Tuscan dialect in the context of "Sound change"

Dante Alighieri (Italian: [ˈdante aliˈɡjɛːri]; most likely baptized Durante di Alighiero degli Alighieri; c. May 1265 – September 14, 1321), widely known mononymously as Dante, was an Italian poet, writer, and philosopher. His Divine Comedy, originally called Comedìa (modern Italian: Commedia) and later christened Divina by Giovanni Boccaccio, is widely considered one of the most important poems of the Middle Ages and the greatest literary work in the Italian language.

At a time when Latin was still the dominant language for scholarly and literary writing—and when many Italian poets drew inspiration from French or Provençal traditions—Dante broke with both by writing in the vernacular, specifically his native Tuscan dialect. His De vulgari eloquentia (On Eloquence in the Vernacular) was one of the first scholarly defenses of the vernacular. His use of the Florentine dialect for works such as The New Life (1295) and Divine Comedy helped establish the modern-day standardized Italian language. His work set a precedent that important Italian writers such as Petrarch and Boccaccio would later follow.

Tuscany (/ˈtʌskəni/ TUSK-ə-nee; Italian: Toscana [tosˈkaːna]) is a region in central Italy with an area of about 23,000 square kilometres (8,900 square miles) and a population of 3,660,834 as of 2025. The capital city is Florence.

Tuscany is known for its landscapes, history, artistic legacy, and influence on high culture. It is regarded as the birthplace of the Italian Renaissance and of the foundations of the Italian language. The prestige established by Tuscan's use in literature by Dante Alighieri, Petrarch, Giovanni Boccaccio, Niccolò Machiavelli, and Francesco Guicciardini led to its adoption as the basis for elaboration of the language of culture throughout Italy. It has been home to many figures influential in the history of art and science, and contains well-known museums such as the Uffizi and the Palazzo Pitti. Tuscany is also known for its wines, including Chianti, Vino Nobile di Montepulciano, Morellino di Scansano, Brunello di Montalcino, and white Vernaccia di San Gimignano. Having a strong linguistic and cultural identity, it is sometimes considered "a nation within a nation".

Milanese (endonym in traditional orthography Milanes, Meneghin) is the central variety of the Western dialect of the Lombard language spoken in Milan, the rest of its metropolitan city, and the northernmost part of the province of Pavia. Milanese, due to the importance of Milan, the largest city in Lombardy, is often considered one of the most prestigious Lombard variants and the most prestigious one in the Western Lombard area.

In Italian-language contexts, Milanese (like most indigenous Romance varieties spoken in Italy other than standard Italian) is often called a dialetto "dialect". This can be misunderstood to mean a variety of the Tuscan-derived national language, which it is not. Lombard in general, including Milanese, is a sister language of Tuscan, thus also of Italian, rather than a derivative. Typologically, Lombard is a Western Romance language, and more closely resembles other Gallo-Italic languages in Northern Italy (e.g. Piedmontese, Ligurian, Emilian, Romagnol) as well as others further afield, including Occitan and Romansh.

The Divine Comedy (Italian: Divina Commedia, pronounced [diˈviːna komˈmɛːdja]) is an Italian narrative poem by Dante Alighieri, begun c. 1308 and completed around 1321, shortly before the author's death. It is widely considered the pre-eminent work in Italian literature and one of the greatest works of Western literature. The poem's imaginative vision of the afterlife is representative of the medieval worldview as it existed in the Western Church by the 14th century. It helped establish the Tuscan language, in which it is written, as the standardized Italian language. It is divided into three parts: Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso.

The poem explores the condition of the soul following death and portrays a vision of divine justice, in which individuals receive appropriate punishment or reward based on their actions. It describes Dante's travels through Hell, Purgatory, and Heaven. Allegorically, the poem represents the soul's journey towards God, beginning with the recognition and rejection of sin (Inferno), followed by the penitent Christian life (Purgatorio), which is then followed by the soul's ascent to God (Paradiso). Dante draws on medieval Catholic theology and philosophy, especially Thomistic philosophy derived from the Summa Theologica of Thomas Aquinas.

Regional Italian (Italian: italiano regionale, pronounced [itaˈljaːno redʒoˈnaːle]) is any regional variety of the Italian language.

Such vernacular varieties and standard Italian exist along a sociolect continuum, and are not to be confused with the local non-immigrant languages of Italy that predate the national tongue or any regional variety thereof. Among these languages, the various Tuscan, Corsican and some Central Italian lects are, to some extent, the closest ones to standard Italian in terms of linguistic features, since the latter is based on a somewhat polished form of Florentine.

The Extreme Southern Italian dialects are a set of languages spoken in Salento, Calabria, Sicily and southern Cilento with common phonetic and syntactic characteristics such as to constitute a single group. These languages derive, without exception, not from Tuscan but from Vulgar Latin; therefore it follows that the name "Italian" is a purely geographical reference.

Today, Extreme Southern Italian dialects are still spoken daily, although their use is limited to informal contexts and is mostly oral. There are examples of full literary uses with contests (mostly poetry) and theatrical performances.

Giovanni Boccaccio (UK: /bəˈkætʃioʊ/ bə-KATCH-ee-oh, US: /boʊˈkɑːtʃ(i)oʊ, bəˈ-/ boh-KAH-ch(ee)oh, bə-; Italian: [dʒoˈvanni bokˈkattʃo]; 16 June 1313 – 21 December 1375) was an Italian writer, poet, correspondent of Petrarch, and an important Renaissance humanist. Born in the town of Certaldo, he became so well known as a writer that he was sometimes simply known as "the Certaldese" and one of the most important figures in the European literary panorama of the fourteenth century. Some scholars (including Vittore Branca) define him as the greatest European prose writer of his time, a versatile writer who amalgamated different literary trends and genres, making them converge in original works, thanks to a creative activity exercised under the banner of experimentalism.

His most notable works are The Decameron, a collection of short stories, and On Famous Women. The Decameron became a determining element for the Italian literary tradition, especially after Pietro Bembo elevated the Boccaccian style to a model of Italian prose in the sixteenth century. Boccaccio wrote his imaginative literature mostly in Tuscan vernacular, as well as other works in Latin, and is particularly noted for his realistic dialogue which differed from that of his contemporaries, medieval writers who usually followed formulaic models for character and plot. The influence of Boccaccio's works was not limited to the Italian cultural scene but extended to the rest of Europe, exerting influence on authors such as Geoffrey Chaucer, a key figure in English literature, and the later writers Miguel de Cervantes, Lope de Vega and classical theatre in Spain.

The Florentine dialect or vernacular (dialetto fiorentino or vernacolo fiorentino) is a variety of Tuscan, a Romance language spoken in the Italian city of Florence and its immediate surroundings.

A variant derived from it historically, once called la pronuncia fiorentina emendata (literally, 'the amended Florentine pronunciation'), was the official national language of the Kingdom of Italy when it was established in 1861. It is the most widely spoken of the Tuscan dialects.