Savoyard dialect

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"Savoyan" redirects here. For the French wine grape, see Savoyan (grape).
Savoyard
Savoyârd
Native to France
Region Savoy
Native speakers
35,000 (date missing)[1]
Latin
Official status
Official language in
Italy (protected by statute).
France (region language).
Regulated by Institute Savoyard language
Language codes
ISO 639-3
Glottolog savo1253[2]
Map-Savoyard language01.png

Savoyard is a dialect of Arpitan (Franco-Provençal). It is spoken in some territories of the historical Duchy of Savoy, nowadays a geographic area spanning France (in Savoie and Haute-Savoie) and Switzerland (in the canton of Geneva). The varieties are commonly known as patois. It has around 35,000 speakers today.

Some words[edit]

Several subdialects of Savoyard exist that exhibit unique features in terms of phonetics and vocabulary. Among them, many words have to do with the weather: bacan (French: temps mauvais); coussie (French: tempête); royé (French: averse); ni[v]ole (French: nuage); ...and, the environment: clapia, perrier (French: éboulis); égra (French: sorte d'escalier de pierre); balme (French: grotte); tova (French: tourbière); and lanche (French: champ en pente).

Linguistic studies[edit]

Savoyard has been the subject of detailed study at the Centre de dialectologie of the Stendhal University, Grenoble, currently under the direction of Michel Contini.

See also[edit]

References[edit]

Notes[edit]

  1. ^ Le francoprovençal, langue oubliée, Gaston Tuaillon in Vingt-cinq communautés linguistiques de la France, tome 1, p.204, Geneviève Vernes, éditions L’Harmattan.
  2. ^ Nordhoff, Sebastian; Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin, eds. (2013). "Savoyard". Glottolog. Leipzig: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology.