At 17:39 04.09.98 MET-1MEST, you wrote:
>
>When did it become common to refer to the language we moderns call
>Italian by that name?
>
>The question arises in the context of the autobiography of the
>Emperor Charles IV (1316-78), where Charles speaks of his linguistic
>abilities:
>
>Ex divina autem gracia non solum Boemicum, sed Gallicum, Lombardicum,
>Teutunicum et Latinum loqui, scribere et legere scivimus.
>
>(Charles presumably picked up his knowledge of "Lombardicum" during
>his campaigns in the north of Italy.)
>
>The question is, would it be anachronistic to translate
>Lombardicum as "Italian"? Or would "Lombard" have been thought of as
>a separate language in the 14thC?
>
>Frank Schaer
Dear Frank,
If referring to the region or its inhabitants, "lombardo"/"lombardus" and
"Lombardia" usually referred to, roughly, North Italy with the center Milan
and was seen as distinct from Tuscany and frequently though not necessarily
distinct also from Romagna (not necessarily, because, for instance, the
Dominican province of Lombardia Superior included Romagna).
When referring to the language, the meaning depends very much on the
context: the meaning is more specific, even unusually specific, in Dante's
_De vulgari eloquentia_ where the difference of Italian dialects is the
topic treated (I, xix, 1: "sicut illud cremonense ac illud lombardum et
tertium semilatium dicitur, sic istud, quod totius Ytalie est, latium
vulgare vocatur"), whereas it is wider, and more in accordance with the
common use, in Dante's Commedia (including Mantova and the "lombardo"
spoken by Vergil or rather heard by Guido da Montefeltro, cf. Inf. 1,68 and
27,20). A still even wider meaning seems to be given in the anonymous _Poi
qe neve ni glaza_ (13th cent.), where 'lombard' refers to the North Italian
language of the author but, by being opposed to 'Provenc,al', may also
assume pars pro toto the meaning 'Italian': "ben e\ rason q'eo faza | un
sirvente/s lonbardo, | qe/ del proenzalesco | no m'acresco: e fo^ra cosa
nova, q'om non trova sirvente/s lombardesco" (ed. Contini, Poeti del
Duecento, 1960, t.I, p.503, quoted by me from the electronic version in the
_Opera del Vocabolario Italiano_).
In the case of your passage, I suppose that it was some northern koine what
Charles had learned but that he was probably not much aware neither of the
internal differenciation of Lombard nor of the differences with regard to
eastern or central variants. To believe Dante, a German, for instance,
would not even have known the difference between Provenc,al and Italian
volgare (Conv. I, vi, 6)! This may be exagerated (says I as a German), but
nevertheless I would translate "Lombardicum loqui" with "to speak Italian"
and would not fear any anachronism.
As to your question at which time "Italian" came to be the common name of
the language, I was surprised to find that among the many occurences of
"italian-" that I found in the OVI (for the period until 1375) there seems
to be no case where it refers to the language: the meanings are ethnic or
geographic, but not specifically metalinguistic. So if my somewhat hurried
search did not miss anything, we may date the metalinguistic use to "post
1375".
Best,
Otfried
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