Chakavian
Chakavian or Čakavian , , ( , proper name: "čakavica" or "čakavština" , own name: "čokovski, čakavski, čekavski") is a dialect of the Serbo-Croatian language spoken by a minority of Croats. It has a low mutual intelligibility with Shtokavian. There is much internal diversity, to the point where intelligibility between the northern and southern varieties of Chakavian is low. All three main Serbo-Croatian dialects are named after their most common word for "what?", which in Čakavian is "ča" or "ca". Chakavian is spoken mainly in the northeastern Adriatic: in Istria, Kvarner Gulf, in most Adriatic islands, and in the interior valley of Gacka, more sporadically in the Dalmatian littoral and central Croatia.
Republic of Ragusa
According to Graubard:
Croatian was normally spoken among lower classes, Italian among the upper. Ragusans were in general bilingual, speaking Croatian in common day-to-day duties and Italian in official occasions or mixing both. Literary works of famous Ragusans were written in both Croatian and Italian. Among them are the works of writers Džore Držić, Marin Držić, Ivan Bunić Vučić, Ignjat Đurđević, Ivan Gundulić, Šišmundo (Šiško) Menčetić, and Dinko Ranjina.