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Italy flagtano
The Italian Slavic language
Many people aren't aware of it (well, at least I wasn't :), but among the various local languages/dialects spoken in Italy, which are generally Romance languages, there is a Slavic one. In three little towns of Molise, a small region in the center of the peninsula, it is possible to hear people talk in the so-called "croato molisano", a variant of the Shtokavian dialect. However the community is very small, actually less than 1000 people. I wonder how easy is for Croatian speakers to understand this language. How much effort does it take to do it?
Aside from the wikipedia page (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavomolisano_dialect), I found a video about it (much part of the video is in Italian, but it can give you a taste of the language): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uxPVZTDNEFI

Comments · 5

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tano, oh, thank you. I never heard about it.

I think there must be Slavic spoken in around Trieste. And I'm not sure about Friuli. I also think in the times of Francs (or maybe Langobards) Slavs settled in many places in North Italy and influenced local dialects. I also know that Romance dialects were spoken in Dalmatian cities until recently.

I have a friend in Herceg Novi (Castelnuovo:)) or maybe now in Kotor (Cattaro), and my another friend when visiting him always confuses Slavic speech of locals (Bokelji, people of the bay) with Italian when he hears it from distance. I think he would have the same impression from speech of some Croatian coastal cities. I also heard about some mixed Croatian dialect on some island. But I haven't hear about Molise.

This topic, Slavic/Italian contacts is what I always wnated to know more about. Especially given that the Italian "ciao" (the famous Italian word ciao) comes form "Slav":) Slav, sclavus (slave), sciavo/schiavo, ciao.
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You asked how easy or difficult for Croatian speakers is to understand Molise Croatian language. I am a native speaker of Croatian and I live in Croatia. I have found several YouTube recordings of Molise language (e.g. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4_NtgtnAtIs). I almost do not understand it at all. I can just understand the general idea (concentrating a lot) of what the person is talking, but I cannot understand the details. I cannot understand a single sentence completely.
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My languages are Belarusian (native), Ukrainian (C2), Polish(B1) and Russian(C2). These are all Northern Slavic languages, but I get a basic idea of every Molise Slavic sentence in the main video, as well as in this one https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4_NtgtnAtIs. I'm sure it's easier for people speaking any south-west Slavic language though:))
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Thank you Goran! Actually in first place I thought the two languages were more similar but, having read that Croatian people migrated in Molise 500 years ago, it is quite normal for the two languages to have been so different.
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Hi Dravsi :) I am glad you enjoyed my note. Unfortunately I don't know that much about the history of Slavic people in Italy but yes, they have left traces here and there, especially in what today are the regions of Friuli and Veneto. And the communities should have been made up by a not so small number of people because, for example, it happens that there is a waterfront in Venice named after them, "Riva degli Schiavoni" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Riva_degli_Schiavoni), as well as a painting by Tiziano, "La schiavona" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Schiavona).

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