- Official language in
- Italy, Switzerland
- Also spoken in
- San Marino, Vatican City
- Script
- Latin
Where it's spoken
Italy's Constitution does not itself name an official language for the Republic. That gap was filled by a law protecting Italy's historic linguistic minorities, whose first article states that the official language of the Republic is Italian. Italian is also an official language of Switzerland at the federal level, alongside German and French; the federal Constitution further makes Romansh an official language for dealings with speakers of Romansh. At the cantonal level, the Constitution of the Republic and Canton of Ticino describes the canton as "a democratic republic of Italian culture and language," and the Constitution of the Canton of Graubünden lists German, Romansh, and Italian as the canton's equal national and official languages. Italian is also spoken in San Marino, whose government requires proficiency in Italian for citizenship by naturalization, and in Vatican City, whose law on the sources of law adopted several of the Kingdom of Italy's codes — including its civil, penal, and procedural codes — as supplementary law.
Sources
- Legge 15 dicembre 1999, n. 482 — "Norme in materia di tutela delle minoranze linguistiche storiche" (official consolidated text, Normattiva) — Art. 1
- Treccani — "Ufficialità della lingua italiana" (Enciclopedia, voce giuridica) — Constitution's silence on an official language; first legal statement (Legge 482/1999, Art. 1)
- Federal Constitution of the Swiss Confederation, Articles 4 and 70 (English translation) — International Constitutional Law project, Institute for Public Law, University of Bern — Art. 4 (national languages); Art. 70 (official languages; Romansh with Romansh speakers)
- Costituzione della Repubblica e Cantone Ticino, del 14 dicembre 1997 (stato 1° gennaio 2023) — Art. 1
- Verfassung des Kantons Graubünden, vom 14. September 2003 (Stand 1. April 2023) — Art. 3 Abs. 1
- Repubblica di San Marino — Segreteria di Stato Affari Interni: "Conoscenza della lingua italiana e test di storia e Istituzioni sammarinesi" (Cittadinanza per naturalizzazione) — B1 Italian requirement for naturalization
- Stato della Città del Vaticano — "N. II. Legge sulle fonti del diritto" (Pio XI, 7 giugno 1929), in Acta Apostolicae Sedis, Supplemento per le Leggi e Disposizioni — Artt. 3, 4, 7, 13 (Kingdom of Italy's civil, penal, and procedural codes as suppletive law); reproduction — the Vatican's own archive is not published online
Script & pronunciation
Italian is written in the Latin alphabet. Some letter combinations stand for a single consonant sound rather than for the sounds of their separate letters: gli, as in this app's card for family, "la famiglia," and gn, as in this app's card asking "Dov'è il bagno?" ("Where is the bathroom?"), each write one palatal sound. The letter c changes sound depending on the vowel that follows it: before e or i, it is pronounced as in this app's card "Piacere di conoscerla" ("Pleased to meet you"); before a, o, or u, it is pronounced differently, and adding an h after c restores that same before-a/o/u sound even before e or i, as in che in this app's card "Che bella città!" ("What a beautiful city!"). The letters sc work the same way: before e or i they stand for a single sound, as in this app's sign card "Uscita" ("Exit"), rather than the sounds of s and c said separately.
Sources
- Treccani — "Fonetica" (Enciclopedia dell'Italiano) — gli /ʎ/, gn /ɲ/, sc before i /ʃ/, c before e /tʃ/ (paglia, ragno, uscio, cielo)
- Treccani — Vocabolario Treccani online, voce "digramma" — ch before e/i restores /k/
Grammar essentials
In unmarked declarative sentences, Italian word order is subject before verb before object. Because the verb's ending already shows the grammatical subject, Italian is described as a language in which expressing the subject is optional, and the subject is very often left out: this app's card "Ho una prenotazione" ("I have a reservation") has no separate word for "I" — the -o ending on ho already shows it. Negation is formed by placing non directly before the verb: this app's card "Non ho una prenotazione" ("I don't have a reservation") places non before ho, and its own grammar note makes the same point. Adjectives most often follow the noun they describe, as in vino rosso ("red wine") in this app's card for a glass of house red wine, and calda ("hot") in this app's card "L'acqua calda" ("hot water"); when an adjective instead comes before the noun, it can carry a more subjective or emphatic reading rather than simply describing it.
Sources
- Treccani — "Sintassi" (Enciclopedia dell'Italiano) — unmarked SVO word order
- Treccani — "Soggetto" (Enciclopedia dell'Italiano) — optional subject expression
- Treccani — "Negazione" (Enciclopedia dell'Italiano) — non precedes the verb
- Treccani — "Aggettivi" (Enciclopedia dell'Italiano) — unmarked postnominal position; prenominal position and subjective/emphatic reading
Politeness & etiquette
Address in Italian splits sharply between the informal tu and the formal Lei. Even though Lei addresses the listener directly, it is grammatically third person: this app's card "Come sta?" ("How are you?", formal) uses sta, the Lei form of stare, and its own grammar note contrasts it with the informal "Come stai?" used with friends. This app marks "You" (polite) with a capitalized Lei, since a lowercase lei instead means "she." Formal address also shows up in possessives: this app's card "Posso avere il suo numero di telefono?" ("May I have your phone number?") uses suo, and its own grammar note explains that "Suo" is the possessive that goes with the formal Lei.
Sources
- Treccani — "Pronomi allocutivi" (Enciclopedia dell'Italiano) — tu vs. Lei; Lei's third-person / feminine agreement