Neapolitan language

Neapolitan
Nnapulitano
Native to	Italy
Native speakers	7.5 million
Language family	Indo-European Italic Romance Italo-Western Italo-Dalmatian Neapolitan
Language codes
ISO 639-2	nap
ISO 639-3	nap
Dialects

See also: Southern Italian

Neapolitan (autonym: napulitano; Italian: napoletano) is the language of the city and region of Naples, Campania (Neapolitan: Nàpule, Italian: Napoli). On October 14, 2008 the Neapolitan language was accepted by a law by the Region of Campania.

The name is often given to the varied Italo-Western group of dialects of southern Italy; for example Ethnologue groups the dialects as a separate Romance language called Napoletano-Calabrese. This linguistic group is spoken throughout most of southern continental Italy, including the Gaeta and Sora districts of southern Lazio, the southern part of Marche and Abruzzo, Molise, Basilicata, northern Calabria, and northern and central Puglia. As of 1976, there were 7,047,399 theoretical native speakers of this group of dialects.

Distribution

Many would argue that the term "Neapolitan" should only be used for the dialect of Naples and its vicinity (as spoken around Naples and the Bay of Naples, Caserta, Avellino, and Salerno).

Neapolitan, as the varied Italo-Western group of dialects, is distributed throughout most of continental southern Italy, historically united during the Kingdom of Naples and the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies. The many dialects of this linguistic group include Neapolitan proper, Irpino, Cilentano, Ascolano, Teramano, Abruzzese Orientale Adriatico, Abruzzese Occidentale, Molisano, Dauno-Appenninico, Garganico, Apulo-Barese, Lucano, and Cosentino. The dialects are part of a strong and varied continuum, so the various dialects in southern Lazio, Marche, Abruzzo, Molise, Apulia, Lucania and Calabria can typically be recognizable as regional groups of dialects. In eastern Abruzzo and Lazio the dialects give way to Central Italian dialects such as Romanesco. In central Calabria and southern Puglia, the dialects give way to Sicilian dialects. Largely due to massive southern Italian immigration in the 20th century, there are also numbers of speakers in Italian diaspora communities in the United States, Canada, Australia, Brazil and Argentina.

Neapolitan has also had a significant influence on the intonation of Rioplatense Spanish, spoken mainly in the Buenos Aires region of Argentina.

The Language

Neapolitan is generally considered as Italo-Dalmatian. There are notable differences among the various dialects, but they are all generally mutually intelligible. The language as a whole has often fallen victim of its status as a "language without prestige".

Standard Italian and Neapolitan are of variable mutual comprehensibility, depending on factors both affective and linguistic. There are notable grammatical differences such as nouns in the neuter form and unique plural formation, and historical phonological developments often render the cognacy of lexical items opaque. Its evolution has been similar to that of Italian and other Romance languages from their roots in Spoken Latin. It has also developed with a pre-Latin Oscan influence, which controversially purported to be noticeable in the pronunciation of the d sound as an r sound (rhotacism), but only when "d" is at the beginning of a word, or between two vowels (e.g.- "doje" or "duje" (two, respectively feminine and masculine form), pronounced, and often spelled, as "roje"/"ruje", vedé (to see), pronounced as "veré", and often spelled so, same for cadé/caré (to fall), and Madonna/Maronna). Some think that the rhotacism is a more recent phenomenon, though. Another purported Oscan influence (claimed by some to be more likely than the previous one) is historical assimilation of the consonant cluster /nd/ as /nn/, pronounced [nː] (this generally is reflected in spelling more consistently) (e.g.- "munno" ('world', compare to Italian "mondo"), "quanno" ('when', compare to Italian "quando"), etc.), along with the development of /mb/ as /mm/ (e.g.- tammuro (drum), cfr. Italian tamburo), also consistently reflected in spelling. Other effects of the Oscan substratum are postulated too, although substratum claims are highly controversial. In addition, the language was also affected by the Greek language. Naples was largely Greek-speaking prior to the eighth century C.E., and the Greek language remained dominant in much of Southern Italy for many further centuries before finally being fully supplanted by Italian dialects (see: Griko language for remnant traces of Greek on the Italian peninsula). There have never been any successful attempts to standardize the language (e.g.- consulting three different dictionaries, one finds three different spellings for the word for tree, arbero, arvero and àvaro).

Neapolitan has enjoyed a rich literary, musical and theatrical history (notably Giambattista Basile, Eduardo de Filippo, Salvatore di Giacomo and Totò). Thanks to this heritage and the musical work of Renato Carosone in the 1950s, Neapolitan is still in use in popular music, even gaining national popularity in the songs of Pino Daniele and the Nuova Compagnia di Canto Popolare.

The language has no official status within Italy and is not taught in schools. The Università Federico II in Naples offers (from 2003) courses in Campanian Dialectology at the faculty of Sociology, whose actual aim is not teaching students to speak the language, but studying its history, usage, literature and social role. There are also ongoing legislative attempts at the national level to have it recognized as an official minority language of Italy. It is however a recognized ISO 639 Joint Advisory Committee language with the language code of nap.

For comparison, The Lord's Prayer is here reproduced in the Neapolitan spoken in Naples and in a northern Calabrian dialect, in contrast with a variety of southern Calabrian (part of Sicilian language), Italian and Latin.

Neapolitan (Naples)	Neapolitan (Northern Calabrian)	Sicilian (Southern Calabrian)	Sicilian (Sicily)	Italian	Latin
Pate nuoste ca staje 'ncielo,	Patre nuorru chi sta ntru cielu,	Patri nostru chi' sini nt'o celu,	Nunnu nostru, ca inta lu celu siti	Padre Nostro, che sei nei cieli,	Pater noster, qui es in caelis
santificammo 'o nomme tuojo	chi sia santificatu u nume tuoio,	m'esti santificatu u nomi toi,	mu santificatu esti lu nomu vostru:	sia santificato il tuo nome.	sanctificetur nomen tuum:
faje vení 'o regno tuojo,	venisse u riegnu tuoio,	Mù veni u rregnu toi,	Mu veni lu regnu vostru.	Venga il tuo regno,	Adveniat regnum tuum.
sempe c' 'a vuluntà toja,	se facisse a vuluntà tuoia,	ù si facissi a voluntà	Mu si faci la vuluntati vostra	sia fatta la tua volontà,	Fiat voluntas tua
accussí 'ncielo e 'nterra.	sia nto cielu ca nterra.	com'esti nt'o celu, u stessa sup'a terra.	comu esti inta lu celu, accussì incapu la terra	come in cielo, così in terra.	sicut in caelo et in terra
Fance avé 'o ppane tutt' 'e juorne	Ranne oje u pane nuorro e tutti i juorni,	Dùnandi ped oji u pani nostru e tutti i jorna	Dunàtini ogghi lu nostru panuzzu.	Dacci oggi il nostro pane quotidiano,	Panem nostrum quotidianum da nobis hodie.
lièvace 'e dièbbete	perdunacce i rebita nuorri,	e' perdùnandi i debiti,	E pirdunàtini li nostri dèbbiti,	e rimetti a noi i nostri debiti,	Et dimitte nobis debita nostra,
comme nuje 'e llevamme a ll'ate,	cumu nue perdunammu i rebituri nuorri.	comu nù nc'i perdunamu ad i debituri nostri.	comu nuautri li pirdunamu a li nostri dibbitura.	come noi li rimettiamo ai nostri debitori.	sicut et nos dimittimus debitoribus nostris.
nun 'nce fa spantecà,	Un ce mannare ntra tentazione,	Non nci dassari nt'a tentazioni,	E nun lassàtini cascari inta la tintazziuni;	E non ci indurre in tentazione,	Et ne nos inducas in temptationem;
e llievace 'o mmale 'a tuorno.	ma liberacce e ru male.	ma liberandi d'o mali	ma scanzàtini di lu mali.	ma liberaci dal male.	sed libera nos a malo.
Ammèn.	Ammèn.	Ammèn.	Ammèn.	Amen.	Amen.

Neapolitan Grammar

• Neapolitan Alphabet and Pronunciation
• Neapolitan articles
• Doubled initial consonants

See also

• Italian dialects
• Languages of Italy
• Sicilian language
• Calabrian languages
• Southern Italian

External links

• On line English - Neapolitan translation
• Websters Online Dictionary Neapolitan/English
• Ethnologue World linguistic classification
• Neapolitan language introduction
• Interactive Map of languages in Italy
• Neapolitan on-line radio station
• Neapolitan glossary on Wiktionary
• Italian-Neapolitan searchable online dictionary
• Grammar primer and extensive vocabulary for the Neapolitan dialect of Torre del Greco
• French-Neapolitan downloadable and searchable online dictionary
• Neapolitan Wikiprimer
• Neapolitan language and culture (in Italian)