verdad" in Spanish._


_

I think the real reason is that the d, the way it is spoken in Portugal, was hard to maintain without a subsequent "auxiliar" vowel, and, apparently, devoicing like in Catalan (compare verdade, verdad, veritat) was not an option.
The "elided" final e in Portuguese, as I hear it, is a schwa._


----------



## Nino83

merquiades said:


> Contrary to Romance languages English only has falling diphthongs, not rising ones. _W_ and _y_ are full consonants when preceding a vowel sound: _yellow, wallow_ and semi-vowels in a falling diphthong afterwords: _boy_ or _bow_.



What is the difference between the "w" in "what" and the "w" in "uovo"? 

Anyway, contemporary Florentine has "bono" (instead of "buono").


----------



## merquiades

Nino83 said:


> and they introduced a lot of irregularities, like "hecho"/"perfecto"
> 
> (I don't know if the "cto"/"cho" was a regular process and if "perfecto" is a learned word. Do you know something more about it?).



Yes, the [k] was vocalized in [j] which combined with the [t], palatalized and made [ʧ].  That's normal in Castilian.   the -ect words are cultismos introduced after the Renaissance.   A similar process happened in French but there was no palatalization,  maybe because the [t] had been muted by then.   

There are certainly irregularities.  It's be quite hard to impose _facer > facto_ on the masses, but they're certainly not going to make *_porhecho_.



Nino83 said:


> What is the difference between the "w" in "what" and the "w" in "uovo"?
> 
> Anyway, contemporary Florentine has "bono" (instead of "buono").



The difference that creates foreign pronunciation.  An Englishman might well say "volyo un wovo", an italian "Uat do you uanta?"  Trivial for some, of great importance to others.

I didn't know the monophthong had become so widespread.  Do they say _omo _too?


----------



## Nino83

merquiades said:


> I didn't know the monophthong had become so widespread.  Do they say _omo _too?



If we're speaking about Tuscan dialect, yes ([ɔ] in central Tuscan, [o] in Arezzo, according to Treccani).


----------



## bloop123

merquiades said:


> Italian has both rising and falling diphthongs.  When _i_ or _u_ precede another vowel they are pronounced together with the first element reduced to [j] or [w] and rising into the following vowel.  See this article.
> 
> Contrary to Romance languages English only has falling diphthongs, not rising ones. _W_ and _y_ are full consonants when preceding a vowel sound: _yellow, wallow_ and semi-vowels in a falling diphthong afterwords: _boy_ or _bow_.



What about the oi in  noi and au in causa? They sound alot like dipthongs to me.


----------



## merquiades

bloop123 said:


> What about the oi in  noi and au in causa? They sound alot like dipthongs to me.



Yes, they are dipththongs, falling diphthongs  [oj] and [aw]


----------



## Youngfun

The Roman dialect has a Southern Italian substratum (pre-16th century Romanesque was very similar to Neapolitan), but heavily influenced by Florentine (huge immigration from Florence after the city's population reduced drastically because of leprosy).
Therefore, it's not closer to Latin than any other Southern or Central Italian dialect.


----------



## Nino83

merquiades said:


> /wi/ come in suino



There is an error on wikipedia. 

"Suino" has a hiatus, not a diphthong (su-ìno) 

http://www.dizionario.rai.it/poplemma.aspx?lid=18199&r=10814


----------



## berndf

merquiades said:


> Italian has both rising and falling diphthongs. When _i_ or _u_ precede another vowel they are pronounced together with the first element reduced to [j] or [w] and rising into the following vowel. See this article.


I don't agree with this analysis (semi vowel + vowel = diphthong rather then approximant + vowel) and I don't think I am alone with this. But it doesn't matter; I forgot about falling diphthongs as in _noi_ or _vorrei_. So, forget what I said about Italian not having diphthongs.


----------



## Ben Jamin

merquiades said:


> The difference that creates foreign pronunciation.  An Englishman might well say "volyo un wovo", an italian "Uat do you uanta?"  Trivial for some, of great importance to others.
> 
> I didn't know the monophthong had become so widespread.  Do they say _omo _too?


Are these differences actually discernible in fast speech?


----------



## Nino83

Ben Jamin said:


> Are these differences actually discernible in fast speech?



No, they aren't (also in normal speech).


----------



## isocore

amazing im enjoying loads reading these! I'm from Rome and i'll add my two cents: in contemporary roman dialect we use the word "Mo" to say "Now" ( in italian being "Ora" or "Adesso") , straight from latin Mox. Also "Sorcio" for rat, from Suricum, italian "Topo". there's defo more of these i can't think of right now!


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## Angelo di fuoco

Wasn't _sorcio_ a somewhat rare synonym for _topo_ in Italian, too?
And if I'm not mistaken, _sorcio_ is not a _rat_, but a _mouse_ in standard Italian. Is that the case in Romanesco?
The etymology for _sorcio_ is not _suricum_ because (_frumentum_) _suricum_ gives _sorgo_ (a crop) in modern Italian. The etymology of _sorcio_ is _sorex_, _soricis_, according to Treccani.


----------



## Dymn

merquiades said:


> The -e was very actively restored to verb forms during the renaissance. The reinstating was successful with verbs and also pronouns, but less so with nouns, especially after -r and -d.


So, is the _e_ in _tiene, quiere, dice, hace, _or in nouns whose final cluster wouldn't be allowed in Modern Spanish (_parte, gente, ..._), the result of a conscious effort to approach Latin?  

In Galician-Portuguese and Astur-Leonese the first group (verbs) have indeed lost their _e_, but not nouns like _parte_ or _gente_.


----------



## Angelo di fuoco

The e in quiere: compare _doquier_ or _qualquier_ (_qualquiera_ when it comes before the noun it (un-)defines) with modern _quiere_, as well as _dizque_ with modern dice _que_, and you have the answer at least for those words.

For what I know, word-final consonant clusters aren't allowed in Galician-Portuguese either, so it's still _parte_ (as a verb form).


----------



## Olaszinhok

Nino83 said:


> Phonology and grammar (as well as 98% of vocabulary) are equal to those of the other dialects spoken south of the La Spezia-Rimini line.


Not at all. The Florentine/Tuscan "dialect" is much more conservative than other Central and Southern Italian"dialects", both phonologically and morphologically. Consider the usage of the subjunctive mood and the extensive use of the perfect (passato remoto). In other areas of Central Italy, the latter  is no longer used in casual speech and the present of the subjunctive mood does not even exist in most dialects. Tuscan also boasts other interesting grammar aspects: the use of _codesto _(Spanish _ese, ése)_, _costì _(Spanish _ahí)_ and so forth.



Angelo di fuoco said:


> Wasn't _sorcio_ a somewhat rare synonym for _topo_ in Italian, too?


Yes, it is. It is normally used in my area, too. It actually means mouse, not rat.


----------



## merquiades

Dymn said:


> So, is the _e_ in _tiene, quiere, dice, hace, _or in nouns whose final cluster wouldn't be allowed in Modern Spanish (_parte, gente, ..._), the result of a conscious effort to approach Latin?
> 
> In Galician-Portuguese and Astur-Leonese the first group (verbs) have indeed lost their _e_, but not nouns like _parte_ or _gente_.


According to what I learned, yes.  All of those -e had disappeared and you can see it in some pre-Renaissance literature, even in object pronouns like -le.  They were then reinstated.
The word that I'm not to sure about is "conscious".  Personally I think it happened naturally with people imbued with Latin (maybe Italian too).  For sure, I've read that some writers believed Spanish to be ugly, lost and vulgar and needing to be elevated, refined or corrected.

I'm wondering if _parte_ and _gente_ might be _cultismos_.  For instance, I think _gentem_ should have been _yen(t)(e)_.



Olaszinhok said:


> and the present of the subjuctive mood does not even exist in most dialects.


  Really?   What would you all use instead of it?


----------



## Olaszinhok

merquiades said:


> Really? What would you all use instead of it?


The present of the indicative mood.


----------



## Sardokan1.0

isocore said:


> amazing im enjoying loads reading these! I'm from Rome and i'll add my two cents: in contemporary roman dialect we use the word "Mo" to say "Now" ( in italian being "Ora" or "Adesso") , straight from latin Mox. Also "Sorcio" for rat, from Suricum, italian "Topo". there's defo more of these i can't think of right now!



Many of these features can be found also in other Romance languages.


_Sardinian (Logudorese,Nuorese) _: _*como *_(now - probably from "com+mox" = with now)
_Sardinian (Campidanese)_ : _*immòi *_(now - in + mox?)
_Friulan _: *acumò *(now - ab + cum + mox?)
_Romanian _: *acum *(now)


_Sardinian (Logudorese,Nuorese) : *sòriche, sòrighe* _(Latin _"soricem"_ accusative of _sorex-soricis_)
_Romanian : _*şoarece*


----------



## Angelo di fuoco

Olaszinhok said:


> Not at all. The Florentine/Tuscan "dialect" is much more conservative than other Central and Southern Italian"dialects", both phonologically and morphologically. Consider the usage of the subjunctive mood and the extensive use of the perfect (passato remoto). In other areas of Central Italy, the latter  is no longer used in casual speech and the present of the subjunctive mood does not even exist in most dialects. Tuscan also boasts other interesting grammar aspects: the use of _codesto _(Spanish _ese, ése)_, _costì _(Spanish _ahí)_ and so forth.



Since I live in Northern Germany, I don't have that much to do with native speakers of Italian, but I've got the feeling that the passato remoto is quite actively used by educated speakers even from areas like Treviso. Friends from Naples (very educated) used it very actively in spontaneous speech.
I'm not so sure about how far the Central Italian area without active use of the passato remoto extends. Is it only Rome or is this area bigger?



Olaszinhok said:


> Yes, it is. It is normally used in my area, too. It actually means mouse, not rat.


I remembered it because Umberto Eco discusses the meanings of topo-sorcio-rat-souris in his book on translation ("Dire quasi la stessa cosa: Esperienze di traduzione").


----------



## bearded

Angelo di fuoco said:


> I've got the feeling that the passato remoto is quite actively used by educated speakers even from areas...


Hello Feuerengel
In my view it's just a legend that passato remoto is so seldom used in Italian. In order to narrate events that took place in a 'remote' past, that tense is normally used by educated people all over Italy.
E.g. _Quando avevo tre mesi, mia madre si *ammalò *e non *poté *più allattarmi _(when I was 3 months old, my mother fell ill and could not breastfeed me any more) : it's a fully normal sentence in Italian.
The difference (from the standard) is that in some regions, like Tuscany and Sicily, 'passato remoto' is used also for recent events.
E.g. _Dianzi il bambino* andò* a scuola _(in Tuscany: a short time ago, the child went to school). Normally: poco fa il bambino è andato a scuola.
_Che* facesti*? _(In Sicily: what did you do?): Normally: che (cosa) hai fatto?.


----------



## Olaszinhok

Angelo di fuoco said:


> I'm not so sure about how far the Central Italian area without active use of the passato remoto extends. Is it only Rome or is this area bigger?
> Friends from Naples (very educated) used it very actively in spontaneous speech.


In my previous post, I was referring to spoken Italian and everybody knows (at least the ones who like reading statistics and articles about this important subject) that in _Northern Italian _the _passato remoto _is no longer used in casual speech, there are some rare exceptions like the city of Bolonia and other small areas. It's still used extensively in Tuscany and in many southern regions: Campania, Apulia, Abruzzo, Southern Marche and even in Rome.   Regards formal Italian, particularly in writing, it is obviously a different story.
As an example, in Northern Marche and Umbria, the _Passato remoto _is no longer used in casual speech, excactly like in the North of Italy. However,  there may be a difference in the use of this verb tense between more educated people or older people and new generations.

Regarding Naples and all the _Campania_ Region, I can say that the usage of_ passato remoto _is widespread everywhere, regardless of educated or not educated people.

In my #78 I was speaking about the usage of the present of the subjunctive mood in most Central and Southern dialects (languages). In standard Italian, based upon the Florentine dialect, the present of the subjunctive must be used throughout the Peninsula.


----------



## elroy

Olaszinhok said:


> I was speaking about the usage of the present of the subjunctive mood in most Central and Southern dialects (languages).


 So in these dialects/languages the present subjunctive is never used?!   Can you give some examples?

Voglio che Guiseppe mi aiuta?  
Penso fa freddo lì?  
È importante che facemo la scelta subito?


----------



## Olaszinhok

elroy said:


> Voglio che Guiseppe mi aiuta?
> Penso fa freddo lì?
> È importante che facemo la scelta subito


For instance, in the_ Romanesco _language that should be:
_Vojo che Giuseppe m'aiuta
Penso che lì fa freddo 
È importante fa' o che famo la scelta subito._


----------



## elroy

Oops, I made up “facemo.”   That should be “facciamo,” but that makes it a bad example because the subjunctive is the same form!


----------



## bearded

elroy said:


> because the subjunctive is the same form!


And I believe that also 'famo' can be both indicative and (if existing) subjunctive in _romanesco. _


----------



## Olaszinhok

elroy said:


> “facemo


_Facemo_ is fine, it is used in many dialects.


----------



## Ben Jamin

Gezedka said:


> ... The city was devastated, abandoned and cleansed many times and the 'patrician' classes left for safe havens long before the alleged 'Germanic Invasions'. ...


"Alleged invasions"? Do you know some secret alternative history of the Italian peninsula?


----------



## guihenning

killerbee256 said:


> Hmmm _tien, vien, haz, diz _rather resemble their portugues counter parts _tem, vem, faz, diz_. Was there no "Restoration" movement in Portugal?


I'm coming too late for this, but until _recently_ _"fazer", "dizer" _and _"querer"_ were conjugated as _"faze", "dize" _and_ "quere"_ - these are still fully accepted imperatives these days, though rare or perceived as dialectal or old fashioned. There are some online conjugators that will show these forms side by side with _"faz", "diz" _and _"quer"_. These forms with final <e> are also (still?) present in some parts of southern Brazil. For "vir", someone already explained correctly above about the nasals. "querer" is the most conservative of the group, so much that it's accepted to say (ele) "quere-o" along with (ele) "qué-lo", just because the conjugation was once like that and it seems it was the latest of these aforementioned verbs to lose its final vowel. The loss is too recent to be revived by some lunatics in the 17th century


----------



## Angelo di fuoco

bearded said:


> Hello Feuerengel
> In my view it's just a legend that passato remoto is so seldom used in Italian. In order to narrate events that took place in a 'remote' past, that tense is normally used by educated people all over Italy.
> E.g. _Quando avevo tre mesi, mia madre si *ammalò *e non *poté *più allattarmi _(when I was 3 months old, my mother fell ill and could not breastfeed me any more) : it's a fully normal sentence in Italian.
> The difference (from the standard) is that in some regions, like Tuscany and Sicily, 'passato remoto' is used also for recent events.
> E.g. _Dianzi il bambino* andò* a scuola _(in Tuscany: a short time ago, the child went to school). Normally: poco fa il bambino è andato a scuola.
> _Che* facesti*? _(In Sicily: what did you do?): Normally: che (cosa) hai fatto?.



Sorry, I didn't come here for quite some time.
I know about the legend that passato remoto is so seldom used in Italian. Unfortunately, this legend is being spread among foreign learners, especially in folk high schools.
Since university, I have met Italians from the most different regions. Since there aren't that many Italians around, I pay close attention to the way they speak. So yes, I know it is used. The first instance was that I consistently used passato remoto when I was making a sum-up of a documentary film on a historical subject. A fellow student had something like a cultural shock, while our Italian teacher, a native speaker from Apulia, afterwards said she didn't notice it and thought that I was using historical present tense.
However, what I wanted to stress was not the fact that passato remoto is used as such, but that it is used, as a wrote, by educated speakers from areas in Northern Italy that you usually wouldn't suspect of having passato remoto in their casual speech. I mentioned Treviso not without intention.



Olaszinhok said:


> In my previous post, I was referring to spoken Italian and everybody knows (at least the ones who like reading statistics and articles about this important subject) that in _Northern Italian _the _passato remoto _is no longer used in casual speech, there are some rare exceptions like the city of Bolonia and other small areas. It's still used extensively in Tuscany and in many southern regions: Campania, Apulia, Abruzzo, Southern Marche and even in Rome.



From Sicilian exchange students I heard that they avoid in speech. The explanation is that, while in Sicilian it is generalised, in Sicilian Italian they fear they might overuse it, so that at least some Sicilians don't used it in context where it is required in Standard Italian.


Olaszinhok said:


> Regards formal Italian, particularly in writing, it is obviously a different story.


Apparently some Northern Italian writers think it is OK not to use passato remoto in narrative.
Yes. When I was reading a book by Susanna Tamaro, I had difficulties understanding because she didn't distinguish between passato remoto and passato prossimo: everything was just the latter. However, she has at least some pretense to write literature with some ambition, while Fabio Volo doesn't have it.



Olaszinhok said:


> As an example, in Northern Marche and Umbria, the _Passato remoto _is no longer used in casual speech, excactly like in the North of Italy. However,  there may be a difference in the use of this verb tense between more educated people or older people and new generations.


Thanks for that information.



Olaszinhok said:


> Regarding Naples and all the _Campania_ Region, I can say that the usage of_ passato remoto _is widespread everywhere, regardless of educated or not educated people.



My sample of Napoletan and Campanian acquaintances is just too small.



Olaszinhok said:


> In my #78 I was speaking about the usage of the present of the subjunctive mood in most Central and Southern dialects (languages). In standard Italian, based upon the Florentine dialect, the present of the subjunctive must be used throughout the Peninsula.


Apparently, in Rome the absence of subjunctive in Romanesco is penetrating at least colloquial Italian.


----------



## Olaszinhok

Angelo di fuoco said:


> However, what I wanted to stress was not the fact that passato remoto is used as such, but that it is used, as a wrote, by educated speakers from areas in Northern Italy that you usually wouldn't suspect of having passato remoto in their casual speech. I mentioned Treviso not without intention.


Not only is passato remoto used in many regions and registers of Italian but I would say that it is also alive and kicking. Even little children, living in areas where this verb tense is no longer used in speech, normally learn to tell fairy tales with Passato remoto, text-books are full of  these verb forms from elementary to secondary school.  As a result, it is undoubtedly  something that belongs to the average Italian's upbringing. As I wrote many times in this forum, the passato romoto is normally used in newspapers and magazines , Tv news and programmes. In many regions is normally used in speech, like in Tuscany and this is quite importat to me, if we take into account that Italian is based upon the Florentine.
You mentioned Susanna Tamaro, I have only read one of her books and I can recall some forms of Passato Remoto, not many to be honest, but the other day, I was just listening to an interview of hers on the telly and she did use the passato remoto quite often, by narrating some episodes of her life.
The usage of Passato remoto in Italian may well be misleading, since it is not like in Spanish where it is very consistent, nor in French where it is no longer used in speech throughout the country. Not to mention Romanian, in which it is extremerly  rare nowadays, apart from some sporadic dialectal usages.



Angelo di fuoco said:


> Apparently, in Rome the absence of subjunctive in Romanesco is penetrating at least colloquial Italian.


You are probably referring to Colloquial Italian spoken in Rome? Aren't you? The subjunctive is a "cult object" in Italian, like the _orthographe_ in French. You could have a look at the tons of questions about this verb mood in the Italian only forum. Italians are almost obsessed with it. Sometimes, they even use it when they should resort to the indicative. It is normally used in colloquial Italian in many areas of the country, so I'd say that it is alive and kicking. Concerning the usage of the subjunctive mood in Italian, I'd say that there is a sort of stigma, if you happen to use it wrongly you may be seen as an uneducated and ignorant person.


----------



## bearded

Olaszinhok said:


> You are probably referring to Colloquial Italian spoken in Rome? Aren't you?


Olaszinhok, do you regard sentences like
_non voglio che vai via
preferisco che chiudi la porta_
(very often heard in TV programmes, especially in dialogues among young people)
as (influenced by) colloquial Italian spoken in Rome?
I think such phrases are unfortunately quite common nowadays in all Italian regions - of course used by not too 'erudite' people.


----------



## Olaszinhok

bearded said:


> Olaszinhok, do you regard sentences like
> _non voglio che vai via
> preferisco che chiudi la porta_


Hello Young Bearded  
You have rightly chosen a couple of sentences with the second person singular, in which the indicative mood seems to erode the subjunctive more substantially  in very informal and sub-standard Italian. However,  just imagine someone writing those sentences, say,  in the Italian forum or saying them during a school test. Wouldn't  they sound inaccurate and incorrect?  How would you consider such expressions? In my opinion, at the end of day,  the subjunctive mood is well preserved in contemporary spoken Italian, particularly if compared to other languages such as French or German, let alone English.
I am not sure, but I guess that the subjunctive is still used in the above sentences in Tuscany, even in very informal contexts.


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## merquiades

Olaszinhok said:


> Hello Young Bearded
> You have rightly chosen a couple of sentences with the second person singular, in which the indicative mood seems to erode the subjunctive more substantially  in very informal and sub-standard Italian. However,  just imagine someone writing those sentences, say,  in the Italian forum or saying them during a school test. Wouldn't  they sound inaccurate and incorrect?  How would you consider such expressions? In my opinion, at the end of day,  the subjunctive mood is well preserved in contemporary spoken Italian, particularly if compared to other languages such as French or German, let alone English.
> I am not sure, but I guess that the subjunctive is still used in the above sentences in Tuscany, even in very informal contexts.


Paraphrasing... Do you mean it sounds weird to (a few) (some) (many) Italians to have 2nd person subjunctive forms ending in -a, and they naturally want to have an -i there?
Present subjunctive is kind of a bizarre tense because of all three singular forms having the same endings.  I have even had natives tell me subject pronouns are needed with subjunctive:  For example, me not using the subject pronouns and it not being clear whom I'm talking about.


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## bearded

Hello Olaszinhok dear (you know, I am young at heart) 


Olaszinhok said:


> in the Italian forum or saying them during a school test. Wouldn't they sound inaccurate and incorrect?


Sure they would. My point was that unfortunately many Italians do not speak an 'accurate and correct' language, particularly as concerns subjunctive… Don't forget that students or foreros are (should be!) 'literate' and would never make those mistakes, which I think are  widespread among 'commoners'.
But you are of course right in saying that correctly-spoken and written Italian has preserved the subjunctive mood much better than other European languages (in German, however, it is extensively used in indirect speech).


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## Olaszinhok

merquiades said:


> Do you mean it sounds weird to (a few) (some) (many) Italians to have 2nd person subjunctive forms ending in -a, and they naturally want to have an -i there?


I don't actually know whether that's one of the reasons to explain the phenomenon. However,  it is advisable to use the subject pronoun with the second person singular in the subjunctive. 
_È meglio che tu vada…_
This is not unique to Italian, though.  Also in Spanish there are some confusing verbal forms: _yo/ él trabajaba; trabajase/trabajara, pueda _ect. Not to mention Brazilian Portuguese in which many verb endings have merged in casual speech.


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## bearded

merquiades said:


> I have even had natives tell me subject pronouns are needed with subjunctive: For example, me not using the subject pronouns and it not being clear whom I'm talking about.


If we hear _che  vada _(without 'tu') we instinctively think of the 3rd person (he/she), unless there is an unmistakable context. That's why 'tu' normally has to be expressed for the 2nd person.


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## Angelo di fuoco

Olaszinhok said:


> Not only is passato remoto used in many regions and registers of Italian but I would say that it is also alive and kicking. Even little children, living in areas where this verb tense is no longer used in speech, normally learn to tell fairy tales with Passato remoto, text-books are full of  these verb forms from elementary to secondary school.  As a result, it is undoubtedly  something that belongs to the average Italian's upbringing. As I wrote many times in this forum, the passato romoto is normally used in newspapers and magazines , Tv news and programmes. In many regions is normally used in speech, like in Tuscany and this is quite importat to me, if we take into account that Italian is based upon the Florentine.
> You mentioned Susanna Tamaro, I have only read one of her books and I can recall some forms of Passato Remoto, not many to be honest, but the other day, I was just listening to an interview of hers on the telly and she did use the passato remoto quite often, by narrating some episodes of her life.
> The usage of Passato remoto in Italian may well be misleading, since it is not like in Spanish where it is very consistent, nor in French where it is no longer used in speech throughout the country. Not to mention Romanian, in which it is extremerly  rare nowadays, apart from some sporadic dialectal usages.


The stereotypical representation of the passato remoto outside Italy is - I repeat it - that it is only a literary form, just like in French, where they, too, use it only in fairy tales now and maybe in historical texts (and in films when speaking about historical events). In written French, you may even encounter the passé simple it in a review of a theatrical performance or sports match, which is a no-go in Italian (the perceived proximity prevails in modern Italian, unlike hundred years ago where it was still perfectly normal, while in French it is the narrative aspect that prevails in this case).
Of course I know this representation to be a misrepresentation, since I have enough contact with Italians from different regions who do use it.
I remember reading a book of Tamaro's containing three stories (unfortunately, I cannot find it now, so I cannot tell you the title) without even one form of passato remoto. So this probably was a very conscious decision.
Yes, I know the usage of passato remote may be misleading. Though in Spanish there are, too, regional differences (Americans use it more than Spaniards, and some Madrileños reportedly use pretérito perfecto in some cases when Standard Spanish requires indefinido, as in sentences beginning with "ayer"). The correct use of passato remoto is more difficult than remembering the many irregular forms, since it implies having to make a conscious choice very often and the Northern Italian use has somewhat permeated the general use (i. e. "ieri sono andato" vs. "ieri andai", which should be the norm, just like in Spanish).
When I came to university I used it way too much, like it would have been used in the 19th century. The Italian teacher had to teach me the difference between librettese ottocentesco and italiano contemporaneo. A Facebook friend, a girl from Bologna, once commented that I used the passato remoto consistently in the way it should be used in modern Italian, unlike her who somewhat overused the passato prossimo.



Olaszinhok said:


> You are probably referring to Colloquial Italian spoken in Rome? Aren't you? The subjunctive is a "cult object" in Italian, like the _orthographe_ in French. You could have a look at the tons of questions about this verb mood in the Italian only forum. Italians are almost obsessed with it. Sometimes, they even use it when they should resort to the indicative. It is normally used in colloquial Italian in many areas of the country, so I'd say that it is alive and kicking. Concerning the usage of the subjunctive mood in Italian, I'd say that there is a sort of stigma, if you happen to use it wrongly you may be seen as an uneducated and ignorant person.


I am. I was asked to step in as interpreter for "Posta per te"on an occasion when they were filming in Germany and didn't know whether the person in question, a young man of 20, spoke Italian, since he had lived the whole of his life in Germany.
Those TV people used definitely less subjunctive mood than I would have, e. g. after "basta che".


Olaszinhok said:


> Hello Young Bearded
> You have rightly chosen a couple of sentences with the second person singular, in which the indicative mood seems to erode the subjunctive more substantially  in very informal and sub-standard Italian. However,  just imagine someone writing those sentences, say,  in the Italian forum or saying them during a school test. Wouldn't  they sound inaccurate and incorrect?  How would you consider such expressions? In my opinion, at the end of day,  the subjunctive mood is well preserved in contemporary spoken Italian, particularly if compared to other languages such as French or German, let alone English.
> I am not sure, but I guess that the subjunctive is still used in the above sentences in Tuscany, even in very informal contexts.


The subjonctif du présent is alive and kicking in French. The particularity of French is that present-tense subjunctive forms are morphologically undistinguishable for the -er conjungation (and ouvrir & couvrir with their derivates) except in the 1nd and 2nd persons in the plural. For the -re and -ir forms, the only undistinguishable form is the 3rd person plural except when the present subjunctive has a different stem (être: ils sont vs, qu'ils soient; faire: elles font vs. qu'elles fassent).
As to imparfait du subjonctif, it never has been used in the protasis of conditional sentences in Modern French except in double protases like "si je venais chez toi et que tu me laisasses passer la nuit chez toi tu me ferais une faveur", which is also standard for the present tense like in "si je viens chez toi et que nous jouions au basket je serai bien content". Regarding German, see below.


bearded said:


> Hello Olaszinhok dear (you know, I am young at heart)
> Sure they would. My point was that unfortunately many Italians do not speak an 'accurate and correct' language, particularly as concerns subjunctive… Don't forget that students or foreros are (should be!) 'literate' and would never make those mistakes, which I think are  widespread among 'commoners'.
> But you are of course right in saying that correctly-spoken and written Italian has preserved the subjunctive mood much better than other European languages (in German, however, it is extensively used in indirect speech).


Exactly. This is why in German it is not called "Konjunktiv Präsens", but "Konjunktiv I" (formal name) and is nicknamed "Konjunktiv der indirekten Rede". In the plural forms Konjunktiv I forms are frequently substituted with Konjunktiv II, which is morphologically derived from the Präteritum forms, while Konjunktiv II and sometimes even Konjunktiv I are often substituted with the (not yet formally grammaticalised) Konjunktiv III (Konjunktiv II forms of "werden" - "würde", "würdest" etc. +infinitive). This is due to the fact that, except for "sein", the Konjunktiv I forms are identical for the 1st and 3rd person plural, while in the weak conjugation the Präteritum and Konjunktiv II form are morphologically indistinguishable. I also get the feeling that Konjunktiv I and II are not properly taught at school anymore.


Olaszinhok said:


> I don't actually know whether that's one of the reasons to explain the phenomenon. However,  it is advisable to use the subject pronoun with the second person singular in the subjunctive.
> _È meglio che tu vada…_
> This is not unique to Italian, though.  Also in Spanish there are some confusing verbal forms: _yo/ él trabajaba; trabajase/trabajara, pueda _ect. Not to mention Brazilian Portuguese in which many verb endings have merged in casual speech.


Yes, but in Spanish the homonyms are limited to the 1st and 3rd person both for presente and imperfecto de subjuntivo, while in Italian the present subjunctive forms are morphologically identical for the three singular forms.


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## Youngfun

The problem with Italian is that we are taught in school that _passato *prossimo*_ literally means "recent past" and _passato *remoto *_"far away past".
This causes uncertainty because how do you define recent or far away?
For me, yesterday is a recent period of time, so I use passato prossimo.
Last year? Hmmm... depends on the mood of the moment.
Talking about Ancient Romans? Passato remoto if I were to talk about history. But informally I could say "ecco il Colosseo. L'hanno costruito gli antichi Romani".


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## symposium

Well, in some parts of Italy they use "passato remoto" and in other parts they don't. Where I was born and grew up, in the North East, no one ever ever uses it: we are taught to use it at school when talking about historical facts, but it's not used in casual, everyday conversation. We are aware, though (everybody is), that in other parts of Italy people normally use it in everyday conversation.


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## jazyk

What do the last posts have to do with "How close is the Roman dialect of Italy to Latin?"


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## Ben Jamin

bubbyx said:


> I wonder why Roman dialect did not gain as much prestige as Venetian and Florentine dialect


Because Florence was much more populous and wealthy than Rome in the Middle Ages. Have you ever wondered why there were no Gothic cathedrals in Rome?


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## Ihsiin

Ben Jamin said:


> Because Florence was much more populous and wealthy than Rome in the Middle Ages. Have you ever wondered why there were no Gothic cathedrals in Rome?



Because a cathedral is the seat of a bishop and the bishop of Rome is the Pope?


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## berndf

Ben Jamin said:


> Have you ever wondered why there were no Gothic cathedrals in Rome?


The term "Gothic" for this style of architecture was coined by the Roman clergy and that should tell us why.

Besides, there are some very nice Gothic churches in Rome.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipe...a_Maria_sopra_Minerva_(Rome)_-_Inside_HDR.jpg


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## Ben Jamin

berndf said:


> The term "Gothic" for this style of architecture was coined by the Roman clergy and that should tell us why.
> 
> Besides, there are some very nice Gothic churches in Rome.
> https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipe...a_Maria_sopra_Minerva_(Rome)_-_Inside_HDR.jpg





berndf said:


> The term "Gothic" for this style of architecture was coined by the Roman clergy and that should tell us why.
> 
> Besides, there are some very nice Gothic churches in Rome.
> https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipe...a_Maria_sopra_Minerva_(Rome)_-_Inside_HDR.jpg


Well, I should have used "almost none". According to Wikipedia "... the Minerva is the only extant example of original Gothic architecture church building in Rome." It seems that if there were more of them, the churches must have been relatively small and insignificant.
See here for Romes's population graph over history Graph of the Population of Rome Through History


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## berndf

Ben Jamin said:


> Well, I should have used "almost none". According to Wikipedia "... the Minerva is the only extant example of original Gothic architecture church building in Rome." It seems that if there were more of them, the churches must have been relatively small and insignificant.
> See here for Romes's population graph over history Graph of the Population of Rome Through History


Well, that was a side note. The main thing remains:


berndf said:


> The term "Gothic" for this style of architecture was coined by the Roman clergy and that should tell us why.


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## Ben Jamin

berndf said:


> Well, that was a side note. The main thing remains:


I thought that the main question was why Roman dialect did not become the standard language in Italy, and the hypothese that small population size and low economical importance of the town played significant roles in the development.


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## berndf

Ben Jamin said:


> I thought that the main question was why Roman dialect did not become the standard language in Italy, and the hypothese that small population size and low economical importance of the town played significant roles in the development.


I agree that the north was culturally and economically leading but the fact that there are so few Gothic churches in Rome has other reasons. The use of the extremely derogatory term "Gothic" for the stye is telling enough.


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## Şafak

The thread is too long to read all the replies. I’m sorry.

Some time ago, I read in one book that the closest dialect to Latin was the Sardinian dialect. Can you confirm this?


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## merquiades

You are right, except Sardinian was a full-fledged Romance language in its own right and the closest one to Latin. So it's not a dialect of Italian as Romanesco and Florentine are.


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## Penyafort

merquiades said:


> You are right, except Sardinian was a full-fledged Romance language in its own right and the closest one to Latin. So it's not a dialect of Italian as Romanesco and Florentine are.



Do you consider the Umbro-Lazian cluster to be constitutive of Italian alongside Tuscan?


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## merquiades

Penyafort said:


> Do you consider the Umbro-Lazian cluster to be constitutive of Italian alongside Tuscan?


I don't know what the original regional "language(s)" were like, but at least in the contemporary version they are very understandable in their oral and written forms.  You can get the hang of _Romanesco_ in the same way you can get used to Andalusian Spanish.  Endings are often lost, like the infinitive forms -_re_ of infinitives and words are truncated in some way or another.  Also l often becomes r, and Italian grammar rules are often broken, like which article to use and the _noi_ forms are -_amo_, -_emo_, -_imo_ rather than -_iamo_.  It's accessible to Italians, and I get it only having learned the purest Italian. Actually the Florentine dialect of Tuscan that replaces /k/ with /x/, /p/ as /f/, /t/ as /θ/ seems harder to follow for me.
This is different from the case of_ Calabrese, Pugliese, Bolognese_ or _Venetian_ which I have read and listened to but cannot decipher at all and the pure southern "language(s)" sound like Portuguese to my ears.
At the current time regional Italian is expanding and ever more entwined with the regional languages, so original dialects of Central Italy may have modified.


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