Venetic ( ) is an extinct

Indo-European language The Indo-European languages are a language family native to the northern Indian subcontinent, most of Europe, and the Iranian plateau with additional native branches found in regions such as Sri Lanka, the Maldives, parts of Central Asia ( ...

, most commonly classified into the Italic subgroup, that was spoken by the Veneti people in ancient times in northeast

Italy Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe, Western Europe. It consists of Italian Peninsula, a peninsula that extends into the Mediterranean Sea, with the Alps on its northern land b ...

(

Veneto Veneto, officially the Region of Veneto, is one of the 20 regions of Italy, located in the Northeast Italy, north-east of the country. It is the fourth most populous region in Italy, with a population of 4,851,851 as of 2025. Venice is t ...

and

Friuli Friuli (; ; or ; ; ) is a historical region of northeast Italy. The region is marked by its separate regional and ethnic identity predominantly tied to the Friulians, who speak the Friulian language. It comprises the major part of the autono ...

) and part of modern

Slovenia Slovenia, officially the Republic of Slovenia, is a country in Central Europe. It borders Italy to the west, Austria to the north, Hungary to the northeast, Croatia to the south and southeast, and a short (46.6 km) coastline within the Adriati ...

, between the Po Delta and the southern fringe of the

Alps The Alps () are some of the highest and most extensive mountain ranges in Europe, stretching approximately across eight Alpine countries (from west to east): Monaco, France, Switzerland, Italy, Liechtenstein, Germany, Austria and Slovenia. ...

, associated with the Este culture. The language is attested by over 300 short inscriptions dating from the 6th to the 1st century BCE. Its speakers are identified with the ancient people called '' Veneti'' by the Romans and ''Enetoi'' by the

Greeks Greeks or Hellenes (; , ) are an ethnic group and nation native to Greece, Greek Cypriots, Cyprus, Greeks in Albania, southern Albania, Greeks in Turkey#History, Anatolia, parts of Greeks in Italy, Italy and Egyptian Greeks, Egypt, and to a l ...

. It became extinct around the 1st century when the local inhabitants assimilated into the Roman sphere. Inscriptions dedicating offerings to Reitia are one of the chief sources of knowledge of the Venetic language.

Linguistic classification

Venetic is a centum language. The inscriptions use a variety of the Northern Italic alphabet, similar to the

Etruscan alphabet The Etruscan alphabet was used by the Etruscans, an ancient civilization of central and northern Italy, to write Etruscan language, their language, from about 700 BC to sometime around 100 AD. The Etruscan alphabet derives from the Euboean alpha ...

. The exact relationship of Venetic to other Indo-European languages is still being investigated, but the majority of scholars agree that Venetic, aside from Liburnian, shared some similarities with the

Italic languages The Italic languages form a branch of the Indo-European languages, Indo-European language family, whose earliest known members were spoken on the Italian Peninsula in the first millennium BC. The most important of the ancient Italic languages ...

and so is sometimes classified as Italic. However, since it also shared similarities with other Western Indo-European branches (particularly

Celtic languages The Celtic languages ( ) are a branch of the Indo-European language family, descended from the hypothetical Proto-Celtic language. The term "Celtic" was first used to describe this language group by Edward Lhuyd in 1707, following Paul-Yve ...

and

Germanic languages The Germanic languages are a branch of the Indo-European languages, Indo-European language family spoken natively by a population of about 515 million people mainly in Europe, North America, Oceania, and Southern Africa. The most widely spoke ...

), some linguists prefer to consider it an independent Indo-European language. Venetic may also have been related to the

Illyrian languages The Illyrian language () was an Indo-European language or group of languages spoken by the Illyrians in Southeast Europe during antiquity. The language is unattested with the exception of personal names and placenames. Just enough information ...

once spoken in the western

Balkans The Balkans ( , ), corresponding partially with the Balkan Peninsula, is a geographical area in southeastern Europe with various geographical and historical definitions. The region takes its name from the Balkan Mountains that stretch throug ...

, though the theory that Illyrian and Venetic were closely related is debated by current scholarship. While some scholars consider Venetic plainly an Italic language, and Eric P. Hamp in 1954 thought it more closely related to Latino-Faliscan than to the

Osco-Umbrian languages The Osco-Umbrian, Sabellic or Sabellian languages are an extinct group of Italic languages, the Indo-European languages that were spoken in central and southern Italy by the Osco-Umbrians before being replaced by Latin, as the power of ancient Ro ...

, many authorities suggest, in view of the divergent verbal system, that Venetic was not part of Italic proper, but split off from the core of Italic early. A 2012 study has suggested that Venetic was a relatively conservative language significantly similar to Celtic, on the basis of morphology, while it occupied an intermediate position between Celtic and Italic, on the basis of phonology. However these phonological similarities may have arisen as an areal phenomenon. Phonological similarities to

Rhaetian The Rhaetian is the latest age (geology), age of the Triassic period (geology), Period (in geochronology) or the uppermost stage (stratigraphy), stage of the Triassic system (stratigraphy), System (in chronostratigraphy). It was preceded by the N ...

have also been pointed out. In 2016, Celtologist Peter Schrijver argued that Venetic and Italic together form one sub-branch of an Italo-Celtic branch of Indo-European, the other sub-branch being Celtic.

Fate

During the period of Latin-Venetic bilingual inscriptions in the Roman script, i.e. 150–50 BCE, Venetic became flooded with Latin loanwords. The shift from Venetic to Latin resulting in

language death In linguistics, language death occurs when a language loses its last native speaker. By extension, language extinction is when the language is no longer known, including by second-language speakers, when it becomes known as an extinct langua ...

is thought by scholarship to have already been well under way by that time.

Features

Venetic had about six, possibly seven, noun cases and four conjugations (similar to Latin). About 60 words are known, but some were borrowed from

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

(''liber.tos.'' < ''libertus'') or Etruscan. Many of them show a clear Indo-European origin, such as ''vhraterei'' < PIE ''*bʰréh₂trey'' = to the brother.

Phonology

In Venetic,

PIE A pie is a baked dish which is usually made of a pastry dough casing that contains a filling of various sweet or savoury ingredients. Sweet pies may be filled with fruit (as in an apple pie), nuts ( pecan pie), fruit preserves ( jam tart ...

stops ''*bʰ'', ''*dʰ'' and ''*gʰ'' developed to , and , respectively, in word-initial position (as in Latin and Osco-Umbrian), but to , and , respectively, in word-internal intervocalic position (as in Latin). For Venetic, at least the developments of ''*bʰ'' and ''*dʰ'' are clearly attested. Faliscan and Osco-Umbrian have , and internally as well. There are also indications of the developments of PIE ''*kʷ'' > ''kv'', ''*gʷ-'' > ''w-'' and PIE ''*gʷʰ-'' > ''f-'' in Venetic, the latter two being parallel to Latin; as well as the regressive assimilation of the PIE sequence ''*p...kʷ...'' > ''*kʷ...kʷ...'', a feature also found in Italic and Celtic.

Language sample

A sample inscription in Venetic, found on a

bronze Bronze is an alloy consisting primarily of copper, commonly with about 12–12.5% tin and often with the addition of other metals (including aluminium, manganese, nickel, or zinc) and sometimes non-metals (such as phosphorus) or metalloid ...

nail at Este (Es 45): Another inscription, found on a '' situla'' (vessel such as an urn or bucket) at Cadore (Ca 4 Valle):

Scholarship

The most prominent scholars who have deciphered Venetic inscriptions or otherwise contributed to the knowledge of the Venetic language are Pauli, Krahe, Pellegrini, Prosdocimi, (Catalogue of an exposition at Montebelluna, 12/2001–05/2002) and Lejeune. Recent contributors include Capuis and Bianchi.

References

External links

*

, Project fund by the Italian Ministry of University and Research (P.R.I.N. 2017) * * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Venetic Language Unclassified Indo-European languages Languages of ancient Italy Languages attested from the 5th century BC Languages extinct in the 1st century BC Este culture Italo-Celtic