Influences on the Spanish language
Encyclopedia
The Spanish language
has a long history of borrowing words, expressions and subtler features of other languages it has come in contact with.
Spanish developed from Vulgar Latin
, with influence from Celtiberian
(and possibly other Paleohispanic languages
), Basque
and Arabic
, and Visigothic
in the north of the Iberian Peninsula
.
, it received influences from neighbouring related languages, and from Basque, which is a language isolate
and thus completely unrelated to Spanish in origin. Umbrian
and Oscan
influences have also been postulated.
s between the 5th and 8th century. However, the linguistic influence of the Visigothic language (an East Germanic language) on Spanish was relatively limited, because the invaders were already Romanized and also spoke their own dialect of Latin. Besides a few military words, Spanish borrowed the following from Visigothic:
by most accounts affected the phonological
development very little, Spanish words of Germanic origin are present in all varieties of Modern Spanish. Many of the Spanish words of Germanic origin were already present in Vulgar Latin
, and so they are shared with other Romance languages. Other Germanic words were borrowed in more recent times; for example, the words for the cardinal directions (norte, este, sur, oeste — 'north', 'east', 'south', 'west') are not documented until late in the 15th century. These direction words are thought to be from Old English, probably by way of French.
by Arabic-speaking
Muslims from North Africa
, sometimes known as Moors
(moros in Spanish). Over the course of the following centuries, Spanish borrowed words from Arabic in many semantic fields:
Many of these borrowings (especially in the scientific field) were then passed on to other languages (English obtained most of them via French
).
Most Spanish nouns beginning with the letters al- (from the Arabic definite article) have their origin in Arabic.
As to how many words in Modern Spanish are of Arabic origin, the estimates vary widely, depending largely on whether the count includes derived forms and place names. One respected authority suggests that they number more than 4,000, based on estimates of 850 of known etymology, 780 forms derived from them, 1,000 place names, 500 additional place names of "probable" Arabic origin, and "very numerous" Arabic-looking words whose affiliation has not yet been established. The largest Spanish etymological dictionary — the Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico
, by Joan Corominas
— lists slightly over 1,000 words of Arabic origin, while Wikipedia's own List of Spanish words of Arabic origin, based on etymologies given by the Real Academia de la Lengua Española so far includes 1,200 confirmed arabisms, excluding place names and derivatives.
Morphological
borrowing was scarce. The suffíx -í (deriving adjectives from place names, as in Marbellí or Ceutí "from Marbella
" or "from Ceuta
" respectively) is an example.
and later repopulation campaigns
were of Basque
lineage and this is evidenced by many place names throughout Spain
. The change from Latin
'f-' to Spanish 'h-' (discussed at length below) was once commonly ascribed to the influence of Basque
speakers for a few reasons. The change from f to h was first documented in the areas around Castile
and La Rioja, areas where many Basques were known to have lived. The change to h took place to a greater degree in the Gascon language
in Gascony
in France
, an area also inhabited by Basques. The claim is that Basque language
lacked the f sound and thus substituted it with h, the closest thing to f in that language.
There are some difficulties with attributing this change to Basque, however. There is no hard evidence that medieval Basque did or did not have an h sound. Presumably early borrowings of forms with initial f into Basque were usually received as p or b (e.g. FESTA > Basque pesta or besta, depending on the dialect), rather than h. Adding to this is the fact that the f to h phenomenon
is not peculiar to Spanish. In fact, the change from f to h is one of the most common phonological
changes in all kinds of world languages. According to the explanations which negate or downplay Basque influence, the change occurred in the affected dialects wholly independent of each other as the result of internal change (i.e. linguistic factors, not outside influence). It is also possible that the two forces worked in concert and reinforced each other.
, the voicing of voiceless consonants and the elision
of voiced consonants (both of which are discussed at greater length below), are the phonological
changes of Spanish which are most often attributed to the influence of Celtic languages. While examples of these two types of lenition are ubiquitous and well-documented in Spanish
, two assumptions need to be made if these two types of lenition are to be attributed to patterns of lenition in Celtic languages. The first assumption is that a population of bilingual Celtiberian
-Romance speakers existed long enough to have had an influence on the development of Castilian
. The second assumption is that Continental Celtic
, an extinct
branch of Celtic
, did indeed exhibit the types of lenition which are known to exist in modern Insular Celtic languages
. The latter is simply not known, and it should also be noted that such lenitions
are a very common kind of change in languages all around the world, and similar phenomena are found in Romance languages throughout areas of Northern Italy and in Corsican and Sardinian where no Celtic causation is plausible. The Spanish development may therefore just be a natural internal process, not due to outside influence.
made his first landfall in the Americas
, and thereafter Spanish settlers began to come into contact with a host of native American languages. Most of these were wiped out or severely reduced in number of speakers and distribution area during the conquest
, but Spanish adopted a number of words from some of them. The following list is by no means exhaustive.
Those words referring to local features or animals might be limited to regional usage, but many others like cóndor, canoa or chocolate are extended even to other languages.
, other Romance languages like French
(this particularly during the Neoclassicist to Napoleonic periods, when French language and culture became the fashion at the royal court) and Italian
, and Germanic languages like English). For example:
s from English equivalents. For example, disco duro is a literal translation of "hard disk". Words like blog
, chat
, and weblog are used, though bitácora (from cuaderno de bitácora, the captain's log on a boat
) is also common.
before the Common Era
. The remaining 25 percent come from other languages. Of these language
s (and language families
), the four which have contributed the most words are Arabic
, Indigenous languages of the Americas
, Germanic
, and Celtic
in roughly that order.
Americas –
Arabic
–
Austronesian –
Basque/Iberian –
Celtic –
Chinese –
Etruscan –
French –
Germanic –
Indo-Aryan –
Iranian –
Italic –
Semitic –
Turkic –
uncertain –
various origins.
Spanish language
Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...
has a long history of borrowing words, expressions and subtler features of other languages it has come in contact with.
Spanish developed from Vulgar Latin
Vulgar Latin
Vulgar Latin is any of the nonstandard forms of Latin from which the Romance languages developed. Because of its nonstandard nature, it had no official orthography. All written works used Classical Latin, with very few exceptions...
, with influence from Celtiberian
Celtiberian language
Celtiberian is an extinct Indo-European language of the Celtic branch spoken by the Celtiberians in an area of the Iberian Peninsula lyingbetween the headwaters of the Duero, Tajo, Júcar and Turia rivers and the Ebro river...
(and possibly other Paleohispanic languages
Paleohispanic languages
The Paleohispanic languages were the languages of the pre-Roman peoples of the Iberian Peninsula, excluding languages of foreign colonies, such as Greek in Emporion and Phoenician in Qart Hadast...
), Basque
Basque language
Basque is the ancestral language of the Basque people, who inhabit the Basque Country, a region spanning an area in northeastern Spain and southwestern France. It is spoken by 25.7% of Basques in all territories...
and Arabic
Arabic language
Arabic is a name applied to the descendants of the Classical Arabic language of the 6th century AD, used most prominently in the Quran, the Islamic Holy Book...
, and Visigothic
Gothic language
Gothic is an extinct Germanic language that was spoken by the Goths. It is known primarily from the Codex Argenteus, a 6th-century copy of a 4th-century Bible translation, and is the only East Germanic language with a sizable Text corpus...
in the north of the Iberian Peninsula
Iberian Peninsula
The Iberian Peninsula , sometimes called Iberia, is located in the extreme southwest of Europe and includes the modern-day sovereign states of Spain, Portugal and Andorra, as well as the British Overseas Territory of Gibraltar...
.
Formative influences
As Spanish went through its first stages of development in SpainSpain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
, it received influences from neighbouring related languages, and from Basque, which is a language isolate
Language isolate
A language isolate, in the absolute sense, is a natural language with no demonstrable genealogical relationship with other languages; that is, one that has not been demonstrated to descend from an ancestor common with any other language. They are in effect language families consisting of a single...
and thus completely unrelated to Spanish in origin. Umbrian
Umbrian language
Umbrian is an extinct Italic language formerly spoken by the Umbri in the ancient Italian region of Umbria. Within the Italic languages it is closely related to the Oscan group and is therefore associated with it in the group of Osco-Umbrian languages...
and Oscan
Oscan language
Oscan is a term used to describe both an extinct language of southern Italy and the language group to which it belonged.The Oscan language was spoken by a number of tribes, including the Samnites, the Aurunci, the Sidicini, and the Ausones. The latter three tribes were often grouped under the name...
influences have also been postulated.
Visigothic
Spain was controlled by the VisigothVisigoth
The Visigoths were one of two main branches of the Goths, the Ostrogoths being the other. These tribes were among the Germans who spread through the late Roman Empire during the Migration Period...
s between the 5th and 8th century. However, the linguistic influence of the Visigothic language (an East Germanic language) on Spanish was relatively limited, because the invaders were already Romanized and also spoke their own dialect of Latin. Besides a few military words, Spanish borrowed the following from Visigothic:
- A new noun declensionDeclensionIn linguistics, declension is the inflection of nouns, pronouns, adjectives, and articles to indicate number , case , and gender...
(nominative -â, oblique -âne), which was used mostly with proper names (whence modern Spanish Froilán and also guardián). - The originally adjectivizing suffixAffixAn affix is a morpheme that is attached to a word stem to form a new word. Affixes may be derivational, like English -ness and pre-, or inflectional, like English plural -s and past tense -ed. They are bound morphemes by definition; prefixes and suffixes may be separable affixes...
-engo (Germanic -ing), as in abolengo ('ancestry, inheritance' — cf. abuelo 'grandfather') and camarlengo 'camerlengoCamerlengoThe Camerlengo of the Holy Roman Church The Camerlengo of the Holy Roman Church (pl. Camerlenghi) The Camerlengo of the Holy Roman Church (pl. Camerlenghi) (Italian for "Chamberlain", when referred to the Holy See; when referred to secular courts the word is "Ciambellano", pl...
(a church official)'. - The origin of the surname suffixes in -z (as in Díaz, Pérez, López, Ruiz, Muñoz, etc.) is controversial. Lapesa attributes it "perhaps" to Ligurian, reinforced by "numerous Latinized Gothic genitivesGenitive caseIn grammar, genitive is the grammatical case that marks a noun as modifying another noun...
in -rici". Menéndez Pidal considers it "doubtlessly" of IberianIberian languageThe Iberian language was the language of a people identified by Greek and Roman sources who lived in the eastern and southeastern regions of the Iberian peninsula. The ancient Iberians can be identified as a rather nebulous local culture between the 7th and 1st century BC...
origin. And Alvar and Pottier link it simply with the [Latin] genitive in -ici.
Other Germanic influence
Although Germanic languagesGermanic languages
The Germanic languages constitute a sub-branch of the Indo-European language family. The common ancestor of all of the languages in this branch is called Proto-Germanic , which was spoken in approximately the mid-1st millennium BC in Iron Age northern Europe...
by most accounts affected the phonological
Phonology
Phonology is, broadly speaking, the subdiscipline of linguistics concerned with the sounds of language. That is, it is the systematic use of sound to encode meaning in any spoken human language, or the field of linguistics studying this use...
development very little, Spanish words of Germanic origin are present in all varieties of Modern Spanish. Many of the Spanish words of Germanic origin were already present in Vulgar Latin
Vulgar Latin
Vulgar Latin is any of the nonstandard forms of Latin from which the Romance languages developed. Because of its nonstandard nature, it had no official orthography. All written works used Classical Latin, with very few exceptions...
, and so they are shared with other Romance languages. Other Germanic words were borrowed in more recent times; for example, the words for the cardinal directions (norte, este, sur, oeste — 'north', 'east', 'south', 'west') are not documented until late in the 15th century. These direction words are thought to be from Old English, probably by way of French.
Arabic
In 711 AD, Spain was invadedUmayyad conquest of Hispania
The Umayyad conquest of Hispania is the initial Islamic Ummayad Caliphate's conquest, between 711 and 718, of the Christian Visigothic Kingdom of Hispania, centered in the Iberian Peninsula, which was known to them under the Arabic name al-Andalus....
by Arabic-speaking
Arabic language
Arabic is a name applied to the descendants of the Classical Arabic language of the 6th century AD, used most prominently in the Quran, the Islamic Holy Book...
Muslims from North Africa
North Africa
North Africa or Northern Africa is the northernmost region of the African continent, linked by the Sahara to Sub-Saharan Africa. Geopolitically, the United Nations definition of Northern Africa includes eight countries or territories; Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Morocco, South Sudan, Sudan, Tunisia, and...
, sometimes known as Moors
Moors
The description Moors has referred to several historic and modern populations of the Maghreb region who are predominately of Berber and Arab descent. They came to conquer and rule the Iberian Peninsula for nearly 800 years. At that time they were Muslim, although earlier the people had followed...
(moros in Spanish). Over the course of the following centuries, Spanish borrowed words from Arabic in many semantic fields:
- Military and administrative terms such as alcázarAlcázarAn alcázar , alcácer or alcàsser is a type of castle in Spain and Portugal. The term derives from the Arabic word القصر meaning "fort, castle or palace"; and the Arabic word is derived from the Latin word, 'castrum', meaning an army camp or fort...
"fortress" (from Latin castrumCastraThe Latin word castra, with its singular castrum, was used by the ancient Romans to mean buildings or plots of land reserved to or constructed for use as a military defensive position. The word appears in both Oscan and Umbrian as well as in Latin. It may have descended from Indo-European to Italic...
"encampment, castle", through Arabic), alcalde "mayor", barrio "ward, neighborhood", aldea "village"; - Leisure and comfort items such as alfombra "carpet", almohada "pillow", guitarra "guitar" (from Greek kithāra "zitherZitherThe zither is a musical string instrument, most commonly found in Slovenia, Austria, Hungary citera, northwestern Croatia, the southern regions of Germany, alpine Europe and East Asian cultures, including China...
, cithara", through Arabic); - Legal terms such as asesino "assassin, murderer", rehén "hostage", tarifa "tariff, fee", arancel "fee";
- Food and beverage names such as aceite "oil", arroz "rice", espinaca "spinach" and naranja "orange" (both from Persian, through Arabic), café "coffee" (from Arabic through Turkish and then Italian), azúcar "sugar";
- Terms of architecture and craftsmanship such as alcoba "alcoveAlcoveAlcove , a vault) is an architectural term for a recess in a room, usually screened off by pillars, balustrades or drapery.In geography and geology, the term Alcove is used for a wind-eroded depression in the side of a cliff of a homogenous rock type, famous from sandstones of the Colorado Plateau...
, room", azotea "flat roof", albañil "mason", tabique "dividing wall", adoquín "paving stone", adobe "adobeAdobeAdobe is a natural building material made from sand, clay, water, and some kind of fibrous or organic material , which the builders shape into bricks using frames and dry in the sun. Adobe buildings are similar to cob and mudbrick buildings. Adobe structures are extremely durable, and account for...
", alfarero "potter", taza "cup", jarra "pitcher"; - Chemical substances and materials such as alcohol "alcohol", álcali "alkali" (through Late LatinLate LatinLate Latin is the scholarly name for the written Latin of Late Antiquity. The English dictionary definition of Late Latin dates this period from the 3rd to the 6th centuries AD extending in Spain to the 7th. This somewhat ambiguously defined period fits between Classical Latin and Medieval Latin...
, hence the initial stress), laca "lacquer"(from Sanskrit through Persian and then Arabic); - Mathematical and astronomical terms such as cero "zero" (through Late LatinLate LatinLate Latin is the scholarly name for the written Latin of Late Antiquity. The English dictionary definition of Late Latin dates this period from the 3rd to the 6th centuries AD extending in Spain to the 7th. This somewhat ambiguously defined period fits between Classical Latin and Medieval Latin...
and then Italian), cifra "cipher, figure", álgebra "algebraAlgebraAlgebra is the branch of mathematics concerning the study of the rules of operations and relations, and the constructions and concepts arising from them, including terms, polynomials, equations and algebraic structures...
" (through Late LatinLate LatinLate Latin is the scholarly name for the written Latin of Late Antiquity. The English dictionary definition of Late Latin dates this period from the 3rd to the 6th centuries AD extending in Spain to the 7th. This somewhat ambiguously defined period fits between Classical Latin and Medieval Latin...
, hence the initial stress), cenit "zenithZenithThe zenith is an imaginary point directly "above" a particular location, on the imaginary celestial sphere. "Above" means in the vertical direction opposite to the apparent gravitational force at that location. The opposite direction, i.e...
" (Arabic semt ar-ra's, with an apparent misreading of -m- as -ni- in 13th-century manuscripts), guarismo "number, figure"; - Interjections such as ojalá ("may it be that. ..", originally "May Allah want. .."), olé, and albricias "joy!".
Many of these borrowings (especially in the scientific field) were then passed on to other languages (English obtained most of them via French
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
).
Most Spanish nouns beginning with the letters al- (from the Arabic definite article) have their origin in Arabic.
As to how many words in Modern Spanish are of Arabic origin, the estimates vary widely, depending largely on whether the count includes derived forms and place names. One respected authority suggests that they number more than 4,000, based on estimates of 850 of known etymology, 780 forms derived from them, 1,000 place names, 500 additional place names of "probable" Arabic origin, and "very numerous" Arabic-looking words whose affiliation has not yet been established. The largest Spanish etymological dictionary — the Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico
Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico
The Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico is the updated compilation of the works of the Diccionario crítico etimológico de la lengua castellana by the Spanish Catalan linguist Joan Coromines , written in collaboration with José Antonio...
, by Joan Corominas
Joan Coromines
Joan Coromines i Vigneaux was a linguist who made important contributions to the study of Catalan, Spanish and other Romance languages....
— lists slightly over 1,000 words of Arabic origin, while Wikipedia's own List of Spanish words of Arabic origin, based on etymologies given by the Real Academia de la Lengua Española so far includes 1,200 confirmed arabisms, excluding place names and derivatives.
Morphological
Morphology (linguistics)
In linguistics, morphology is the identification, analysis and description, in a language, of the structure of morphemes and other linguistic units, such as words, affixes, parts of speech, intonation/stress, or implied context...
borrowing was scarce. The suffíx -í (deriving adjectives from place names, as in Marbellí or Ceutí "from Marbella
Marbella
Marbella is a town in Andalusia, Spain. It is situated on the Mediterranean Sea, in the province of Málaga, beneath the La Concha mountain. In 2000 the city had 98,823 inhabitants, in 2004, 116,234, in 2010 approximately 135,000....
" or "from Ceuta
Ceuta
Ceuta is an autonomous city of Spain and an exclave located on the north coast of North Africa surrounded by Morocco. Separated from the Iberian peninsula by the Strait of Gibraltar, Ceuta lies on the border of the Mediterranean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean. Ceuta along with the other Spanish...
" respectively) is an example.
Possible Basque influence
Many Castilians who took part in the reconquistaReconquista
The Reconquista was a period of almost 800 years in the Middle Ages during which several Christian kingdoms succeeded in retaking the Muslim-controlled areas of the Iberian Peninsula broadly known as Al-Andalus...
and later repopulation campaigns
Military campaign
In the military sciences, the term military campaign applies to large scale, long duration, significant military strategy plan incorporating a series of inter-related military operations or battles forming a distinct part of a larger conflict often called a war...
were of Basque
Basque people
The Basques as an ethnic group, primarily inhabit an area traditionally known as the Basque Country , a region that is located around the western end of the Pyrenees on the coast of the Bay of Biscay and straddles parts of north-central Spain and south-western France.The Basques are known in the...
lineage and this is evidenced by many place names throughout Spain
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
. The change from Latin
Latin
Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...
'f-' to Spanish 'h-' (discussed at length below) was once commonly ascribed to the influence of Basque
Basque language
Basque is the ancestral language of the Basque people, who inhabit the Basque Country, a region spanning an area in northeastern Spain and southwestern France. It is spoken by 25.7% of Basques in all territories...
speakers for a few reasons. The change from f to h was first documented in the areas around Castile
Castile (historical region)
A former kingdom, Castile gradually merged with its neighbours to become the Crown of Castile and later the Kingdom of Spain when united with the Crown of Aragon and the Kingdom of Navarre...
and La Rioja, areas where many Basques were known to have lived. The change to h took place to a greater degree in the Gascon language
Gascon language
Gascon is usually considered as a dialect of Occitan, even though some specialists regularly consider it a separate language. Gascon is mostly spoken in Gascony and Béarn in southwestern France and in the Aran Valley of Spain...
in Gascony
Gascony
Gascony is an area of southwest France that was part of the "Province of Guyenne and Gascony" prior to the French Revolution. The region is vaguely defined and the distinction between Guyenne and Gascony is unclear; sometimes they are considered to overlap, and sometimes Gascony is considered a...
in France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
, an area also inhabited by Basques. The claim is that Basque language
Basque language
Basque is the ancestral language of the Basque people, who inhabit the Basque Country, a region spanning an area in northeastern Spain and southwestern France. It is spoken by 25.7% of Basques in all territories...
lacked the f sound and thus substituted it with h, the closest thing to f in that language.
There are some difficulties with attributing this change to Basque, however. There is no hard evidence that medieval Basque did or did not have an h sound. Presumably early borrowings of forms with initial f into Basque were usually received as p or b (e.g. FESTA > Basque pesta or besta, depending on the dialect), rather than h. Adding to this is the fact that the f to h phenomenon
Phenomenon
A phenomenon , plural phenomena, is any observable occurrence. Phenomena are often, but not always, understood as 'appearances' or 'experiences'...
is not peculiar to Spanish. In fact, the change from f to h is one of the most common phonological
Phonology
Phonology is, broadly speaking, the subdiscipline of linguistics concerned with the sounds of language. That is, it is the systematic use of sound to encode meaning in any spoken human language, or the field of linguistics studying this use...
changes in all kinds of world languages. According to the explanations which negate or downplay Basque influence, the change occurred in the affected dialects wholly independent of each other as the result of internal change (i.e. linguistic factors, not outside influence). It is also possible that the two forces worked in concert and reinforced each other.
Possible Celtiberian influence
Two specific types of lenitionLenition
In linguistics, lenition is a kind of sound change that alters consonants, making them "weaker" in some way. The word lenition itself means "softening" or "weakening" . Lenition can happen both synchronically and diachronically...
, the voicing of voiceless consonants and the elision
Elision
Elision is the omission of one or more sounds in a word or phrase, producing a result that is easier for the speaker to pronounce...
of voiced consonants (both of which are discussed at greater length below), are the phonological
Phonology
Phonology is, broadly speaking, the subdiscipline of linguistics concerned with the sounds of language. That is, it is the systematic use of sound to encode meaning in any spoken human language, or the field of linguistics studying this use...
changes of Spanish which are most often attributed to the influence of Celtic languages. While examples of these two types of lenition are ubiquitous and well-documented in Spanish
Spanish language
Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...
, two assumptions need to be made if these two types of lenition are to be attributed to patterns of lenition in Celtic languages. The first assumption is that a population of bilingual Celtiberian
Celtiberian language
Celtiberian is an extinct Indo-European language of the Celtic branch spoken by the Celtiberians in an area of the Iberian Peninsula lyingbetween the headwaters of the Duero, Tajo, Júcar and Turia rivers and the Ebro river...
-Romance speakers existed long enough to have had an influence on the development of Castilian
Spanish language
Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...
. The second assumption is that Continental Celtic
Continental Celtic languages
The Continental Celtic languages are the Celtic languages, now extinct, that were spoken on the continent of Europe, as distinguished from the Insular Celtic languages of Britain and Ireland. The Continental Celtic languages were spoken by the people known to Roman and Greek writers as Keltoi,...
, an extinct
Extinction
In biology and ecology, extinction is the end of an organism or of a group of organisms , normally a species. The moment of extinction is generally considered to be the death of the last individual of the species, although the capacity to breed and recover may have been lost before this point...
branch of Celtic
Celtic languages
The Celtic languages are descended from Proto-Celtic, or "Common Celtic"; a branch of the greater Indo-European language family...
, did indeed exhibit the types of lenition which are known to exist in modern Insular Celtic languages
Insular Celtic languages
Insular Celtic languages are those Celtic languages that originated in the British Isles, in contrast to the Continental Celtic languages of mainland Europe and Anatolia. All surviving Celtic languages are from the Insular Celtic group; the Continental Celtic languages are extinct...
. The latter is simply not known, and it should also be noted that such lenitions
are a very common kind of change in languages all around the world, and similar phenomena are found in Romance languages throughout areas of Northern Italy and in Corsican and Sardinian where no Celtic causation is plausible. The Spanish development may therefore just be a natural internal process, not due to outside influence.
Influences from Native American languages
In October of 1492 Christopher ColumbusChristopher Columbus
Christopher Columbus was an explorer, colonizer, and navigator, born in the Republic of Genoa, in northwestern Italy. Under the auspices of the Catholic Monarchs of Spain, he completed four voyages across the Atlantic Ocean that led to general European awareness of the American continents in the...
made his first landfall in the Americas
Americas
The Americas, or America , are lands in the Western hemisphere, also known as the New World. In English, the plural form the Americas is often used to refer to the landmasses of North America and South America with their associated islands and regions, while the singular form America is primarily...
, and thereafter Spanish settlers began to come into contact with a host of native American languages. Most of these were wiped out or severely reduced in number of speakers and distribution area during the conquest
Spanish colonization of the Americas
Colonial expansion under the Spanish Empire was initiated by the Spanish conquistadores and developed by the Monarchy of Spain through its administrators and missionaries. The motivations for colonial expansion were trade and the spread of the Christian faith through indigenous conversions...
, but Spanish adopted a number of words from some of them. The following list is by no means exhaustive.
- From NahuatlNahuatlNahuatl is thought to mean "a good, clear sound" This language name has several spellings, among them náhuatl , Naoatl, Nauatl, Nahuatl, Nawatl. In a back formation from the name of the language, the ethnic group of Nahuatl speakers are called Nahua...
: tomate "tomatoTomatoThe word "tomato" may refer to the plant or the edible, typically red, fruit which it bears. Originating in South America, the tomato was spread around the world following the Spanish colonization of the Americas, and its many varieties are now widely grown, often in greenhouses in cooler...
", chocolate "chocolateChocolateChocolate is a raw or processed food produced from the seed of the tropical Theobroma cacao tree. Cacao has been cultivated for at least three millennia in Mexico, Central and South America. Its earliest documented use is around 1100 BC...
", ajolote "axolotlAxolotlThe axolotl , Ambystoma mexicanum, is a neotenic salamander, closely related to the Tiger Salamander. Larvae of this species fail to undergo metamorphosis, so the adults remain aquatic and gilled. It is also called ajolote...
", cacao "cocoa", coyote "coyoteCoyoteThe coyote , also known as the American jackal or the prairie wolf, is a species of canine found throughout North and Central America, ranging from Panama in the south, north through Mexico, the United States and Canada...
". - From Quechua: cóndor "condorCondorCondor is the name for two species of New World vultures, each in a monotypic genus. They are the largest flying land birds in the Western Hemisphere.They are:* The Andean Condor which inhabits the Andean mountains....
" (orig. kuntur), cancha "playing field", alpacaAlpacaAn alpaca is a domesticated species of South American camelid. It resembles a small llama in appearance.Alpacas are kept in herds that graze on the level heights of the Andes of southern Peru, northern Bolivia, Ecuador, and northern Chile at an altitude of to above sea level, throughout the year...
, caucho "rubber", cocaCocaCoca, Erythroxylum coca, is a plant in the family Erythroxylaceae, native to western South America. The plant plays a significant role in many traditional Andean cultures...
, guanoGuanoGuano is the excrement of seabirds, cave dwelling bats, and seals. Guano manure is an effective fertilizer due to its high levels of phosphorus and nitrogen and also its lack of odor. It was an important source of nitrates for gunpowder...
, gauchoGauchoGaucho is a term commonly used to describe residents of the South American pampas, chacos, or Patagonian grasslands, found principally in parts of Argentina, Uruguay, Southern Chile, and Southern Brazil...
(orig. wakcha "poor person"), guanaco, llamaLlamaThe llama is a South American camelid, widely used as a meat and pack animal by Andean cultures since pre-Hispanic times....
, puma, pampaPampaThe Pampas are the fertile South American lowlands, covering more than , that include the Argentine provinces of Buenos Aires, La Pampa, Santa Fe, Entre Ríos and Córdoba, most of Uruguay, and the southernmost Brazilian State, Rio Grande do Sul...
"plains, flat terrain". - From GuaraníGuaraní languageGuaraní, specifically the primary variety known as Paraguayan Guaraní , is an indigenous language of South America that belongs to the Tupí–Guaraní subfamily of the Tupian languages. It is one of the official languages of Paraguay , where it is spoken by the majority of the population, and half of...
: caracú "bone marrowBone marrowBone marrow is the flexible tissue found in the interior of bones. In humans, bone marrow in large bones produces new blood cells. On average, bone marrow constitutes 4% of the total body mass of humans; in adults weighing 65 kg , bone marrow accounts for approximately 2.6 kg...
", catinga "body odor", chamaméChamaméChamamé is a folk music genre from the Argentine Northeast, Mesopotamia and in the south of Brazil. Paraná, Santa Catarina, Rio Grande do Sul and Mato Grosso do Sul....
(a folk music genre), tapera "ruins", jaguar, yaguareté "jaguarJaguarThe jaguar is a big cat, a feline in the Panthera genus, and is the only Panthera species found in the Americas. The jaguar is the third-largest feline after the tiger and the lion, and the largest in the Western Hemisphere. The jaguar's present range extends from Southern United States and Mexico...
", mateYerba mateMaté, yerba maté or erva maté , Ilex paraguariensis, is a species of holly native to subtropical South America in northeastern Argentina, Bolivia, southern Brazil, Uruguay and Paraguay...
(an infusion, orig. mati "pumpkin"). - From Carib: caimán "caimanCaimanCaimans are alligatorid crocodylians within the subfamily Caimaninae. The group is one of two subfamilies of the family Alligatoridae, the other being alligators. Caimans inhabit Central and South America. They are relatively small crocodilians, with most species reaching lengths of only a few...
", huracán "hurricaneTropical cycloneA tropical cyclone is a storm system characterized by a large low-pressure center and numerous thunderstorms that produce strong winds and heavy rain. Tropical cyclones strengthen when water evaporated from the ocean is released as the saturated air rises, resulting in condensation of water vapor...
", caníbal "cannibalCannibalismCannibalism is the act or practice of humans eating the flesh of other human beings. It is also called anthropophagy...
", canoa "canoeCanoeA canoe or Canadian canoe is a small narrow boat, typically human-powered, though it may also be powered by sails or small electric or gas motors. Canoes are usually pointed at both bow and stern and are normally open on top, but can be decked over A canoe (North American English) or Canadian...
" (through ArawakArawakan languagesMacro-Arawakan is a proposed language family of South America and the Caribbean based on the Arawakan languages. Sometimes the proposal is called Arawakan, in which case the central family is called Maipurean....
). - From Tupi: capibara (the largest rodentRodentRodentia is an order of mammals also known as rodents, characterised by two continuously growing incisors in the upper and lower jaws which must be kept short by gnawing....
on Earth), jacarandáJacarandaJacaranda is a genus of 49 species of flowering plants in the family Bignoniaceae, native to tropical and subtropical regions of South America , Central America, Mexico, and the Caribbean. It is also found in Asia, especially in Nepal...
(a tree).
Those words referring to local features or animals might be limited to regional usage, but many others like cóndor, canoa or chocolate are extended even to other languages.
Modern borrowings
Spanish borrowed words from other European languages (its close neighbors such as CatalanCatalan language
Catalan is a Romance language, the national and only official language of Andorra and a co-official language in the Spanish autonomous communities of Catalonia, the Balearic Islands and Valencian Community, where it is known as Valencian , as well as in the city of Alghero, on the Italian island...
, other Romance languages like French
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
(this particularly during the Neoclassicist to Napoleonic periods, when French language and culture became the fashion at the royal court) and Italian
Italian language
Italian is a Romance language spoken mainly in Europe: Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, Vatican City, by minorities in Malta, Monaco, Croatia, Slovenia, France, Libya, Eritrea, and Somalia, and by immigrant communities in the Americas and Australia...
, and Germanic languages like English). For example:
- chao, chau "bye" from Italian ciaoCiaoThe word "ciao" is an informal Italian verbal salutation or greeting, meaning either "hello", "goodbye", "bye" or "hi". Originally from the Venetian language, it was adopted into the Italian language and eventually entered the vocabulary of English and of many other languages around the world...
(sometimes co-existing with adiós) - chofer "chauffeur" from French (co-existing with "conductor")
- elenco "team" or "cast" from Italian (co-existing with equipo when it is used as team)
- sandwich, from English (Originally 'emparedado," sometimes co-existing with "bocadillo")
- briquet from French (used in Colombia, co-existing with encendedor)
- capot from French
- fútbol from English (football) (originally balompié)
- gendarme from French (prison guards).
- coche from Hungarian kocsi.
- pistola from German Pistole.
Recent borrowings
In recent times, Spanish has borrowed many words and expressions from English, especially in the fields of computers and the Internet. In many cases, technical expressions which superficially employ common Spanish words are in fact calqueCalque
In linguistics, a calque or loan translation is a word or phrase borrowed from another language by literal, word-for-word or root-for-root translation.-Calque:...
s from English equivalents. For example, disco duro is a literal translation of "hard disk". Words like blog
Blog
A blog is a type of website or part of a website supposed to be updated with new content from time to time. Blogs are usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video. Entries are commonly displayed in...
, chat
Online chat
Online chat may refer to any kind of communication over the Internet, that offers an instantaneous transmission of text-based messages from sender to receiver, hence the delay for visual access to the sent message shall not hamper the flow of communications in any of the directions...
, and weblog are used, though bitácora (from cuaderno de bitácora, the captain's log on a boat
Boat
A boat is a watercraft of any size designed to float or plane, to provide passage across water. Usually this water will be inland or in protected coastal areas. However, boats such as the whaleboat were designed to be operated from a ship in an offshore environment. In naval terms, a boat is a...
) is also common.
Words of non-Latin origin
Some authors estimate that seventy-five percent of Spanish words have come from Latin and were in use in SpainSpain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
before the Common Era
Common Era
Common Era ,abbreviated as CE, is an alternative designation for the calendar era originally introduced by Dionysius Exiguus in the 6th century, traditionally identified with Anno Domini .Dates before the year 1 CE are indicated by the usage of BCE, short for Before the Common Era Common Era...
. The remaining 25 percent come from other languages. Of these language
Language
Language may refer either to the specifically human capacity for acquiring and using complex systems of communication, or to a specific instance of such a system of complex communication...
s (and language families
Language family
A language family is a group of languages related through descent from a common ancestor, called the proto-language of that family. The term 'family' comes from the tree model of language origination in historical linguistics, which makes use of a metaphor comparing languages to people in a...
), the four which have contributed the most words are Arabic
Arabic language
Arabic is a name applied to the descendants of the Classical Arabic language of the 6th century AD, used most prominently in the Quran, the Islamic Holy Book...
, Indigenous languages of the Americas
Indigenous languages of the Americas
Indigenous languages of the Americas are spoken by indigenous peoples from Alaska and Greenland to the southern tip of South America, encompassing the land masses which constitute the Americas. These indigenous languages consist of dozens of distinct language families as well as many language...
, Germanic
Germanic languages
The Germanic languages constitute a sub-branch of the Indo-European language family. The common ancestor of all of the languages in this branch is called Proto-Germanic , which was spoken in approximately the mid-1st millennium BC in Iron Age northern Europe...
, and Celtic
Celtic languages
The Celtic languages are descended from Proto-Celtic, or "Common Celtic"; a branch of the greater Indo-European language family...
in roughly that order.
Lists of Spanish etymology
African –Americas –
Arabic
Arabic influence on the Spanish language
Arabic influence on the Spanish language has been significant due to the Islamic presence in the Iberian peninsula between 711 and 1492 A.D. ....
–
Austronesian –
Basque/Iberian –
Celtic –
Chinese –
Etruscan –
French –
Germanic –
Indo-Aryan –
Iranian –
Italic –
Semitic –
Turkic –
uncertain –
various origins.
See also
- History of the Spanish languageHistory of the Spanish languageThe language known today as Spanish is derived from a dialect of spoken Latin that developed in the north-central part of the Iberian Peninsula in what is now northern Spain. Over the past 1,000 years, the language expanded south to the Mediterranean Sea, and was later transferred to the Spanish...
- Iberian languageIberian languageThe Iberian language was the language of a people identified by Greek and Roman sources who lived in the eastern and southeastern regions of the Iberian peninsula. The ancient Iberians can be identified as a rather nebulous local culture between the 7th and 1st century BC...
- Paleohispanic languagesPaleohispanic languagesThe Paleohispanic languages were the languages of the pre-Roman peoples of the Iberian Peninsula, excluding languages of foreign colonies, such as Greek in Emporion and Phoenician in Qart Hadast...
- Vulgar LatinVulgar LatinVulgar Latin is any of the nonstandard forms of Latin from which the Romance languages developed. Because of its nonstandard nature, it had no official orthography. All written works used Classical Latin, with very few exceptions...
- Romance languagesRomance languagesThe Romance languages are a branch of the Indo-European language family, more precisely of the Italic languages subfamily, comprising all the languages that descend from Vulgar Latin, the language of ancient Rome...
- List of Spanish words of Indigenous American Indian origin
- List of Spanish words of Philippine origin
- List of English words of Spanish origin