Welcome To The Mexican Town Where The Locals Speak Italian

You don’t have to travel to Venice to hear the sweet, melodious tones of Casanova’s native tongue. Just take a trip to Puebla, Mexico. Seven miles southwest of the state capital is the tiny town of Chipilo, where a Venetian language is spoken by the descendants of some 38 Italian families who migrated to Mexico more than 130 year ago.

The families were driven from their hometown of Segusino, at the foot of the Alps in northern Italy, when a burst riverbank flooded their farmlands. They arrived in Mexico in 1882 and set to work in agriculture and dairy production, becoming famous throughout the region for producing excellent cheese.

The town they built, with its lively central piazza and its numerous fantastic Italian restaurants, still retains the flavor of rural Italy. Local stores are stocked with potent cheeses, pastas, cold cuts of meat, and wine.

https://www.instagram.com/p/8ti1GVCowd/?tagged=chipilo

Over the years the language has grown apart from the Venetian dialect you would hear in Segusino today. “When we meet Venetians they tell us that we sound like their grandparents,” restaurant owner Javier Galeazzi told Spanish newspaper El País.

The town has managed to retain its personality through the years, with locals defining themselves as both proud Italians and proud Mexicans. As these two countries share many values and traditions, complications with this dual identity rarely arise. The one exception is when Italy play Mexico at soccer, an event that throws Chipilo into confusion, with some supporting their birth country and others identifying with the European country of their forefathers.

Some of the ancestors of the Venetian migrants have enjoyed great success in Mexico. The Italian Coffee Company is a franchise of coffee shops with some 400 branches throughout the country. Domingo Minutti, the co-founder of the company, is an Italian-Mexican whose great-grandparents made the journey from Segusino.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BUnT4JlgVv-/?taken-at=468925441

Eduardo Montagner Anguiano is a writer and a campaigner on behalf of minority languages in Mexico. His debut novel Al prim (The First) was written in the Venetian dialect that he grew up speaking.

The dialect is one of only four non-indigenous languages that are used in Mexico today, according to Ethnologue, a publication that provides a linguistic profile of the world. (The other three are Spanish, Mennonite Low German and Vlax Romani, a dialect of the Romani language). Ethnologue categorizes Mexico’s Venetian dialect as “threatened,” although it notes that Chipilo has maintained its strong community bonds through the years, enabling the language to survive until now.

Montagner Anguiano is concerned about his language’s fragile status and is actively involved in the fight to preserve it. To highlight the importance of the language, he likes to use a common Chipilo saying:

“Fin che i veneti i parle veneto i sará vivi.” Venetians will exist as long as they speak Venetian.

The writer and poet Eduardo Montagner Anguiano

Since you are here, we would like to share our vision for the future of travel - and the direction Culture Trip is moving in.

Culture Trip launched in 2011 with a simple yet passionate mission: to inspire people to go beyond their boundaries and experience what makes a place, its people and its culture special and meaningful — and this is still in our DNA today. We are proud that, for more than a decade, millions like you have trusted our award-winning recommendations by people who deeply understand what makes certain places and communities so special.

Increasingly we believe the world needs more meaningful, real-life connections between curious travellers keen to explore the world in a more responsible way. That is why we have intensively curated a collection of premium small-group trips as an invitation to meet and connect with new, like-minded people for once-in-a-lifetime experiences in three categories: Culture Trips, Rail Trips and Private Trips. Our Trips are suitable for both solo travelers, couples and friends who want to explore the world together.

Culture Trips are deeply immersive 5 to 16 days itineraries, that combine authentic local experiences, exciting activities and 4-5* accommodation to look forward to at the end of each day. Our Rail Trips are our most planet-friendly itineraries that invite you to take the scenic route, relax whilst getting under the skin of a destination. Our Private Trips are fully tailored itineraries, curated by our Travel Experts specifically for you, your friends or your family.

We know that many of you worry about the environmental impact of travel and are looking for ways of expanding horizons in ways that do minimal harm - and may even bring benefits. We are committed to go as far as possible in curating our trips with care for the planet. That is why all of our trips are flightless in destination, fully carbon offset - and we have ambitious plans to be net zero in the very near future.