The Italian language is pretty much the Tuscan dialect (although people in Tuscany still retain a particular accent and cadence). It's the reason why Tuscan people sound well-educated even when they're not. Why Tuscan and not, say, the dialect of Rome, or Milan, or Venice? In a nutshell this is what happened, roughly.
Up until the 1200s, the few people who could write would write in Latin, considered a lofty language. But in the early 1300s three Florentine poets (Dante Alighieri, Francesco Petrarca and Giovanni Boccaccio) decided, more or less independently, that their own dialect (which they called volgare, vulgar, in the sense of popular) was good enough for poetry.
The works of those three poets proved so popular that many subsequent authors, from other parts of the peninsula, made a conscious effort to imitate their style and to use their vocabulary. (With some exceptions. Venice still produced a body of literature in Venetian, and so did Naples. Venetian is quite lovely.)
For example, the 19th century novelist Alessandro Manzoni was from Milan. The first draft of his (only) novel I Promessi Sposi (The Betrothed, Los Novios in Spanish) was full of Lombard words. He then decided to spend a couple of months in Florence to soak up the language, and rewrote the whole thing using Tuscan words instead. (We can argue whether that was the right thing to do or not, but that's what he did.)
Those three Tuscan poets (Dante, Petrarca and Boccaccio) are rightly considered the fathers of the Italian language (of course modern Italian has changed somewhat from medieval Tuscan), and they're studied at school. But there was a fourth poet, also from Tuscany and from the same period, who also wrote in volgare, and yet he's hardly ever anthologized. His name was Cecco Angiolieri.
While Dante and Petrarca wrote poem after poem obsessing about two women (Beatrice and Laura respectively) whom they didn't even know personally but only saw walking down the street once or twice (I kinda get it, though), Cecco Angiolieri wrote mostly about the three things he loved the most: drinking, gambling and shagging. Not exactly edifying stuff. No wonder he's usually left out from school books. The guy was a pig. (Boccaccio was quite the pervert too, to be honest, but his Decameron is just too good to be ignored.)
He wrote several sonnets (a bit more than a hundred), and I'd like to share the two best-known with you. When you bear in mind that they were written in the early 1300s (a time when you could get in serious trouble for saying the wrong kind of thing), this is pretty immoral, irreverent, iconoclastic stuff. Pretty gutsy for the time.
I decided to include the original text alongside the English translations. I don't know how many of you want to read medieval Tuscan, but to an Italian ear those poems have a charming, quaint flavour. (A bit like Shakespeare does for Anglo-Saxon ears.)
1. SI'I' FOSSE FOCO (IF I WERE FIRE)
S'i' fosse foco arderei 'l mondo
If I were fire I would burn the world
S'i' fosse vento lo tempesterei
If I were wind I would batter it
S'i' fosse acqua i' l'annegherei
If I were water I would drown it
S'i' fosse Dio mandereil'en profondo
If I were God I would send it to hell
S'i' fosse Papa sarei allor giocondo
If I were Pope I would have my fun
Ché tutti cristiani imbrigherei
Pitting Christians against one another
S'i' fosse 'mperator sa' che farei?
If I were Emperor you know what I'd do?
A tutti mozzarei lo capo a tondo
I would chop heads off all around
S'i' fosse morte andarei da mio padre
If I were Death I would visit my father
S'i' fosse vita fuggirei da lui
If I were Life I would run from him
Similemente farìa da mi' madre
I would do the same with my mother
S'i' fosse Cecco com'i' sono e fui
If I were Cecco as I am and always have been
Torrei le donne giovani e leggiadre
I'd keep the young and pretty women
E vecchie e laide lasserei altrui
And leave the old and ugly ones for others
2. TRE COSE SOLAMENTE (ONLY THREE THINGS)
Tre cose solamente mi so ’n grado
Only three things I like
Le quali posso non ben men fornire
Which I cannot easily obtain
Ciò è la donna, la taverna e ’l dado
They are women, the tavern and the dice
Queste mi fanno ’l cuor lieto sentire
These things fill my heart with joy
Ma sì me le conven usar di rado
But I can only have them sparingly
Ché la mia borsa mi mett’al mentire
Because my empty wallet lets me down
E quando mi sovvien, tutto mi sbrado
And when I think about it I get mad
Ch’i’ perdo per moneta ’l mie disire
Because I lose, for lack of money, the object of my desire
E dico: "Dato li sia d’una lancia!"
And I say: "Let him be hit by a spear!"
Ciò a mi’ padre, che mi tien sì magro
I mean my father, who keeps me so lean
Che tornare’ senza logro di Francia
I could walk all the way from France without getting any thinner
Trarl’un denai’ di man serìa più agro
It's harder to get money from him
La man di Pasqua che si dà la mancia
On Easter morning when people give tips
Che far pigliar la gru ad un bozzagro
Than it is for a sparrow hawk to catch a crane
(a sparrow hawk is a lot smaller than a crane)
