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Neapolitan language

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Neapolitan (autonym: 'o nnapulitano [o nːapuliˈtɑːnə]; Italian: napoletano) is a Romance language of the Southern Italo-Romance group spoken in most of continental Southern Italy. It is named after the Kingdom of Naples, which once covered almost the entirety of the area. On 14 October 2008, a law by the Region of Campania acknowledged that Neapolitan was to be protected.[1]

Neapolitan
napulitano
Native toItaly
RegionAbruzzo
Apulia
Basilicata
Calabria
Campania
Lazio
Marche
Molise
EthnicityMezzogiorno Italians
Native speakers
around 7.5 million (2025)
Dialects
Language codes
ISO 639-2nap
ISO 639-3nap
Glottologneap1235  Continental Southern Italian
sout3126  South Lucanian = (Vd) Lausberg
Southern Italo-Romance languages
Neapolitan as part of the European Romance languages[image reference needed]

While the language group is native to much of continental Southern Italy or the former Kingdom of Naples, the terms Neapolitan, napulitano or napoletano may also instead refer more narrowly to the specific variety spoken natively in the city of Naples and the immediately surrounding Naples metropolitan area and Campania region. The present article mostly deals with this variety, which enjoys a certain degree of prestige and has historically wide written attestations.[2][3]

A Neapolitan native speaker recorded in Italy

Classification and standardization

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Giambattista Basile (1566–1632), who composed the first known collection of fairy tales with the name of Lo cunto de li cunti, that includes the earliest written versions of famous stories like the Sleeping Beauty, Rapunzel and Cinderella, all in the Neapolitan language

Neapolitan is a Romance language and is considered as part of Southern Italo-Romance. There are notable differences among the various dialects, but they are all generally mutually intelligible.

Italian and Neapolitan are of variable mutual comprehensibility, depending on affective and linguistic factors. There are notable grammatical differences, such as Neapolitan having nouns in the neuter form and a unique plural formation, as well as historical phonological developments, which often obscure the cognacy of lexical items.

Its evolution has been similar to that of Italian and other Romance languages from their roots in Vulgar Latin. It may reflect a pre-Latin Oscan substratum, as in the pronunciation of the d sound as an r sound (rhotacism) at the beginning of a word or between two vowels: e.g. doje (feminine) or duje (masculine), meaning "two", is pronounced, and often spelled, as roje/ruje; vedé ("to see") as veré, and often spelled so; also cadé/caré ("to fall") and Madonna/Maronna.[4] Another purported Oscan influence is the historical assimilation of the consonant cluster /nd/ as /nn/, pronounced [nː] (this is generally reflected in spelling more consistently: munno vs Italian mondo "world"; quanno vs Italian quando "when"), along with the development of /mb/ as /mm/~[mː] (tammuro vs Italian tamburo "drum"), also consistently reflected in spelling. Other effects of the Oscan substratum are postulated, but substratum claims are highly controversial. As in many other languages in the Italian Peninsula, Neapolitan has an adstratum greatly influenced by other Romance languages (Catalan, Spanish and Franco-Provençal above all), Germanic languages and Greek (both ancient and modern). The language had never been standardised, and as a result the word for tree shows four different forms: arbero, arvero, arbolo, arvolo.

Neapolitan has enjoyed a rich literary, musical and theatrical history (notably Giambattista Basile, Eduardo Scarpetta, his son Eduardo De Filippo, Salvatore Di Giacomo and Totò). Thanks to this heritage and the musical work of Renato Carosone in the 1950s, Neapolitan is still in use in popular music, even gaining national popularity in the songs of Pino Daniele and the Nuova Compagnia di Canto Popolare.

The language has no official status within Italy and is not taught in schools. The University of Naples Federico II offers (from 2003) courses in Campanian Dialectology at the faculty of Sociology, whose actual aim is not to teach students to speak the language but to study its history, usage, literature and social role. There are also ongoing legislative attempts at the national level to have it recognized as an official minority language of Italy. It is a recognized ISO 639 Joint Advisory Committee language with the ISO 639-3 language code of nap.

Here is the IPA pronunciation of the Neapolitan spoken in the city of Naples:

English Italian (standard) Neapolitan (standard) Neapolitan (diacritics) IPA (Neapolitan)


Our Father who art in heaven, Padre Nostro, che sei nei cieli, Pate nuosto ca staje 'n cielo, Patë nuóstö ca stajë 'n ciélö, [ˈpɑːtə ˈnwostə ka ˈstɑːjə nˈdʒjeːlə]
hallowed be thy name Sia santificato il tuo nome. santificammo 'o nomme tujo. santificammö 'o nòmmë tujö. [sandifiˈkammə o ˈnɔmmə ˈtuːjə]
Thy kingdom come, Venga il tuo regno, Faje vinì 'o rigno tujo, Fajë vinì 'o rignö tujö, [ˈfɑːjə viˈni o ˈriɲɲə ˈtuːjə]
Thy will be done, Sia fatta la tua volontá, sempe c'a vuluntà toja, sèmpë c'a vuluntà tójä, [ˈsɛmbə ˈkɑ: vulunˈda ˈtoːjə]
on earth as it is in heaven. Come in cielo, così in terra. accussì 'n cielo, accussì 'n terra. accussì 'n ciélö, accussì 'n tèrrä. [akkusˈsi nˈdʒjeːlə akkusˈsi nˈdɛrrə]
Give us this day our daily bread Dacci oggi il nostro pane quotidiano, Fance avé 'o ppane tutte 'e juorne, Fancë avé 'o ppanë tuttë 'e juórnë, [ˈfandʒə aˈve o ˈppɑːnə ˈtuttə e ˈjwornə]
and forgive us our trespasses E rimetti a noi i nostri debiti e lèvance 'e diébbete e lèväncë 'e diébbëtë [ɛ ˈllɛːvəndʒə e ˈrjebbətə]
as we forgive those who trespass against us, Come noi li rimettiamo ai nostri debitori. commo nuje 'e livammo all'ate. commö nujë 'e livammö all'atë. [ˈkommə ˈnuːjə e liˈvammə aˈllɑːtə]
and lead us not into temptation, E non ci indurre in tentazione, Nun ci fà spanticà, Nun ci fà spanticà, [nun dʒi ˈfa ʃpandiˈka]
but deliver us from evil. Ma liberaci dal male. ma lèvance 'o mmale 'a tuorno. ma lèväncë 'o mmalë 'a tuórnö. [ma ˈlɛːvəndʒə o ˈmmɑːlə a ˈtwornə]
Amen. Amen. Ammèn. Ammèn. [amˈmɛnn(ə)]

Orthography and phonology

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Neapolitan orthography consists of 22 Latin letters. Much like what happens for Italian, it does not contain k/w/x/y, although these letters might be found in foreign words. Yet unlike Italian, it does employ j, which overall reflects a higher incidence of this sound. The following English pronunciation guidelines are based on General American pronunciation, and the values used may not apply to other dialects. (See also: International Phonetic Alphabet chart for English dialects.)

All Romance languages are closely related. Although Neapolitan shares a high degree of its vocabulary with Standand Italian, the official language of Italy, several differences in pronunciation can make the connection almost unrecognizable to those without knowledge of Neapolitan. A difference is the phonological difference is the Neapolitan weakening of unstressed vowels into schwa (schwa is pronounced like the a in about or the u in upon).[a] However, it is also possible (and quite common for some Neapolitans) to speak standard Italian with a "Neapolitan accent"; that is, by pronouncing un-stressed vowels as schwa or by pronouncing the letter s as [ʃ] (like the sh in ship) instead of [s] (like the s in sip) when the letter representing /s/ is in initial position followed by a consonant, but not when it is followed by a dental occlusive /t/ or /d/ (at least in the purest form of the language) but by otherwise using the vocabulary and grammatical forms of Italian.

Therefore, the grammar of Neapolitan is what sets it apart from Italian. In Neapolitan, for example, the gender and number of a word is expressed by a change in the accented vowel because it no longer distinguishes final unstressed /a/, /e/ and /o/ (e.g. luongo [ˈlwoŋːə], longa [ˈlɔŋːə]; Italian lungo, lunga; masc. "long", fem. "long"), whereas in Italian it is expressed by a change in the final vowel. These and other morpho-syntactic differences distinguish the Neapolitan language from the Italian language and the Neapolitan accent.

Neapolitan seems to have had a significant influence on the intonation of Rioplatense Spanish, which is spoken in a major portion of Argentina, in addition to the entire country of Uruguay, but also on that of the Paulistano dialect from in and around the area of São Paulo in Brazil.

Vowels

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While there are only five graphic vowels in Neapolitan, phonemically, there are eight. Stressed vowels e and o can be either "closed" or "open" and the pronunciation is different for the two. The grave accent (à, è, ò) is used to denote open vowels, and the acute accent (é, í, ó, ú) is used to denote closed vowels, with alternative ì and ù. However, accent marks are not commonly used in the actual spelling of words except when they occur on the final syllable of a word, such as Totò, arrivà, or pecché, and when they appear here in other positions, it is only to demonstrate where the stress, or accent, falls in some words. Also, the circumflex is used to mark a long vowel where it would not normally occur (e.g. sî "you are").

Vowels
Front Central Back
High i u
High-mid e ə o
Low-mid ɛ ɔ
Low a
Letter IPA Pronunciation guide
a /a/~[ɑ]
/ə/ 		a is usually open and is pronounced like the a in father
when it is the final, unstressed vowel, its pronunciation is indistinct and approaches the sound of the schwa
e /ɛ/
/e/
/ə/ 		stressed, open e is pronounced like the e in bet
stressed, closed e is pronounced like the a in fame except that it does not die off into ee
unstressed e is pronounced as a schwa
o /ɔ/
/o/
/ə/ 		stressed, open o is pronounced like the o in often
stressed, closed o is pronounced like the o in closed except that it does not die off into oo
unstressed o is pronounced as a schwa
i /i/
/j/ 		i is always closed and is pronounced like the ee in meet
when it is initial, or preceding another vowel
u /u/
/w/ 		u is always closed and is pronounced like the oo in boot
when it is initial, or preceding another vowel

Consonants

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Labial Dental/Alveolar Post-
alveolar 		Palatal Velar
central sibilant
Nasal m n ɲ (ŋ)
Plosive/
Affricate 		voiceless p t t͡s t͡ʃ k
voiced b d (d͡z) d͡ʒ ɡ
Fricative voiceless f s ʃ
voiced v (z) (ʒ) ʎ
Lateral l
Approximant w j
Trill/Tap r ~ ɾ
Letter IPA Pronunciation guide
p /p/
[b] 		pronounced the same as the p in English spill (not as the p in pill, which is aspirated)
voiced after m
b /b/ pronounced the same as in English, always geminated when preceded by a vowel
t /t/
[d] 		dental version of the English t as in stop (not as the t in top, which is aspirated)
voiced after n
d /d/ dental version of the English d
c /t͡ʃ/~[ʃ]
[d͡ʒ]
/k/
[ɡ] 		when followed by e or i the pronunciation is somewhere between the sh in share and the ch in chore, especially after a vowel
otherwise it is like the k in scan (not like the c in can, which is aspirated)
in both cases voiced after n
g /d͡ʒ/,
/ɡ/ 		when followed by e or i the pronunciation is like the g of gem, always geminated when preceded by another vowel
otherwise it is like the g in get
f /f/ pronounced the same as in English
v /v/ pronounced the same as in English
s /s/
[d͡z]
[z] 		pronounced the same as in English sound unless it comes before a consonant other than /t d n r l/
pronounced as ds in lads after n
pronounced as English z before d or after n
/ʃ/
[ʒ][5] 		pronounced sh when followed by a voiceless consonant (except /t/)
zh when followed by a voiced consonant (except /n d r l/)
z /t͡s/
[d͡z] 		unvoiced z (not occurring after n) is pronounced like the ts in jetsam
voiced z is pronounced like the ds in lads after n
j /j/ referred to as a semi-consonant, is pronounced like English y as in yet
l /l/ pronounced the same as in English
m /m/ pronounced the same as in English
n /n/ pronounced the same as in English; if followed by a consonant, it variously changes its point of articulation
r /r/~[ɾ] when between two vowels it sounds very similar to the American t in later; it is a single tap of a trilled r
when at the beginning of a word or when preceded by or followed by another consonant, it is trilled
q /kʷ/ represented by orthographic qu, pronounced similarly as in English, but more accurately described as pronouncing k and w simultaneously rather than sequentially
h h is always silent and is used to differentiate words pronounced the same and otherwise spelled alike (e.g. a, ha; anno, hanno)
and placed after g or c to indicate the hard sound when e or i follows (e.g. ce, che; gi, ghi)
x /k(ə)s/ pronounced like the x in next or like the cus in raucus; this consonant sequence does not occur in native Neapolitan or Italian words

Digraphs and trigraphs

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The following clusters are always geminated if vowel-following.

Letter IPA Pronunciation Guide
gn /ɲ/ palatal version of the ni in the English onion
gl(i) /ʎ/~[ʝ] palatal version of the lli in the English million, most commonly realized like a strong version of y in the English yes.
sc /ʃ/ when followed by e or i it is pronounced as the sh in the English ship

Grammar

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Neapolitan text at the Scampìa Carnival; note the definite article 'o.

Definite articles

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Before a word beginning with a consonant:

Singular Plural
Masculine 'o 'e
Feminine 'a 'e C:
Neuter 'o C: 'a

C: indicates that the initial consonant of the following word is geminated if followed by a vowel. The reason why they are traditionally spelled with a preceding apostrophe ' is to indicate the elision of the initial sound /l/. All these definite articles are always pronounced distinctly.

The definite article becomes ll' before a word beginning with a vowel, which is invariable for all genders, and for all numbers.

In general, because of the systemic vowels' reduction process, which doesn't allow for an immediate words' gender identification, the tendency in Neapolitan is to specify articles before nouns even in isolation, at least more frequently than what happens in Italian, and more similarly to what happens for instance in French.

A couple of notes about the gemimation process:

  • It is a function of the article (and certain other words), and these same words may be seen in other contexts without the geminated consonant. More will be said about this in the section about gemination.
  • It only occurs when a vowel follows the consonant that will be in turn geminated. No gemination occurs if it is followed by some another consonant, such as in 'o scuro "the dark(ness)".

Indefinite articles

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The Neapolitan indefinite articles are presented in the following table:

Masculine Feminine
Before words beginning with a consonant no na
Before words beginning with a vowel n'

These articles can be practically regarded as contracted forms deriving from the numerical pronouns meaning "one", which are uno/una/un', with elision of u in the unstressed initial position. Such development ultimately explains why in these articles, although it always happens to precede either o or a or the following initial vowel, n never undergoes gemination even after words triggering it, as in dimane è n'ato juorno instead of dimane è *nn'ato juorno ("tomorrow is another day").

Verbal conjugation

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In Neapolitan there are four finite moods: indicative, subjunctive, conditional and imperative, and three non-finite modes: infinitive, gerund and participle. Each mood has an active and a passive form. The only auxiliary verbs used in the active form is (h)avé (Eng. "to have", It. avere), which contrasts with Italian, in which the intransitive and reflexive verbs take èssere for their auxiliary. For example, we have:

Neapolitan

Aggio

AUX.have.1SG.PRES

stato

be.PTCP.PAST

a

in

Napule

Naples

ajere.

yesterday

Aggio stato a Napule ajere.

AUX.have.1SG.PRES be.PTCP.PAST in Naples yesterday

I was in Naples yesterday.

Italian

Sono

AUX.be.1S.PRES

stato

be.PTCP.PAST

a

in

Napoli

Naples

ieri.

yesterday

Sono stato a Napoli ieri.

AUX.be.1S.PRES be.PTCP.PAST in Naples yesterday

I was in Naples yesterday.

Doubled initial consonants

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In Neapolitan, even the initial consonant of a word can be doubled. This is called syntactic gemination (raddoppiamento sintattico in Italian). Such phenomenon also occurs in Italian, as well as in totally unrelated languages like Finnish.

  • All feminine plural nouns, preceded by the feminine plural definite article, 'e, or any feminine plural adjective, have their initial consonant doubled.
  • All neuter singular nouns, when preceded by the neuter singular definite article, 'o, or by a neuter singular adjective, have their initial consonant doubled.
  • In addition, other words also trigger this doubling. Below is a list of words that trigger the doubling of the initial consonant of the following word.

However, when there is a pause after the "trigger" word, the phonological doubling does not occur (e.g. tu sî (g)guaglione, "You are a boy", where sî is a "trigger" word causing doubling of the initial consonant in guaglione, but in the phrase 'e do sî, guaglió? "Where are you from, boy?", no doubling occurs. Neither does doubling occur when the initial consonant is followed by another consonant (other than l or r), e.g. 'o ttaliano "the Italian language", but 'o spagnuolo "the Spanish language", where 'o is the neuter definite article). This doubling phenomenon happens phonologically (in pronunciation), and the doubling is not always represented in spelling. However, many Neapolitan-language editions do represent syntactic gemination in writing, resulting in many words spelled with initial double consonants. So, je so' pazzo ("I am crazy") may also be spelled je so' ppazzo (regardless of the spelling, it is pronounced with syntactic gemination). In Italian and Finnish, syntactic gemination is not reflected in writing.

Words that trigger doubling in pronunciation

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Viola Carofalo wearing a T-shirt with Neapolitan je so' pazzo ("I am crazy.")
  • The conjunctions e and né but not o (e.g. pane e (c)caso; né (p)pane né (c)caso; but pane o caso)
  • The prepositions a, pe, cu (e.g. a (m)me; pe (t)te; cu (v)vuje)
  • The negation nu, short for nun (e.g. nu ddicere niente)
  • The indefinites ogne, cocche (e.g. ogne (c)casa; cocche (c)cosa)
  • Interrogative che and relative che but not ca (e.g. che (p)piense? che (f)femmena! che (c)capa!)
  • accussí (e.g. accussí (b)bello)
  • From the verb "essere", so'; sî; è but not songo (e.g. je so' (p)pazzo; tu sî (f)fesso; chella è (M)Maria; chilli so' (c)cafune but chilli songo cafune)
  • chiú (e.g. chiú (p)poco)
  • The number tre (e.g. tre (s)segge)
  • The neuter definite article 'o (e.g. 'o (p)pane, but nu poco 'e pane)
  • The neuter pronoun 'o (e.g. 'o (t)tiene 'o (p)pane?)
  • Demonstrative adjectives chistu and chillu which refer to neuter nouns in indefinite quantities (e.g. chistu (f)fierro; chillu (p)pane) but not in definite quantities (e.g. Chistu fierro; chillu pane)
  • The feminine plural definite article 'e (e.g. 'e (s)segge; 'e (g)guaglione)
  • The plural feminine pronoun 'e, e.g., 'e (g)guaglione 'e (c)chiamme tu? "
  • The plural masculine pronoun 'e preceding a verb, but not when 'e is an article; in 'e guagliune 'e (c)chiamme tu?, the first 'e is an article, so it does not trigger doubling; the second 'e does trigger doubling because it is a masculine plural pronoun.
  • The locative lloco (e.g. lloco (s)sotto)
  • From the verb stà: sto' (e.g. sto' (p)parlanno)
  • From the verb puté: può; pô (e.g. isso pô (s)sapé)
  • Special case Spiritu (S)Santo

See also

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References

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  1. ^ "Tutela del dialetto, primo via libera al Ddl campano" Archived 27 July 2011 at the Wayback Machine ("Bill to protect dialect green-lighted") from Il Denaro, economic journal of South Italy, 15 October 2008 Re Franceschiello. L'ultimo sovrano delle Due Sicilie
  2. ^ Ledgeway, Adam. 2009. Grammatica diacronica del napoletano. Tübingen: Max Niemeyer Verlag, pp. 3, 13-15
  3. ^ Radtke, Edgar. 1997. I dialetti della Campania. Roma: Il Calamo. pp. 39ff
  4. ^ Sornicola, Rosanna (2006). "Campania" (PDF). In Maiden, Martin; Parry, Mair (eds.). The dialects of Italy. London: Routledge. Retrieved 30 December 2023.
  5. ^ Canepari, Luciano (2005), Italia (PDF), Manuale di fonetica, Lincom Europa, pp. 282–283, ISBN 3-89586-456-0, archived from the original (PDF) on 6 June 2011 (in Italian)

Additional sources

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  • Iandolo, Carlo (2001). A lengua 'e Pulecenella: Grammatica napoletana (in Italian). Sorrento: Franco Di Mauro. ISBN 978-8885263710.
  • De Blasi, Nicola; Imperatore, Luigi (2001). Il napoletano parlato e scritto: Con note di grammatica storica [Written and Spoken Neapolitan: With Notes on Historic Grammar] (in Italian) (2nd ed.). Napoli: Dante & Descartes. ISBN 978-8888142050.
  • Del Vecchio, Emilano (3 July 2014). "Neapolitan: A Great Cultural Heritage". TermCoord.
  • Verde, Massimiliano (17 June 2017). "Consegnato il primo Certificato Europeo di Lingua Napoletana" [Granted the first European Certificate of the Neapolitan language]. NapoliToday (in Italian). First Course of Neapolitan Language according to the QCER CEFR with the Patronage of City of Naples realized by Dr.Massimiliano Verde "Corso di Lingua e Cultura Napoletana" with a document of study in Neapolitan Language by Dr.Verde

First public document in Neapolitan Language of the XXI century according to a text of Dr.Verde; the touristic Map of the III Municipality of Naples in Neapolitan Language:

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