Talk:The Essays of Montaigne/Book I/Chapter XXV

Montaigne and the Bergamaschi
In this chapter in the original French, immediately before the Latin phrase Verbaque praevisam... Montaigne makes a perhaps derogatory reference to bergamasco, the Lombard dialect of the people of Bergamo:

"For my part, I believe that anyone with a lively and clear imagination will be able to explain [a thing], whether it be in bergamasco, or by mime if he is mute." [Translation mine]

Cotton's translation in this chapter renders the French as "...he will express it well enough in one kind of tongue or another...," not incorrect but certainly lacking in the flavour of the original.

Can anyone provide an insight into how Montaigne might have acquired an awareness of bergamasco as an odd tongue? That is certainly the opinion of many Lombards (eg. the people of Milan) today, but it intrigues me that that may have been a widespread opinion even in Montaigne's time. His travels in Italy do not seem to have included a visit to Bergamo, and the closest he seems to have been to that city was Milan. Why should a Frenchman from the province of Guyenne have made such a reference? GianniBGood (talk) 10:02, 18 September 2023 (UTC)