Talk:Eastern Lombard dialects

Untitled

People, you did a great job on this page. I hope I'll help you in improving it. --Gio' 21:18, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Italian <-> Lombard dialects not mutually intelligible?

"Eastern Lombard and Italian are different languages and are not mutually intelligible." The last part of that statement is too disputable to be published. To a reader not familiar with either linguistic idiom, the impression might arise, that there are no similarities at all. Whereas in a everyday context not absolutely everything might be understood by a person mastering standard-italian, the grasp of more than just the basic meaning of a conversation is almost immediately possible. Furthermore, a lombard-speaker will always understand any speaker of standard-italian. Therefore, as this is a very arbitrary assertion and will strongly vary depending on the dialogue partners, i suggest that it be deleted. -- 15:42, 16 March 2011 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.3.12.61 (talk)

I do not agree. "real" bresciano and bergamasco dialect (i.e not "italian spoken with inflection") is hard to be understood, non only by italians, but by other people from lombardia, too. non only; it's not uncommon to find young people from Bergamo on Brescia unable to understand their grandparents, if they speak the "real" dialect. Dave4mame (talk)

Insüber and Orobech

Hi, is it true that West Lombard is called Insüber (after the Insubrian Gauls)? and East Lombard is called Orobech (after the Orobic gauls)? Or is Insüber just a dialect of west lombard and orobech of east lombard?

Present perfect

What about changing the name from Present Perfect into Recent Past, like in Italian grammar page? I prefer the latter because Present Perfect describes a particular tense in English, but in Eastern Lombard the meaning associated to the English form is not present.
hò andàt a scöla should not be translated into: I have gone to school but into: I went to school. --Gio' 21:16, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm aware that 'Present Perfect' is not the most appropiate term, unfortunately I'm not a grammarian and that was the best I could find. Of course I have nothing against a change but I think we should have to find a technically correct term, i.e. that which describes the specifical function covered by the tense. Recent Past sounds to me as an approximative translation of Passato Prossimo. I'm not sure this is a standard term in linguistic literature. Don't know if I've clarified enough my thought.

By the way, 151.24.71.104, 195.206.3.188 and Ninonino (I mean in history report) is always me. The article, at the moment, except for your last contributions, is almost entirely written by me.
I'm a fluent Eastern Lombard speaker from Concesio and of course all the exemples are based on my own variety. I hope to have the time to further contribute to this page.

Ninonino 13:11, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

you're right, there is no tense like Recent past, it would have been only a rough translation from Italian. but I added a short description after the past tenses, maybe we should add it even for other tenses. I know that these descriptions are somewhat sloppy, try to improve them if you'd like to.
I'm from Palazzolo, we prefer to use h instead of s (breha instead of bresa), but the form in s is also acceptable for me. I'm not very fluent, correct when there's any mistake, thank you!

--Gio' 10:43, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

I think that the short descriptions you added are an important improvement, not sloppy at all.
Me too, I pronounce /ˈbrɛha/ instead of /ˈbrɛsa/, but I preferred to always use the 's' variant because we should never forget that we are writing an article about the Eastern Lombard and not about Brescian or Bergamask. The aspiration of the 's' is only a local feature for Eastern Lombard.
Now, we are two Brescians editing this article and nobody from other provices. This implies that we should be careful to avoid the risk to become brescianocentric.
I already considered the idea to move the grammar section to a new article titled 'Brescian language' but at the moment I superseded, but in the future we should not discard this perspective.

Ninonino 12:16, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

Veser

What do you mean by that? What about the other auxiliary in the Recent Past?

I knew this could generate confusion. This is the verb 'to be', 'essere' in italian. What can be confusing is the initial 'v-' that is purely... oops, I don't recall the correct term at the moment. ;) In my own Brescian variety a v- is often added to a word beginning with a vowel when this appears at the beginning of a sentence or when the preceeding word ends with a liquid or a nasal consonant (l, r, m or n). for example:

iè le òt (it's eight o'clock - sono le otto)
sóm en vòt (we are eight - siamo in otto)

this is probably bound (or even due) to the phenomenon of the desappearing of the intervocalic -v- that also desappears at the beginning of a word.
for example:
öler (to want - volere; the initial v- in certain conditions desappears)

This phenomenon could be an interesting argument to investigate and add to the article. Isn't it?

p.s.: I got to admit that v- as initial is quite random, anyway 'éser' without initial v- sounds weird to me...

Ninonino 13:36, 28 March 2006 (UTC)
I added the conjugation of the verb, tell me if it's correct, please.

_________
Absolutely correct!!!

Ninonino 12:41, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

Pota

Do you mind if I added pota to the list of words? or should we add a paragraph about pota? I think it's very original. --Gio' 21:16, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Pota deserves a specific article, not a simple paragraph! I'm not joking.
Look, I think this is not the right place for two reasons:
1) Pota is not used by all the Eastern Lombard speakers, in my opinion it is merely Brescian and partly Bergamask, but Mantuan and Cremask do not even know what it is.
2) It is an interjection that actually is not that particular. You can compare it with 'minchia' for the Sicilians. Of course the use does not entirely coincide, but this is normal. The most relevant difference between these two words is that 'pota' in Brescian has lost its original meaning (I think you know what I mean), and had become a pure intejection, while 'minchia' still conserves the meaning of masculine sexual organ.
Ninonino 09:56, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

I don't agree , pota has a very different meaning , actually I would translate it as "what to do about it" , for example :"what to do about it , I'm not happy" , could translate "pota, sö mia contëtt" in Bergamask. Is a very fatalistic expression. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.212.111.107 (talk) 16:08, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

References

do you have any references on the Eastern Lombard?

This time it's me who did not understand what you meant. Cosa intendi con 'se ho referenze in Eastern Lombard?' Referenze o riferimenti? Non ho capito la domanda.

Ninonino 13:40, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

I meant, if you have any books on grammar in Lombard or Eastern Lombard. Otherwise let's write the grammar by ourselves!
I could find something about poetry, but I dont have any book with me now. Or I can use the songs of Charlie Cinelli (...).

_________
No, unfortunately I do not have any grammar or whatever book about our language. The text of the article was only flour from my sack ;) ...
At the moment, as far as I know, this is the most accurate description of Eastern lombard language one can find on the web*, but I think that there are not so many texts on this argument publicly available even on paper. So, let's write it by ourselves, and maybe, soon or later some grammarian will want to help us and amend our imprecisions... ;)
_* = Parlato troppo presto, guarda qui, trovato giusto 10 minuti fa:
http://www.etek.chalmers.se/~em7marco/dialect/grammatica.html

PS: If you were thinking about a paragraph dedicated to poetry or literature in eastern lombard, I would suggest to insert a mention about 'L'albero degli zoccoli'. Actually this is the most important work in Eastern Lombard Language and it is internationally reknown.

Ninonino 12:38, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

Metega po' a chesto http://www.websters-online-dictionary.org/definition/Lombard-english/ —Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.212.111.107 (talk) 16:11, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

Eastern Lombard at Lombard wikipedia

Hello, as you probably already know, a Lombard wikipedia has been recently created. Unfortunately, its authors (me included) are mostly western Lombard speakers. There are some papers in Eastern Lombard, though. I guess that you are an Eastern Lombard one, instead. I would like to invite you to participate to this project. Though I am a western speaker, I am studying Eastern varieties too, so, if you are not willing to take part in Lombard wikipedia for any reason, I could translate Eastern Lombard in the next future. Best regards, lmo:user:Clamengh 15:31 UTC+2 12/06/06

PS: Many thanks for references, even if probably not meant just for me... See also this camunic dictionary. There is also a study by Glauco Sanga (I am not sure) on the dialect of Cigole, series 'mondo popolare in Lombardia'. Perhaps you can find some copies at 'Silvana Editoriale' at Scinisell Bàlsum (MI). You will (not so) soon find something more in Lombard wikipedia Cheers.

Final A and ò/ó

Hello, could you be more precise about this item, please?

QUOTING FROM THE PAPER: 'Locally, the sound /a/ is pronounced [ɔ] when it appears as last sound of the word in an unstressed syllable (actually slightly closer than the phonemic /ɔ/). For example:

[ˈlynɔ] (moon), [sɛtɛˈmanɔ] (week).'

I suspect you mean that final a can turn into a schwa: ə (mid/central in the chart below), however I could be wrong. Turning of final a into o is rather an Occitanian phenomenon, this would be quite interesting. Please let me know. Here you can find a chart of vowels, leading you to audio samples (please follow links):

Many thanks, lmo:user:Clamengh 13:19 UTC+2 12/06/06

Derivation of -ga particle

Clamengh, I do not agree with the changes you did in the article about the derivation of the '-ga' particle. The point is that in the original text there was no mention to the origin of the particle, just suggested a comparison with the use of the particle 'ci' in Italian. Infact 'ìga' is not correctly translated with 'avere' but rather with 'averci'.

The sentence 'Gó du gacc' can be translated with the form 'C'ho (ci ho) due gatti' that is very usual for not cultivated people speaking Eastern Lombard more frequently that Italian.

Similarly the sentence 'L'è bèl a ìga i sólcc' is better translated in popular Italian as 'è bello averci i soldi'. Of course it is not grammatically correct in accademical Italian but it is not so rare to hear it in current spoken Italian. Isn't it?

In conclusion: I don't dispute the correctness of the statements you added, but it should not be regarded as alternative to the original text but, why not, as complementary. On the other hand, just note that never in the article have been given reference to the latin origin of the Eastern Lombard words, as I think it is out of the goals of the article.

Tell me your opinion,

Ciao,

Ninonino 09:25, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

I agree with Ninonino. Plus, is the Latin origin supported by the some reference/text? And as Ninonino said, comparisons with Latin are not topic for this article. --Gio' 12:40, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

Separate page for verb conjugation

The part on verb is disproportinately long in comparison to the other parts; what do you think about moving verb conjugation to another page? And what title could we use? Eastern Lombard verbs? I am not myself sure about this moving. --Gio' 12:46, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

I agree, I was thinking the same and I was about to ask your opinion on the same topic. My opinion is that we would have to create a new article called Eastern Lombard grammar and move all the grammatical paragraphs. I see on other languages pages that this is usually the policy adopted.
In this page we can put uniquely some general notes, we can follow the exemple of other languages pages. On the other hand, in our hypothetical new page the verbs section would be still disproportionate, but I think that in that context it could be more acceptable. Anyway, new sections on other grammatical functions will be added in the future I hope...
What do you think?

--Ninonino 09:27, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

I moved it. I hope you agree. If you don't like the change, just re-edit back. --Gio' 18:03, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Some remarks

Please have a look at negation and the modified parts in verb conjuction. I have some doubts: gnent and negota (or I'd say nigota) are really synonimous? I would say yes, not sure though. Also, is there any preference for mia or miga? Another thing I'd like to include: there is a verb meherés, that could be translated into it should be or, in Italian, bisognerebbe. What kind of form is that? and which root verb is it? I am really puzzled but if you have an idea, please include it. Finally, my use of stress is really random, I know, but I dont like using stress for monosyllabic words (unless it is to distinguish è/é and ò/ó). Also, I dont like stress on plain polysillabic words like gàta, is it not enough to write gata? As personal preference, I would use Italian orthography for accents unless there are good reasons not to do so (like in example è/é). Last point: are there other ways to write s.cèt without using a point? A fullstop is usually used to indicate period, just like a comma. Are there other conventions to express this sound? --Gio' 15:06, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

Hi Gio', nice remarks!
As concerns negation, I noticed your changes, I appeciate them and I will add my comments lately because at the moment I need more time to think about it.
- As concerns stresses: in the rules I adopted, for monosyllabic words the stress is not needed, unless to discriminate è/é and ó/ò, and umlauts of course. Removing them would compromise comprehension.
- As concerns 'gàta' issue. Well, when I chose this rule, I had in mind people that do not know Eastern Lombard, for whom the understanding of the correct pronounce would be facilitated. I agree with you if you think that this boring for us, but it is also a matter of practice.
- As concerns 's.cèt' issue: I just took inspiration from the catalan 'l.l' (ela geminada) but we can choose a different sign. May be we can change it with 's-cèt'. Do you think it is better. Have you other suggestions?

--Ninonino 09:56, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

I looked up at Catalan phonology and orthography and the ela geminata is written as l·l, with a point in the middle. s·cèt is not bad actually. I also found s'cet. We have four possibilities: s.cèt,s-cèt, s·cèt,s'cèt. I am not fond of s.cèt because points are used to end a sentence, the other possibilieties are equally good. If we can find a text using one of them (or another one) it would be great. Otherwise, pick one out. --Gio' 18:16, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Ooops, you are right! the point is in the middle. I didn't notice it.
Well, I would discard the full stop as you are right not to be fond. Effectively it can induce misunderstandings.
I would also discard the apostrophe as it supposes a truncation that is not our case.
The hyphen is practical but it is usually utilised to connect separate words and to divide syllables.
S·cèt is the nicer one. The sole problem is that the point in the middle is not practical for our standard keyboards (ó also is not present but in that case we have no choice).
Nevertheless, at this point I would incline for s·cèt as it is not a frequent accident. And you? Have you got a preference?
In case we choose the point in the middle, should we have to state in the orthography section that the middle point can be obtained by pressing [alt+0183] on windowz platforms? Mmmmh... may be it is not necessary.
--Ninonino 07:15, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

I edited the orthography part, using s·cèt. Unfortunately, inside Wikipedia there is no standard: for s'cet look at [1] and for s-cet, look at [2]. Amazing! Theoretically, I prefer s·cèt but if one of the other forms is more widely accepted, we should try to standardize.--Gio' 09:57, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Negóta, gnènt, mìa, mìga, etc.

In my own variety of EL, 'negóta' and 'gnènt' are synonims. Or better I should say 'neènt' or 'niènt' as we do not say 'gnènt'. We also say 'negót'
'Mìa' or 'mìga'? The answer to this question depends on which variety we choose to take as reference. If we take as reference the variety of the city of Brescia we should say 'mìa', and I would prefer it because I feel 'mìga' as a local variant. I have no basis to say which is the area where 'mìga' is used instead of 'mìa' but my sensation is that it is remarkably smaller that the area of 'mìa'. This is exactly one of the doubts that make me think we need contributions from people living in other provinces.

The examples you added in your last contributions made me think also that we should take a decision on what to do with the speech examples (there are difference from what I would say in my own variant, i.e. 'stüdia' instead of 'stödia', etc.).
I mean, we have two options:
- choose a language variety as reference and use it for all of the examples.
- specify for all of the examples which is the variety they are based on.
There are some good reasons for both ways. The first make the article more consistent. The second gives an information on multiple varieties but makes it dispersive.
But if we choose the first way, we should revise and standardize each of the exemples that will be added in the future. Of course we should choose a variant that we are able to manage with a good mastery.
Please, tell me your opinion on this point. Bye.

--Ninonino 11:42, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

I see the point, and here is my opinion: I agree that contributions from other people are strongly needed but we don't have any unfortunately. I also know that I don't speak a 'pure' variant of the language (from Palazzolo, right between Brescia and Bergamo), so if we choose for a variaty from, say, Brescia, somebody else would have to correct the examples. A more theoretical reason is that Eastern lombard has been a spoken language, spoken by different people in different ways and it's difficult to find a common variety. And any choice for one particular variety is, I think, rather arbitrary. Although I agree that different varieties may confuse the reader (and particularly, using only two of them, yours and mine, so far), it represents better the daily usage. We are writing a descriptive grammar more than a prescriptive one. However, in such case, we would also need to define a name for each variety that we are using (do I speak a 'Palazzolo Eastern lombard? and you'd need to define your own variety; this could be rather complicated). I really want to know your opinion and your suggestions. And feel free to correct any example I added; sometimes I am not that sure about the pronunciations and it could be wrong. --Gio' 18:43, 17 July 2006 (UTC) )

Ok, I think we can solve the problem in this way. We will choose a variety as reference for all of the examples when we describe the grammatical functions (nouns, verbs, etc.). This makes all the examples consistent, otherwise we will confuse the reader and makes the scientifical information poorer.
At this point of the work I think that the choice cannot fall differently than on the Brescian (city) variety. I can revise your contributions if you think that it is the case.
Beside this, we can start a section with a certain number of representative sentences to be translated in a certain number of different EL varieties. This would give a synthetic sight of the wide local viariability of the language.
To do this we need contributions from speakers from areas other than ours. My idea is that we should translate the entire article in Italian and port it in the Italian Wikipedia. This would give us much more visibility in the Italian context that is the one we need at this point.
Otherwise we hardly will find readers and finally contributors if we remain exclusively in English context. Once the job is done we can leave the Italian version grow independently and pick the language contributions that we need in our English version. It's a medium time project, but I think it can work. Your opinion? --Ninonino 08:55, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Ok, let's take the Brescian variety and revise the examples I add. I think that you're much better in phonology than me, so feel free to adjust the phonology. Good idea about comparing the variaties, but it can become a very long business. Anyway, as soon as we have enough material, we should add a section about this. You're completely right in saying that we should extend the work to the Italian wikipedia. However, personally I am not fully convinced by that project as I'm not convinced by the Lombard wikipedia. I fear it can become more a political issue (for example, look at the discussion between definition of lingua and dialetto [3]) than a linguistic one (oh, my gosh, look at these [4] and [5]). Anyway, in the next days, I'll be working on Eastern Lombard grammar. --Gio' 12:04, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

You are absolutely right. I completely share your feeling on the political issues. In fact I proposed you to translate it in Italian not in Lombard for that reason. On the other hand, once in Italian context, the possible politic use of our job is out of our responsibility. I will do all the efforts to keep my writings on the article as neuter as possible, but as WP is open, malicious users are always behind the corner. In English context the risk is lower but not null. --Ninonino 12:49, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

I was very amazed when I found out that catalan language uses nigota (literally no drop) , ningu' (nigu' , nobody in bergamask) aigua (water in bergamask, different from agua , spanish) només (literally, no mas) meaning only, noma in bergamask —Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.212.111.107 (talk) 16:16, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

interrogative conjugation

Hi, I would like to modify the following sentence: A particular feature of the Eastern Lombard is the interrogative form of the verb to:

• A particular feature of Lombard tongue, much better preserved in Eastern varieties, is the interrogative form of the verb...

Cheers,--Clamengh 08:16, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

Catalan ortography

Hi, it would be very nice to adopt a Catalan like ortography: something like is being done at Lombard Wikipedia. Please see this article. See also this one, available starting from this evening. But consider also that one should feel free to write accents when needed, since our tongues are not so strong as Catalan one: we have no teaching in Lombard tongue! A more serious issue is the question of apophonic alterarion of o: I would be for writing o in atonic position, and reading u (as in Catalan) when needed by a particular dialect (generally western ones, but some rustic eastern one in Bergamasque valleys as well, in my knowledge), for instance:

portaal, to be read

/pur'ta:l/ by western speakers

/por'tal/ or /por'ta:l/ by eastern ones.

Unified ortography is phonetic though, and maybe Lombard tongue, being endangered, could carry only a phonetic ortography. This is an item to be deeply discussed. I am also developing a "mathematical koiné" for writing mathematical articles: check when this paper is on line. Maybe I should write something like in English as well. Many thanks. Sincerely yours, Claudi--Clamengh 08:25, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

miga, mia

Hi, this is a slight dialectal variation. Western dialects are affected as well by this. They should be considered synonimous. Cheers,--Clamengh 08:30, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

Lombard wikipedia

Hi, I am sorry to hear from you that you do not feel convinced about Lombard Wikipedia. The matter lingua/dialetto simply does not exist there: we have no time to waste, so we have simply ignored the question. Please consider that there is no politics in that project. The goal of Lombard wikipedia is:

• to get back contexts of uses of the tongue,

to counter its tendency to desappear. This is done for elemetary socio-linguistic reasons: as scientific community teaches, the death of a languages starts from its loss of contexts in which it is spoken or written. Sincerely yours, Claudi--Clamengh 08:36, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

Maybe this is not the place to discuss this item: I would be honoured to invite you at my user talk page! Nevertheless, I leave this unchanged, for the moment.--Clamengh 13:58, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

malicious users

Yes, you are right.

• At English wikipedia: low risk
• At Italian wikipedia: high risk
• At Lombard wikipedia: to be evaluated: so far nothing dangerous happened.

Cheers, Claudi --Clamengh 08:38, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

but, anyway, please don't give up your tongue

Hi, of course I respect any kind of habit you have towards your tongue or Wikipediae. But, please, don't give it up, and consider that writing is a fine way to preserve it: it will be archived, so... Cheers, Claudi --Clamengh 08:40, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

Varieties

Hi, nothing prevents to write a paper for each dialect. But, so far, Bergamasque seems urgent: I hope I could do something in the next future, but I am busy at Lombard wikipedia. Cheers,--Clamengh 08:43, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

Hi...nothing prevents, as well, that you translate from Lombard the article about Bergamasque, when available ;-)....--Clamengh 09:37, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

I dé de la mèrla

Actually two different versions of this tradition exist. The most widespread refers to the last three days of January, but beside this a second verison exists and refers to the last two days of January and February 1st.

For example, this website (of the Oglio-Chiese Civic Museum, in Italian) relates of the second tradition:

http://www.mantova.org/museocanneto/mitfuo.htm

The relevant excerpt from the above mentioned site is:

• 30/31 gennaio e 1 febbraio "I dé de la mèrla"

Si accendevano i fuochi con fascine di gelso. In certe zone si bruciava pure la vecchia (evidente il significato di purificazione). Gli anziani traevano auspici dalle fiamme del falò - se le fiamme attecchivano velocemente e si alzavano diritte verso il cielo si prevedeva una bella annata, diversamente, il presagio non era favorevole. Il falò dei giorni della merla era rito propiziatore per la buona riuscita dei bachi da seta.

or this one from the ADL (Atlante Demologico Lombardo):

http://www.demologia.it/brescia/calendario/locale/71cal.htm

from which:

• 30 gennaio / 1° febbraio

(frazione Ponte Zanano) i dé de la merla: si dice che sono i giorni più freddi dell'anno. In questi giorni un merlo bianco cantava a primavera; ma cadde la neve e il merlo andò a ripararsi in un camino, da allora divenne tutto nero.

To explain the signification of the sentence in the tale I utilised as example, I made reference to the this second version as it better fits to the words said by January.

Ninonino 12:13, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Bergamasque / Brescian articles

I just created the Bergamasque article; maybe it's time for most of the Brescian features of this Eastern Lombard article to also move to a Brescian article... --Dans (talk) 11:41, 4 July 2009 (UTC)