Tuone Udaina
Sign in to saveLast known speaker of Dalmatian (1821–1898)
Key facts
- Born
- Tuone Udaina , 1823, Veglia , Austrian Empire , (now Krk, Croatia)
- Died
- ( 1898-06-10 ) 10 June 1898 (aged 74), Veglia, Austria-Hungary
- Other name
- Antonio Udina
- Known for
- Being the last person to have any active knowledge of the Dalmatian language
via Wikipedia infobox
~1 min read
Encyclopedic overview
Tuone Udaina (1823 – 10 June 1898; Antonio Udina in Italian) was the last known speaker of Dalmatian, a Romance language that evolved from Latin along the eastern coast of the Adriatic Sea. He was the main source of knowledge about his parents' dialect, that of the island of Veglia, for the linguist Matteo Bartoli, who recorded it in 1897.
Udaina bore the nickname Burbur, the etymology of which is uncertain. Bartoli tentatively associated it with burbero, an Italian word for a surly, gruff, or ill-tempered person. Other interpretations include "barbarian" and "barber". He worked as a marine postman and as a sexton.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Tuone Udaina” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.