Romansh language of Grisons, and is a working language in various districts and numerous municipalities within the canton. The first Swiss constitution of 1848, as well as the subsequent revision of 1872, make no mention of Romansh, which at the time was not a working language of the Canton of Grisons either. The federal government did finance a translation of the constitution into the two Romansh varieties Sursilvan and Vallader in 1872, noting however that these did not carry the force of law. Romansh became a national language of Switzerland in 1938, following a referendum. However, a distinction was introduced between "national
Romansh language is a person or an animal, with "a", as in "test vis a Peider?" "did you see Peter?", "eau d'he mno a spass al chaun" "I took the dog out for a walk", but "hest vis la baselgia?" "did you see the church?". No systematic synchronic description of Romansh vocabulary has been carried out so far. Existing studies usually approach the subject from a historical perspective, taking particular interest in pre-Roman substratum, archaic words preserved only in Romansh, or in loan words from German. A project to compile together all known historic and modern Romansh vocabulary is the Dicziunari Rumantsch