The Southern Romance languages make up a hypothetical sub-group of the family of Romance languages

Romance languages

The Romance languages are a branch of the Indo-European language family, more precisely of the Italic languages subfamily, comprising all the languages that descend from Vulgar Latin, the language of ancient Rome...

 suggested by Ethnologue

Ethnologue

Ethnologue: Languages of the World is a web and print publication of SIL International , a Christian linguistic service organization, which studies lesser-known languages, to provide the speakers with Bibles in their native language and support their efforts in language development.The Ethnologue...

 but with little support among linguists.

According to Ethnologue, the language group would include Sardinian

Sardinian language

Sardinian is a Romance language spoken and written on most of the island of Sardinia . It is considered the most conservative of the Romance languages in terms of phonology and is noted for its Paleosardinian substratum....

, Corsican

Corsican language

Corsican is a Italo-Dalmatian Romance language spoken and written on the islands of Corsica and northern Sardinia . Corsican is the traditional native language of the Corsican people, and was long the vernacular language alongside the Italian, official language in Corsica until 1859, which was...

, the Gallurese dialect, and the dialect

Dialect

The term dialect is used in two distinct ways, even by linguists. One usage refers to a variety of a language that is a characteristic of a particular group of the language's speakers. The term is applied most often to regional speech patterns, but a dialect may also be defined by other factors,...

s of Sassarese. In mainstream linguistics, Corsican is instead considered closest to the Tuscan dialect

Tuscan dialect

The Tuscan language , or the Tuscan dialect is an Italo-Dalmatian language spoken in Tuscany, Italy.Standard Italian is based on Tuscan, specifically on its Florentine variety...

 of Italian and closer to standard Italian

Italian language

Italian is a Romance language spoken mainly in Europe: Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, Vatican City, by minorities in Malta, Monaco, Croatia, Slovenia, France, Libya, Eritrea, and Somalia, and by immigrant communities in the Americas and Australia...

 than many other Italian dialects

Italian dialects

Dialects of Italian are regional varieties of the Italian language, more commonly and more accurately referred to as Regional Italian. The dialects have features, most notably phonological and lexical, percolating from the underlying substrate languages...

 while Sardinian is considered a separate language.

Classification

• Corsican:
  • Corsican
    Corsican language
    Corsican is a Italo-Dalmatian Romance language spoken and written on the islands of Corsica and northern Sardinia . Corsican is the traditional native language of the Corsican people, and was long the vernacular language alongside the Italian, official language in Corsica until 1859, which was...
    
     (corsu) - Corsica;
  • Gallurese
    Gallurese
    Gallurese is a Italo-Dalmatian Romance language spoken in the northeastern part of Sardinia. It is often considered as a variety of Corsican, or a transitional language between Corsican and Sardinian....
    
     (gaddhuresu) - Sardinia;
• Sassarese (sassaresu) , transitional between Corsican and Sardinian - Sardinia.
• Sardinian
  Sardinian language
  Sardinian is a Romance language spoken and written on most of the island of Sardinia . It is considered the most conservative of the Romance languages in terms of phonology and is noted for its Paleosardinian substratum....
  
  (sardu):
  • Logudorese (sardu logudoresu) - Sardinia;
  • Nuorese (sardu nugoresu) - Sardinia;
  • Campidanese (sardu campidanesu) - Sardinia.

See also

• Sardinian language
  Sardinian language
  Sardinian is a Romance language spoken and written on most of the island of Sardinia . It is considered the most conservative of the Romance languages in terms of phonology and is noted for its Paleosardinian substratum....
  
  
• Corsican language
  Corsican language
  Corsican is a Italo-Dalmatian Romance language spoken and written on the islands of Corsica and northern Sardinia . Corsican is the traditional native language of the Corsican people, and was long the vernacular language alongside the Italian, official language in Corsica until 1859, which was...
  
  
• Gallurese language
• Sassarese
• List of Romance languages