subject: Quite Interesting History Of The Spanish Language [print this page] After Mandarin Chinese and English, the third most used language on the globe is Spanish, withan estimated four hundred thousand native speakers throughout the world. Its origins,however, are very much reduced, both geographically and numerically.
Together with other initially European languages such as French, Italian, or Portuguese, the linguistic roots ofSpanish make it a romance language. This means that Latin, or more specifically, Vulgar Latin, constitutes its most important linguistic base.
Withthe constant contact and thefriendly influence of the Latin base with other language cultures and traditions has led to theformation of all the different romantic languages as we know them today. In the case of Spanish, there are, for example, characteristics that come from the Celtic and Iberian traditions.
Also there is a huge amount of Greek vocabulary that was first adopted by Latin speakers and then brought into Spanish. Such as words like "hurfano" (orphan) or "escuela" (school) that belong to this tradition. And we should not forget the seven centuries of Arab domination of the peninsula. This has left, among other things, an important legacy of lexical elements that have been incorporated into the Spanish language. A surname you probably know which exemplifies this is "Almodvar".
Spanish, especially in the bilingual territories of Spain, is also known as Castellano (Castilian), because of its origins in the region of Castilla. Castilla is found in the north central part of Spain, and it was once the neuralgic center of the Spanish empire that would export the Spanish language to more than twenty other countries.
The introduction of a linguistic unity of Spanish as a common language for the country of Spain was eqivilant to its territorial unity. This union was only possible after the re-conquest of the peninsula from the Arab settlers, at the end of the 15th century.
The linguistic variety of the kingdom of Castilla expanded to the practical totality of the Iberian Peninsula. After the marriage of Isabel I of Castilla and Fernando II of Aragn, the Spanish state was born, and Castilian language and culture became its most dominant identity. During the 16th and 17th centuries, through a lot's of linguistic evolutions and normalizing changes, the language of the Spanish state became what is nowadays known as Modern Spanish.
It's very important to remember, however, that spoken Spanish is not identical in the different regions of Spain. In fact, its pronunciation and lexical characteristics can vary to a very significant extent from one village to another.
