Cremonese (Cremunés) is a dialect of the

Western Lombard dialect Western Lombard is a group of dialects of Lombard, a Romance language spoken in Italy. It is widespread in the Lombard provinces of Milan, Monza, Varese, Como, Lecco, Sondrio, a small part of Cremona (except Crema and its neighbours), Lo ...

group spoken in the city and province of Cremona in Lombardy,

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...

, with the exception of

Crema Crema or Cremas may refer to: Crema * Crema, Lombardy, a ''comune'' in the northern Italian province of Cremona * Crema (coffee), a thin layer of foam at the top of a cup of espresso * Crema (dairy product), the Spanish word for cream * ''Cremà ...

and the area of

Soresina Soresina ( Soresinese: ) is a ''comune'' (municipality) in the Province of Cremona in the Italian region Lombardy, located about southeast of Milan and about northwest of Cremona. It received the honorary title of city with a presidential dec ...

, where an

Eastern Lombard Eastern Lombard is a group of closely related variants of Lombard, a Gallo-Italic dialect spoken in Lombardy, mainly in the provinces of Bergamo, Brescia and Mantua, in the area around Cremona and in parts of Trentino. Its main variants are Be ...

dialect is spoken, and the area of Casalmaggiore, where a form of Emilian closely related to

Parmigiano Parmesan ( it, Parmigiano Reggiano; ) is an Italian hard, granular cheese produced from cows’ milk and aged at least 12 months. It is named after two of the areas which produce it, the provinces of Parma and Reggio Emilia (''Parmigiano'' i ...

is spoken. Being at the crossroad between the core areas of different Lombard varieties, it shows some elements of both

Western Lombard Western Lombard is a group of dialects of Lombard, a Romance language spoken in Italy. It is widespread in the Lombard provinces of Milan, Monza, Varese, Como, Lecco, Sondrio, a small part of Cremona (except Crema and its neighbours), Lo ...

and

, and a few which are typical of dialects spoken in the nearby region of

Emilia-Romagna egl, Emigliàn (man) egl, Emiglièna (woman) rgn, Rumagnòl (man) rgn, Rumagnòla (woman) it, Emiliano (man) it, Emiliana (woman) or it, Romagnolo (man) it, Romagnola (woman) , population_note = , population_blank1_title ...

. It is best classified as belonging to the Southwestern Lombard group of dialects. Mappa Dialetti lombardi

Phonology

Vowels

The Cremonese dialect of the Lombard language has 9 vowel qualities, which can be either phonemically long or short, without any difference in quality. The following 18 phonemes all occur in stressed environments: /i/ /iː/ /y/ /yː/ /e/ /eː/ /ø/ /øː/ /ɛ/ /ɛː/ /a/ /aː/ /ɔ/ /ɔː/ /o/ /oː/ /u/ /uː/. Vowel length is contrastive in stressed syllables, for example /'veːder/ ''glass'' with a long /eː/ differs from /'veder/ ''to see'', with a short /e/. This is a reflex of the

Proto-Romance Proto-Romance is the comparatively reconstructed ancestor of all Romance languages. It reflects a late variety of spoken Latin prior to regional fragmentation. Phonology Vowels Monophthongs Diphthong The only phonemic diphthong was ...

rule of lengthening open syllables, which in Cremonese, has led to phonemic vowel length also being contrastive in penultimate-stressed words, as well as in monosyllabic words. In unstressed position, only the following 6 vowels occur: /i/ /e/ /ø/ /ɛ/ /a/ /u/.

Orthography

The publication of the ''Dizionario del dialetto cremonese'' in 1976 by the ''Comitato promotore di studi e ricerche di dialettologia, storia e folklore cremonese'' outlined an orthography for Cremonese. * ''a'' as in Italian (and''àa'': to go, Italian: ''andare'') * ''è'' for open /ɛ/ (pulèer: Italian: pollaio) * ''é'' for closed /e/ (fradél: Italian: fratello) * ''i'' as in Italian (finìi: Italian: finire) * ''ò'' for open /ɔ/ (bòon: Italian: buono) * ''ó'' for closed /o/ (fióol: Italian: ragazzo) * ''u'' as in Italian (pùl: Italian: pollo) * ''ö'' as in French "eu" and German "ö" (nisöön: Italian: nessuno) * ''ü'' as in French "u" and German "ü" (paüüra: Italian: paura) Vowel length is represented by doubling the vowel letter, with the acute or grave diacritic removed for the second and letters. The umlaut diacritic however is retained across both letters, thus <öö> for /øː/ and <üü> for /yː/.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Cremunes dialect Western Lombard language