Ladin language

Not to be confused with Ladino language.

Ladin
Ladin
Native to	Italy
Region	Province of Belluno, South Tyrol and Trentino
Native speakers	30,000
Language family	Indo-European Italic Romance Italo-Western Western Gallo-Iberian Gallo-Romance Gallo-Rhaetian Rhaetian Ladin
Official status
Regulated by	The office for Ladin language planning Ladin Cultural Centre Majon di Fascegn Istitut Ladin Micurà de Rü
Language codes
ISO 639-2	roa
ISO 639-3	lld
ELP	Ladin
Linguasphere	51-AAA-l
Distribution of Ladin in Trentino, South Tyrol and Belluno in northeastern Italy

Detailed map of the Ladin communities and valleys

Ladin (German: Ladinisch, Italian: Ladino) is a group of dialects (which some consider part of a unitary Rhaeto-Romance language) spoken in the Dolomite Mountains in Northern Italy in the border regions of the provinces Trentino, South Tyrol and Belluno. It is closely related to the Swiss Romansh, Surselvan and Friulian.

Ladin should not be confused with Ladino (also called Judaeo-Spanish), which is a Romance dialect of Spanish, with Hebrew, Turkish and Greek influences.

Geographic distribution

It is spoken in:

• the following municipalities of South Tyrol:
  • Urtijëi
  • Santa Cristina Gherdëina
  • Sëlva
  • Badia
  • Corvara
  • La Val
  • San Martin de Tor
  • Mareo

In the 2001 census, 18,124 inhabitants of South Tyrol declared Ladin as their native language.

• the following municipalities of Trentino
  • Val di Fassa:
    • Canazei (Ladin Cianacei)
    • Campitello di Fassa (Ladin Ciampedèl)
    • Mazzin (Ladin Mazin)
    • Pozza di Fassa (Ladin Poza)
    • Vigo di Fassa (Ladin Vich)
    • Soraga (Ladin Soraga -or- Sorega)
    • Moena (Ladin Moena)

In the 2001 census, 16,462 inhabitants of Trentino declared Ladin as their native language.

• the province of Belluno in:
  • Cortina d'Ampezzo (Ladin: Anpëz, German: Hayden)
  • Colle Santa Lucia (Ladin: Col, German: Verseil)
  • Livinallongo del Col di Lana valley (Ladin: Fodóm, German: Buchenstein)

History

The name derives from Latin, because Ladin is originally a vulgar Latin language left over from the romanized Alps. Ladin is often attributed to be a relic of vulgar Latin dialects associated with Rhaeto-Romance languages. Whether a proto-Romance language ever existed is controversially discussed amongst linguists and historians, a debate known as Questione Ladina. Starting in the 6th century, the Bavarii started moving in from north, while from the south the Italian language started pushing in, which further shrank the original extent of the Ladin area. Only in the more remote mountain valleys was Ladin able to survive.

Starting in the very early middle ages, the whole area was eventually ruled by the County of Tyrol or the Bishopric of Brixen, both belonging to the realms of the Austrian Habsburg rulers. In the vast multi-ethnic Holy Roman Empire and then after 1804 the Austrian empire, the Ladins were left in relative peace and were allowed to continue the use of their language and culture. The outbreak of World War I saw heavy battle action in these areas, as the front ran between Austria-Hungary and the Kingdom of Italy.

After the end of the war in 1918, Italy annexed the southern part of Tyrol including the Ladin areas. The Italian nationalistic movement of the 19th and 20th century almost always regarded Ladin as an Italian dialect, a notion that has been repeatedly rejected by most Ladins. The programme of Italianization professed by fascists such as Ettore Tolomei and Benito Mussolini added further pressure to the Ladin communities to subordinate their identities as Italians. This included changing Ladin place names into the Italian pronounciation according to Tolomei's Prontuario dei nomi locali dell'Alto Adige.

Following the end of World War II, the Gruber-De Gasperi Agreement of 1946 between Austria and Italy introduced a level of autonomy for Trentino and South Tyrol, but did not include any provisions for Ladins. Only the second autonomy statute for South Tyrol in 1972 started recognising the minority rights for these communities.

Status

Unofficial flag of the Ladin people

Ladin is officially recognised in Trentino and South Tyrol by provincial and national law. Italy signed the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages of 1991, but has not ratified it so far. The charter calls for minority rights to be respected and minority languages, to which Ladin belongs to, to be appropriately protected and promoted. Nevertheless starting in the 1990's, various laws and regulations have been passed by the Italian parliament and provincial assembly, that put the Ladin language and culture under protection. A cultural institute was founded by decree, whose purpose is to safeguard and educate on the language and culture. School curricula were adapted in order to teach in Ladin, and street signs are being changed to be bilingual.

Ladin does not enjoy official status and protection in the province of Belluno in the Veneto region. The wishes of the Ladins there have barely been addressed by the regional government. In a popular referendum in October 2007, the inhabitants of Anpëz overwhelmingly voted to leave Veneto and return to South Tyrol. The redrawing of the provincial borders would see a return of Anpëz, Fodóm and Col to South Tyrol, to which they have traditionally belonged when they were still a part of the County of Tyrol or the Bishopric of Brixen.

Although the Ladin communities are spread out over three neighbouring regions, no serious political movement exists to unite them into a separate region, nor are there political parties elected into the regional and provincial assemblies based on a Ladin list. Ladins are however guaranteed political representations in the assemblies of Trentino and South Tyrol due to a reserved seats system.

In South Tyrol, in order to reach a fair allocation of jobs in public service, a system called "ethnic proportion" was established in the 1970's. Every ten years, when the general census of population takes place, each citizen has to declare to which linguistic group they belong or want to be aggregated to. According to the results it is decided how many potential positions in public service are allocated for each linguistic group. This has enabled Ladins to receive guaranteed representation in the South Tyrolean civil service according to their numbers.

Subdivisions

The Ladin spoken in the Fascia Valley in Trentino is also subdivided into two further branches: "Cazét" (pronounced [kazɛt]) is spoken in the northern half of the valley, whereas "Brach" (pronounced [brak]) is spoken in the southern half. For example, in Cazét water is "ega" ("e" pronounced /ɛ/), whereas in Brach it is "aga".

Phonology

Standard Ladin has the following phonemes:

Consonants

	Labial	Labio- dental	Dental and alveolar	Alveolo- palatal	Post- alveolar	Palatal	Velar	Glottal
Nasal	m		n			ɲ	ŋ
Plosive	p  b		t  d				k  ɡ
Affricate			ts	tɕ  dʑ
Fricative		f  v	s  z		ʃ  ʒ			h
Approximant			ɹ
Lateral			l

Vowels

The vowel phonemes of Standard Ladin are shown in the table below:

Monophthongs	Front	Central	Back
Close	i		u
Close mid	e		o
Open mid	ɛ	ə	ɔ
Open	a

The [ə] vowel, spelled /ë/,as in Urtijëi (), occurs in some local dialects but is not included in Standard Ladin.

Further reading

• Rut Bernardi: Curs de gherdëina – Trëdesc lezions per mparé la rujeneda de Gherdëina/Dreizehn Lektionen zur Erlernung der grödnerischen Sprache. Istitut ladin Micurà de Rü, St. Martin in Thurn 1999, ISBN 88-8171-012-9
• Vittorio Dell'Aquila und Gabriele Iannàccaro: Survey Ladins: Usi linguistici nelle Valli Ladine. Autonome Region Trentino-Südtirol, Trient 2006, ISBN 88-86053-69-X
• Marco Forni: Wörterbuch Deutsch–Grödner-Ladinisch. Vocabuler tudësch–ladin de Gherdëina. Istitut ladin Micurà de Rü, St. Martin in Thurn 2002, ISBN 88-8171-033-1
• Günter Holtus, Michael Metzeltin, Christian Schmitt (ed.): Lexikon der Romanistischen Linguistik (LRL), Tübingen, Niemeyer, 1988-2005 (12 Bände); Band III: Die einzelnen romanischen Sprachen und Sprachgebiete von der Renaissance bis zur Gegenwart. Rumänisch, Dalmatisch / Istroromanisch, Friaulisch, Ladinisch, Bündnerromanisch, 1989.
• Theodor Gartner: Ladinische Wörter aus den Dolomitentälern. Niemeyer, Halle 1913 (Online version)
• Maria Giacin Chiades (ed.): Lingua e cultura ladina. Canova, Treviso 2004, ISBN 88-8409-123-3 ([2])
• Constanze Kindel: Ladinisch für Anfänger. In: Die Zeit 4/2006 (Online version)
• Heinrich Schmid: Wegleitung für den Aufbau einer gemeinsamen Schriftsprache der Dolomitenladiner. Istitut Cultural Ladin Micurà de Rü, St. Martin in Thurn/Istitut Cultural Ladin Majon di Fascegn, San Giovanni 1994 (Online version)
• Servisc de Planificazion y Elaborazion dl Lingaz Ladin (SPELL): Gramatica dl Ladin Standard. Istitut Cultural Ladin Micurà de Rü, St. Martin in Thurn (u.a.) 2001, ISBN 88-8171-029-3 (http://www.spell-termles.ladinia.net/documents/gramatica_LS_2001.pdf Online version)

External links

Media related to Ladin language at Wikimedia Commons

• The office for Ladin language planning
• TraiL TV News - Five minutes news in public TV
• News - Noeles.net the first internet-news-portal in ladin language (ladin dolomitan / ladin standard). The main contents are about ladin culture, politics, society, and other.
• Radio TV Ladin
• Ethnologue report on Ladin
• Weekly Paper - La Usc Di Ladins (The Voice of the Ladins - in Ladin - different sections written in all the different sub-dialects), paper of the General Union of the Ladins of the Dolomites. Weekly news from the Ladin valleys in the Dolomites.
• Ladinienatlas ALD-I
• Linguistic Atlas of Dolomitic Ladinian and neighbouring Dialects - Speaking Linguistic Atlas
• Grzega, Joachim, Template:De icon Ku-eichstaett.de, Materialien zu einem etymologischen Wörterbuch des Dolomitenladinischen (MEWD), Katholische Universität Eichstätt-Ingolstadt (KU) 2005.
• Dictionary of Fassano