Seven municipalities (Italy)
The seven communities ( Italian Sette Comuni , Cimbrian Siben Komoin, Siben Kaméün ) are or were a German- speaking island of the Cimbri people .
Geographically, one also speaks of the Asiago plateau (Italian: Altopiano di Asiago ), named after the capital Asiago , or the plateau of the seven municipalities (Italian: Altopiano dei Sette Comuni , Cimbrian: Hoga Ebene bon Siben Komoine). It is located in the Altovicentino , in the northern Italian province of Vicenza in the Veneto region , north of Vicenza and west of Bassano del Grappa at an altitude of about 700 to 1200 meters. With the formation of new parishes and incorporations, the number of parishes has changed several times over the course of history.
History and language
According to comparative language studies, the extensive Asiago plateau in the southern foothills of the Alps was settled and made arable by German farmers from the Bavarian - Alemannic region around 1050 to 1100 . The seven emerging German towns united in the League of Seven Communities. After the neighboring rulers had recognized these rights and self-administration, the seven municipalities formed a largely independent German peasant republic from 1310 to 1807. By subordinating themselves to the recognition of special rights, the seven communities found protection with powerful neighbors, first with the Scaligians of Verona, then with the Visconti of Milan.
The so-called Cimbrian language variant of the seven communities still shows clear elements of early Bavarian Middle High German and even Old High German , so that it has the oldest language level of all variants of "Cimbrian" and is therefore of great interest for linguistics.
The statutes of the Seven Congregations, written on June 29, 1310, are entitled: "Dise saint Siben, Alte Komeun, Prudere Liben" ( Dear Brothers, these are the Seven Old Congregations ). In 1405 they submitted to the Republic of Venice , which recognized the statute and special rights (for example the right to freely carry arms). The municipalities supplied the Republic of Venice with wood for the construction of ships.
In 1796 the seven municipalities with Veneto became part of Austria. Conco became an independent and therefore eighth municipality. Ownership changed several times during the Napoleonic Wars. In 1807 Napoléon lifted the special statute of the seven municipalities and thus their independence. In 1815 the area came back to Austria and became part of the Austrian Kingdom of Lombardy-Venetia . Unaware of the situation on the plateau, the Austrian administration introduced the Italian school and official language, thereby initiating the Italianization of the entire plateau.
In 1866 the plateau was attached to the Kingdom of Italy with Veneto in the course of the Italian Risorgimento . Although German folklorists also began to be interested in the German language island, Italianization was pushed forward quickly after Italian unification. At that time most place names were Italianized. The first ethnologists who visited the island of language tried to explain its existence under the influence of Romanticism by resorting to early Germanic traits to Italy. They said that the Germans of the seven communities were descendants of the Germanic Cimbri who lived in the late 2nd century BC. Moved to Italy and were defeated by the Romans. The self-designation " Zimbern " , which is often used today in the small German-speaking islands of northern Italy, is derived from this erroneous assumption .
With Italy's declaration of war on Austria-Hungary on May 23, 1915, the seven communities became the immediate frontline area and the scene of some of the bitterest battles of the Dolomite War . The villages were reduced to rubble and as the seven parishes were on the Italian side of the front line, their inhabitants were relocated to the Po Valley . There they were forced to speak Italian even in their private and family life so as not to be viewed by the Italian population as enemies and traitors. Many never returned to the Seven Churches Plateau.
Since the evacuation in 1915 and the policy of Italianization by the fascists (1922–1943) under the leadership of Ettore Tolomei , who made the use of German not only in public but also in the private sphere a criminal offense, Cimbrian German has only survived in small parts of the seven municipalities can keep as a niche language: While it is no longer spoken in Asiago , there are essentially only in Roana and its district Mezzaselva Cimbrish speakers, but for a long time only as a minority in their own villages, in contrast to the approximately 30 km northwest of Luserna, where about 90% of the population speak Cimbrian in everyday life.
Today there is the well-equipped “Agustin Prunner Cultural Institute” in Roana and a supraregional cooperation with the other language islands of the Zimbri ( Lusern , Fersental , Sappada , Sauris , Thirteen Municipalities , Timau ).
Family and field names in the area of the seven parishes document that originally their entire area was once shaped by the Cimbres.
Today's residents of the Seven Churches - not just the Cimbrian speakers - are aware of the special history and tradition of their region and try to preserve what is left of it. In a referendum in 2007, a large part of the population spoke out in favor of separating the area from the Veneto and joining the Autonomous Region of Trentino-South Tyrol, but could not find appropriate support either in the provincial parliaments of South Tyrol or Trentino or in the regional council of Trentino-South Tyrol .
Language examples
The vernacular parts of St. Mass were translated into Cimbrian and made available in a printed “Messa in cimbro”.
The Sanctus in this Cimbrian version reads as follows:
|
Hoolik, hoolik, hoolik dar Guute Heere, |
List of the Seven Parishes
The historical communities are:
| Italian name | Cimbrian name | German name | Population (2011) |
comment |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Asiago | Sleghe / Schlege | Sleghe / Schlege (also blows ) | 6,496 | |
| Enego | Genebe or Jeneve | Jeneve | 1,834 | |
| Foza | Vüsche | 729 | ||
| Gallio | Ghel | Gelle | 2,458 | |
| Lusiana | Lusaan | 2,773 | not to be confused with Lusern (Italian Luserna) parliamentary group since 2019 ; since then has formed the municipality of Lusiana Conco together with Conco | |
| Roana | Robaan | Robaan (also Rain ) | 4,343 | |
| Rotzo | snot | Snot (also horse ) | 640 | |
| Conco | Kunken | Kunken | 2,206 | between 1796 and 2019 independent eighth parish. Formerly a district of Lusiana, since 2019 fraction of the municipality of Lusiana Conco |
literature
- Wilhelm Baum : History of the Zimbern / Storia dei Cimbri. Landshut 1983.
Web links
- Asiago 7 Comuni news
- General information about the Cimbri,
- Extensive site with numerous links about the Zimbri people
- Lusern Documentation Center: in Italian, German and Cimbrian
Individual evidence
- ^ Altopiano di Asiago: Conco
- ↑ According to a 2012 study, there are still a few speakers in Roana who use Cimbric primarily in contexts of remembrance; According to Stefan Rabanus: language contact on the “Brenner Line”. Pre-articles, partitive pronouns and subject pronouns in Romance and Germanic-German varieties. In: Michael Elmentaler, Markus Hundt, Jürgen Erich Schmidt: German dialects. Concepts, problems, fields of action. Files of the 4th Congress of the International Society for the Dialectology of German (IGDD) (= Journal for Dialectology and Linguistics. Supplements. Volume 158). Steiner, Stuttgart 2015, pp. 415-433.
- ↑ Senato della Reppublica: Disegno di legge N. 1770
- ^ Voting of the South Tyrolean Parliament
- ^ Voting regional council
- ^ Maria Hornung: The seven communities in the province of Vicenza. In: South Tyrol in words and pictures. Südtirol Verlag Herbert Neuner, Munich 1984, p. 25.
- ^ Maria Hornung: The seven communities in the province of Vicenza. In: South Tyrol in words and pictures. Südtirol Verlag Herbert Neuner, Munich 1984, p. 25.
- ↑ https://www.sprachinselverein.at/sieben-gemeinden-sette-comuni.html