Editing Lombard language (section)

== History ==

=== Origins ===
The most ancient [[linguistic substratum]] that has left a mark on the Lombard language is that of the ancient [[Ligures]].{{sfn|Agnoletto|1992|p=120}}{{sfn|D'Ilario|2003|p=28}} However, available information about the ancient language and its influence on modern Lombard is extremely vague and limited.{{sfn|Agnoletto|1992|p=120}}{{sfn|D'Ilario|2003|p=28}} That is in sharp contrast to the influence left by the [[Celts]], who settled in [[Northern Italy]] and brought their [[Celtic languages]] and culturally and linguistically Celticised the Ligures.{{sfn|D'Ilario|2003|p=29}} The Celtic substratum of modern Lombard and the neighbouring languages of Northern Italy is self-evident and so the Lombard language is classified as a [[Gallo-Italic languages|Gallo-Italic language]] (from the ancient Roman name for the Celts, [[Gauls]]).{{sfn|Agnoletto|1992|p=120}}

[[Roman Empire|Roman domination]] shaped the dialects spoken in the area, which is called [[Cisalpine Gaul]] ("Gaul, this side of the mountains") by the Romans, and much of the [[lexicon]] and [[grammar]] of the Lombard language have their origin in [[Latin]].{{sfn|D'Ilario|2003|p=29}} However, that influence was not homogeneous{{sfn|Agnoletto|1992|p=120}} since idioms of different areas were influenced by previous linguistic substrata, and each area was marked by a stronger or weaker Latinisation or the preservation of ancient Celtic characteristics.{{sfn|Agnoletto|1992|p=120}}

The Germanic [[Lombardic language]] also left strong traces in modern Lombard, as it was the variety of [[Germanic languages|Germanic]] that was spoken by the Germanic [[Lombards]] (or Longobards), who settled in Northern Italy, which is called [[Lombardy (historical region)|Greater Lombardy]] after them, and in other parts of the [[Italian Peninsula]] after the fall of the [[Western Roman Empire]]. Lombardic acted as a [[linguistic superstratum]] on Lombard and neighboring Gallo-Italic languages since the Germanic Lombards did not impose their language by law on the Gallo-Roman population, but they rather acquired the Gallo-Italic language from the local population. Lombardic left traces, mostly in lexicon and phonetics, without Germanicising the local language in its structure and so Lombard preserved its Romance structure.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.lagobba.it/?p=652 |title=Il milanese crogiuolo di tanti idiomi |trans-title=The Milanese melting pot of many languages |language=it |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170924183757/http://www.lagobba.it/?p=652 |archive-date=2017-09-24}}</ref>

=== From the 15th to the 17th century ===
[[File:Giovanni_Bressani.jpg|thumb|left|Giovanni Bressani, author of satirical poems in the Bergamo dialect]]

From the 15th century onwards, literary Tuscan began to supplant the use of northern vernaculars such as Lombard, even regardless of the fact that Lombard itself began to be heavily influenced by the Tuscan vernacular. Prior to that, the Lombard language was widely used in administrative spheres.<ref>Brown, Josh: ''Testimonianze Di Una Precoce Toscanizzazione Nelle Lettere Commerciali del Mercante Milanese Francesco Tanso (?-1398)'', Archivio Datini, Prato https://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-437059133.html {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180818052204/https://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-437059133.html |data=18 agosto 2018 }}</ref> Among those who favoured the strengthening of Tuscan influences over Lombard culture was the Duke of Milan Ludovico il Moro; during his reign he brought numerous men of culture from the Republic of Florence to the Sforza court, the most famous of whom was certainly Leonardo da Vinci.<ref>{{cite web|access-date=21 September 2017 |publisher=storico.org |title=Ludovico il Moro e l'età aurea della Grande Milano |url=http://www.storico.org/umanesimo_rinascimento/ludovico_moro.html}}<!-- auto-translated from Italian by Module:CS1 translator --></ref> At the same time, however, Lancino Curzio still wrote some works in Milanese dialect at the Sforza court.<ref>{{cite book|access-date=21 September 2017 |first=Mirko |last=Tavoni |title=Storia della lingua italiana. Il Quattrocento. |date=2015 |isbn=978-88-6292-538-9 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=OYbtCgAAQBAJ&dq=Lancino+Curti+dialetto+milanese&pg=PA153}}<!-- auto-translated from Italian by Module:CS1 translator --></ref>

Between the 15th and 16th centuries, the Lombard language was widely and actively discredited in Italian literary circles.  Tuscan writers and humanists such as [[Luigi Pulci]] and [[Benedetto Dei]] recorded aspects of the language spoken in Milan in the form of parodies;<ref>Mirko Tavoni, ''Storia della lingua italiana. Il Quattrocento'', Libreriauniversitaria.it Edizioni, 2015, p. 152</ref> similarly, the Asti-born writer Giorgio Alione parodied Milanese in his ''Commedia e farse carnovalesche nei dialetti astigiano, milanese e francese misti con latino barbaro'' (eng. "Comedy and carnival farces in the Asti, Milanese and French dialects mixed with barbaric Latin") composed at the end of the 15th century.<ref>{{Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani|gian-giorgio-alione|ALIONE, Gian Giorgio}}</ref> The Florentine humanist [[Lionardo Salviati|Leonardo Salviati]], one of the founders of the [[Accademia della Crusca]], an important Italian linguistic academy operating to this day, published a series of translations of a Boccaccian tale into various vernaculars (including Bergamo and Milanese) explicitly in order to demonstrate how ugly and awkward they were compared to Tuscan.<ref>Salviati, Leonardo: ''Degli Avvertimenti Della Lingua Sopra Il Decamerone'', Raillard, 1712</ref>

At the same time, the 15th century saw the first signs of a true Lombard literature: in the eastern parts of Lombardy, the Bergamo-born [[Giovanni Bressani]] composed numerous volumes of satirical poetry and  the Brescia-born Galeazzo dagli Orzi wrote his ''Massera da bé'', a sort of theatrical dialogue;<ref>{{cite book|access-date=21 September 2017 |first=Hermann |last=Haller |title=The Other Italy: The Literary Canon in Dialect |date=January 1999 |isbn=978-0-8020-4424-2 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_F4C4AXtLFIC&dq=Giovanni+Bressani+Galeazzo+dagli+Orzi&pg=PA106}}<!-- auto-translated from Italian by Module:CS1 translator --></ref> in the west of the region area, the Mannerist painter Giovanni Paolo Lomazzo lead the composition of the "arabesques" in the Accademia dei Facchini della Val di Blenio, a Milanese [[academy]] founded in 1560.<ref>{{Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani|giovanni-paolo-lomazzo|LOMAZZO, Giovanni Paolo}}</ref>

At the beginning of the 17th century, the Ossola native Giovanni Capis published the ''Varon milanes de la lengua de Milan'' (eng. "Varrone Milanese on the language of Milan"), a sort of etymological dictionary was published.<ref>{{cite book|access-date=21 September 2017 |first=Guglielmo |last=Stefani |title=Dizionario corografico del Novarese |date=November 2010 |isbn=978-88-488-1157-6 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=q7fAAgAAQBAJ&dq=Varon+Milanes+dizionario+etimologico&pg=PA65}}<!-- auto-translated from Italian by Module:CS1 translator --></ref> 
[[File:Meneghino - stampa ottocento.jpg|thumb|upright|Meneghino, a character from the Milanese theatre, who later became a mask of the commedia dell'arte]]

An example of a text in ancient Milanese dialect is this excerpt from ''Il falso filosofo'' (1698), act III, scene XIV, where [[Meneghino]], a traditional Milanese character from the [[commedia dell'arte]], presents himself in court (Lombard on the left,  Italian translation on the right):
{{Text and translation
| <poem>
«E mì interrogatus ghe responditt.
Sont Meneghin Tandœuggia,
Ciamæ par sora nomm el Tananan,
Del condamm Marchionn ditt el Sginsgiva;
Sont servitor del sior Pomponi Gonz,
C'al è trent agn che'l servj»
</poem>
| <poem>
E io interrogatus risposi:
Sono Meneghino Babbeo
chiamato per soprannome il Ciampichino
del fu Marchionne detto il Gengiva;
sono servitore del signor Pomponio Gonzo
che servo da trent'anni
</poem>
| Meneghino appears in court in "The False Philosopher" (1698), act III, scene XIV<ref>{{cite book|author=Carlo Maria Maggi |date=1701 |location=Milano |pages=100–101 |title=Comedie e rime in lingua milanese |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kPQmkrFoPdYC&pg=PA100 |volume=2}}<!-- auto-translated from Italian by Module:CS1 translator --></ref>
}}

The 17th century also saw the rise of the figure of the playwright Carlo Maria Maggi, who normalised the spelling of the Milanese dialect and who created, among other things, the Milanese mask of Meneghino.<ref>Atlante del Sapere: ''Maschere italiane'', Edizioni Demetra, 2002, pag. 116</ref> A friend and correspondent of Maggi was Francesco De Lemene, author of La sposa Francesca (the first literary work in modern [[Lodi, Lombardy|Lodi]] dialect)<ref>De Lemene, Francesco: ''La Sposa Francesca'', Edizione curata da Dante Isella, Giulio Einaudi Editore, 1979.</ref> and of a translation of ''[[Jerusalem Delivered|Gerusalemme liberata]]''. Moreover, the 17th century saw the emergence of the first [[Bosinada|bosinade]]: popular poems written on loose sheets and posted in the squares or read (or even sung) in public; they were widely diffused until the first decades of the 20th century.<ref>Sapere.it: ''[http://www.sapere.it/enciclopedia/bosinada.html Bosinada]''</ref>

=== In the modern era ===
[[File:Carlo Porta.jpg|thumb|Carlo Porta, the most important author of Lombard literature, also included among the greatest poets of Italian national literature]]

Milanese literature in the 18th century was quickly developing: some important names which emerged in that period include [[Domenico Balestrieri (writer)|Domenico Balestrieri]], who was associated the famous poet [[Giuseppe Parini]]. The latter wrote some compositions in the Lombard language.<ref name="anticacredenza">{{cite web|access-date=21 September 2017 |archive-date=6 May 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160506201135/http://www.anticacredenzasantambrogiomilano.org/linguastoria/7001.html |publisher=anticacredenzasantambrogiomilano.org |title=Letteratura milanese - Il '700 |url=http://www.anticacredenzasantambrogiomilano.org/linguastoria/7001.html}}<!-- auto-translated from Italian by Module:CS1 translator --></ref><ref>{{cite web|access-date=21 September 2017 |publisher=unicatt.it |title=Sistema bibliotecario e documentale |url=http://opac.unicatt.it/search~S13*ita?/cFONDO+Silvio+Cipriani-E-75/cfondo+silvio+cipriani+e+++++++75/-3,-1,,E/browse}}<!-- auto-translated from Italian by Module:CS1 translator --></ref> One of the most important writers of the period was the Bergamo-based abbot [[Giuseppe Rottario|Giuseppe Rota]], author of a substantial (unpublished) Bergamo-Italian-Latin vocabulary and of several poetic works in the Orobic idiom, which he always called "lingua".<ref>Biondelli, Bernardino: ''Saggio sui dialetti gallo-italici'', Milano, 1853, pag. 106.</ref>

In this period the linguistic characteristics of Lombard were well recognizable and comparable to the modern ones, except for some phonetic peculiarities and the presence of a remote past tense, replaced almost fully by the past perfect tense by 1875.<ref>{{cite web|archive-date=14 November 2023 |language=lmo |title=Il passato remoto in lombardo |trans-title=The remote past in Lombard |url=https://academiabonvesin.eu/2022/09/el-passad-lontan-in-lombard/ |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231114162543/https://academiabonvesin.eu/2022/09/el-passad-lontan-in-lombard/ |url-status=dead}}<!-- auto-translated from unknown (Italian or Spanish) by Module:CS1 translator --></ref><ref name="remoto">Biondelli reports that the Milanese dialect was the first Lombard variant to lose this verb tense. Biondelli, Bernardino: ''Saggio sui dialetti Gallo-italici'', 1853.</ref><ref name="veja">{{cite web|access-date=21 September 2017 |publisher=veja.it |title=La lingua padana o padanese |date=6 June 2012 |url=http://www.veja.it/2012/06/07/la-lingua-padana-o-padanese-prima-parte/}}<!-- auto-translated from Italian by Module:CS1 translator --></ref>

The beginning of the 19th century was dominated by the figure of [[Carlo Porta]], recognized by many as the most important author of Lombard literature, also included among the greatest poets of Italian national literature. With him some of the highest peaks of expressiveness in the Lombard language were reached, which clearly emerged in works such as ''La Ninetta del Verzee, Desgrazzi de Giovannin Bongee'', ''La guerra di pret'' and ''Lament del Marchionn de gamb avert''.<ref name="porta"/>

Milanese poetic production assumed such important dimensions that in 1815 the scholar [[Francesco Cherubini]] published an anthology of Lombard literature in four volumes, which included texts written from the seventeenth century to his day.<ref>{{Treccani|francesco-cherubini|Cherubini, Francesco}}</ref>

=== In the contemporary era ===
In the first part of the 20th century, the greatest exponent of Lombard literature was the Milanese lawyer [[Delio Tessa]], who distanced himself from the Portian tradition by giving his texts a strong expressionist tone.<ref>Novelli, Mauro: ''I saggi lirici di Delio Tessa'', LED, 2001, pagg. 52-54.</ref> In Bergamo, the most prominent advocate of Lombard language was [[Bortolo Belotti]], a lawyer, historian and minister in the liberal governments of the time.<ref>{{cite web|access-date=21 September 2017 |archive-date=22 September 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170922050758/http://servizi.ct2.it/ssl/wiki/index.php?title=Bortolo_Belotti |publisher=servizi.ct2.it |title=Bortolo Belotti |url=http://servizi.ct2.it/ssl/wiki/index.php?title=Bortolo_Belotti}}<!-- auto-translated from Italian by Module:CS1 translator --></ref>

The Lombard language became known outside its linguistic borders thanks to I Legnanesi, a theatre company that performed comedies in the [[Legnanese]] dialect and which is the most famous example of [[Travesti (theatre)|travesti theatre]] in Italy.<ref name="ilgiorno">{{cite web|access-date=11 April 2014 |publisher=ilgiorno.it |title=Antonio Provasio, capocomico dei Legnanesi: "Milano mi dà il pane e mi riempie il cuore" |date=22 March 2014 |url=http://www.ilgiorno.it/milano/cronaca/2014/03/23/1042734-antonio-provasio-legnanesi-intervista.shtml#1}}<!-- auto-translated from Italian by Module:CS1 translator --></ref> In their comic shows the actors propose to the public satirical figures of the typical Lombard court; founded in [[Legnano]] in 1949 by Felice Musazzi, Tony Barlocco and Luigi Cavalleri, it is among the most famous companies in the European dialect theatre scene.<ref name="ilgiorno" />

The 21st century has also seen the use of Lombard in contemporary music, such as in the musical pieces of Davide Van De Sfroos<ref name="antologia">{{cite web|access-date=21 September 2017 |archive-date=30 June 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160630102556/https://sites.google.com/site/lombardofonia/home |title=Antologia lombarda |url=https://sites.google.com/site/lombardofonia/home}}<!-- auto-translated from Italian by Module:CS1 translator --></ref> and in the translations into Lombard of the works of Bob Dylan.<ref>{{cite web|access-date=21 September 2017 |publisher=repubblica.it |title=Il tempismo è perfetto, Bob Dylan è in dialetto lombardo: "È l'emblema dei cantastorie" |date=17 October 2016 |url=http://www.repubblica.it/spettacoli/musica/2016/10/17/news/bob_dylan-149853920/}}<!-- auto-translated from Italian by Module:CS1 translator --></ref> There is no shortage of translations of great literary classics; in fact, there are numerous versions in Lombard of works such as Pinocchio, The Betrothed, The Little Prince, the Divine Comedy and – in religious literature – of the Gospels.<ref>{{cite web|access-date=21 September 2017 |publisher=patrimonilinguistici.it |title=Letteratura in lingua locale: quale futuro? |date=2 February 2017 |url=http://patrimonilinguistici.it/letteratura-lingua-locale-quale-futuro/}}<!-- auto-translated from Italian by Module:CS1 translator --></ref>