Lepontic language
(Redirected from Lepontic)
Categories: Continental Celtic languages | Languages of Italy
| Language classification |
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| Indo-European Celtic |
Lepontic is an extinct Celtic language, the language of the Lepontii, that was spoken in parts of Gallia Cisalpina (Cisalpine Gaul) between 700 BC and 400 BC. Sometimes called Cisalpine Celtic, it is considered a dialect of the Gaulish language and thus a Continental Celtic language (Eska 1998).
The language is only known from a few inscriptions discovered that were written in the alphabet of Lugano, one of five main varieties of Northern Italic alphabets, derived from the Etruscan alphabet. These inscriptions were found in an area centered around Lugano, including Lago di Como and Lago Maggiore. Similar scripts were used for writing the Rhaetic and Venetic languages, and the Germanic runic alphabets probably derive from a script belonging to this group.
Lepontic was assimilated first by Gaulish, with the settlement of Gaulish tribes north of the River Po, and then by Latin, after the Roman Republic gained control over Gallia Cisalpina during the late second and first century BC.
The grouping of all of these inscriptions into a single Celtic language has been disputed, and some (including specifically all of the older ones) are said to be in a non-Celtic language related to Ligurian (Whatmough 1933, Pisani 1964). Under this view, which was the prevailing view until about 1970, Lepontic is the correct name for the non-Celtic language, while the Celtic language is to be called Cisalpine Gaulish. Following Lejeune (1971), the consensus view became that Lepontic should be classified as a Celtic language, albeit possibly as divergent as Celtiberian, and in any case quite distinct from Cisalpine Gaulish. Only in recent years, there has been a tendency to identify Lepontic and Cisalpine Gaulish as one and the same language.
While the language is named after the tribe of the Lepontii, which occupied portions of Rhaetia (in modern Switzerland and Italy), in the Alps, bordering Cisalpine Gaul, the term is currently used by many Celticists to apply to all Celtic dialects of ancient Italy. This usage is disputed by those who continue to view the Lepontii as one of several indigenous pre-Roman tribes of the Alps, quite distinct from the Gauls who invaded the plains of Northern Italy in historical times.
Sources
- Eska, J. F. (1998). The linguistic position of Lepontic. In Proceedings of the twenty-fourth annual meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society vol. 2, Special session on Indo-European subgrouping and internal relations (February 14, 1998), ed. B. K. Bergin, M. C. Plauché, and A. C. Bailey, 2–11. Berkeley: Berkeley Linguistics Society.
- Eska, J. F., and D. E. Evans. (1993). "Continental Celtic". In The Celtic Languages, ed. M. J. Ball, 26–63. London: Routledge. ISBN 0-415-01035-7.
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