History
The Tarantino dialect traces its origins into ancient times, when the territory was dominated by Messapii populations.
The colonization of the Greeks founded Taranto not only as the capital of Magna Graecia but as a center of poetry and theatre. The Greeks had left considerable influence on Tarantino, both lexical and morpho-syntax, and a very peculiar accent that scholars had to correspond to it with Doric. These influences are still found in many Tarantino words of Greek origin.
Subsequently, the city of Taranto became a Roman city, thus introducing much vulgar vocabulary.
During the Byzantine and Lombard periods, Tarantino acquired a unique approach to the time period: the o pronunciation changed to ue and the e pronunciation changed to ie; thus Tarantino vocabulary was further enriched with new words.
With the arrival of the Normans in 1071 and the Angevins all the way through to 1400, the dialect lost much of its eastern influences and was influenced by French and Gallo-Italic elements.
By the Middle Ages, the city became a Saracen domain with the consequent introduction of Arabic words. In 1502, Taranto went under Catalan-Aragonese rule.
In 1801 the city was once again under the dominion of French troops, who left their mark with their Franco-Provençal language.
Taranto has long been linked to the Kingdom of Naples, which would explain some words in common with the Neapolitan language. The Arab influences, combined with the French and Latin, have led to a massive de-sonorisation of voice, turning them into semi-mutations, which can cause a significant increase in phonetics of the consonant links .
Read more about this topic: Tarantino Dialect
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“A man will not need to study history to find out what is best for his own culture.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“The disadvantage of men not knowing the past is that they do not know the present. History is a hill or high point of vantage, from which alone men see the town in which they live or the age in which they are living.”
—Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874–1936)
“The only history is a mere question of one’s struggle inside oneself. But that is the joy of it. One need neither discover Americas nor conquer nations, and yet one has as great a work as Columbus or Alexander, to do.”
—D.H. (David Herbert)