Italian Islands of the Aegean
The Italian Islands of the Aegean were an archipelago of fourteen islands in the southeastern Aegean Sea, that—together with the surrounding islets—were ruled by the Kingdom of Italy from 1912 to 1943 and the Italian Social Republic from 1943 to 1945. When the Kingdom of Italy was restored, they remained under formal Italian possession until they were ceded to Greece in 1947 under the Treaty of Paris.
Palazzo Governale
Casa del Fascio (City hall)
Italian is a Romance language of the Indo-European language family that evolved from the Vulgar Latin of the Roman Empire. Italian is the least divergent Romance language from Latin, together with Sardinian. Spoken by about 85 million people including 67 million native speakers (2024), Italian is an official language in Italy, San Marino, and Switzerland, and is the primary language of Vatican City. It has official minority status in Croatia and in some areas of Slovenian Istria.
Dante Alighieri (top) and Petrarca (bottom) were influential in establishing their Tuscan dialect as the most prominent literary language in all of Italy in the Late Middle Ages.
Venetian Pietro Bembo was an influential figure in the development of the Italian language from the Tuscan dialect, as a literary medium, codifying the language for standard modern usage.
Alessandro Manzoni set the basis for the modern Italian language and helping create linguistic unity throughout Italy.
Italian Secondary School in Rijeka/Fiume, Croatia