Francoprovenzale dialet

The fact that the French soldiers who settled in Crepacore were foreign and spoke a different language prevented them from interacting with other villages and cultures. Along with the Italian language, the Francophone dialect is still spoken in Celle and Faeto. This language belongs to a family of dialects spoken across southern France and Northwest Italy (Piemonte and Valle D’Aosta). These dialects are called francoprovenzale or PATOIS and they have all same features. Celle and Faeto's dialect is the only PATOIS spoken in South Southern Italy and there is no other dialect like it in the rest of the world ! So this dialect is unique! For this reason many glottologists and historiographers have studied it in the past. This dialect is linked with the Southern French origins of the soldiers who created Celle and Faeto. They still spoke their medieval French eight centuries later and thanks to the isolation by the mountains until today it has remained unchanged!
In this map you can see the area where the soldiers left from.

This dialect is still much more similar to French than the Italian language. Comparing this language with the dialect spoken in some villages situated in the Northwest area of Greboble city in Southern France, glottologists assume that the soldiers migrated from there in 1269: La Combe de Lancey, Saint-Mury, Saint-Jean, Saint Agnès, Saint Luc, Chandolin.
Here you can see the comparison between the French dialect still spoken today in La Combe in South France, Celle's and Faeto's dialect and Italian.
There are also some differences between Celle's and Faeto's dialects.

Today all the linguistic minorities in Italy are protected by the law 482/99 (Norme in materia di tutela delle minoranze linguistiche storiche). What this law says is that each minority language must be protected by teaching it as school as well as the Italian language and the minority group can receive money by the government in order to make projects, books, and any other thing concerning the protection of this language.

On August 12th 2007 in Celle San Vito took place a ceremony to welcome the francoprovenzale flag. This symbol was created in northen Italy a few years ago in order to unite all the francoprovenzali villages under the same logo and identity. In 2007 this flag became a symbol of identity also in Celle and Faeto. Now they officially belong to the francoprovenzale family! This flag will now be standing close to the Italian and European one.

Flag's photos powered by Silvano Tangi