Calabrian Greek - Echoes of an Ancient Language film card

Il greco di Calabria - la lingua che lotta per sopravivere al tempo

Calabrian Greek - Echoes of an Ancient Language

Lydia Gasparini 

29' / 

Italy 

/ 2025

Screenings

A language that still survives, clinging to the mountains much like the remote villages where it is still spoken, in the mountains of Calabria. The Calabrian-Greek dialect (known as Grecanic) dates back to the eighth century and represents one of the last living legacies of Magna Graecia, the strip of southern Italy colonized by the ancient Greeks. Today, approximately 300 people still speak this ancient language. They live in the southern part of the province of Reggio Calabria, known as Bovesìa, in Gallicianò, Bova, Bova Marina, Pentedattilo, and Roghudi. It is here that this language has endured for almost 3000 years. But the villages are emptying, the houses are abandoned, and the alleys are silent, and only a distant echo of this dialect remains. The director, through interviews and a thorough documentary investigation, follows the trail of one of the oldest living languages ​​in Europe and of the people who preserve it and fight to save it from extinction, that is not necessarily inevitable.

photo of Lydia Gasparini

Lydia Gasparini

LydiaGasparini

Born in Trento in 1998, she studied editing and post-production at Zelig – School of Documentary, Television and New Media in Bolzano, South Tyrol. Her graduation feature film Dear Odesa (2022) won the Best Editing award at the Sole Luna Doc Film Festival in Palermo and received a special mention at the Trento Film Festival. She works as an editor for the production company Mediaart.

photo of Lydia Gasparini

Credits

Producer

  • Peter Paul Kainrath

Screenplay

  • Lydia Gasparini

Photography

  • Agostino Fuscaldo

Editing

  • Martine De Biasi

Sound

  • Agostino Fuscaldo

Music

  • Sonoton - Musicmedia

single_film.roles.animation

  • Hannes Pasqualini