The Dante Alighieri Society, one of Italy most prestigious cultural institutes with over 500 seats in the five continents, has announced plans to found a Museum of Italian Language, to be inaugurated in 2011 to mark the 150° anniversary of the Unification of Italy.
The Dante as it is called, was founded in 1889 by a group of intellectuals, led by poet Giosuè Carducci. It promotes Italian culture throughout the world, organizing Italian language courses, as well as various events connected with art, music, sport, cinema, fashion, literature etc..
Meanwhile, the cultural institution Accademia della Crusca, the honourable official custodian of the Italian language, has published a new edition of the Vocabolario degli Accademici first published in Venice in 1612 and claimed to be the first dictionary of a European language. The language we know as Italian actually deriva Crusca from the dialect of Tuscany, as used by writers Dante, Petrarca and Boccaccio. Its adoption was championed by the Florentine ruler Cosimo de Medici and the idea of compiling a dictionary is attributed to 16° century philologist Leonardo Salviati with the help of a group of literati who had formed a supper club known as the Brigata dei Crusconi.
The term Crusca was a joke, referring to the husk of the corn that encloses the seed.
The idea of a language dictionary was soon copied by other countries: France brought out its own Dictionnaire in 1694, modelled on the Crusca Italian version. Portugal and Spain followed in the first half of the 18° century. Dr. Johnson brought out his Dictionary of the English Language in 1755, again referring to the Crusca model.
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