On occasion of the Dantedì (a special day
dedicated to the “father of the Italian language”) on March 25, I wish to share
one of his best passages as an involontary stand-up comedian. As you’ll see, our
good old Dante has a good word for everybody!
De Vulgari Eloquentia, Dante Alighieri,
transl. by Steven Botterill, Cambridge University Press, 1996, Chs. XI-XIV [I
have made a few minimal edits].
Amid the cacophony of the many varieties of
Italian speech, let us hunt for the most respectable and illustrious vernacular
that exists in Italy [...]
Accordingly, since the Romans believe that they
should always receive preferential treatment, I shall begin […] with them; and
I do so by declaring that they should not be taken into account in any didactic
work about effective use of the vernacular. For what the Romans speak is not so
much a vernacular as a vile jargon, the ugliest of all the languages spoken in
Italy; and this should come as no surprise, for they also stand out among all
Italians for the ugliness of their manners and their outward appearance. They
say things like 'Messure, quinto dici?' [Sir, what do you say?]
After these let us prune away the inhabitants of
the Marches of Ancona, who say 'Chignamente state siate' [be as you are]; and
along with them we throw out the people of Spoleto. Nor should I fail to
mention that a number of poems have been composed in derision of these three
peoples; I have seen one of these, constructed in perfect accordance with the
rules, written by a Florentine of the name of Castra. It began like this: ‘Una
fermana scopai da Cascioli, cita cita se'n gìa'n grande aina’. [I met a woman
from Fermo near Cascioli; she hurried briskly away, in great haste]
After these let us root out the Milanese, the
people of Bergamo, and their neighbours; I recall that somebody has written a
derisive song about them too: ‘Enter l'ora del vesper, ciò fu del mes
d'ochiover’. [Around the hour of vespers, it was in the month of October]
After these let us pass through our sieve the
people of Aquileia and Istria, who belch forth 'Ces fas-to?' [What are you up
to?] with a brutal intonation. And along with theirs I reject all languages
spoken in the mountains and the countryside, by people like those of Casentino
and Fratta, whose pronounced accent is always at such odds with that of
city-dwellers. As for the Sardinians, who are not Italian but may be associated
with Italians for our purposes, out they must go, because they alone seem to
lack a vernacular of their own, instead imitating gramatica as apes do humans:
for they say 'domus nova' [new house] and 'dominus meus' [my master].
[…] let us [now] turn our attention to the
language of Sicily, since the Sicilian vernacular seems to hold itself in
higher regard than any other, first because all poetry written by Italians is
called 'Sicilian', and then because we do indeed find that many learned natives
of that island have written serious poetry [...] [However,] if by Sicilian
vernacular we mean what is spoken by the average inhabitants of the island [...] then this is far from
worthy of the honour of heading the list, because it cannot be pronounced
without a certain drawl, as in this case: ‘Tragemi d'este focora se t'este a
bolontate’. [Get me out of this fire, if you would be so kind] [...]
The people of Apulia, to continue, whether
through their own native crudity or through the proximity of their neighbours
(the Romans and the people of the Marches), use many gross barbarisms: they say
‘Bòlzera che chiangesse lo quatraro’. [I would like the boy to cry] [...]
After this, we come to the Tuscans, who, rendered
senseless by some aberration of their own, seem to lay claim to the honour of
possessing the illustrious vernacular. [...] Now, since the Tuscans are the
most notorious victims of this mental intoxication, it seems both appropriate
and useful to examine the vernaculars of the cities of Tuscany one by one, and
thus to burst the bubble of their pride. When the Florentines speak, they say
things like: 'Manichiamo, introcque che noi non facciamo altro' [Let's eat,
since there's nothing else to do]. The Pisans: 'Bene andonno li fatti de
Fiorensa per Pisa' [The business at Florence went well for Pisa]. The people of
Lucca: 'Fo voto a Dio ke ingrassarra eie lo comuno de Lucca' [I swear to God,
the city of Lucca is really in the pink]. The Sienese: 'Onche renegata avess'io
Siena. Chée chesto?' [If only I'd left Siena for good! What's up now?]. The
people of Arezzo: 'Vuo' tu venire ovelle?' [Do you want to go somewhere?].
I have no intention of dealing with Perugia,
Orvieto, Viterbo, or Città di Castello, because of their inhabitants' affinity
with the Romans and the people of Spoleto. [...]
If there is anyone who thinks that what I have
just said about the Tuscans could not be applied to the Genoese, let him
consider only that if, through forgetfulness, the people of Genoa lost the use
of the letter z, they would either have to fall silent for ever or
invent a new language for themselves. For z forms the greater part of
their vernacular, and it is, of course, a letter that cannot be pronounced
without considerable harshness.
[…] [As for] the language of Romagna, […] I say
that in this part of Italy are found two vernaculars which stand in direct
opposition to each other because of certain contradictory features. One of them
is so womanish, because of the softness of its vocabulary and pronunciation,
that a man who speaks it, even if in a suitably virile manner, still ends up
being mistaken for a woman. This is spoken by everybody in Romagna, especially
the people of Forlì, whose city, despite being near the edge of the region,
none the less seems to be the focal point of the whole province: they say
'deuscì' [God, yes!] when they wish to say 'yes'; and to seduce someone they
say 'oclo meo' [My eye] and 'corada mea' [My heart]. […] There is also another
vernacular, as I said, so hirsute and shaggy in its vocabulary and accent that,
because of its brutal harshness, it not only destroys the femininity of any
woman who speaks it, but, reader, would make you think her a man.
This is the speech of all those who say 'magarà'
[If only], such as the citizens of Brescia, Verona and Vicenza; and the Paduans
also speak like this, when they cruelly cut short all the participles ending in
tus and the nouns in tas, saying 'mercò' [traded] and 'bontè' [goodness]. Along
with these I will mention the people of Treviso, who, like those of Brescia and
their neighbours, abbreviate their words by pronouncing consonantal u as f,
saying 'nof' for 'nove' [nine] and 'vif' for 'vivo' [alive]. This I denounce as
the height of barbarism.
Nor can the Venetians be considered worthy of the
honour due to the vernacular for which we are searching; and if any of them,
transfixed by error, be tempted to take pride in his speech, let him remember
if he ever said ‘Per le plaghe di Dio tu no verras’. [By God's wounds, you
won't come]
