LINGUA LOMBARDA?

Abstract

The paper deals with the vivid concept of ‘lingua lombarda’ (often in between higher and lower cultures) as it is can be traced in a wide range of authors, from the first centuries to Dante, from Manzoni to 20^th- and 21^st-centuries scholars. It is in Italian dialectal areas where it is especially clear the cultural and methodological connection between (micro-)history and (micro-)geography for the long linguistic his-tory of Italy. On the steps of a willing and yet perfectible regional law, scholars and aca-demics (and the very Crusca too) should take actions in favour of these documentary and oral testimonies of ‘local varieties’ in order to avoid their disappearance; they are an immaterial and now endangered treasure which was able, over the centuries, to give voice to so many ‘vili e meccanici’. One important step in this direction could be a new (historically and geographically oriented) reading of the AIS maps.