italian language
From Latin to the vernacular
Origins and the thirteenth century
After the fall of the Western Roman Empire, Latin remained the only language used in written communication in Italy for a long time, the only one to be used in literature and official documents.
he earliest written documents in which the vernacular is consciously used are four placites (i.e., judgments) found at Cassino and dating from 960.
One of these reads thus:
“Sao ko kelle terre, per kelle fini que ki contene, trenta anni le possette parte Sancti Benedicti” (= I know that those lands, within those boundaries described here, have been possessed by the Abbey of St. Benedict for thirty years).
However, the written vernacular language, from which the Italian language would originate, became established only in the 1200s, when it was also used in literary texts. From 1224 is the famous Canticle of the Creatures by St. Francis of Assisi, written in the Umbrian vernacular, some verses of which we quote:
Altissimu, onnipotente, bon Signore,
tue so’ le laude, la gloria, e l’honore et onne benedictione.
Ad te solo, Altissimo, se konfano,
et nullu homo ène dignu te mentovare.
Laudato sie, mi’ Signore, cum tucte le tue creature,
spetialmente messor lo frate sole,
lo qual’è iorno, et allumini noi per lui.
Et ellu è bellu e radiante cum grande splendore:
de te, Altissimo, porta significatione.
Altissimu, almighty, good Lord,
Thine are the praises, the glory, and the honor et onne benedictione.
To you alone, Most High, se konfano,
et nullu homo ène dignu te mentovare.
Praised be you, my Lord, with all your creatures,
Specially messor the brother sun,
Who is iorno, and lighten us for him.
And he is beautiful and radiant with great splendor:
Of you, Most High, he bears significance.
This document was followed by the lyrics of Sicilian poets from the court of Frederick II of Swabia. They were inspired by the Provençal troubadours (initiators in France of poetry in a later vanished neo-Latin literary language: Provençal), and founded a veritable vernacular school of poetry. The poetry of the Sicilians was so successful that it was immediately imitated in Tuscany, particularly by the writers of the Dolce Stil Novo.
During the thirteenth century the spelling of the literary language is still rather uncertain, and has quite a few fluctuations. The k for example is often present alternatively with c, the noun -gn- is reproduced in different ways (bath but also bango, bangno, bannio, etc.). The Latin etymological h still survives in many cases (homo, honore). The Latin spelling is also retained in the conjunction et. Among the articles lo predominates (lo quale, lo frate). Next to the Tuscan conditional in -ei appears in the poems the one in -ia spread by the Sicilian poetic school (saria = would be, diviria = should).
Numerous Frenchisms enter the lexicon, relating mainly to chivalric life and warfare (messere, knight, squire, damsel, madame, hostage, standard).
The fortunes of troubadour poetry lead to the establishment of many Provençal words (mestiere, onta, pensiero, coricare, donneare). On the other hand, the Arabs (who were present in Sicily from 827 to 1091 and had frequent trade exchanges with the maritime cities) are responsible for the entry into the peninsula of Oriental terms, especially in the maritime, economic and scientific spheres, such as warehouse, customs, dockyard, arsenal, tariff, admiral, admiral, zenith, nadir, algebra, digit, zero, alembic, syrup, orange, apricot, artichoke, saffron.
The Fourteenth Century
The fifteenth century
In the 1400s there is a return to the cult of Latin. The abandonment of medieval spiritualism and renewed faith in human reason are accompanied by the rediscovery of the Greek and Latin classics. The Humanists took to analyzing and reconstructing ancient manuscripts, rediscovering texts thought to be lost or even discovering works whose existence was unknown. Admiration for the classical world gives rise to the desire to imitate ancient writers and consequently also causes the revival of Latin, considered as the only language worthy of use in literature.
This situation of decadence of the vernacular ended only toward the end of the century, when some great authors (Lorenzo the Magnificent, Poliziano, Boiardo, and Sannazaro) came back to believe in the expressive capacities of the vernacular and to use it in their works.
Around 1470, with the spread of printing also in our country, there is not only a greater diffusion of books, but also the search for fixed rules that would make handwriting more stable. Despite this, many oscillations still remain, for example in double consonants (fuggiamo / fugiamo, abbiamo / abiamo). Punctuation is sparse and the apostrophe is missing (thus we spell lanima, lerrore for soul, error).
The articles el and il take over from lo. In the imperfect of verbs the ending -o for the first person begins to appear (I had to), but in the literary language the -a still prevails
(I owed). The imperfect in -o, which is a “quattrocentism” peculiar to fifteenth-century spoken Florentine, will be accepted into the literary language definitively only in the nineteenth century with The Betrothed. In Tuscany in the conditional the -ei forms prevail over the -ia forms of the Sicilian and literary tradition.
In the lexicon, as a consequence of the cult of Latinity, a great many Latinisms penetrate (clap, arboreal, epidemic, fanatic, insect, prodigious, trophy, vitreous). Contacts with other European countries and with the East make common words especially French (franc, archer, farce, regname), but also Spanish (marrano, giannetto = horse) and Arabic (mosque, tafferuglio).
The sixteenth century
The sixteenth century is passionately devoted to discussions on language: having now definitively recognized the literary dignity of the vernacular, it is now a question of which vernacular should be used. The positions taken by the Italian literati of the sixteenth century are basically three: that of those who believe that the Tuscan-Florentine of the great writers of the fourteenth century (Dante, Petrarch and Boccaccio) should be adopted, that of those who believe that Italian should make its own the most elegant words of all the nation’s spoken languages, and finally that of those who would like the modern Tuscan-Florentine to predominate.
The controversy ended with the success of the first proposal, mainly due to Pietro Bembo, who, in Prose della volgar lingua (1525), proposed as a model the language of Petrarch for poetry and Boccaccio for prose. Ludovico Ariosto, a poet of the Ferrarese court and author of the famous poem Orlando furioso, contributes to the affirmation of this proposal, correcting his own work according to the indications provided by Bembo.
The spelling in the sixteenth century is still largely Latin-like, but from the second half of the century onward the etymological h, the x and the ti group in place of z gradually disappear. Punctuation becomes richer and more regular, and spelling is made clearer by the introduction of the apostrophe.
As for the article, the rule advocated by Pietro Bembo is imposed: il in front of consonant, lo in front of vowel and s impure (the table, the friend, the coat of arms). In front of z, however, the is still used.
In the imperfect the first person forms in -a predominate, while the conditional in -ia now appears only in poetry.
Many Latinisms still enter the lexicon (abolish, canoro, decorum, exaggerate, peninsula). Wars and foreign dominations bring to Italy a good number of Frenchisms (convoy, crew, march, resource, trench) and Spanishisms (kiss the hand, compliment, disinclination, coward, punctilious). However, there are also many voices that Italy exports because of Italian supremacy in the cultural and artistic fields: for example, sonnet (spanish soneto, franc. sonnet, engl. sonnet), fugue (as a musical term: spanish fugue, franc. fugue, engl. fugue, ted. fuge), piedestal (spanish pedestal, franc. piedestal, engl. pedestal).
The Seventeenth Century
The Baroque age is a period rich in linguistic innovations, many of which, however, once the fashion is over, will eventually disappear. The need to arouse “wonder” in the reader prompts writers to invent bold and bizarre metaphors in large numbers, to invent new words, to mix in the lexicon, opposing tradition, elegant words to everyday and concrete terms, dialectal and foreign voices to technical vocabulary.
Nevertheless, in some circles the cult of tradition is still very much alive. Indeed, in 1612 the Accademia della Crusca published the first edition of its Vocabolario, based strictly on the language used by 14th-century Florentine writers. The work of the Accademia della Crusca helped regulate spelling: for example, the Academicians proposed the preservation of the etymological h only in ho, hai, ha, huomo and systematically replaced ti with zi (grace).
As for the articles, in front of z the is still used, but in the plural the prevails. In the imperfect of verbs the solemn style prefers the form in -a for the first person, but often the termination in -o is also found (in Galileo: solevo, dicevo, but also had).
The conditional in -ia, more frequent in poetry, is also found used in prose.
Many new words formed by the addition of prefixes and suffixes enter the lexicon (arcifreddissimo, oltrabello, Anticrusca, disamabile, impassibile, indispensable, caffeista, marinista, galileista, asineggiare, usignoleggiare). Many scientific (cell, condense, injection, hyperbole, prism, skeleton) and legal (aggression, census, consultant, advocacy) words are taken from Latin. Finally, to the domination of foreign powers we owe the importation of Spanishisms, in the first half of the century (brio, chocolate, boatswain, posata, backwash), and Frenchisms in the second (hazard, detail, fashion, wig, platoon, regiment).
The eighteenth century
Impatience with Baroque extravagances, already manifested in the late seventeenth century, became more pronounced at the beginning of the eighteenth century, when, due to the influence of the English and especially the French Enlightenment, the cult of reason spread.
The Enlightenment aimed to bring the truth and enlightenment of reason everywhere, to abolish superstitions and prejudices for the spiritual and material betterment of all men.
This new culture, based more on concrete action than words, also influences language use, which, particularly in prose, privileges the usefulness of content over the elegance of form.
As far as spelling is concerned, there is now a certain stability: the h is used only in exclamations and in the voices of the verb to have, and the spelling with zi has completely replaced the Latinising spelling with ti.
Among articles the front of z always prevails, but lo and gli in front of impure s dominate. In verbs there is still an abundance of variants (vediamo / veggiamo / vedemo). The -a form of the first person of the imperfect predominates over the -o form, and the conditional in -ia survives in both poetry and prose.
The strong influence of the French Enlightenment culture determines the entry into the lexicon of a very large number of Frenchisms, relating to different fields, such as fashion (chenille, flannel, frisare, frising), social life (boarding, madame, mademosella), food (cream puff, schnitzel, dessert, ragout), military life (bayonet, machine gun, picket), theater and music (marionette, minuet, oboe, rondo). There are also a great many general Frenchisms (alarming, daddy, replace) and locutions that translate French idioms (bel mondo, coup d’oeil, coup de mani, pun, cold blooded, dar carte blanche, courting).
The Nineteenth Century
The growth of the middle class leads to the success of the Romantic thesis, as teachers, doctors, notaries, technicians and military personnel feel the need for a middle tone language to replace dialect, whether for the needs of their profession or for simple conversation.
While poetry will still remain bound to tradition for decades, a definitive linguistic renewal takes place in prose. The most authoritative testimony in this regard is Alessandro Manzoni’s Promessi sposi (The Betrothed), who, for the final edition of 1840, adopted not the antiquated language of tradition, but the Florentine spoken by the middle class of the Tuscan city.
With political unity and the proclamation of the Kingdom of Italy, the slow but continuous process of linguistic unification of the peninsula began, a process facilitated by the more frequent opportunities for contact between people from different regions and the introduction in 1877 of compulsory schooling for two years. Despite the laws, the scourge of illiteracy nevertheless proved very difficult to heal: towards the end of the 19th century the vast majority of the population was still unable to read and write and spoke only dialect.
As for linguistic facts, the spelling is gradually stabilizing, although some fluctuations remain, for example in the use of double consonants (appostolo, proccurare, academia, catolico, publico).
Among the articles alternate the / lo and li / gli in front of impure s and z. Very common are the apostrophe forms of articulated prepositions (a’, co’, de’, ne’). Among the pronouns, he and she as subjects instead of he / ei and ella are becoming more prominent, partly because of the choice made by Manzoni in Promessi sposi (The Betrothed). In the verbs many variants still remain (abbiamo / avemo, deve / debbe / dee). In the imperfect the first person in -o begins to impose itself (Manzoni in the last revision of the novel replaces did, did not think with did, did not think). The -ia forms of the conditional are also sometimes found in prose.
Dialect words related to administration (e.g., Lombardisms accaparrare, caseggiato, ragioneria) and to typical foods (Piedmontese grissini and Emilian cotechini) are spreading in the lexicon. Many Latinisms enter the language of politics and law (constitutional, dilapidate, plebiscite, refurcation, socialism), while the penetration of Frenchisms continues on a massive scale (ambulance, suspenders, debut, misunderstand, account, oversee).
The Twentieth Century
The twentieth century brings to near completion the spread of the Italian language at the expense of dialects. Illiteracy, especially due to increased schooling and the work of the mass media, is increasingly reduced. After that of prose, the language of poetry, too, with the experiences of the Futurists and the Hermeticists, finally frees itself from the metrical and formal bonds of tradition.
Spelling and morphology have now achieved remarkable stability. In syntax, sentences of nominal type, i.e., without a verb, are becoming more widespread, following the example of the journalistic style (Bellissima the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games).
In the lexicon, the most noticeable phenomenon is the huge influx of Anglicisms, brought about by the great prestige achieved in science, technology and economics by English-speaking countries, especially overseas (baby sitter, bestseller, blue jeans, horn, computer, guard rail, hostess, jeep, killer, pullover, quiz, rock, self-service, spray, stop, supermarket, weekend).
Is the Italian language difficult?
Why is it worth knowing the Italian language?
Before asking “Is it difficult to learn Italian?”, it’s worth pointing out the advantages of learning Italian:
1. Phonetics - simple pronunciation
2. Vocabulary
3. Accessible grammar
There are no cases in Italian! (To date, my Italian stepfather does not understand why in Polish movies when addressing Maria, they say “Mario” – after all, Mario is a male name). For simple communication, 3 tenses are enough.
The challenges begin only at the intermediate level. There come grammatical structures that do not exist in Polish – such as congiuntivo, a mode that expresses emotions, suppositions, opinions. But on the other hand, I think this mode is brilliant, because immediately our interlocutor knows that we are speaking subjectively, it is only our opinion.
The suppositional mode has two forms, but it is very logical. If I invite someone to a party and he answers me with “verrei” it means that he will probably be happy to come, but if he starts the sentence with “sarei venuto” I don’t have to listen to the rest of the sentence, I know right away that it’s not possible. Beautiful, isn’t it?
I don’t know if all my students will agree with me, but I always say that the beauty of the Italian language lies in the exceptions. After all, a language is a living creation, constantly developing, changing and more than once surprising. This is exactly what Italy is like, diverse at every turn, simple to discover, hard to understand. Full of emotions, melodies, loud jingles.
4. Gestures
Summary
I love the phrase that a new language is a new vision of the world. By learning Italian, you will just learn a different vision of the world. I feel that this vision is more optimistic, open, dynamic and energizing. I like it. This is also my world since I said the first ciao.
Italian language and culture
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