FRIULI. – A name derived from Forum Iulii (later Patria del F.), designating the territory extending eastward as far as the Isonzo and the Timavo, westward to the course of the Livenza, and southward and northward to the Adriatic Sea and the Carnic Alps. A particular Ladin dialect, quite distinct from the dialects of the rest of the Veneto, is spoken there for the most part; while along the left bank of the Livenza the populations have adopted a dialect similar to Trevisan, in some mountain villages inhabited by ancient Carinthian immigrants a German dialect continues to be spoken, whereas in the upper valleys of the Torre and the Natisone, as also in that of the Isonzo, inhabited until the 7th century by Slavic populations, a Slovenian dialect is spoken.
The territory, divided between the two bishoprics of Aquileia (the patriarchate) and Concordia until 1731, thereafter, with Concordia remaining as it was, formed the archbishopric of Udine and, in part, that of Gorizia.
The great Lombard duchy of the F., established by Alboin in 568 as a bulwark against Avar-Slav invasions, became a march under the Carolingians; within it the county of the F. was carved out within the boundaries indicated above, and under the Saxon-Frankish emperors it constituted the feudal state
of the patriarch, with extensive privileges. The principal vassals were the bishop of Concordia and the count of Gorizia as advocate of the patriarch, the abbot of Sesto, and later chapters and prelates and lay lords; alongside them there subsequently arose the free communities (Aquileia, Udine, Cividale, etc.). All of these, divided into the three estates—nobility, clergy, and communities—had a voice in the Friulian Parliament, which from the 13th century moderated the authority of the patriarch as feudal lord. When the F. entered the mainland territories of the Republic of Venice in 1420, the ancient institutions continued to remain in force, although the Parliament was deprived of all political power, until the end of the 18th century. From then on the F. followed the political and administrative fortunes of the rest of the Veneto, with its eastern boundaries curtailed until the end of the 1914–18 war.