Indo-European · ISO 639-3 scn
Sicilian Language Sicilianu
Sicilian is an Indo-European language spoken by about 5.0 million people in 1 country. It is written in the Latin script.
Where Sicilian is spoken
- Official language
- Regional official
- Spoken by 10%+
- 1–10%
- Smaller communities
Countries that speak Sicilian
Language family
- Indo-European
- Classical Indo-European
- Italic
- Latino-Faliscan
- Latinic
- Imperial Latin
- Romance
- Italo-Western Romance
- Italo-Dalmatian
- Italian Romance
- Southern Italian Romance
- Sicilian
Writing system
Latin script
Related languages
About the Sicilian language
Sicilian (Sicilianu) is spoken by about 5.0 million people, which makes it the 189th most spoken language in the world — just behind Mewari (5.0 million) and ahead of Paraguayan Guaraní (4.9 million). It belongs to the Indo-European language family and, more precisely, to the Southern Italian Romance group within the Italic branch.
Where is Sicilian spoken?
Sicilian is used in 1 country. The largest communities live in Italy (499,912).
Sicilian is not a national official language anywhere.
Writing system and status
Sicilian is written in the Latin script. Glottolog classifies it as threatened, meaning fewer children learn it than in the past.
Its closest relatives in the same branch of the family are Neapolitan, Italian, Venetian, Spanish, Portuguese, French and 2 more.
ISO codes: ISO 639-3 scn.
Frequently asked questions about Sicilian
How many people speak Sicilian?
Where is Sicilian spoken?
What language family does Sicilian belong to?
What is Sicilian called in Sicilian?
Is Sicilian an endangered language?
Data: Languages of the World dataset (MIT) — ISO 639-3, Glottolog (CC BY 4.0), Unicode CLDR, Google LinguaMeta (CC BY 4.0) and Wikidata; country lists: samayo/country-json (MIT). Speaker numbers include first- and second-language speakers where sources report them.