Provençal (Prouvençau in Provençal language) is one of several dialects of the Romance languageOccitan, which is spoken by a minority of people in southern France and other areas of France.
"Provençal" is often used to refer to all dialects of Occitan, but actually refers specifically to the dialect spoken in the former province of Provence as well as south of Dauphiné and the Nîmes region in Languedoc and the upper valleys of Piedmont, Italy (Val Mairo, Val Varacho, Val d'Esturo, Entraigas, Limoun, Vinai, Pignerol, Sestriero).
"Provençal" is also the customary name given to the older version of the langue d'oc used by the troubadours of medievalliterature, corresponding to Old French of the northern areas of France.
Also, some secluded areas of Sicily still bear significant traces of Provençal in terms of vocabulary and pronunciation.
The Vaudois literary language, in which is written the Nobla Leyczon, has, however, no direct connexion with any of the spoken dialects; it is a literary language, and is connected with literary Provencal, the language of the troubadours; see W. Foerster, GOttingische gelehrte Anzeigen (1888) Nos.
With this the corresponding tendency of the Celtic languages has been more than once and with justice compared; here it may be added that the Milanese nfin, apparently a single form for "noi," is really a compound or reduplication in the manner of the ni-ni, its exact counterpart in the Celtic tongues.
In such a case the dialect loses its slang and petty localisms, and at the same time also somewhat of its freshness; but it learns to express with more conscious sobriety and with more assured dignity the thought and the feeling of the various peoples which are fused in one national life.
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