Symbols
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Lombard alphabet
Accented letters sit next to their base vowel. Ö and Ü are used in Eastern Lombard and Ticinese spelling; classical Milanese writes oeu and u instead. J, K, W, X and Y are rare.
Lombard punctuation
Currency and where it's spoken
The Swiss franc has no symbol of its own; it is written CHF or Fr.
Lombardy in emoji
The Duomo of Milan, risotto alla milanese, polenta, the cheeses and the lakes.
On the map
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The Lombard alphabet: one language, several spellings
Lombard (lombard, in Italy usually just called dialett) is a Romance language of northern Italy and southern Switzerland, written in the Latin alphabet. CLDR lists the 26 plain letters a–z as its alphabet; on top of those, Lombard writing uses the accented vowels à è é ì ò ó ù and, in most spellings, the rounded vowels ö and ü. The accented forms are not separate letters and sort with their plain vowels.
There is no single official spelling. Lombard has no official status in Italy; an informal academy, Academia Bonvesin de la Riva, promotes the Noeuva Ortografia Lombarda. The oldest is the classical Milanese spelling used by poets such as Carlo Porta; Eastern Lombard (Bergamo, Brescia) and Ticino in Switzerland mostly write ö and ü; and newer proposals try to cover every variety with one set of rules. The same word can therefore look different from one book to the next: the Milanese winter dish of pork and cabbage is written cassoeula in classical Milanese spelling and cassöla in ö spellings.
The letters j, k, w, x and y are in the CLDR alphabet but are rare in most spellings, showing up mainly in names, loanwords and some local systems.
Lombard letters and accents: ö, ü and the accented vowels
Ö and ü are what most sets Lombard apart from Italian. They write the front rounded vowels that French spells eu and u and German spells ö and ü, sounds Italian does not have. In Eastern Lombard you see them everywhere, as in the saying ciapa sü e porta a cà (take it and carry it home: deal with it) or fa balà l’öcc (make the eye dance: keep your eyes open). Classical Milanese writes the same vowels with plain letters instead: oeu for the ö sound, as in cassoeula, and a simple u for the ü sound.
The grave accent marks a stressed final vowel, much as in Italian: cà (house), chì (here), lì (there). On e and o the two accents keep two sounds apart: è and ò are open, é and ó closed. Place names show the accents in daily use: Bergamo is Bèrghem and Brescia Brèsa. Capitals keep their marks: BÈRGHEM.
Lombard drops most final vowels except -a, so words often end in a consonant where Italian ends in a vowel: Milanese gatt for Italian gatto (cat), Milan for Milano, Lugan for Lugano. Western Lombard also tells long and short vowels apart, and the different spellings mark that length in different ways.
Lombard punctuation: « », “ ” and the apostrophe
Lombard follows Italian typography. Quotations open with the angle quotes « », with “ ” or ‘ ’ for quotes inside quotes, and dialogue in books often starts with a dash —. There is no inverted ¿ or ¡.
The apostrophe ’ is constant, because the short pronouns and articles lose their vowel before another vowel: l’è (it is, he is), as in the Milanese proud saying Milan l’è on gran Milan, and l’öcc (the eye). A typographic ’ looks better in print than the straight ' of the keyboard, and both are understood.
How to type Lombard letters: ö, ü, ó and the grave accents
An Italian keyboard has keys for à è é ì ò ù but none for ö, ü or ó, so Lombard writers need one of these methods. Windows: hold Alt and type on the number pad à 0224, è 0232, é 0233, ì 0236, ò 0242, ó 0243, ù 0249, ö 0246, ü 0252, À 0192, È 0200, É 0201, Ì 0204, Ò 0210, Ó 0211, Ù 0217, Ö 0214, Ü 0220, « 0171, » 0187. On the United States-International layout type then a vowel for the grave accent, ' then a vowel for the acute, and " then o or u for ö and ü.
Mac: hold the letter and pick from the pop-up, or use Option then a vowel for à è ì ò ù, Option E then a vowel for é ó, and Option U then o or u for ö ü. Phones: long-press o, u, e or any vowel and slide to the accented form. HTML: ö ö, ü ü, ó ó, è è, « «, » ».
Every accented letter on this page is a single precomposed Unicode character.
Where the Lombard language is spoken
Lombard is spoken across the Italian region of Lombardy, in the east of Piedmont around Novara and Verbania, in parts of western Trentino, and in Switzerland in the canton of Ticino and the Italian-speaking valleys of Graubünden. CLDR estimates around 3.8 million speakers: about 3.5 million in Italy and about 360,000 in Switzerland . Numbers are rough: Swiss statistics group Ticino and Italo-Grison dialects with Italian rather than counting Lombard separately. In Italy prices are in euros (20 ); Switzerland uses the franc, written CHF or Fr., which has no symbol of its own.
The river Adda roughly divides the two main groups: Western Lombard (Milanese, Ticinese, the speech of Como, Varese and Brianza) and Eastern Lombard (Bergamasque, Brescian). Lombard belongs to the Gallo-Italic family with Piedmontese, Ligurian and Emilian, which share its lost final vowels and, in many varieties, its front rounded vowels; Venetian to the east is a close neighbour. For the national language of both countries see the Italian letters page, and for the region in emoji the Italy and Switzerland collections.
Lombardy in emoji usually means for the Duomo of Milan, for saffron risotto alla milanese, for the polenta of Bergamo and the valleys, for Gorgonzola, Taleggio and Grana Padano, and for the lakes Como, Garda, Maggiore and Lugano.
How to use them
5 situationsClick to copyLombard Alphabet & Letters combos
10Worth knowing
- Lombardy is named after the Lombards (Langobards, a name sometimes explained as "long beards"), a Germanic people who ruled much of Italy from 568. Their own language, Lombardic, was Germanic and died out; the Lombard spoken today is a Romance language that grew from Latin and kept only some Lombardic loanwords.
- Ossobuco, the braised veal shank, takes its name from Milanese: oss bus, a bone with a hole, for the marrow bone at its centre.
- The traditional local dialects of Italian-speaking Switzerland, in Ticino and the southern valleys of Graubünden, are Lombard, and Swiss Lombard speakers make up a tenth of the CLDR estimate.
- Carlo Porta (1775–1821), the great poet of Milanese, wrote his satires and verse tales in Lombard rather than Italian, and he wrote in the established classical Milanese orthography.
Questions people ask
7What letters are in the Lombard alphabet?
The Latin letters A–Z (CLDR lists all 26, though J, K, W, X and Y are rare) plus the accented vowels À È É Ì Ò Ó Ù and, in most spellings, Ö and Ü. Classical Milanese writes the ö sound as oeu and the ü sound as u instead.
Is Lombard a language or an Italian dialect?
Linguists treat it as a Romance language of its own in the Gallo-Italic group, with the ISO 639-3 code lmo. In Italy it is usually called dialect, it has no official status, and it is not descended from Italian: both grew separately from Latin.
Is the Lombard language Germanic?
No. Modern Lombard is a Romance language. The name comes from the Lombards, a Germanic people of the early Middle Ages, whose own Germanic language, Lombardic, died out long ago.
Lombard language vs Italian: how different are they?
Different enough that Italians often cannot follow it: Lombard has the rounded vowels ö and ü, drops most final vowels (gatt for gatto, Milan for Milano) and has its own grammar, such as subject pronouns repeated before the verb.
How do I type ö and ü on an Italian keyboard?
Copy them from this page, or on Windows hold Alt and type 0246 for ö and 0252 for ü (0214 and 0220 for capitals). On a Mac press Option U, then o or u. On a phone, long-press o or u.
What is the language code for Lombard?
lmo, the ISO 639-3 code. It is also the prefix of Lombard Wikipedia, lmo.wikipedia.org.
How many people speak Lombard?
CLDR estimates around 3.8 million speakers, about 3.5 million in Italy and about 360,000 in Switzerland. Real numbers are uncertain, because many speakers switch between Lombard and Italian.
