La codificazione della lingua montenegrina. La storia di un’idea

On July 30th, 2009 in the Republic of Montenegro the Pravopis crnogorskoga jezika [Orthography of the Montenegrin language] and the Rječnik crnogorskoga jezika (pravopisni rječnik) [Dictionary of the Montenegrin language (orthographic dictionary)] came into being. This fact sanctioned the offi cial birth, not only nominal, of the Montenegrin language which differs from Bosnian/Bosniak, Croatian and Serbian. The aim of the article is to illustrate the new orthography of the Montenegrin language and to delineate how the idea of an independent Montenegrin language came alive. Firstly, the main stages of the discussion in favour of a Montenegrin language are illustrated. Secondly, a recapitulation of the arguments deployed in order to demonstrate the diversity of the Montenegrin language from Serbo(Croatian) is offered. Finally, a description of the innovations introduced by the orthographic reform is presented.