Piedmontese

The Piedmontese are the Romance-speaking people of Piedmont, the Alpine foothills of northwest Italy centered on Turin, Asti and Alessandria. In Roman times it was held by Celtic-Ligurian tribes such as the Taurini, who gave their name to Augusta Taurinorum, modern Turin; after Rome's fall it passed under Lombard then Frankish rule.

Their tongue, Piedmontese, is a Gallo-Italic language whose earliest surviving texts, the twelfth-century sermones subalpini, were still very close to Occitan; its local dialects include those of Turin and Asti. In the eleventh century the counts of Savoy entered the region, while Asti and Alessandria grew into self-governing communes and the marquisates of Montferrat and Saluzzo stayed independent.

Savoy became a duchy in 1416 and Duke Emanuele Filiberto moved its capital to Turin in 1563; in 1720 the dukes took the title of kings of Sardinia. Through these centuries Piedmontese remained the speech of town and countryside, while French and Tuscan served court and administration.