Pantesco is the
Sicilian dialect
Sicilian refers to the autonomous Italian island of Sicily.
Sicilian can also refer to:
* Sicilian language, a Romance language spoken on the island of Sicily, its satellite islands, and southern Calabria
* Sicilians, people from or with origins ...
of the island of
Pantelleria
Pantelleria (; Sicilian: ''Pantiddirìa'', Maltese: ''Pantellerija'' or ''Qawsra''), the ancient Cossyra or Cossura, is an Italian island and comune in the Strait of Sicily in the Mediterranean Sea, southwest of Sicily and east of the Tunisi ...
between
Sicily
(man) it, Siciliana (woman)
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, demographics_type1 = Ethnicity
, demographics1_footnotes =
, demographi ...
and
Tunisia
)
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, map_caption = Location of Tunisia in northern Africa
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, capital = Tunis
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, ...
. It is notable among Romance varieties for an unusually high degree of influence from
Arabic
Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C. E.Watson; Walte ...
, reflecting a variety close to
Maltese
Maltese may refer to:
* Someone or something of, from, or related to Malta
* Maltese alphabet
* Maltese cuisine
* Maltese culture
* Maltese language, the Semitic language spoken by Maltese people
* Maltese people, people from Malta or of Malte ...
. Arabic loanwords, mainly nouns, include words such as ''hurrìhi'' "nettle" < ''ħurrayq'' (Maltese ''ħurrieq''), ''vartàsa'' "hornless (goat)" < ''farṭās'', ''hèddi'' "calm wind" < ''hādiʔ'', as well as many place names around the island, including the name Pantelleria itself.
[
] In such loans, the glottal fricative ''h'' (unusual for a Romance dialect) is preserved as a reflex of Arabic laryngeals ''h/x/ħ'' and sometimes even ''q''.
Pantesco uses unstressed subject pronoun clitics to form durative aspect.
A dialectal dictionary has been published (Tropea 1988).
References
{{Romance languages
Sicilian language
Italo-Dalmatian languages