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Rhaeto-Cisalpine (or Padanese) is a western Romance language, spoken in the
Po valley (extended to include the Ligurian coast), which has developed in
an independent fashion from Italian and is strictly related to French,
Occitan, and Catalan. This subject has been relatively neglected in recent
years, apart from a monumental work by Geoffrey Hull, dating back to 1982.
This book aims at both offering a solid reference about, and at proposing a
complete synthesis of this diasystem, including the Rhaeto-Romance
languages and the so called Gallo-Italic ones, sometimes mistaken for
Italian dialects, a conclusion probably driven by unscientific criteria
inherited by the ’Italian Risorgimento’ political bias.
In the formation of a general Rhaeto-Cisalpine koiné the following criteria
have systematically been adopted: getting close to medieval forms, purging
the language from Italian influence, adopting Galloroman models as decisive
contributions, accepting widespread forms and generalising local ones.
In particular Ladin forms (both Rhaetian and Dolomitic) have been deemed
central, thus synthetic Padanese has been modelled mainly upon these ones.
The author is the founder of the "Institud de studis Rhaeto-Cisalpins"
Contents
Chapter 1. General Information 5
1. Introduction 5
2. Geographic overview 6
3. The koineisation process 6
Chapter 2. Phonology 9
1. Vowels 9
2. Diphthongs 9
3. Consonants 10
Chapter 3. Orthography 13
1. Guidelines and criteria 13
2. Outstanding orthographic fetures 14
3. Synoptic tables 16
4. Some excerpts from Padanian literature 21
Chapter 4. Morphology 25
1. The noun and adjective 25
2. The article 29
3. The personal pronoun 30
4. The demonstrative pronoun/adjective 33
5. The possessive pronoun/adjective 35
6. Relative and interrogative pronouns/adjectives 36
7. Indefinite pronouns/adjectives 37
8. The numerals 38
9. The adverb 40
10. Prepositions 44
11. Conjunctions 48
12. The verb 51
13. The Passive Conjugation 62
14. The Reflexive Conjugation 62
15. Irregular verbs 63
16. Verbs with vowel alternance 66
Bibliography 69
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