L’italiano e il libro: il mondo fra le righe

"Sao ke kelle terre, per kelle fini que ki contene, trenta anni le possette parte sancti Benedicti" sounds to us today like a strange Italian phrase, almost incomprehensible, incorrect, inaccurate, ancient, outdated. In short, we might say, this is not Italian. In fact, such a statement would seem partially true. But not entirely. Although we cannot yet speak of “Italian” as we understand it today, not yet in 960 AD – the year this inscription was recorded – we must, however, highlight the importance that these strange words have acquired over the centuries.

The Placito Capuano: a linguistic turning point

This is the Placito Capuano, one of the oldest documents in Italian vernacular. It marks the beginning of the transition from classical Latin to the vernacular language, the ancestor of modern Italian. Specifically, we are looking at a legal document aimed at resolving a land dispute. The parties involved were the Abbey of Montecassino and a local landowner.

From translation to the birth of a new language

"So those lands, within those boundaries described here, were held by the part of Saint Benedict for thirty years" is how we might exemplify this inscription today. What interests us, however, is that the inscription in our introduction is no longer Latin and not yet Italian.

The spread of the vernacular

At least for official documents like legal ones, a new language was spreading, the vernacular. But here’s the crux of the matter: the Placito Capuano is an official document, and as such – it is reasonable to believe – written by someone who must have known the language well. However, in society at the time, another powerful, rebellious, and at the same time parallel force was making its way. An unofficial but crucial line that favored more than any other the spread of Italian as we know it today (or almost).

The role of merchants in spreading the language

It was thanks to merchants who, during the Middle Ages and then the Renaissance, not only had the merit of transporting goods and wares from North to South of Italy, but also of carrying with them a new language, the language of the people, the vernacular (vulgus in Latin, means “people”). A common language, but not yet purely Italian, was thus born: out of necessity, to “bring home the bread,” to make oneself understood.

Seaports as centers of cultural exchange

Fertile ground for this were coastal cities, where ports became places of exchange for goods and words, for food and common linguistic structures. And between the trade routes and the lines of words, a new world was beginning to take shape, which, many years later and thanks to the work of Manzoni, solidified into the Italian language we speak and study today.

Language as a social and cultural network

Language has always done this: it has created a network, established connections, redefined and continues to redefine the political and social geography of the world. Language is capable of creating a new theory of plate tectonics: it unites distant continents, gives life to new thoughts, creates new shades of color and new intensities of smells and flavors. None of this would be possible without the material support of the book.

Gutenberg’s contribution to the spread of language

And Gutenberg, the inventor of movable type printing, would be delighted to see how mobile those characters are today. They know no borders, just like literature. We know this well: it is the words of the Italian language that every year, every day, bring to Dilit the new “merchants” of our time, helping us in the challenging task of spreading Italian around the world.

The spread of the Italian language in the world

Yes, we give it our all, but the initial push, only that, comes from us. It happens like a stone thrown into water that creates a series of concentric circles that expand, and expand, and expand. In the end, that stone is no longer just a stone, but something more, capable of reaching everywhere and creating something immense.

The creative power of the Italian language

Here, too, the Italian language assumes a potential creative force, which then becomes effective (and why not, affective). Italian, after all, is one language, but there are many ways to use it. And it no longer matters if the language of the Placito Capuano seems like a non-Italian, because for us, everything that is produced is a work of art, deserving to be a pebble in the sea, whose driving force reaches far and wide.

The importance of books and schools

Italian is between the lines, and we can draw the lines ourselves, and rewrite a book. It is here that the world passes, between the vertical railings of a school, where the soul finds a resting place. No disputes with landowners here because it works like literature: if you read a book, you choose which side to take, and you create your own story.

The journey through Italian grammar

Yes, it’s true; you’ll have to pass through the island of the subjunctive, cross the bridge of pronouns, and it will seem like you’re shipwrecked in the sea of irregular verbs. And yet, as someone who knew Italian well once said, "Shipwrecking is sweet in this sea."

Martina D’Errico