Fun fact. The word “ciao” to say hello is not from latin but from Venetian dialect. At the beginning was “Sciao” means Schiavo (slave) and when people used it meant “ti sono schiavo” (i am your slave) in a friendly (and strange) form of kindness
I attended a Liceo Classico in downtown Rome and I was always told that Dante was the creator of the language, but Manzoni was the one who curated Italian and fought for "la questione della lingua", mixing formal Italian with vocabulary from latin and different dialects. Furthermore, don't know if this is true but I remember it is, the television was fundamental and had a massive impact in the spreading of standard Italian in all regions when it arrived in Italy. Btw at Liceo Classico (a kind of Italian high school), we study for 5 long years latin, greek and Italian, with respective literature. It was very interesting back in the days to see how the language has grown throughout the centuries.
@@storylearning The "Licei" were introduced with the Gentile Reform of 1923. The "Scientifico" was established with a more holistic approach in mind - despite what the name may suggest, you really study every subject - while the "Classico" focuses more on the humanities, as they were seen as essential for the future Fascist leadership. While we consider Dante as the father of Italian, a pivotal role was played by Manzoni with his masterpiece "The Betrothed" ("I Promessi Sposi"), which cemented Florentine as the definitive version of institutional Italian. Btw, please read it, it's a magnificent novel, which for some reason is completely ignored outside of Italy, especially in the English-speaking countries.
@Roberto Biagio Randazzo historically this was true, but now not at all. Liceo classico is defined by the subjects studied. Grammar school in the UK is defined by state funding and selective admission, students there can study any subjects
We also have “problems” to understand similar dialects in a range of 20/30 km. 😅 Every little-middle size town you visit have his variations of lot of words, so you can understand about the 80% of a speech but you will always find some word you don’t understand. Just an example for the other Italians here in comments: I’m from Rimini and I’m able to speak and understand “my” dialect, but if I go to Cesena (30 km) or Ravenna (50 km) I surely miss a good 20% of dialect terms. And I’m pretty sure this is a common problem in all areas of Italy 😂
"Nothing was ever simple in older Italy" Scratch that, nothing is ever simple in Italy, period 😂 great video, you were able to summarize everything without being confusing
I'm Italian, I grew up and currently live in Piedmont region. In 1988, during the last year of high school, we went on a school trip in Trieste. And while we were on a bus in Trieste, a lovely white-haired old lady told to a classmate of mine: "Hey, id1ot, please ring the bell" (to request to stop at the next bus stop). My classmate, a very polite boy, was astonished and replied: "please...?" And the lady: "Id1ot, please, ring the bell." My classmate was speechless and just rang the bell. And then we discovered that the word "picio", that means "id1ot" or "d..k" in piedmontese dialect, means "little one" or "kid" in Trieste's dialect.
Well in liguria as well as contea of Nizza , Picio, Piccion means little kid, little boy too. Piccioi al plural. Picciona in feminine and piccioni at feminine plural.
Just for the sake of knowledge/curiosity, Dante named his poem "The Comedy". It was Boccaccio, another famous writer (The Decameron) almost contemporary to Dante, who started calling it "The Divine Comedy" as a tribute to its greatness and that name stuck to this day.
@@MrKimikAos Indeed...I assume that even in Asmara young locals that can speak the language are few and far between...although my uncle did stumble on two Italian-speaking young Eritreans when I visited there a few years ago...
Thank you for this video. As a speaker of abruzzese (in the Neapolitan language group) it's really refreshing to see an English speaker correctly understand and explain that Italian dialects are really different languages that all come from Latin.
I was stationed in Napoli 1987-1991, and spent 3 years studying formal Italian thru courses at an American University branch, but the classes were taught by Italians. MY "Language Development" course was taught by a tough old woman from teh mountains of Abruzzo ( she moved to Napoli wiht her British husband she married after WW2). We had to STUDY "Inferno" in particular, and I remember herr commenting on the [espensive] special book we used because even modern Italian speakers need a page of notes/commentary on 1 page of COmmedia Divina. I wish I could have stayed in touch with her. SHe did become warm and freindly after I completed my courses in the Language for my Associate degree and moved on to the Art/ARchitecture, CUlture, History angles. I still remember most of the INscription on the Door to Hell, that som many lazy English speakers only know the one phrase "Abandon all hope...". Per me si va nella citta' dolente Per me si va nell eterno dolore Per me si va tra la perduta gente... ".. Lasciate ogni speranza, voi che entrate".
ALso after 4 years I had finally learned to understand a great deal of Napoletano [man, getting your ears used to separating those words TAKES A LONG TIME] but realized one has to grow up with, or move into that area at young age to ever really learn to spek it with any decency. But man do I love my Neapolitan music.
@@ZakhadWOW “per me si va nella città dolente, per me si va nell’eterno dolore, per me si va tra la perduta gente. Giustizia mosse il mio alto fattore; fecemi la divina podestate, la somma sapienza e ‘l primo amore. Dinanzi a me non fuor cose create, se non eterne e io eterno duro. Lasciate ogni speranza, voi ch’entrate”. This is complete period 😉
The incredible thing is, 700 years later an italian can still understand every word of the divine comedy (though it still feels rusty and some parts need some context to make sense), and appreciate its rhymes.
Insomma, senza la parafrasi l'inferno e il paradiso possono essere spesso incomprensibili Il purgatorio un po' meno ma troverai sempre una parola o due per verso che ti lasciano perplesso
The story behind the word "bischero" is a great one. Bischeri was the family name of a wealthy family living in Florence in the XIV-XV csntury but of foreign origins. They owned buildings just in the back of what today is known as the Cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore. At the time the cathedral was just a giant building site and the city council needed more space to build it. A big sum of money was offered to the Bischeri but they declined the offer. They wanted more money. The council raised the offer more and more but the avid Bischeri always refused. A fire mysteriously spread during a night, burning down the Bischeri's buildings, incinerating warehouses and the goods inside. Bankrupted, they had to sell what remained for a small sum. Later they left the city but their family name remained, turned into an adjective...bischero! lol
@@Lightmooninthesky lo so benissimo ma l'origine è quella da me narrata. Tra l'altro pare che l'accento originariamente fosse sulla e, stretta, Bischéri
@@ilarianannini2975 1. interessante, lo avevo saputo un po di tempo fa ma non me lo ricordavo effettivamente. 2. non avevo finito il video e quindi solo dopo mi sono accorto della mia "futile" osservazione e pensavo solo che potessi aiutare qualcuno con il messaggio precedente.
The longest ITALIAN WORD IS 30 LETTERS. This may be the funniest of them all. The Germans are renowned for their love of long terms and phrases, but they are not the only ones who like to push the envelope. Today, “psiconeuroendocrinoimmunologia” is the Italian dictionary’s longest word, clocking in at 30 letters and 13 syllables. The term has an acronym of PNEI and refers to the study of nervous, immune, and endocrine system functions. Okay, so it’s not longer than “supercalifragilisticexpialidocious”, but you have to admit, it’s still a pretty monstrous word.
just a quick correction, that serves more as a trivia: dante titled his work, "la commedia", the adjective "divina" was added by critics in later years
specifically by Boccaccio (which is also the main contributor in spreading the masterpiece that is "La Divina Commedia"), another prominent figure in italian literature
A fact that I find funny and interesting is that operas were written in Italian, even by foreigner composers (like Haendel and Mozart), whilst in Italy still every region had its own language. It was like a super-partes language (a lingua franca) spoke to understand each other.
I'm pretty sure that Italian was the official European language arpund 1400-1700. Not sure about the exact period, but it happened! Even a British Queen sent diplomatic messages in Italian
@@Fred_Klingon Sure, there were tons of literature wrote in Italian, but still the single regions spoke their own language 'till WW2. And in south Italy, where they didn't get a lot of migrants it's easier to here them still using their own idiom.
@@manuelaf.658 I libretti interi, come ad esempio per Mozart li scriveva Da Ponte quelli in italiano. Wagner faceva tutto da solo invece, lui predicava il WortTonDrama. Comunque, fino al romanticismo, l'opera per antonomasia era quella italiana, quindi tutti i compositori che volevano cimentarsi con essa dovevano masticarla un po'. Sia Haendel che Mozart vennero appunto a studiare in Italia.
My mother too. Every High School teacher before 1968 must learn perfect italian and calligraphy. She study a lot before delete her Natural slang from Rome, actually she still talk in a perfect perfect italian and sounds like Heaven, i'm afraid i was not able to talk the same way. She ever Say that She spent 10 years to learn the perfect pronunciation. And She talks fluid and normal latin too. Was a great teacher now retired.
@@ltubabbo529 yes only the old the young people no speak only spanish or portugués italian no is a important language in South América and no have more influence
In the 16th century, the dispute (other than Venetian), was between the 14th century Florentine (that was Bembo's position. But he proposed not the Florentine of Dante, but that of Petrarca and Boccaccio. Dante's style was considered too variable to be the base of the language, since he used both "high" and "low" level words), and the 16th century Florentine (Machiavelli's position). Bembo's position prevailed among the high class (in 17th century the Crusca's Dictionary was pure 14th century Florentine), but the dispute didn't end there. There remained advocates of contemporary Florentine, and they prevailed at last. In 19th century Monti and Manzoni, the most famous authors of the time, advocated for the use of contemporary Florentine and Manzoni's "I Promessi Sposi", the text that defined standard Italian, was written in 19th century Florentine. However, the particular evolution of the Italian language (that, being an "educated" language, wasn't subject to the evolution of common spoken language) made so that modern day Italians can still read texts written in 14th century vulgar without problems.
Allegedly, the oldest Romance language was Sicilian. In fact, the Sicilian spoken at the court of Frederick II was also one of the languages considered to be adopted as a national language. Also, a big player in the making of the Italian language as we know it is the novelist Alessandro Manzoni, who had written his I Promessi Sposi in Milanese but then rewrote it in late-medieval spoken Florentine, or as he put it, "bagnar i panni in Arno". Manzoni's writing was instrumental in the creation of Italian, he even was one of those in charge of designing the language. Also, thank you for promoting the history and uniqueness of the various Italian languages. They're disappearing because of the goverment insisting on teaching and speaking only Standard Italian, so much so that "dialect"-only speakers are considered rude and unrefined.
To be precise Manzoni rewrote his novel (the english title would be "The Betrothed", for all those who can't read italian) not in late-medieval florentine dialect, but in the florentine dialect variety that the élite of Florence spoke in the late 1800s, when he personally left Milan and went to live in Florence for a while in order to learn it so he could rewrite his book: the famous expression you quoted (although inexactly: it's "sciacquare i panni in Arno"->"to rinse your laundry in the river Arno") in fact references exactly his learning the language directly from its native speakers.
I taught myself Italian and lived in Sardinia and Sicily and was married to an Italian for a number of years. She was raised in Piemonte but her family was from Veneto and she had lived in Puglia and I met her in Sicily. Sometimes, she would say something that I didn't understand so I had to ask her if she was actually speaking Italian, Veneto, Piemontese, Barese or Siciliano. From my experience of living in Italy, it seemed that all Italian dialects sounded like something closer to Italian except Sardinian (Sardo). Sardinian is a language all unto itself.
Sardinian is a different language my friend.It is older than Standard Italian and it also contains influences from Ibero-Celtic languages that were spoken in Sardinia long before the Romans and Latin rose in prominence but nevertheless,it contains some similarities to Italian because of the shared Latin influence
I remember my literature teacher, presenting the Alessandro Manzoni's novel I Promessi Sposi (The Betrothed. I just learned that...), saying "this is an awful book: it has all the "don'ts" of good writing, but we have to learn it in school as it is the first book *officially* written in Italian" (1827)
In 13th century, before Dante's success, sicilian poems were the most appreciate and sicilian had good chances to become "official italian". Sicilian had anyway a great infuence.
Fun fact: I was born in Milan but when I was 4, my family decided to move in a smaller city in the suburbs. It was 50 km away from Milan, but I can tell you that during my whole childhood, and probably even my adolescence, I had to learn how to tweak my accent, in order to avoid to be noticed by the "locals". Now is not important as before. Considering also that the accent in Milan is more similar to the official, I'm happy to speak the "right" one :) The city were we moved to had a strong french influence, that's probably why the difference is more noticeable, while if you move to the Eastern side of Milan, to reach the same level of variation you need to travel around 180 km (against 40). Cheers!
Wow, and I thought our Swiss German dialects we speak in Switzerland are ultimate when it comes to dialects in Europe… Looks like our southern neighbours become some really tough competitors here! 😅🇨🇭🇮🇹
Schweizerdeutsch is almost incomprehensible to me spoken, and only a little better in written form. THe pronunciation of the Swiss/Swabian dialects drives me nuts LOL
@@razoo911 Sounds quite similar to the German-speaking part of Switzerland. We also have multiple dialects, maybe not around 100 (Switzerland is still much smaller than Italy), but even here, dialects change from place to place. Sometimes, even the neighbouring village speaks a different dialect than you do. It gets very interesting in the alpine regions of Switzerland. Over many decades, villages used to be quite isolated within the valleys. So, pronunciation and vocabulary have often changed, although everyone still speaks the same language. Of course, this was back in the day when mobility wasn’t such an easy thing as today. In modern times this isn’t much the case anymore, but you can often still hear people speaking much more differently although they are all from the same region.
@@razoo911 dialects, yes. BUt some ar distnct laguages according to the Liguistic standards. Napoletano, Sicilano, Sardo, Friuliano as primary examples
I have a few notes: It's funny how you called it "the language of love" while most of the words in our vocabulary have their own meaning as an insult. As you mentioned, it's worth noting that the spoken language is just one part of it, we are able to comunicate even without speaking, and that "what" gesture can actually mean "who? Where?" depending on the context. It usually translates to "repeat what you said". That "full of people" can actually also mean "say it shortly" or "get to the point" and can be done with either one or two hands. It can even mean "fear", but in a light context. If instead of wrapping your fingers together you rub them against your thumb, that means "money" if done fast, and "something of poor value" if done slowly. And it goes on. Don't worry if you're not able to say "tre tigri contro tre tigri", Italians can't say that either.
My grandma was born in 1934 it didn’t speak Italian as first language. Living in a small hamlet I learnt my Genovese dialect from the elderly. It is still largely spoken and it's still first language in the rural areas.
Also the Italians learned Italian because of the Tv, because in the first tv in Italy was there italian people speaking Italian, so here was the real spread of Italian 🇮🇹
In the Italian Constitution there is no article that says: Italian is the official language of the Italian Republic in 2007 there was an attempt to include it in the Italian Constitution However, there is an ordinary law (n° 482 / 1999) that recognizes the Italian language as the official language of the Republic.
Perché dovrebbe stare nella Costituzione, del resto? Tratta di diritti e doveri, alla fin fine. I dialetti sono importanti, ma se non si conosce l’italiano si è solo ignoranti come capre
@@JohnDoe-dj3lw Non tratta solo di diritti e doveri, definisce anche la struttura di base dello Stato. La nostra costituzione qualche falla ce l'ha, però alla gente piace dire "la costituzione più bella del mondo", su che base?😂 Andrebbero insegnate sia le lingue regionali che quella nazionale, come in Spagna o simili
Hi Olly! This was a great video! Just out of curiosity, have you ever thought about making a video on the Finnish language (suomen kieli)? I’m currently studying Finnish, and I think you would find the language very interesting to research. Have a great day!
I wasn't raised speaking Italian but after visiting Europe, I couldn't help learning It. I was fourty. I never woul have thought I could but I met people imigrating to Italy, learning the language, also speaking English. That's three languages! That seemed even more impossible so I tried to learn and it never became difficult. Even without anybody to learn with, I've been able to keep learning because I was in love with the Italian culture. I visited lots of other countries but there's only one Florence (Firenze).
Only one note on this very good video. You mentioned that Dante was "later" exiled, meaning after he wrote the "Commedia", but actually he was already in exile out of Florence when he started working on it
Never forget the importance of the Sicilian School to define the first rules of the language and the importance of the TV that after the WWII was the tool to spread the modern italian during the 60s.
The intelligibility problem is often overstated, as the local languages are disappearing and most people only speak standard Italian (albeit with different accents) as their native language. Especially in the north.
We literally speak different languages, you can recognize from what region someone is from the accent they have while speaking Italian. If a person from northern Italy tried to chat with one from southern Italy while only using dialect they wouldn't be able to understand each others at all (in fact there's a theory that links Italian gestures to the need to understand each others, since languages vary so much in just few km you just have to find a way to communicate that is para verbal)
A very informative video! It piqued my interest for the history of my neighbouring country as well as their language*s. Really appreciate the content you've been providing us.
After unification in 1861 a way to spread italian in the country (in addition to school) was military service. Sending young boys to do military service far from home, mixing various lands of origin, was a practice used until the end of 20th century, no more necessary for the language, but useful to improve mutal knowledge of different cultures.
Oh, those lucky people from Tuscany! They always have an unfair advantage. I’m from the north east, but I have colleagues from Tuscany. Every time they say a word that sounds strange (a word that I’ve never read in books or in the papers, or I’ve never heard) I go and look it up in the dictionary and, lo and behold, it’s an actual real word! Dang! Whereas when I venture to use a word from my own dialect which sounds a bit “off“, I have a 60% chance that it’s not to be found in the dictionary! Fun fact, in the region where I come from, if you just cross a river, you can enter another linguistic domain. “Friulano” is another language on its own and, despite having lived all my life in this area, having friends who are native speakers and listening to the radio in that language from time to time, sometimes I have a hard time understanding what they’re saying! And I cannot say a whole sentence in that language, without making a couple of mistakes!
Lo stereotipo del toscano come accento più vicino al neutro non poggia su basi reali. Addirittura ai tempi del fascismo si usava dire "fiorentino in bocca romana", questo perché i romani non hanno la gorgia, la g strusciata e altre cose tipiche fiorentine
I'm romagnol... And I speak Italian, English and a little bit of our dialect, I can understand why it is so tough to understand, in fact it's not italian, it's way more similar to a language in between French and Spanish all together in a weird mix of sounds.
Hello! Google says Florida is 170 000 km2 and Italy 301 000 km2? Anyway love your linguistics videos, I learn so much from them and I’m always taking notes! Will you do one on the Yiddish language anytime in the future?
My grandparents came to America from Calabria and I remember them telling us as children that there were so many dialects that Italians could not understand each other. Thank you for explaining the history. Edited to add that my grandfathers brother migrated to Brazil and was the only one. As a result of that we have family in Brazil today!
Hi people! A guy from Verona here, who can help you to solve the Veronese riddle. The answer is: a writer. Back in those days the pen was actually a pen, a feather (white plough), hold by the writer between the index and middle fingers (looking like two oxen). The black seed in the white meadows is the ink on pages. Hope you liked the riddle!
My grandmothers, one from Venice (1909) and one from Neaples (1922) could both understand my standard Italian, but they could not speak it. When they met, they needed the help of a translator...
So i was born in 2006 in Italy, and discovering that my state's official language was introduced only in 2007 was a almost a shock to me. Also you talked about so many things i didn't know, nice vid!
dialects can vary from town to town, even within one or two generation of people (like, grandparents-grandchildren) you can hear an evolution. anyway, in puglia we do have two different branches of dialect: the northern part speaks one that developed from neapolitan and the southern part speaks one that developed from sicilian
You can't say that one developed from neapolitan and the other developed from sicilian, because they all developed from vulgar latin. They just developed together. So you can say that Northern apulian dialects and neapolitan are related, while souther apulian dialects are related with sicilian. In the past all dialects related to neapolitan and neapolitan itself were called vulgar apulian.
If anyone is wondering about the riddle at 3:22, the answer is a scribe. He moves his white feather pen (the plough) on paper (the white field) spewing ink (the black seed).
I caught a taxi in Perth, Australia. The driver was an Italian immigrant to Australia. His was a distinctive accent that would be hard to replicate. The anglo-auzies already use what I call "poly-pthongs," e.g. snake comes out as "snaheeack." Combine that with an Italian accent, then try to understand.
Congratulations, you have a very good italian pronounciation. You should study the italian part of Switzerland, Ticino. Ticinese is quite similar to lombardo. Ticino is very small, the population is about 350K, but you will find dialect's differences similar to those you explained in your video, which is even more interesting.
I live very close to the Italian border to Ticino and even though we are only a few kilometres away from each other, people in my area can immediately recognize a Ticinese just by the way they speak and the words they use. It's very distinctive
Hey Olly, I recently discovered your channel, great job! Can’t stop binging on your videos🤓 Could you please make a video on Baltic languages, Latvian and Lithuanian? Being a native speaker of the latter, I would be more than happy to help you with the content!
There are some things I have to disagree with: - It's not true that with an intermediate Italian there's no guarantee that locals will understand you. Maybe that's true for old people in remote villages (not even Italians like to be in that situation), but everyone understands Italian even when they prefer to speak dialect (and notice that we often speak a mix of Italian and dialect with some adoptions from one into the other). - We definitely don't consider our dialects our first language and in bigger cities speaking a dialect is even considered less sophisticated and it's generally discouraged to speak it too much or in certain contexts. There are many who are proud to speak their dialects (often they are not from big cities) but this doesn't mean they think that's their first language. - It's true that many dialects can be really really different and dialects even vary between neighbour cities to make things more complicated but the level of distinction is not as high as many believe, the root is the same. Example: I'm from Sicily, I visited a friend in Veneto (2 very different dialects) and after a few hours I started to figure out what they were saying when they spoke their dialect. Dialects are not completely different languages. I would actually consider a stretch to see a dialect as a language. The examples at 12:05 are only partially correct: yes, they're both used to call somebody a stupid, but bischero is an actual Italian word (a tuning peg in a string instrument) that people mostly in Tuscany use to say stupid; pirla is a dialect word and means penis.
About dialects not being languages is very debatable, it depends on what you mean for language. Can a language define a culture, history, and exists without some political officiality? A State, and schools of grammars? If you say yes then italian dialects are languages, they have roots way back in centuries, before Dante was born, and they are not derivations each others, Venetian is not a derivation from Florentine. So, this is also my point of view, our dialects are languages, and we should preserve them. But if you answer no, and you require that a language must be official, and be imposed by a State, then dialects are secondary languages spoken by some farmers, inferior languages to purge from Italy. For me this is wrong, and ignorant about our history. We believe that "Italian" is much better just because it is modern and better codified, and we refuse to acknowledge the literature we have in our original languages, we let it disappear. With propaganda we spot on Dante, Manzoni and all recent writers. But this does not mean that our history is this short, what language was used when Venice fought the turks, when Vivaldi wrote his symphonies, when Marco Polo went in Asia and wrote Il Milione?
@@trattogatto Wow you took a long road. What I consider a language is something that can be consistently codified into a grammar compendium and that is officially recognised as a language, meaning for example that in a certain area that language is used in formal contexts like administration, lectures, etc. To my knowledge, no Italian dialect can be codified into rules, unlike Italian, English, etc. I'll limit my point only to Sicilian, my own dialect, and I'll go on telling you that we actually have a lot of inconsistency in the dialect between cities and small towns within the same province and between different provinces the dialect is even different in the "rules" with the same words used to say different things. So basing on that, it's pretty bold to consider it a language for me. Though we have literature in dialects, nowhere in italy dialects are officially in use in the institutional life of that region, and you'll never add your dialect in a CV. As a comparison, Catalan can be argued to be a Spanish dialect, but that is actually used in written document and used in lectures in schools so it has a much better claim as a language. All of this does not mean that dialects must be eradicated but let's be real they are secondary means of verbal (and hardly ever written) communication and the mindset of the big cities at least in Sicily is a reality: if you go to a bank and speak Sicilian people will understand you but you'll sound uneducated, in school teachers will force you to speak Italian, your parents will not let you speak it all the time (but it's from them that you'll learn it). This will not erase the history and culture behind dialects and it's expected that a person from a part of Italy should know its dialect, like a person from Italy should know the history and culture of their country and region to an extent.
Oh stuff it. Half the country are octogenarians who probably answered "yes" on the "do you speak Italian" census question, but that doesn't mean they actually do or (more importantly) will. Most of Italy doesn't speak a brand of Italian that foreigners who learned from books will ever understand and that's just a fact. Italians should quit lying about it and just help learners to buckle up for the rough ride they're in for.
As an actual Italian I can say that your fluence is quite good. Even if your accent instantly tells me where you are from 😂 I really liked this video. I miei complimenti
Fun fact: in most Tuscan dialects, the use of high register or Latin terms is still quite widespread. E.g. "codesto" ("that" but only if the object is near the listener), "capo" (meaning "head", not "chief" form latin "caput"), "stolto" and various other words that fell out of fashion in standard Italian.
Olly, you're such an interactive, entertaining (in a good sense), and effective communicator. I think you deserve more subscribers, even those who don't care about learning foreign languages.
5:27 Dante actually wrote the Commedia only after being exiled. Before that, he was mainly an ambassador in Rome and a member of the city of Florence's government before his political faction was defeated (which is the reason while he was exiled)
There's a film called Non ci resta che piangere with Roberto Benigni and Massimo Troisi, two comics from Florence and Naples, i'm florentine and i cannot know what Troisi says
![Digital Circus Episode 4 [TRAILER]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/abZtsmMUbJo/mqdefault.jpg)
The surprising truth about why the U.S. is full of Italians 👉🏼ruclips.net/video/K8E-iwNAoJM/видео.html
Olly , why don't you talk about Kato Lomb? A video about her and her prolific language skills
the guy does not sound so Romagnolo. And ROmagnolo is quite intelligible in comparison to other dialects
Florida is almost half of Italy, numbers are important..
Where is Florida? Is that a Spanish colony?
@@arolemaprarath6615 Love this comment
Fun fact. The word “ciao” to say hello is not from latin but from Venetian dialect. At the beginning was “Sciao” means Schiavo (slave) and when people used it meant “ti sono schiavo” (i am your slave) in a friendly (and strange) form of kindness
Il saluto esatto era : Sciao vostro Sior, Schiavo vostro signore,
In Austria e in alcune parti della Germania si usa dire "servus", con un significato molto simile
Venetian was the first language, together with Tuscan, to diversify from the vernacular
@@matteoarbitrio4260 in Romania as well
Ah, bene, d'oggi in poi riutilizzerò Ave per salutare
I attended a Liceo Classico in downtown Rome and I was always told that Dante was the creator of the language, but Manzoni was the one who curated Italian and fought for "la questione della lingua", mixing formal Italian with vocabulary from latin and different dialects. Furthermore, don't know if this is true but I remember it is, the television was fundamental and had a massive impact in the spreading of standard Italian in all regions when it arrived in Italy. Btw at Liceo Classico (a kind of Italian high school), we study for 5 long years latin, greek and Italian, with respective literature. It was very interesting back in the days to see how the language has grown throughout the centuries.
I had no Idea of the complexity before researching this video
@Roberto Biagio Randazzo absolutely false. Kind of insulting to define it as just “grammar school”
@@storylearning The "Licei" were introduced with the Gentile Reform of 1923. The "Scientifico" was established with a more holistic approach in mind - despite what the name may suggest, you really study every subject - while the "Classico" focuses more on the humanities, as they were seen as essential for the future Fascist leadership. While we consider Dante as the father of Italian, a pivotal role was played by Manzoni with his masterpiece "The Betrothed" ("I Promessi Sposi"), which cemented Florentine as the definitive version of institutional Italian. Btw, please read it, it's a magnificent novel, which for some reason is completely ignored outside of Italy, especially in the English-speaking countries.
@Roberto Biagio Randazzo historically this was true, but now not at all. Liceo classico is defined by the subjects studied. Grammar school in the UK is defined by state funding and selective admission, students there can study any subjects
@Roberto Biagio Randazzo well you study more literature than grammar actually
We also have “problems” to understand similar dialects in a range of 20/30 km. 😅
Every little-middle size town you visit have his variations of lot of words, so you can understand about the 80% of a speech but you will always find some word you don’t understand.
Just an example for the other Italians here in comments: I’m from Rimini and I’m able to speak and understand “my” dialect, but if I go to Cesena (30 km) or Ravenna (50 km) I surely miss a good 20% of dialect terms.
And I’m pretty sure this is a common problem in all areas of Italy 😂
Vero. Basta parlare con uno di Santarcangelo per sentire come cambia 😂
@@valentinoborghi4051 ecco, Santarcangelo poi ha un modo tutto suo di declinare certe chiusure, come stentazOINC melafrOINC 😂
@@manulanci e bagOIN 🤣
@@valentinoborghi4051 eeeeeeeesatto! 😂
Perché da noi passa un'issoglossa linguistica, cambia qualcosa anche tra Savignano sul Rubicone e San Mauro Pascoli
"Nothing was ever simple in older Italy"
Scratch that, nothing is ever simple in Italy, period 😂 great video, you were able to summarize everything without being confusing
I'm Italian, I grew up and currently live in Piedmont region.
In 1988, during the last year of high school, we went on a school trip in Trieste.
And while we were on a bus in Trieste, a lovely white-haired old lady told to a classmate of mine: "Hey, id1ot, please ring the bell" (to request to stop at the next bus stop).
My classmate, a very polite boy, was astonished and replied: "please...?"
And the lady: "Id1ot, please, ring the bell."
My classmate was speechless and just rang the bell.
And then we discovered that the word "picio", that means "id1ot" or "d..k" in piedmontese dialect, means "little one" or "kid" in Trieste's dialect.
Piedmontese language *
stupendo ahahah
This can create a lot of confusion if care is not taken.False friends can be a pain sometimes.Still, the situation is quite funny
Well in liguria as well as contea of Nizza , Picio, Piccion means little kid, little boy too. Piccioi al plural.
Picciona in feminine and piccioni at feminine plural.
"picin" is Ligurian for a little kid.
Just for the sake of knowledge/curiosity, Dante named his poem "The Comedy". It was Boccaccio, another famous writer (The Decameron) almost contemporary to Dante, who started calling it "The Divine Comedy" as a tribute to its greatness and that name stuck to this day.
I'm learning Italian as my second language and I think it's cool to learn about the history of it
Me too! Especially when it’s so interesting!
Are you based in Russia? :)
@@LOKI77able More like MOTHER RUSSIA! 😅
@@Tranefine Ты из Беларуси? :)
@@LOKI77able I speak 5 languages but yours isn’t one of them unfortunately! 😬🙈
Italian is spoken in Eritrea too! Asmara is called the Little Rome
A parte forse qualche vecchiotto quasi nessuno sa più nulla di italiano in Eritrea....e neanche in Etiopia...
@@MrKimikAos Quando c'era lui...
@@MrKimikAos Indeed...I assume that even in Asmara young locals that can speak the language are few and far between...although my uncle did stumble on two Italian-speaking young Eritreans when I visited there a few years ago...
No it not stay there all speak english only some old people speak it
@@MrKimikAos C'è anche una scuola italiana ad Asmara
Thank you for this video. As a speaker of abruzzese (in the Neapolitan language group) it's really refreshing to see an English speaker correctly understand and explain that Italian dialects are really different languages that all come from Latin.
I was stationed in Napoli 1987-1991, and spent 3 years studying formal Italian thru courses at an American University branch, but the classes were taught by Italians. MY "Language Development" course was taught by a tough old woman from teh mountains of Abruzzo ( she moved to Napoli wiht her British husband she married after WW2). We had to STUDY "Inferno" in particular, and I remember herr commenting on the [espensive] special book we used because even modern Italian speakers need a page of notes/commentary on 1 page of COmmedia Divina. I wish I could have stayed in touch with her. SHe did become warm and freindly after I completed my courses in the Language for my Associate degree and moved on to the Art/ARchitecture, CUlture, History angles. I still remember most of the INscription on the Door to Hell, that som many lazy English speakers only know the one phrase "Abandon all hope...".
Per me si va nella citta' dolente
Per me si va nell eterno dolore
Per me si va tra la perduta gente...
".. Lasciate ogni speranza, voi che entrate".
ALso after 4 years I had finally learned to understand a great deal of Napoletano [man, getting your ears used to separating those words TAKES A LONG TIME] but realized one has to grow up with, or move into that area at young age to ever really learn to spek it with any decency. But man do I love my Neapolitan music.
Frechete
@@ZakhadWOW “per me si va nella città dolente, per me si va nell’eterno dolore, per me si va tra la perduta gente. Giustizia mosse il mio alto fattore; fecemi la divina podestate, la somma sapienza e ‘l primo amore.
Dinanzi a me non fuor cose create, se non eterne e io eterno duro. Lasciate ogni speranza, voi ch’entrate”.
This is complete period 😉
@@ZakhadWOW imparare un dialetto non ha senso: l'unico dialetto che ci appartiene è quello della nascita
As a speaker of Brazilian Portuguese, it's impossible for me not to love the Italian Language and how it sounds. It just feels like home.
The incredible thing is, 700 years later an italian can still understand every word of the divine comedy (though it still feels rusty and some parts need some context to make sense), and appreciate its rhymes.
Beh ora tutte tutte no
Fratm ti sei riletto il paradiso di recente?
Insomma, senza la parafrasi l'inferno e il paradiso possono essere spesso incomprensibili
Il purgatorio un po' meno ma troverai sempre una parola o due per verso che ti lasciano perplesso
@@zoroasper9759 mi chiedo i compari inglesi cosa pensino del celeberrimo verso "ed elli avea del cul fatto trombetta"
@@uninspiredname2974 per non parlare di:
Tra le gambe pendevan le minugia;
la corata pareva e ’l tristo sacco
che merda fa di quel che si trangugia.
Ciao Olly, what an incredibly informative video and what a pleasure to be in there! Always fun chatting with you!
You made it!
The story behind the word "bischero" is a great one. Bischeri was the family name of a wealthy family living in Florence in the XIV-XV csntury but of foreign origins. They owned buildings just in the back of what today is known as the Cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore. At the time the cathedral was just a giant building site and the city council needed more space to build it. A big sum of money was offered to the Bischeri but they declined the offer. They wanted more money. The council raised the offer more and more but the avid Bischeri always refused. A fire mysteriously spread during a night, burning down the Bischeri's buildings, incinerating warehouses and the goods inside.
Bankrupted, they had to sell what remained for a small sum. Later they left the city but their family name remained, turned into an adjective...bischero! lol
Molto interessante 🙂
Non lo sapevo, ho imparato qualcosa di nuovo
it means "stupid"
@@Lightmooninthesky lo so benissimo ma l'origine è quella da me narrata. Tra l'altro pare che l'accento originariamente fosse sulla e, stretta, Bischéri
@@ilarianannini2975 1. interessante, lo avevo saputo un po di tempo fa ma non me lo ricordavo effettivamente. 2. non avevo finito il video e quindi solo dopo mi sono accorto della mia "futile" osservazione e pensavo solo che potessi aiutare qualcuno con il messaggio precedente.
The longest ITALIAN WORD IS 30 LETTERS.
This may be the funniest of them all. The Germans are renowned for their love of long terms and phrases, but they are not the only ones who like to push the envelope. Today, “psiconeuroendocrinoimmunologia” is the Italian dictionary’s longest word, clocking in at 30 letters and 13 syllables. The term has an acronym of PNEI and refers to the study of nervous, immune, and endocrine system functions. Okay, so it’s not longer than “supercalifragilisticexpialidocious”, but you have to admit, it’s still a pretty monstrous word.
Wow!
@@storylearning 😄😄😄😄
Me: psiconeuroendocri...why? Why?
In spanish psiconeuroendocrinoimmunologia is the same
@@marcelinho101176 en serio?
just a quick correction, that serves more as a trivia: dante titled his work, "la commedia", the adjective "divina" was added by critics in later years
specifically by Boccaccio (which is also the main contributor in spreading the masterpiece that is "La Divina Commedia"), another prominent figure in italian literature
You make me want to learn Italian
Mission accomplished!
This videos fills us with even more passion to keep making our videos about Italy 🇮🇹💙
Sono sorpreso dal tuo gesticolare per un intero video proprio quando parli della lingua italiana.
Io sono Italiano e mi domando perché sto vedendo questo video 😃. Anyway great video as usual. 👍
Sentire un parere esterno fa sempre bene
A fact that I find funny and interesting is that operas were written in Italian, even by foreigner composers (like Haendel and Mozart), whilst in Italy still every region had its own language. It was like a super-partes language (a lingua franca) spoke to understand each other.
I'm pretty sure that Italian was the official European language arpund 1400-1700.
Not sure about the exact period, but it happened!
Even a British Queen sent diplomatic messages in Italian
@@Fred_Klingon Sure, there were tons of literature wrote in Italian, but still the single regions spoke their own language 'till WW2. And in south Italy, where they didn't get a lot of migrants it's easier to here them still using their own idiom.
Ehm, loro hanno scritto le musiche, ma i testi delle arie vengono scritti dai librettisti. Per dire.
@@manuelaf.658 I libretti interi, come ad esempio per Mozart li scriveva Da Ponte quelli in italiano. Wagner faceva tutto da solo invece, lui predicava il WortTonDrama. Comunque, fino al romanticismo, l'opera per antonomasia era quella italiana, quindi tutti i compositori che volevano cimentarsi con essa dovevano masticarla un po'. Sia Haendel che Mozart vennero appunto a studiare in Italia.
Trade in the Mediterranean was conducted in "lingua franca." This was meant to refer to the Franks, but actually the base was Venetian.
It's fair to say that the only people who have correct diction in Italian are classically trained actors and a few newscasters.
There's no such thing as "correct" diction. I'd rather read "standard".
My mother too. Every High School teacher before 1968 must learn perfect italian and calligraphy. She study a lot before delete her Natural slang from Rome, actually she still talk in a perfect perfect italian and sounds like Heaven, i'm afraid i was not able to talk the same way. She ever Say that She spent 10 years to learn the perfect pronunciation. And She talks fluid and normal latin too. Was a great teacher now retired.
@@sibbolo9204 again, as an Italian, I am telling you there's no such thing as a perfect Italian.
Being "correct" in speaking a language is highly subjective, is it not? Who judges correctness? The director of a news program?
Finally a very educated and informative video about the many nuances of pronunciation and thousands of dialects of Italy.
Quite simplistic to be honest, but a good start
This video is wrong
Veramente è pieno di errori
@@ltubabbo529 you’re right but I appreciate the effort 😊
Great video Olly, thanks for your content and your explanations.
Simone
Italian is a beautiful language: very musical and very expressive.
Dante actually only called his creation “Comedy”, it would be called “Divine” later on
Great video! In Southern Brazil there are many small towns where people still speak Venetian (Veneto) to this day!
Cool
El talian
Not only the old who born in italy
@@chinchanchou Not only old people speak them
@@ltubabbo529 yes only the old the young people no speak only spanish or portugués italian no is a important language in South América and no have more influence
In the 16th century, the dispute (other than Venetian), was between the 14th century Florentine (that was Bembo's position. But he proposed not the Florentine of Dante, but that of Petrarca and Boccaccio. Dante's style was considered too variable to be the base of the language, since he used both "high" and "low" level words), and the 16th century Florentine (Machiavelli's position).
Bembo's position prevailed among the high class (in 17th century the Crusca's Dictionary was pure 14th century Florentine), but the dispute didn't end there. There remained advocates of contemporary Florentine, and they prevailed at last. In 19th century Monti and Manzoni, the most famous authors of the time, advocated for the use of contemporary Florentine and Manzoni's "I Promessi Sposi", the text that defined standard Italian, was written in 19th century Florentine.
However, the particular evolution of the Italian language (that, being an "educated" language, wasn't subject to the evolution of common spoken language) made so that modern day Italians can still read texts written in 14th century vulgar without problems.
Thank goodness that the Tuscan dialect was chosen. It is just so beautiful, the most beautiful language in the world.
It is ridiculous to say Tuscan is the most beautiful language in the world unless you add "to me."
Allegedly, the oldest Romance language was Sicilian. In fact, the Sicilian spoken at the court of Frederick II was also one of the languages considered to be adopted as a national language. Also, a big player in the making of the Italian language as we know it is the novelist Alessandro Manzoni, who had written his I Promessi Sposi in Milanese but then rewrote it in late-medieval spoken Florentine, or as he put it, "bagnar i panni in Arno". Manzoni's writing was instrumental in the creation of Italian, he even was one of those in charge of designing the language.
Also, thank you for promoting the history and uniqueness of the various Italian languages. They're disappearing because of the goverment insisting on teaching and speaking only Standard Italian, so much so that "dialect"-only speakers are considered rude and unrefined.
No, la lingua piú antica di italia il ligure
Laughs in sardinian laguage
Wrong. It is the first of the vulgar languages of Italy to develop a literature.
@@CarloRossi54523 exactly
To be precise Manzoni rewrote his novel (the english title would be "The Betrothed", for all those who can't read italian) not in late-medieval florentine dialect, but in the florentine dialect variety that the élite of Florence spoke in the late 1800s, when he personally left Milan and went to live in Florence for a while in order to learn it so he could rewrite his book: the famous expression you quoted (although inexactly: it's "sciacquare i panni in Arno"->"to rinse your laundry in the river Arno") in fact references exactly his learning the language directly from its native speakers.
I taught myself Italian and lived in Sardinia and Sicily and was married to an Italian for a number of years. She was raised in Piemonte but her family was from Veneto and she had lived in Puglia and I met her in Sicily. Sometimes, she would say something that I didn't understand so I had to ask her if she was actually speaking Italian, Veneto, Piemontese, Barese or Siciliano.
From my experience of living in Italy, it seemed that all Italian dialects sounded like something closer to Italian except Sardinian (Sardo). Sardinian is a language all unto itself.
Sardinian is a different language my friend.It is older than Standard Italian and it also contains influences from Ibero-Celtic languages that were spoken in Sardinia long before the Romans and Latin rose in prominence but nevertheless,it contains some similarities to Italian because of the shared Latin influence
I remember my literature teacher, presenting the Alessandro Manzoni's novel I Promessi Sposi (The Betrothed. I just learned that...), saying "this is an awful book: it has all the "don'ts" of good writing, but we have to learn it in school as it is the first book *officially* written in Italian" (1827)
Wow, you oploaded this literally as these couple of days have seen my passion and amore for this language reignited. Grazie mille. 🙏 😄
Great timing!
In 13th century, before Dante's success, sicilian poems were the most appreciate and sicilian had good chances to become "official italian". Sicilian had anyway a great infuence.
It had zero chances. Power and money was not in Sicily. It was definitely in Genova, Milano, Venezia, Pisa, and Firenze.
The quality of Olly's videos are on another level!
Thanks man. This was fun to make.
@@storylearning loved to see the cameo from Stefano too!
As a Spanish speaker it is impossible not to love the Italian language and how beautiful it is.
😮
Fun fact: I was born in Milan but when I was 4, my family decided to move in a smaller city in the suburbs.
It was 50 km away from Milan, but I can tell you that during my whole childhood, and probably even my adolescence, I had to learn how to tweak my accent, in order to avoid to be noticed by the "locals".
Now is not important as before. Considering also that the accent in Milan is more similar to the official, I'm happy to speak the "right" one :)
The city were we moved to had a strong french influence, that's probably why the difference is more noticeable, while if you move to the Eastern side of Milan, to reach the same level of variation you need to travel around 180 km (against 40).
Cheers!
The first piece of national legislation declaring Italian the official language of the Italian Republic was adopted as late as 1999
Wow, and I thought our Swiss German dialects we speak in Switzerland are ultimate when it comes to dialects in Europe… Looks like our southern neighbours become some really tough competitors here! 😅🇨🇭🇮🇹
Schweizerdeutsch is almost incomprehensible to me spoken, and only a little better in written form. THe pronunciation of the Swiss/Swabian dialects drives me nuts LOL
@@ZakhadWOW true, I guess many people underestimate Swiss German even though they are native German speakers.
i think we have over 100 dialects here in italy, every 40-50km dialects change
@@razoo911 Sounds quite similar to the German-speaking part of Switzerland. We also have multiple dialects, maybe not around 100 (Switzerland is still much smaller than Italy), but even here, dialects change from place to place. Sometimes, even the neighbouring village speaks a different dialect than you do. It gets very interesting in the alpine regions of Switzerland. Over many decades, villages used to be quite isolated within the valleys. So, pronunciation and vocabulary have often changed, although everyone still speaks the same language. Of course, this was back in the day when mobility wasn’t such an easy thing as today. In modern times this isn’t much the case anymore, but you can often still hear people speaking much more differently although they are all from the same region.
@@razoo911 dialects, yes. BUt some ar distnct laguages according to the Liguistic standards. Napoletano, Sicilano, Sardo, Friuliano as primary examples
In Italia spesso il dialetto cambia da città a città, conoscere ogni dialetto è una ricchezza storico culturale unica!
Saluti dall'Italia!!!🇮🇹❤️✨
per esempi io sto invedato lingua idialeto napoletano per la campagna 🎄🇮🇹
I have a few notes:
It's funny how you called it "the language of love" while most of the words in our vocabulary have their own meaning as an insult.
As you mentioned, it's worth noting that the spoken language is just one part of it, we are able to comunicate even without speaking, and that "what" gesture can actually mean "who? Where?" depending on the context. It usually translates to "repeat what you said". That "full of people" can actually also mean "say it shortly" or "get to the point" and can be done with either one or two hands. It can even mean "fear", but in a light context. If instead of wrapping your fingers together you rub them against your thumb, that means "money" if done fast, and "something of poor value" if done slowly. And it goes on.
Don't worry if you're not able to say "tre tigri contro tre tigri", Italians can't say that either.
I recently started listening to Italian. And this video on its history has been helpful 👍
My grandma was born in 1934 it didn’t speak Italian as first language. Living in a small hamlet I learnt my Genovese dialect from the elderly. It is still largely spoken and it's still first language in the rural areas.
belin!
Cominciamo a parlare di lingue, è quello che sono! Dovremmo proteggere il nostro patrimonio anziché vergognarcene
Grande che hai imparato il genovese
Pala zenese, todo il mondo te capisce.
Hai riassunto in 13 minuti ciò che ho dovuto studiare per mesi ... Nice .
🙏🏻
Also the Italians learned Italian because of the Tv, because in the first tv in Italy was there italian people speaking Italian, so here was the real spread of Italian 🇮🇹
In the Italian Constitution there is no article that says: Italian is the official language of the Italian Republic
in 2007 there was an attempt to include it in the Italian Constitution
However, there is an ordinary law (n° 482 / 1999) that recognizes the Italian language as the official language of the Republic.
Perché dovrebbe stare nella Costituzione, del resto? Tratta di diritti e doveri, alla fin fine. I dialetti sono importanti, ma se non si conosce l’italiano si è solo ignoranti come capre
It doesn't have to be in the constitution ya know?
@@JohnDoe-dj3lw Non tratta solo di diritti e doveri, definisce anche la struttura di base dello Stato.
La nostra costituzione qualche falla ce l'ha, però alla gente piace dire "la costituzione più bella del mondo", su che base?😂
Andrebbero insegnate sia le lingue regionali che quella nazionale, come in Spagna o simili
@@federicobraghetto4772 Per quale motivo?
@@ltubabbo529 perché la Costituzione è scritta in italiano e di conseguenza non c’è bisogno di specificarlo
5:10 Actually Dante just called it the equivalent of "Comedy", the adjective "Divine" was added by Boccaccio.
Hi Olly! This was a great video! Just out of curiosity, have you ever thought about making a video on the Finnish language (suomen kieli)? I’m currently studying Finnish, and I think you would find the language very interesting to research. Have a great day!
So many languages to talk about!
Amazing video as always, greetings from Veneto! 😊 I'm glad that you included my dialect !
Grazie Giulia!
@@storylearning Di niente! È sempre un piacere guardare i tuoi video 😊
Thanks for the detailed history of the Italian language, well done.
I'd advise foreigners who want to learn italian to start with "Italo Calvino" his books are great and Easy to understand.
Certo, hai ragione. Sto imparando l'italiano come uno straniero e mi piacciono molto i libri di Calvino.
Ho letto uno dei tuoi libri e l'ho ascoltato. Grazie mille sono fantastici e hanno un sacco di vocabolario per costruire la lingua
I'm Italian, and you move hands like an Italian, if you move them more slowly you're a perfect Italian!
I wasn't raised speaking Italian but after visiting Europe, I couldn't help learning It. I was fourty. I never woul have thought I could but I met people imigrating to Italy, learning the language, also speaking English. That's three languages! That seemed even more impossible so I tried to learn and it never became difficult. Even without anybody to learn with, I've been able to keep learning because I was in love with the Italian culture. I visited lots of other countries but there's only one Florence (Firenze).
Only one note on this very good video. You mentioned that Dante was "later" exiled, meaning after he wrote the "Commedia", but actually he was already in exile out of Florence when he started working on it
Never forget the importance of the Sicilian School to define the first rules of the language and the importance of the TV that after the WWII was the tool to spread the modern italian during the 60s.
The intelligibility problem is often overstated, as the local languages are disappearing and most people only speak standard Italian (albeit with different accents) as their native language. Especially in the north.
My grandpa was from Northern Italy and said it was hard for him to understand anyone from southern Italy.
We literally speak different languages, you can recognize from what region someone is from the accent they have while speaking Italian. If a person from northern Italy tried to chat with one from southern Italy while only using dialect they wouldn't be able to understand each others at all (in fact there's a theory that links Italian gestures to the need to understand each others, since languages vary so much in just few km you just have to find a way to communicate that is para verbal)
Because in Southern italy are non real italians....Are Bourbons ! 😉👍
@@campanianrepublic82 Esistono ancora i neoborbonici? Dai staccatevi se ci tenete tanto, non durereste una settimana
@@campanianrepublic82 🤡🤡🤡
Thanks for the interesting video, and I really liked the way you presented it too.
Grazie!
A very informative video! It piqued my interest for the history of my neighbouring country as well as their language*s. Really appreciate the content you've been providing us.
Thanks - glad you enjoyed it. This video was super fun to make.
After unification in 1861 a way to spread italian in the country (in addition to school) was military service. Sending young boys to do military service far from home, mixing various lands of origin, was a practice used until the end of 20th century, no more necessary for the language, but useful to improve mutal knowledge of different cultures.
Oh, those lucky people from Tuscany!
They always have an unfair advantage. I’m from the north east, but I have colleagues from Tuscany.
Every time they say a word that sounds strange (a word that I’ve never read in books or in the papers, or I’ve never heard) I go and look it up in the dictionary and, lo and behold, it’s an actual real word! Dang!
Whereas when I venture to use a word from my own dialect which sounds a bit “off“, I have a 60% chance that it’s not to be found in the dictionary!
Fun fact, in the region where I come from, if you just cross a river, you can enter another linguistic domain. “Friulano” is another language on its own and, despite having lived all my life in this area, having friends who are native speakers and listening to the radio in that language from time to time, sometimes I have a hard time understanding what they’re saying!
And I cannot say a whole sentence in that language, without making a couple of mistakes!
Think that Dante, in "de vulgari eloquentia" didn't consider Florentine to be a good basis for a national language.
Like "bischero", "panzanella", "arronzare" and "boiadé"
Lo stereotipo del toscano come accento più vicino al neutro non poggia su basi reali. Addirittura ai tempi del fascismo si usava dire "fiorentino in bocca romana", questo perché i romani non hanno la gorgia, la g strusciata e altre cose tipiche fiorentine
First ever written document in italian is "placito capuano" that is part of "placiti cassinesi"
I'm romagnol... And I speak Italian, English and a little bit of our dialect, I can understand why it is so tough to understand, in fact it's not italian, it's way more similar to a language in between French and Spanish all together in a weird mix of sounds.
Hello!
Google says Florida is 170 000 km2 and Italy 301 000 km2?
Anyway love your linguistics videos, I learn so much from them and I’m always taking notes!
Will you do one on the Yiddish language anytime in the future?
Yeah italy is the same size as arizona not florida
Classic murican ego
True! But for History, Culture, Art and Traditions and as if millions of Km2 divided us. Do not you think? ⚓️
You can do another video about Sardinian language. Inside every little city has different dialects, clothes, different syllables used in music ect...
My grandparents came to America from Calabria and I remember them telling us as children that there were so many dialects that Italians could not understand each other. Thank you for explaining the history. Edited to add that my grandfathers brother migrated to Brazil and was the only one. As a result of that we have family in Brazil today!
Hi people! A guy from Verona here, who can help you to solve the Veronese riddle. The answer is: a writer.
Back in those days the pen was actually a pen, a feather (white plough), hold by the writer between the index and middle fingers (looking like two oxen). The black seed in the white meadows is the ink on pages.
Hope you liked the riddle!
My grandmothers, one from Venice (1909) and one from Neaples (1922) could both understand my standard Italian, but they could not speak it. When they met, they needed the help of a translator...
So i was born in 2006 in Italy, and discovering that my state's official language was introduced only in 2007 was a almost a shock to me. Also you talked about so many things i didn't know, nice vid!
dialects can vary from town to town, even within one or two generation of people (like, grandparents-grandchildren) you can hear an evolution. anyway, in puglia we do have two different branches of dialect: the northern part speaks one that developed from neapolitan and the southern part speaks one that developed from sicilian
You can't say that one developed from neapolitan and the other developed from sicilian, because they all developed from vulgar latin. They just developed together. So you can say that Northern apulian dialects and neapolitan are related, while souther apulian dialects are related with sicilian. In the past all dialects related to neapolitan and neapolitan itself were called vulgar apulian.
@@ntnntl96 i know, but i wanted to be short and clear, so… 🤷🏻♀️
@@jona8464 ok I get it.
@@jona8464 Di quale parte della Puglia sei?
@@ntnntl96 bari
If anyone is wondering about the riddle at 3:22, the answer is a scribe. He moves his white feather pen (the plough) on paper (the white field) spewing ink (the black seed).
Brazil other than North America also, has the largest number of Japanese living outside of Japan.
In fact there are 1.7 million Brazilians of Japanese origin versus 1.5 million US citizens of Japanese descent
11:16
Great pronunciation for a foreigner! I still have problems with "aiuola" even after twenty years, and I'm twenty!
The difference in dialects, is the reason for hand gestures being a thing too
I caught a taxi in Perth, Australia. The driver was an Italian immigrant to Australia. His was a distinctive accent that would be hard to replicate. The anglo-auzies already use what I call "poly-pthongs," e.g. snake comes out as "snaheeack." Combine that with an Italian accent, then try to understand.
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I am Italian and I have lived in different parts of Italy... and I have never heard anyone speaking proper standard Italian
Se intendi senza accento... È normale, il doppiaggese è un linguaggio artificiale
Love you Olz, keep up the inspirational work.
Congratulations, you have a very good italian pronounciation. You should study the italian part of Switzerland, Ticino. Ticinese is quite similar to lombardo. Ticino is very small, the population is about 350K, but you will find dialect's differences similar to those you explained in your video, which is even more interesting.
I live very close to the Italian border to Ticino and even though we are only a few kilometres away from each other, people in my area can immediately recognize a Ticinese just by the way they speak and the words they use. It's very distinctive
I'm convinced the Argentinan spanish accent is heavily influenced by Italian
Thank you, about this video!
Hey Olly, I recently discovered your channel, great job! Can’t stop binging on your videos🤓
Could you please make a video on Baltic languages, Latvian and Lithuanian? Being a native speaker of the latter, I would be more than happy to help you with the content!
I really enjoyed this video thank you 💕
Thank you for this video
Your Italian pronunciation is amazing. I wish my English pronunciation was as good as your Italian's one.
Well even here in Rome,in an area that we call Castelli Romani are some dialects that may be different between eachother(some little things)...
Excellent! Thank you.
Italy's size is almost twice Florida, btw...
Nice job! Very well explained. Thank you. Greetings from Ferrara.
Wonderful video, sir!
There are some things I have to disagree with:
- It's not true that with an intermediate Italian there's no guarantee that locals will understand you. Maybe that's true for old people in remote villages (not even Italians like to be in that situation), but everyone understands Italian even when they prefer to speak dialect (and notice that we often speak a mix of Italian and dialect with some adoptions from one into the other).
- We definitely don't consider our dialects our first language and in bigger cities speaking a dialect is even considered less sophisticated and it's generally discouraged to speak it too much or in certain contexts. There are many who are proud to speak their dialects (often they are not from big cities) but this doesn't mean they think that's their first language.
- It's true that many dialects can be really really different and dialects even vary between neighbour cities to make things more complicated but the level of distinction is not as high as many believe, the root is the same. Example: I'm from Sicily, I visited a friend in Veneto (2 very different dialects) and after a few hours I started to figure out what they were saying when they spoke their dialect. Dialects are not completely different languages. I would actually consider a stretch to see a dialect as a language.
The examples at 12:05 are only partially correct: yes, they're both used to call somebody a stupid, but bischero is an actual Italian word (a tuning peg in a string instrument) that people mostly in Tuscany use to say stupid; pirla is a dialect word and means penis.
About dialects not being languages is very debatable, it depends on what you mean for language. Can a language define a culture, history, and exists without some political officiality? A State, and schools of grammars? If you say yes then italian dialects are languages, they have roots way back in centuries, before Dante was born, and they are not derivations each others, Venetian is not a derivation from Florentine. So, this is also my point of view, our dialects are languages, and we should preserve them.
But if you answer no, and you require that a language must be official, and be imposed by a State, then dialects are secondary languages spoken by some farmers, inferior languages to purge from Italy. For me this is wrong, and ignorant about our history. We believe that "Italian" is much better just because it is modern and better codified, and we refuse to acknowledge the literature we have in our original languages, we let it disappear. With propaganda we spot on Dante, Manzoni and all recent writers. But this does not mean that our history is this short, what language was used when Venice fought the turks, when Vivaldi wrote his symphonies, when Marco Polo went in Asia and wrote Il Milione?
@@trattogatto i. Immancabile! Un veneto e/o un napoletano che dice che la sua è una lingua e bla bla bla.
E ora vai con gli insulti
@@trattogatto Wow you took a long road. What I consider a language is something that can be consistently codified into a grammar compendium and that is officially recognised as a language, meaning for example that in a certain area that language is used in formal contexts like administration, lectures, etc.
To my knowledge, no Italian dialect can be codified into rules, unlike Italian, English, etc. I'll limit my point only to Sicilian, my own dialect, and I'll go on telling you that we actually have a lot of inconsistency in the dialect between cities and small towns within the same province and between different provinces the dialect is even different in the "rules" with the same words used to say different things. So basing on that, it's pretty bold to consider it a language for me.
Though we have literature in dialects, nowhere in italy dialects are officially in use in the institutional life of that region, and you'll never add your dialect in a CV. As a comparison, Catalan can be argued to be a Spanish dialect, but that is actually used in written document and used in lectures in schools so it has a much better claim as a language.
All of this does not mean that dialects must be eradicated but let's be real they are secondary means of verbal (and hardly ever written) communication and the mindset of the big cities at least in Sicily is a reality: if you go to a bank and speak Sicilian people will understand you but you'll sound uneducated, in school teachers will force you to speak Italian, your parents will not let you speak it all the time (but it's from them that you'll learn it). This will not erase the history and culture behind dialects and it's expected that a person from a part of Italy should know its dialect, like a person from Italy should know the history and culture of their country and region to an extent.
Oh stuff it. Half the country are octogenarians who probably answered "yes" on the "do you speak Italian" census question, but that doesn't mean they actually do or (more importantly) will. Most of Italy doesn't speak a brand of Italian that foreigners who learned from books will ever understand and that's just a fact. Italians should quit lying about it and just help learners to buckle up for the rough ride they're in for.
@@Nome_utente_generico Gli insulti vengono da chi ha pregiudizio ed è frettoloso di darmi un'etichetta, cioè gente come te.
What an interesting video!
You made me really proud of my country... Thank you 😊
Your accent is nearly perfect 👌
Italy is the size of Florida? Italy is almost twice the size of Florida and has three times the population.
As an actual Italian I can say that your fluence is quite good. Even if your accent instantly tells me where you are from 😂
I really liked this video. I miei complimenti
Fun fact: in most Tuscan dialects, the use of high register or Latin terms is still quite widespread. E.g. "codesto" ("that" but only if the object is near the listener), "capo" (meaning "head", not "chief" form latin "caput"), "stolto" and various other words that fell out of fashion in standard Italian.
Olly, you're such an interactive, entertaining (in a good sense), and effective communicator. I think you deserve more subscribers, even those who don't care about learning foreign languages.
Che bello vedere questo video come italiano
5:27 Dante actually wrote the Commedia only after being exiled. Before that, he was mainly an ambassador in Rome and a member of the city of Florence's government before his political faction was defeated (which is the reason while he was exiled)
Why isn't this video viral
There's a film called Non ci resta che piangere with Roberto Benigni and Massimo Troisi, two comics from Florence and Naples, i'm florentine and i cannot know what Troisi says