The selection „Ils Rumantsch“ is representing the Romansh of Switzerland. Their language generated as own language isle from the huge territory of the Ladins. After the invasion of the Bajuwars from North and the Italians from South, the territory split into three parts (see I Ladins). This was the origin of the “Rumantsch” or Romansh. The language is one of the recognized ones in Swiss. Around 40000 people are belonging to this language minority. Descending from the Ladin, the language differentiated into five different dialects, the so called surselvisch, sutselvisch, surrisch, vallader and puter. The commonly used written language „Rumantsch Grischun“took its rise in 1892 by Heinrich Schmidt and was declared as third official language besides German and Italian in 2001. Despite these and other support measures the Romansh is displaced increasingly by the German. The canton of Graubünden attempted to avoid this huge increase with by adopting the “language law” in 2006. The “Lia Rumantsch” with its place of residence in Chur and branch offices in Laax, Zernez, Savognin and Zillis is the parent organization of all Romansh language associations and tries to get fundings for both Romansh culture and language. Moreover, “Lia Rumantsch” was the organizer and idea generator of the first EUROPEADA in 2008.

Ils Rumanatschs at the EUROPEADA
At the home event in 2008, the selection had knocked out in the quarterfinals; in 2012 they reached the 17th and in 2016 the 9th place.