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Western Romance languages are one of the two subdivisions of a proposed subdivision of the Romance languages based on the La Spezia–Rimini Line. They include the Gallo-Romance, Occitano-Romance (sometimes included in one of the two other branches) and Iberian Romance branches. Gallo-Italic may also be included.
The Romance language most widely spoken natively today is Spanish, followed by Portuguese, French, Italian and Romanian, which together cover a vast territory in Europe and beyond, and work as official and national languages in dozens of countries.
Western Romance languages are one of the two subdivisions of a proposed subdivision of the Romance languages based on the La Spezia–Rimini Line. They include the Gallo-Romance , Occitano-Romance (sometimes included in one of the two other branches) and Iberian Romance branches.
- History
- Areas
- Literature
- Phonology
- Morphology
- Vocabulary
- Present Condition
- Standardisation
- Writing Systems
- Examples
A question that causes many debates is the influence of the Latin spoken in Aquileia and surrounding areas. Some claim that it had peculiar features that later passed into Friulian. Epigraphs and inscriptions from that period show some variants if compared to the standard Latin language, but most of them are common to other areas of the Roman Empir...
Italy
Today, Friulian is spoken in the province of Udine, including the area of the Carnia Alps, but as well throughout the province of Pordenone, in half of the province of Gorizia, and in the eastern part of the province of Venice. In the past, the language borders were wider since in Trieste and Muggia, local variants of Friulian were spoken. The main document about the dialect of Trieste, or tergestino, is "Dialoghi piacevoli in dialetto vernacolo triestino", published by G. Mainati in 1828.
World
Friuli was, until the 1960s, an area of deep poverty, causing a large number of Friulian speakers to emigrate. Most went to France, Belgium, and Switzerland or outside Europe, to Canada, Mexico, Australia, Uruguay, Argentina, Brazil, Venezuela, the United States, and South Africa. In those countries, there are associations of Friulian immigrants (called Fogolâr furlan) that try to protect their traditions and language.
The first texts in Friulian date back to the 13th century and are mainly commercial or juridical acts. The examples show that Friulian was used together with Latin, which was still the administrative language. The main examples of literature that have survived (much from this period has been lost) are poems from the 14th century and are usually ded...
Consonants
Notes: 1. /m,p,b/ are bilabial, whereas /f,v/ are labiodental and /w/ is labiovelar. 2. Note that, in the standard language, a phonemic distinction exists between true palatal stops [cɟ] and palatoalveolar affricates [tʃdʒ]. The former (written ⟨cj gj⟩) originate from Latin ⟨c g⟩ before ⟨a⟩, whereas the latter (written ⟨c/ç z⟩, where ⟨c⟩ is found before ⟨e⟩ and ⟨i⟩, and ⟨ç⟩ is found elsewhere) originate primarily from Latin ⟨c g⟩ before ⟨e⟩ and ⟨i⟩. The palatalization of Latin ⟨c⟩ and ⟨g⟩ bef...
Orthography
Some notes on orthography (from the perspective of the standard, i.e. Central, dialect): 1. Long vowels are indicated with a circumflex: ⟨â ê î ô û⟩. 2. ⟨e⟩ is used for both /ɛ/ (which only occurs in stressed syllables) and /e/; similarly, ⟨o⟩ is used for both /ɔ/ and /o/. 3. /j/ is spelled ⟨j⟩ word-initially, and ⟨i⟩elsewhere. 4. /w/ occurs primarily in diphthongs, and is spelled ⟨u⟩. 5. /s/ is normally spelled ⟨s⟩, but is spelled ⟨ss⟩ between vowels (in this context, a single ⟨s⟩ is pronoun...
Long vowels and their origin
Long vowels are typical of the Friulian language and greatly influence the Friulian pronunciation of Italian. Friulian distinguishes between short and long vowels: in the following minimal pairs (long vowels are marked in the official orthography with a circumflexaccent): 1. lat(milk) 2. lât(gone) 3. fis(fixed, dense) 4. fîs(sons) 5. lus(luxury) 6. lûs(light n.) Friulian dialects differ in their treatment of long vowels. In certain dialects, some of the long vowels are actually diphthongs. Th...
Friulian is quite different from Italian in its morphology; it is, in many respects, closer to French.
Most vocabulary is derived from Latin, with substantial phonological and morphological changes throughout its history. Therefore, many words are shared with the other Romance languages,Here the composition: 1. Celtic(9%) words are many, because the substrate of the Vulgar Latin spoken in Friuli, was the Karn-Celtic language. ("bâr", wood; "clap/cra...
Nowadays, Friulian is officially recognized in Italy, supported by law 482/1999, which protects linguistic minorities. Therefore, optional teaching of Friulian has been introduced in many primary schools. An online newspaper is active, and there are also a number of musical groups singing in Friulian and some theatrical companies. Recently, two mov...
A challenge that Friulian shares with other minorities is to create a standard language and a unique writing system. The regional law 15/1996 approved a standard orthography, which represents the basis of a common variant and should be used in toponyms, official acts, written documents. The standard is based on Central Friulian, which was tradition...
In the official writing system, approved by the (former, abolished in 2017) Province of Udine and used in official documents, Friulian is written using the Latin script with the c-cedilla(ç). The letter q is used only for personal names and historical toponyms, and in every other case, it is replaced by c. Besides that, k, x, w, and y appear only i...
The Fox and the Crow translation in Central Friulian
La bolp e jere di gnûf famade. In chel e a viodût un corvat poiât suntun pin, ch'al tigneve un toc di formadi tal bec. "Chel si che mi plasarès!" e a pensât le bolp, e e disè al corvát: "Ce biel che tu sês! Se il to cjant al é biel come il to aspiet, di sigûr tu sês il plui biel di ducj i ucei!
The differences among Romance languages occur at all levels, including the sound systems, the orthography, the nominal, verbal, and adjectival inflections, the auxiliary verbs and the semantics of verbal tenses, the function words, the rules for subordinate clauses, and, especially, in their vocabularies.
The Western Romance languages are a branch of Romance languages. The main languages in the branch are Spanish , French , and Portuguese . The branch has two parts, Gallo-Romance and Iberian Romance .
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The Gallo-Romance languages are generally considered the most innovative (least conservative) among the Romance languages. Northern France, the medieval area of the langue d'oïl from which modern French developed, was the epicentre.
