Istriot

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Romance language spoken in Croatia

title: "Istriot" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["languages-of-croatia", "italo-dalmatian-languages", "endangered-romance-languages", "italians-of-croatia", "subject–verb–object-languages"] description: "Romance language spoken in Croatia" topic_path: "linguistics" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Istriot" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary Romance language spoken in Croatia ::

::data[format=table title="Infobox language"]

Field	Value
name	Istriot
nativename	Eîstrioto, Lèngua Eîstriota
Bumbar, Valìʃe, Ruvignìʃ, Faʃanìʃ, Siʃanìʃ, Galiʃaneʃ
states	Croatia
region	Istria
speakers	400
date	2007
ref	e23
speakers2	L2 speakers: 900 (2007)
familycolor	Indo-European
fam2	Italic
fam3	Latino-Faliscan
fam4	Latin
fam5	Romance
fam6	Italo-Western
fam7	Italo-Dalmatian
fam8	Dalmatian Romance?
iso3	ist
glotto	istr1244
glottorefname	Istriot
lingua	51-AAA-na
map	File:Lang Status 40-SE.svg
mapcaption
::

The Istriot language (Lèngua Eîstriota) is a Romance language of the Italo-Dalmatian branch spoken by about 400 people in the southwestern part of the Istrian peninsula in Croatia, particularly in Rovinj and Vodnjan.

Classification

Istriot is a Romance language currently only found in Istria. Its classification has remained mostly unclear; it has been variously regarded:

as being related to the Ladin populations of the Alps. According to the Italian linguist Matteo Bartoli, the Ladin area used to extend – until the year 1000 AD – from southern Istria to Friuli and eastern Switzerland.
as an independent Northern Italian language, belonging neither to the Venetian language nor to the Gallo-Italic group (opinion shared by linguists Tullio De Mauro and Maurizio Dardano);
as a variety of the Rhaeto-Romance languages by the Istriot Antonio Ive
as an independent language of the Italo-Dalmatian group
as an autochthonous Romance language heavily influenced by Venetian, Friulian and Slavic superstrates by Mirko Deanović
In 2017 it was classified by the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History with the Dalmatian language in the Dalmatian Romance subgroup,

When Istria was a region of the Kingdom of Italy, Istriot was considered by the authorities as a subdialect of Venetian.

Historically, its speakers never referred to it as "Istriot"; it had six names, after the six towns where it was spoken. In Vodnjan it was named "Bumbaro", in Bale "Valìʃe", in Rovinj "Ruvignìʃ", in Šišan "Siʃanìʃ", in Fažana "Faʃanìʃ" and in Galižana "Galiʃaneʃ". The term Istriot was coined by the 19th-century Italian linguist Graziadio Isaia Ascoli.

This language is still spoken by some people in the Istriot communities in Fertilia and Maristella, in Sardinia.

There are about 400 speakers left, making it an endangered language.

Vocabulary

Below is a comparison of Istriot with several closely related Romance languages and Latin: ::data[format=table] | Latin|| Italian || Istriot (Rovignìʃ)|| Venetian || Bisiacco Venetian || English | |---| | |clave(m) | | |nocte(m) | | |cantare | | |capra(m) | | |lingua(m) | | |platea(m) | | |ponte(m) | | |ecclesia(m) | | |hospitale(m) | | |caseu(m) lat.vulg.formaticu(m) | ::

Phonology

The phonology of the Istriot language:

Consonants

::data[format=table] | Labial | Dental/ Alveolar | Post-alv./ Palatal | Velar | Nasal | Stop | voiceless | voiced | Fricative | voiceless | voiced | Trill | Approximant | central | lateral | |---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---| | | | | () | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | () | | | | | | | | | | | | | ::

Sounds can also be noted as among different dialects.
occurs as a result of a nasal consonant preceding a velar stop.
can occur as a result of Italian loanwords.

Vowels

::data[format=table]

Front	Central	Back	Close	Close-mid	Open-mid	Open




::

Orthography

The Istriot alphabet is the following:

::data[format=table]

Letter	Pronunciation (IPA)	Notes
A, a		à
B, b		–
C, c	,	when followed by "a", "o", "u" or a consonant; when followed by "e" or "i"
Ch, ch		When followed by "e" or "i"
Ci, ci		When followed by "a", "o", "u"
D, d		–
Dz, dz		–
E, e	,	è, é
F, f		–
G, g	,	before "a", "o", "u" or a consonant, before "e" and "i"
Gh, gh		When followed by "e" or "i"
Gi, gi		When followed by "a", "o", "u"
H, h	–	Used in [ch] and [gh]
I, i	,	í, î
J, j		–
L, l		–
M, m		–
N, n		–
Nj, nj / Gn, gn
O, o	,	ò, ó
P, p		–
R, r		–
S, s		–
T, t		–
Ts, ts		–
U, u	,	ú, û
V, v		–
Z, z		–
::

Example

This is a poem called "Grièbani" by in the dialect of Rovinj-Rovigno.

::data[format=table] | Istriot || Italian | |---| | | ::

Notes

References

Bartoli, Matteo. ''Le parlate italiane della Venezia Giulia e della Dalmazia''. Tipografia italo-orientale. Grottaferrata 1919.
"Ethnologue entry for Istriot".
Stammerjohann, Harro. (2009). "Lexicon Grammaticorum".
"Glottolog 3.1 - Istriot".
Tagliavini, Carlo. ''Le origini delle lingue neolatine''. Patron Ed. Bologna 1982.
Cernecca, Domenico. (1967). "Analisi fonematica del dialetto di Valle d'Istria". Studia Romanica et Anglica Zagrabiensia.

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