Canzés dialect

Canzés (also written Canzees) is a variety of Brianzöö (a Western Lombard dialect) spoken in the commune of Canzo, Italy.

Because Canzo is in the northernmost zone of the Brianza, Canzés preserves lexical archaisms better than modern Milanese, and has changed less under the influence of Italian.

The language descends from Latin with some influence from a Celtic substratum due to the original inhabitants of the region, the Insubres, Lambrani, Lepontii, and Orobi (local populations already merged with Gauls).

In the little written literature, almost totally poetry, bloomed in the 1970s basing on Brianzöö and Milanese literatures (born in the 13th century), it is used a simple orthography, adherent to the pronunciation and based on Italian and Milanese ones, using diaeresis, letter j for semivocalic i, not applying the circumflex accent but the redoubling of long vowels, or the redoubling of consonant for short vowels.

An important role of Canzés and other local languages is in toponyms, often derived from Celtic words, and traditional gentilics.

Canzés, even if it has a consistent heritage of oral and written literature, besides high importance for the local identity, does not have an official recognition, so it is getting uncommon in young generations.