112-624: Koper ( Slovene: [ˈkòːpəɾ] ; Italian : Capodistria ) is the fifth-largest city in Slovenia . Located in the Istrian region in the southwestern part of the country, Koper is the main urban center of the Slovene coast. Port of Koper is the country's only container port and a major contributor to the economy of the Municipality of Koper . The city is a destination for
224-689: A local language of Italy , most frequently the language spoken at home in their place of origin. Italian is a major language in Europe, being one of the official languages of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe and one of the working languages of the Council of Europe . It is the third-most-widely spoken native language in the European Union (13% of the EU population) and it
336-646: A free port in 1719, Koper lost its monopoly on trade, and its importance diminished further. According to the 1900 census, 7,205 Italian, 391 Slovenian, 167 Croatian, and 67 German inhabitants lived in Koper. Assigned to Italy from Austria-Hungary after World War I, at the end of World War II it was part of the Zone B of the Free Territory of Trieste , controlled by Yugoslavia . Most of the Italian inhabitants left
448-510: A huge number of civil servants and soldiers recruited from all over the country introduced many more words and idioms from their home languages— ciao is derived from the Venetian word s-cia[v]o ("slave", that is "your servant"), panettone comes from the Lombard word panetton , etc. Only 2.5% of Italy's population could speak the Italian standardized language properly when
560-471: A little over one million people in the United States speak Italian at home. Nevertheless, an Italian language media market does exist in the country. In Canada, Italian is the second most spoken non-official language when varieties of Chinese are not grouped together, with 375,645 claiming Italian as their mother tongue in 2016. Italian immigrants to South America have also brought a presence of
672-612: A number of Mediterranean cruising lines. Koper is also one of the main road entry points into Slovenia from Italy, which lies to the north of the municipality. The main motorway crossing is at Spodnje Škofije to the north of the city of Koper. The motorway continues into Rabuiese and Trieste . Koper also has a rail connection with the capital city, Ljubljana . On the coast, there is a crossing at Lazaret into Lazzaretto in Muggia municipality in Trieste province . The Italian border crossing
784-658: A poetic and literary origin in the works of Tuscan writers of the 12th century, and, although the grammar and core lexicon are basically unchanged from those used in Florence in the 13th century, the modern standard of the language was largely shaped by relatively recent events. However, Romance vernacular as language spoken in the Italian Peninsula has a longer history. In fact, the earliest surviving texts that can definitely be called vernacular (as distinct from its predecessor Vulgar Latin) are legal formulae known as
896-689: A real independent state – although its formal status and separate sovereignty were generally respected. It operated as a separate state in the Marshall Plan (launched in April 1948) and the related OEEC (formed in March 1948). Meanwhile, the Tito-Stalin split in mid-1948 led to the deterioration of relations between Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union, which resulted in a political stalemate, and
1008-417: A renewed interest in linguistics in the 16th century, sparked a debate that raged throughout Italy concerning the criteria that should govern the establishment of a modern Italian literary and spoken language. This discussion, known as questione della lingua (i.e., the problem of the language ), ran through the Italian culture until the end of the 19th century, often linked to the political debate on achieving
1120-522: A result. Starting in late medieval times in much of Europe and the Mediterranean, Latin was replaced as the primary commercial language by languages of Italy, especially Tuscan and Venetian. These varieties were consolidated during the Renaissance with the strength of Italy and the rise of humanism and the arts . Italy came to enjoy increasing artistic prestige within Europe. A mark of
1232-474: A seven-vowel system, consisting of /a, ɛ, e, i, ɔ, o, u/ , as well as 23 consonants. Compared with most other Romance languages, Italian phonology is conservative, preserving many words nearly unchanged from Vulgar Latin . Some examples: Free Territory of Trieste The Free Territory of Trieste was an independent territory in Southern Europe between Northern Italy and Yugoslavia , facing
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#17327732669581344-479: A single language is that they have evolved so that they are no longer mutually intelligible ; this diagnostic is effective if mutual intelligibility is minimal or absent (e.g. in Romance, Romanian and Portuguese), but it fails in cases such as Spanish-Portuguese or Spanish-Italian, as educated native speakers of either pairing can understand each other well if they choose to do so; however, the level of intelligibility
1456-513: A united Italian state. Renaissance scholars divided into three main factions: A fourth faction claimed that the best Italian was the one that the papal court adopted, which was a mixture of the Tuscan and Roman dialects. Eventually, Bembo's ideas prevailed, and the foundation of the Accademia della Crusca in Florence (1582–1583), the official legislative body of the Italian language, led to
1568-622: Is twinned with: Italian language Italian ( italiano , pronounced [itaˈljaːno] , or lingua italiana , pronounced [ˈliŋɡwa itaˈljaːna] ) is a Romance language of the Indo-European language family that evolved from the Vulgar Latin of the Roman Empire . Italian is the least divergent language from Latin , together with Sardinian (meaning that Italian and Sardinian are
1680-427: Is 89% with French, 87% with Catalan , 85% with Sardinian , 82% with Spanish, 80% with Portuguese , 78% with Ladin , 77% with Romanian . Estimates may differ according to sources. One study, analyzing the degree of differentiation of Romance languages in comparison to Latin (comparing phonology , inflection , discourse , syntax , vocabulary , and intonation ), estimated that distance between Italian and Latin
1792-414: Is 988 millimetres (39 in). In the past, Italian was the most common language spoken in the town, but its presence decreased sharply after Slovenian Istria was incorporated into Yugoslavia in 1954, with most of the ethnic Italians leaving the town. Today, Koper is officially bilingual, with both Slovene and Italian as its official languages, with Italian being mainly used as a secondary language by
1904-759: Is also spoken by a minority in Monaco and France, especially in the southeastern part of the country. Italian was the official language in Savoy and in Nice until 1860, when they were both annexed by France under the Treaty of Turin , a development that triggered the " Niçard exodus ", or the emigration of a quarter of the Niçard Italians to Italy, and the Niçard Vespers . Giuseppe Garibaldi complained about
2016-690: Is also spoken by large immigrant and expatriate communities in the Americas and Australia . Italian is included under the languages covered by the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages in Bosnia and Herzegovina and in Romania , although Italian is neither a co-official nor a protected language in these countries. Some speakers of Italian are native bilinguals of both Italian (either in its standard form or regional varieties ) and
2128-534: Is higher than that between Sardinian and Latin. In particular, its vowels are the second-closest to Latin after Sardinian . As in most Romance languages, stress is distinctive. Italian is the official language of Italy and San Marino and is spoken fluently by the majority of the countries' populations. Italian is the third most spoken language in Switzerland (after German and French; see Swiss Italian ), although its use there has moderately declined since
2240-467: Is known as San Bartolomeo. Major sights in Koper include the 15th-century Praetorian Palace and Loggia in Venetian Gothic style, the 12th-century Carmine Rotunda church, and St. Nazarius' Cathedral, with its 14th-century tower. The Italian name of the city was anciently written as Capo d'Istria , and is reported on maps and sources in other European languages as such. Ancient names of
2352-460: Is markedly lower between Italian-Spanish, and considerably higher between the Iberian sister languages of Portuguese-Spanish. Speakers of this latter pair can communicate with one another with remarkable ease, each speaking to the other in his own native language without slang/jargon. Nevertheless, on the basis of accumulated differences in morphology, syntax, phonology, and to some extent lexicon, it
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#17327732669582464-462: Is not difficult to identify that for the Romance varieties of Italy, the first extant written evidence of languages that can no longer be considered Latin comes from the ninth and tenth centuries C.E. These written sources demonstrate certain vernacular characteristics and sometimes explicitly mention the use of the vernacular in Italy. Full literary manifestations of the vernacular began to surface around
2576-594: Is spoken as a second language by 13.4 million EU citizens (3%). Including Italian speakers in non-EU European countries (such as Switzerland, Albania and the United Kingdom ) and on other continents, the total number of speakers is approximately 85 million. Italian is the main working language of the Holy See , serving as the lingua franca (common language) in the Roman Catholic hierarchy as well as
2688-549: Is used, and the town of Chipilo near Puebla, Mexico; each continues to use a derived form of Venetian dating back to the 19th century. Other examples are Cocoliche , an Italian–Spanish pidgin once spoken in Argentina and especially in Buenos Aires , and Lunfardo . The Rioplatense Spanish dialect of Argentina and Uruguay today has thus been heavily influenced by both standard Italian and Italian regional languages as
2800-509: The Il Globo (Australia) and the La gazzetta del Sud Africa (South Africa). Italian is widely taught in many schools around the world, but rarely as the first foreign language. In the 21st century, technology also allows for the continual spread of the Italian language, as people have new ways to learn how to speak, read, and write languages at their own pace and at any given time. For example,
2912-991: The La Voce del Popolo ( Croatia ), the Corriere d'Italia (Germany), the L'italoeuropeo (United Kingdom), the Passaparola ( Luxembourg ), the America Oggi (United States), the Corriere Canadese and the Corriere Italiano (Canada), the Il punto d'incontro (Mexico), the L'Italia del Popolo ( Argentina ), the Fanfulla (Brazil), the Gente d'Italia ( Uruguay ), the La Voce d'Italia ( Venezuela ),
3024-486: The 9th Corps ) entered Trieste on 1 May 1945, after a battle in the town of Opicina on the outskirts of Trieste. The 2nd New Zealand Division also arrived the following day, and forced the surrender of some 2,000 German troops holding out in Trieste, who warily had refused to capitulate to Yugoslav troops, fearing reprisals and executions. An uneasy truce then developed between New Zealand and Yugoslav troops occupying
3136-783: The Axis powers . When the Fascist regime collapsed and Italy capitulated with the Armistice of Cassibile in September 1943, the territory in and around Trieste was occupied by the German Wehrmacht armed forces, which made the city the capital of their regional Operational Zone of the Adriatic Littoral (OZAK). Amid the collapse of German front line towards the end of the war, Yugoslav Partisan units ( 4th Army and
3248-755: The European Commission about the Free Port of Trieste: Annex VIII to the Treaty of peace with Italy of 10 February 1947 stipulates in its Article 1 that the port of Trieste shall be a customs-free port. Article 5(2) of Annex VIII provides that in connection with the importation into or exportation from or transit through the Free Port, the authorities of the Free Territory shall not levy on such goods customs duties or charges other than those levied for services rendered . [emphasis added] During
3360-702: The Gallo-Italic linguistic panorama of Northern Italy , the Italo-Dalmatian , Neapolitan and its related dialects were largely unaffected by the Franco- Occitan influences introduced to Italy mainly by bards from France during the Middle Ages, but after the Norman conquest of southern Italy , Sicily became the first Italian land to adopt Occitan lyric moods (and words) in poetry. Even in
3472-674: The Kingdom of Italy in the Dodecanese ). Italian is widely spoken in Malta , where nearly two-thirds of the population can speak it fluently (see Maltese Italian ). Italian served as Malta's official language until 1934, when it was abolished by the British colonial administration amid strong local opposition. Italian language in Slovenia is an officially recognized minority language in
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3584-773: The Kingdom of Lombardy–Venetia ), although the masses kept speaking primarily their local vernaculars. Italian was also one of the many recognised languages in the Austro-Hungarian Empire . Italy has always had a distinctive dialect for each city because the cities, until recently, were thought of as city-states . Those dialects now have considerable variety . As Tuscan-derived Italian came to be used throughout Italy, features of local speech were naturally adopted, producing various versions of Regional Italian . The most characteristic differences, for instance, between Roman Italian and Milanese Italian are syntactic gemination of initial consonants in some contexts and
3696-615: The Lombards . In honour of the Byzantine Emperor Justinian II , the town was renamed Justinopolis . Later, Justinopolis was under both Lombard and Frankish rule and was briefly occupied by Avars in the 8th century. Since at least the 8th century (and possibly as early as the 6th century) Koper was the seat of a diocese . One of Koper's bishops was the Lutheran reformer Pier Paolo Vergerio . In 1828, it
3808-1033: The Middle Ages , the established written language in Europe was Latin, although the great majority of people were illiterate, and only few were well versed in the language. In the Italian Peninsula , as in most of Europe, most would instead speak a local vernacular. These dialects, as they are commonly referred to, evolved from Vulgar Latin over the course of centuries, unaffected by formal standards and teachings. They are not in any sense "dialects" of standard Italian, which itself started off as one of these local tongues, but sister languages of Italian. Mutual intelligibility with Italian varies widely, as it does with Romance languages in general. The Romance languages of Italy can differ greatly from Italian at all levels ( phonology , morphology , syntax , lexicon , pragmatics ) and are classified typologically as distinct languages. The standard Italian language has
3920-554: The Placiti Cassinesi from the province of Benevento that date from 960 to 963, although the Veronese Riddle , probably from the 8th or early 9th century, contains a late form of Vulgar Latin that can be seen as a very early sample of a vernacular dialect of Italy. The Commodilla catacomb inscription is also a similar case. The Italian language has progressed through a long and slow process, which started after
4032-460: The Port of Koper/Capodistria . The first had a peculiar free zone (nowadays also offshore ) status originated in 1719 and confirmed by the Treaty of Peace with Italy of 1947 , which allows the transportation of goods inside the area. This status is recognised by the international community and the European Union. An excerpt from the answer given by Algirdas Šemeta on 7 August 2012, on behalf of
4144-639: The United Nations Security Council approved Resolution 16 under Article 24 of its charter calling for the creation of a free state in Trieste and the region surrounding it. A permanent statute codifying its provisions was to become recognized under international law upon the appointment of an international governor approved by the Quatripartite Powers (UK, US, France, and the Soviet Union). On 15 September 1947,
4256-528: The Western Roman Empire's fall in the 5th century. The language that came to be thought of as Italian developed in central Tuscany and was first formalized in the early 14th century through the works of Tuscan writer Dante Alighieri , written in his native Florentine . Dante's epic poems, known collectively as the Commedia , to which another Tuscan poet Giovanni Boccaccio later affixed
4368-406: The 111 Italian lecturer sections belonging to foreign schools where Italian is taught as a language of culture. As of 2022, Australia had the highest number of students learning Italian in the world. This occurred because of support by the Italian community in Australia and the Italian Government and also because of successful educational reform efforts led by local governments in Australia. From
4480-458: The 13th century in the form of various religious texts and poetry. Although these are the first written records of Italian varieties separate from Latin, the spoken language had probably diverged long before the first written records appeared since those who were literate generally wrote in Latin even if they spoke other Romance varieties in person. Throughout the 19th and 20th centuries, the use of Standard Italian became increasingly widespread and
4592-438: The 1970s. It is official both on the national level and on regional level in two cantons : Ticino and Grisons . In the latter canton, however, it is only spoken by a small minority, in the Italian Grisons . Ticino, which includes Lugano , the largest Italian-speaking city outside Italy, is the only canton where Italian is predominant. Italian is also used in administration and official documents in Vatican City . Italian
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4704-417: The Italian dialects has declined in the modern era , as Italy unified under Standard Italian and continues to do so aided by mass media from newspapers to radio to television, diglossia is still frequently encountered in Italy and triglossia is not uncommon in emigrant communities among older speakers. Both situations normally involve some degree of code-switching and code-mixing . Notes: Italian has
4816-439: The Italian language into a lingua franca used not only among clerks, nobility, and functionaries in the Italian courts but also by the bourgeoisie . Italian literature's first modern novel, I promessi sposi ( The Betrothed ) by Alessandro Manzoni , further defined the standard by "rinsing" his Milanese "in the waters of the Arno " ( Florence 's river), as he states in the preface to his 1840 edition. After unification,
4928-431: The London Memorandum was signed by ministers of the United States, United Kingdom, Italy, and Yugoslavia. The memorandum effectively disestablished the Free Territory of Trieste, which meant that the civilian administration was formally transferred to neighboring Italy and Yugoslavia. Most of Zone A, including Trieste, was given to Italy, while Zone B – which already had a separate communist civilian government since 1947 –
5040-497: The Mediterranean. The increasing political and cultural relevance of Florence during the periods of the rise of the Medici Bank , humanism , and the Renaissance made its dialect, or rather a refined version of it, a standard in the arts. The Renaissance era, known as il Rinascimento in Italian, was seen as a time of rebirth, which is the literal meaning of both renaissance (from French) and rinascimento (Italian). During this time, long-existing beliefs stemming from
5152-424: The Morgan Line: Zone A, which was 222.5 square kilometres (85.9 sq mi) and had a population of 262,406 - including Trieste itself - was administered by the British and American forces; Zone B, which was 515.5 square kilometres (199.0 sq mi) with 71,000 residents - including north-western Istria - was administered by the Yugoslav army. Between October 1947 and March 1948, the Soviet Union rejected
5264-407: The November 1975 signing of the bilateral Treaty of Osimo between Italy and Yugoslavia, which ended any current or future claims - as the London Memorandum had only dissolved the territory de facto , but not de jure . *Governors of all Julian March prior to the establishment of the Territory. The economy of the territory was based on its ports, namely the Free Port of Trieste and
5376-401: The Port of Koper on tourism was one of the factors in Ankaran deciding to leave the municipality in a referendum in 2011 to establish its own municipality. Koper's 15th-century Praetorian Palace is located on the city square. It was built from two older 13th-century houses that were connected by a loggia, rebuilt many times, and then finished as a Venetian Gothic palace. Today, it is home to
5488-498: The Quadripartite Commission set up by the UN), in the part of Istria which was to become Zone B there were a total of 67,461 inhabitants - including 30,789 Slovenes, Serbs and Croats, 29,672 Italians, and 7,000 people of unidentified nationality. Elections in the Territory were held twice, in 1949 and 1952, but only for municipal councils. The elections for what was supposed to be the People's Assembly (Free Territory of Trieste's national legislature) were never held. On 5 October 1954,
5600-412: The Slovene-speaking majority. Slovene dominates with virtually all citizens speaking it, followed by pockets of speakers of Italian and Croatian . The main association football club is FC Koper , who currently play in the Slovenian PrvaLiga , the top flight of Slovenian football , having won it once. First established during the Roman Empire , the Port of Koper has played an important role in
5712-498: The area, until British General William Morgan proposed partition of the territory into separate military-administered zones. Yugoslav leader Josip Broz Tito agreed with the idea on 23 May, as the British 13th Corps was moving forward to the proposed demarcation line. A formal agreement on partition was signed in Duino on 10 June, which created the so-called Morgan Line dividing the Julian March territory. Yugoslav troops withdrew to their area on 12 June 1945. In January 1947,
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#17327732669585824-450: The best Renaissance paintings in Slovenia, made by Vittore Carpaccio . Koper has a humid subtropical climate ( Cfa ). There is a substantial amount of rainfall in Koper, even in the driest month, with each month averaging well over 60 mm (2.4 in). This climate is considered to be Cfa according to the Köppen-Geiger climate classification. The average temperature in Koper is 14.4 °C (57.9 °F). The average annual rainfall
5936-437: The border region known as the Julian March (Venezia Giulia). In 1924, Italy also annexed the Free State of Fiume (now the city of Rijeka in Croatia). During the 1920s and 1930s, the Slavic population was subject to forced Italianization and discrimination under the Italian Fascist regime led by Benito Mussolini . They were also exposed to state violence by mobs incited by the ruling fascist party PNF , which included
6048-413: The candidacy of 12 successive nominees for the civilian governor of the territory, at which point the Tripartite Powers (United States, United Kingdom, and France) issued a note to the Soviet and Yugoslav governments on 20 March 1948 recommending that the territory be returned to Italian sovereignty. Since no governor was ever appointed under the terms of UN Resolution 16, the Territory never functioned as
6160-444: The case of Northern Italian languages, however, scholars are careful not to overstate the effects of outsiders on the natural indigenous developments of the languages. The economic might and relatively advanced development of Tuscany at the time ( Late Middle Ages ) gave its language weight, although Venetian remained widespread in medieval Italian commercial life, and Ligurian (or Genoese) remained in use in maritime trade alongside
6272-406: The city by 1954, when the Free Territory of Trieste formally ceased to exist and Zone B became part of Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia . In 1977, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Koper was separated from the Diocese of Trieste . With Slovenian independence in 1991, Koper became the only commercial port in Slovenia . The University of Primorska is based in the city. The influence of
6384-405: The city include Ægidia and Justinopolis . Modern names of the city include Croatian : Kopar , Serbian : Копар , romanized : Kopar , and German : Gafers . The Slovene population calls the city Koper . The Slavic population, present in the area since at least the late 7th century , largely relied on oral tradition up to the invention of printing . The Slovenian name Koper
6496-419: The city of Koper's tourist office. The city's Cathedral of the Assumption was built in the second half of the 12th century and has one of the oldest bells in Slovenia (from 1333), cast by Nicolò and Martino, the sons of Master Giacomo of Venice . The upper terrace is periodically open and offers a great view of the Bay of Trieste . In the middle of it hangs the Sacra Conversatione painting from 1516, one of
6608-526: The city walls and towers were partly demolished. In 1420, the Patriarch of Aquileia ceded his remaining possessions in Istria to the Republic, consolidating Venetian power in Koper. Koper grew to become the capital of Venetian Istria and was renamed Caput Histriae 'head of Istria' (from which stems its modern Italian name, Capodistria ). The 16th century saw the population of Koper fall drastically, from its high of between 10,000 and 12,000 inhabitants, due to repeated plague epidemics. When Trieste became
6720-455: The colonial period. In the early 19th century, Eritrea was the country with the highest number of Italians abroad, and the Italian Eritreans grew from 4,000 during World War I to nearly 100,000 at the beginning of World War II. In Asmara there are two Italian schools, the Italian School of Asmara (Italian primary school with a Montessori department) and the Liceo Sperimentale "G. Marconi" (Italian international senior high school). Italian
6832-405: The country (some 0.42% of the total population). Their numbers dropped dramatically after World War II following the Istrian–Dalmatian exodus , which caused the emigration of between 230,000 and 350,000 Istrian Italians and Dalmatian Italians. Italian was the official language of the Republic of Ragusa from 1492 to 1807. It formerly had official status in Albania due to the annexation of
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#17327732669586944-408: The country to the Kingdom of Italy (1939–1943). Albania has a large population of non-native speakers, with over half of the population having some knowledge of the Italian language. The Albanian government has pushed to make Italian a compulsory second language in schools. The Italian language is well-known and studied in Albania, due to its historical ties and geographical proximity to Italy and to
7056-446: The country. A few hundred Italian settlers returned to Libya in the 2000s. Italian was the official language of Eritrea during Italian colonisation . Italian is today used in commerce, and it is still spoken especially among elders; besides that, Italian words are incorporated as loan words in the main language spoken in the country (Tigrinya). The capital city of Eritrea, Asmara , still has several Italian schools, established during
7168-415: The country. The official census, carried out in 2002, reported 2,258 ethnic Italians ( Istrian Italians ) in Slovenia (0.11% of the total population). Italian language in Croatia is an official minority language in the country, with many schools and public announcements published in both languages. The 2001 census in Croatia reported 19,636 ethnic Italians (Istrian Italians and Dalmatian Italians ) in
7280-464: The design and fashion industries, in some sports such as football and especially in culinary terms. In Italy, almost all the other languages spoken as the vernacular —other than standard Italian and some languages spoken among immigrant communities—are often called " Italian dialects ", a label that can be very misleading if it is understood to mean "dialects of Italian". The Romance dialects of Italy are local evolutions of spoken Latin that pre-date
7392-400: The development of the area. It is among the largest in the region and is one of the most important transit routes for goods heading from Asia to central Europe. In contrast with other European ports, which are managed by port authorities, the activities of the Port of Koper comprise the management of the free zone area, the management of the port area, and the role of terminal operator. Koper
7504-420: The diffusion of Italian television in the country. Due to heavy Italian influence during the Italian colonial period , Italian is still understood by some in former colonies such as Libya. Although it was the primary language in Libya since colonial rule , Italian greatly declined under the rule of Muammar Gaddafi , who expelled the Italian Libyan population and made Arabic the sole official language of
7616-424: The early 1990s, the area of the former Zone B is today part of Slovenia and Croatia . The Free Territory of Trieste comprised an area of 738 square kilometres (285 sq mi) around the Gulf of Trieste in the northern Adriatic, from Duino (Devin) in the north to Cittanova (Novigrad) in the south, and had approximately 330,000 inhabitants. It bordered post-war Italy to the north, and Yugoslavia to
7728-445: The east and south. The rivers of the territory included the Rižana/Risano , the Dragonja/Dragogna , the Timavo/Timava , the Val Rosandra/Glinščica , and the Mirna/Quieto . The Territory's highest point was at Monte Cocusso/Kokoš (668 metres (2,192 ft)). Its most extreme points were near Medeazza/Medjavas at 45° 48’ in the north, at Tarski Zaliv / Porto Quieto at 45° 18’ in the south, Savudrija / Punta Salvore at 13° 29’ in
7840-420: The educated gentlemen was to make the Grand Tour , visiting Italy to see its great historical monuments and works of art. It was expected that the visitor would learn at least some Italian, understood as language based on Florentine. In England, while the classical languages Latin and Greek were the first to be learned, Italian became the second most common modern language after French, a position it held until
7952-409: The establishment of Italian, and as such are sister languages to the Tuscan that was the historical source of Italian. They can be quite different from Italian and from each other, with some belonging to different linguistic branches of Romance. The only exceptions to this are twelve groups considered " historical language minorities ", which are officially recognized as distinct minority languages by
8064-541: The estimates published by the Allied Military Government, the population in Zone A as of 1949 was about 310,000, which included 239,200 ethnic Italians and 63,000 ethnic Slovenes. According to contemporary Italian sources, in Zone B there were at the time 36,000 to 55,000 Italians and 12,000 to 17,000 Slovenes and Croats. According to the Yugoslav census of 1945 (which was considered falsified by
8176-433: The fact that it was linguistically an intermediate between the northern and the southern Italian dialects. Thus the dialect of Florence became the basis for what would become the official language of Italy. Italian was progressively made an official language of most of the Italian states predating unification, slowly replacing Latin, even when ruled by foreign powers (such as Spain in the Kingdom of Naples , or Austria in
8288-476: The free website and application Duolingo has 4.94 million English speakers learning the Italian language. According to the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs , every year there are more than 200,000 foreign students who study the Italian language; they are distributed among the 90 Institutes of Italian Culture that are located around the world, in the 179 Italian schools located abroad, or in
8400-602: The infamous burning of the Slovene National Hall in Trieste on 13 July 1920. Because of this, some native Slovenes and Croats emigrated to Yugoslavia, while others joined the TIGR resistance organization, whose methods included more than 100 bombings and assassinations, mostly against Italian authorities in the region, and especially in the areas around Trieste and Gorizia to the north. Beginning in 1940, Italy joined World War II alongside Nazi Germany as one of
8512-489: The island of Corsica (but not in the neighbouring Sardinia , which on the contrary underwent Italianization well into the late 18th century, under Savoyard sway: the island's linguistic composition, roofed by the prestige of Spanish among the Sardinians , would therein make for a rather slow process of assimilation to the Italian cultural sphere ). The rediscovery of Dante's De vulgari eloquentia , as well as
8624-640: The language to that continent. According to some sources, Italian is the second most spoken language in Argentina after the official language of Spanish, although its number of speakers, mainly of the older generation, is decreasing. Italian bilingual speakers can be found scattered across the Southeast of Brazil as well as in the South. In Venezuela , Italian is the most spoken language after Spanish and Portuguese, with around 200,000 speakers. In Uruguay , people who speak Italian as their home language are 1.1% of
8736-498: The late 18th century when it tended to be replaced by German. John Milton , for instance, wrote some of his early poetry in Italian. Within the Catholic Church , Italian is known by a large part of the ecclesiastical hierarchy and is used in substitution for Latin in some official documents. Italian loanwords continue to be used in most languages in matters of art and music (especially classical music including opera), in
8848-651: The late 1940s and in the years following the division of the territory, up to 40,000 people (mostly Italians) chose to leave the Yugoslav Zone B and move to the Italian Zone A for various reasons: some were intimidated into leaving, and some simply preferred not to live in Yugoslavia. Within Yugoslavia, the people who left were referred to as optanti 'choosers', whereas they called themselves esuli 'exiles'. About 14,000 Italians chose to remain in
8960-534: The late 19th to the mid-20th century, millions of Italians settled in Argentina, Uruguay, Southern Brazil and Venezuela, as well as in Canada and the United States, where they formed a physical and cultural presence. In some cases, colonies were established where variants of regional languages of Italy were used, and some continue to use this regional language. Examples are Rio Grande do Sul , Brazil, where Talian
9072-567: The law. On the other hand, Corsican (a language spoken on the French island of Corsica ) is closely related to medieval Tuscan , from which Standard Italian derives and evolved. The differences in the evolution of Latin in the different regions of Italy can be attributed to the natural changes that all languages in regular use are subject to, and to some extent to the presence of three other types of languages: substrata, superstrata, and adstrata . The most prevalent were substrata (the language of
9184-620: The most conservative Romance languages). Spoken by about 85 million people, including 67 million native speakers (2024), Italian is an official language in Italy , San Marino , Switzerland ( Ticino and the Grisons ), Corsica , and Vatican City . It has official minority status in Croatia , Slovenian Istria , and the municipalities of Santa Tereza and Encantado in Brazil . Italian
9296-412: The nation was unified in 1861. Italian is a Romance language , a descendant of Vulgar Latin (colloquial spoken Latin). Standard Italian is based on Tuscan , especially its Florentine dialect , and is, therefore, an Italo-Dalmatian language , a classification that includes most other central and southern Italian languages and the extinct Dalmatian . According to Ethnologue , lexical similarity
9408-471: The north part of the Adriatic Sea , under direct responsibility of the United Nations Security Council in the aftermath of World War II . For a period of seven years, it acted as a free city. The territory was established on 10 February 1947, by a protocol of the Treaty of Peace with Italy , to accommodate an ethnically and culturally mixed population in a neutral independent country. The intention
9520-408: The number of printing presses in Italy grew rapidly and by the year 1500 reached a total of 56, the biggest number of printing presses in all of Europe. This enabled the production of more pieces of literature at a lower cost and Italian, as the dominant language, spread. Italian became the language used in the courts of every state in the Italian Peninsula , as well as the prestige variety used on
9632-590: The official language of the Sovereign Military Order of Malta . Italian has a significant use in musical terminology and opera with numerous Italian words referring to music that have become international terms taken into various languages worldwide. Almost all native Italian words end with vowels , and the language has a 7-vowel sound system ('e' and 'o' have mid-low and mid-high sounds). Italian has contrast between short and long consonants and gemination (doubling) of consonants. During
9744-630: The openness of vowels, the length of the consonants, and influence of the local language (for example, in informal situations andà , annà and nare replace the standard Italian andare in the area of Tuscany, Rome and Venice respectively for the infinitive "to go"). There is no definitive date when the various Italian variants of Latin—including varieties that contributed to modern Standard Italian—began to be distinct enough from Latin to be considered separate languages. One criterion for determining that two language variants are to be considered separate languages rather than variants of
9856-584: The original inhabitants), as the Italian dialects were most probably simply Latin as spoken by native cultural groups. Superstrata and adstrata were both less important. Foreign conquerors of Italy that dominated different regions at different times left behind little to no influence on the dialects. Foreign cultures with which Italy engaged in peaceful relations with, such as trade, had no significant influence either. Throughout Italy, regional varieties of Standard Italian, called Regional Italian , are spoken. Regional differences can be recognized by various factors:
9968-458: The other hand, almost everyone still speaks the Corsican idiom , which, due to its linguistic proximity to the Italian standard language, appears both linguistically as an Italian dialect and therefore as a carrier of Italian culture, despite the French government's decades-long efforts to cut Corsica off from the Italian motherland. Italian was the official language in Monaco until 1860, when it
10080-545: The peace treaty between the United Nations (UN) and Italy was ratified, establishing the Free Territory of Trieste. Official languages were Italian and Slovene, possibly with the use of Serbo-Croatian in the portion of Zone B south of the Dragonja River. However, local government bodies were never formed, and it continued to be run by military authorities, respecting the administrative division demarcated by
10192-406: The population of Italy could speak Standard Italian. He reports that in 1951 that percentage had risen to 87%. The ability to speak Italian did not necessarily mean it was in everyday use, and most people (63.5%) still usually spoke their native dialects. In addition, other factors such as mass emigration, industrialization, and urbanization, and internal migrations after World War II , contributed to
10304-523: The proliferation of Standard Italian. The Italians who emigrated during the Italian diaspora beginning in 1861 were often of the uneducated lower class, and thus the emigration had the effect of increasing the percentage of literates, who often knew and understood the importance of Standard Italian, back home in Italy. A large percentage of those who had emigrated also eventually returned to Italy, often more educated than when they had left. Although use of
10416-528: The pronunciation of stressed "e", and of "s" between vowels in many words: e.g. va bene "all right" is pronounced [vabˈbɛːne] by a Roman (and by any standard Italian speaker), [vaˈbeːne] by a Milanese (and by any speaker whose native dialect lies to the north of the La Spezia–Rimini Line ); a casa "at home" is [akˈkaːsa] for Roman, [akˈkaːsa] or [akˈkaːza] for standard, [aˈkaːza] for Milanese and generally northern. In contrast to
10528-576: The proposal to return the territory to Italy was suspended until 1954. The Allied Military Government (AMG) thus continued to administer Zone A. The governance was split into peacekeeping and law enforcement sectors, with the local command comprising 5,000 Americans in the Trieste United States Troops (TRUST) and 5,000 British personnel in the British Element Trieste Forces (BETFOR). According to
10640-415: The publication of Agnolo Monosini 's Latin tome Floris italicae linguae libri novem in 1604 followed by the first Italian dictionary in 1612. An important event that helped the diffusion of Italian was the conquest and occupation of Italy by Napoleon in the early 19th century (who was himself of Italian-Corsican descent). This conquest propelled the unification of Italy some decades after and pushed
10752-542: The referendum that allowed France to annex Savoy and Nice, and a group of his followers (among the Italian Savoyards ) took refuge in Italy in the following years. Corsica passed from the Republic of Genoa to France in 1769 after the Treaty of Versailles . Italian was the official language of Corsica until 1859. Giuseppe Garibaldi called for the inclusion of the " Corsican Italians " within Italy when Rome
10864-473: The teachings of the Roman Catholic Church began to be understood from new perspectives as humanists —individuals who placed emphasis on the human body and its full potential—began to shift focus from the church to human beings themselves. The continual advancements in technology play a crucial role in the diffusion of languages. After the invention of the printing press in the 15th century,
10976-668: The territory was mostly populated by ethnic Slovenes or Croats in the southernmost portion of the area. There was also a smaller number of Istro-Romanians , Greeks, Albanians, as well as a sizeable Triestine Jewish community. The local Triestine dialect reflects this ethnic mix. Based on the Romance Venetian language , the dialect was influenced by ancient Rhaeto-Romance substrate. In addition, some Triestine vocabulary are of German and Slovene origin, and there are also loanwords from other languages, such as Greek . The variations of spoken Slovenian and Serbo-Croatian in
11088-680: The territory were also largely dialectal, sharing words with the Triestine and Istrian dialects. In the southernmost part of the territory, the Croatian-based dialects are of the Chakavian type, while the Venetian-based Istrian is also commonly used. At the end of World War I in 1918 and the dissolution of Austria-Hungary , Kingdom of Italy annexed Trieste, Istria and part of modern-day western Slovenia , establishing
11200-412: The territory. Italian -speakers have been predominant in most urban settlements and along the coast, with significant ethnic Slavic minorities of Slovenes and Croats inland - especially in the Trieste district, where Slovenes represented a third of the population by the end of World War I (although most of them were recent arrivals, after 1880, from interior Slovene districts). The countryside of
11312-469: The title Divina , were read throughout the peninsula and his written dialect became the "canonical standard" that all educated Italians could understand. Dante is still credited with standardizing the Italian language. In addition to the widespread exposure gained through literature, the Florentine dialect also gained prestige due to the political and cultural significance of Florence at the time and
11424-542: The total population of the country. In Australia, Italian is the second most spoken foreign language after Chinese, with 1.4% of the population speaking it as their home language. The main Italian-language newspapers published outside Italy are the L'Osservatore Romano ( Vatican City ), the L'Informazione di San Marino ( San Marino ), the Corriere del Ticino and the laRegione Ticino ( Switzerland ),
11536-559: The west, and Gročana/Grozzana at 13° 55’ in the east. Since 1382, Trieste had been part of the Habsburg monarchy , whilst neighboring Istria had been divided for centuries between the Habsburg monarchy (its central, northern and eastern parts) and the Republic of Venice (its western and southern parts). The population of the territory has been diverse and mixed, with different and often changing ethnic majorities in different parts of
11648-410: Was de facto dissolved in 1954 and given to Italy (Zone A) and Yugoslavia (Zone B). This created a border dispute which was only settled twenty years later with the signing of the bilateral Treaty of Osimo in 1975, which was ratified in 1977. The city of Trieste and the territory which formed Zone A is today part of Italy's Friuli-Venezia Giulia region. Following the dissolution of Yugoslavia in
11760-561: Was also introduced to Somalia through colonialism and was the sole official language of administration and education during the colonial period but fell out of use after government, educational and economic infrastructure were destroyed in the Somali Civil War . Italian is also spoken by large immigrant and expatriate communities in the Americas and Australia. Although over 17 million Americans are of Italian descent , only
11872-438: Was also to cool down territorial claims between Italy and Yugoslavia, due to its strategic importance for trade with Central Europe . It came into existence on 15 September 1947. Its administration was divided into two areas: one being the port city of Trieste with a narrow coastal strip to the northwest (Zone A); the other (Zone B) was formed by a small portion of the north-western part of the Istrian peninsula . The territory
11984-525: Was annexed to the Kingdom of Italy , but King Victor Emmanuel II did not agree to it. Italian is generally understood in Corsica by the population resident therein who speak Corsican , which is an Italo-Romance idiom similar to Tuscan. Francization occurred in Nice case, and caused a near-disappearance of the Italian language as many of the Italian speakers in these areas migrated to Italy. In Corsica, on
12096-675: Was first attested in writing in 1557, but with the spelling Copper . Koper began as a settlement built on an island in the southeastern part of the Gulf of Koper in the northern Adriatic. Called Insula Caprea (Goat Island) or Capro by Roman settlers, it developed into the city of Aegida, which was mentioned by the Roman author Pliny the Elder in his Naturalis Historia (Natural History) (iii. 19. s. 23). In 568, Roman citizens of nearby Tergeste (modern Trieste ) fled to Aegida due to an invasion of
12208-474: Was given to Yugoslavia. In addition, Yugoslavia received several villages of Zone A in the municipalities of Muggia and San Dorligo della Valle , such as Plavje , Spodnje Škofije , Elerji , Hrvatini , Kolomban , Cerej , Premančan , Barizoni , and Socerb (with its castle ), according to the demarcation line defined by Annex I. However, objections to the demarcation line and territorial claims from both sides continued. These were finally put to rest with
12320-585: Was merged into the Diocese of Trieste . Trade between Koper and Venice has been recorded since 932. In the war between Venice and the Holy Roman Empire , Koper was on the latter side, and as a result was awarded with town rights , granted in 1035 by Emperor Conrad II . After 1232, Koper was under the Patriarch of Aquileia , and in 1278 it joined the Republic of Venice . It was at this time that
12432-443: Was mirrored by a decline in the use of the dialects. An increase in literacy was one of the main driving factors (one can assume that only literates were capable of learning Standard Italian, whereas those who were illiterate had access only to their native dialect). The percentage of literates rose from 25% in 1861 to 60% in 1911, and then on to 78.1% in 1951. Tullio De Mauro , an Italian linguist, has asserted that in 1861 only 2.5% of
12544-658: Was replaced by the French. This was due to the annexation of the surrounding County of Nice to France following the Treaty of Turin (1860) . It formerly had official status in Montenegro (because of the Venetian Albania ), parts of Slovenia and Croatia (because of the Venetian Istria and Venetian Dalmatia ), parts of Greece (because of the Venetian rule in the Ionian Islands and by
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