From crisica@idt.net Thu Sep 7 21:30:25 2000 Received: from mxu2.u.washington.edu (mxu2.u.washington.edu [140.142.32.9]) by lists.u.washington.edu (8.9.3+UW00.05/8.9.3+UW99.09) with ESMTP id VAA169550 for ; Thu, 7 Sep 2000 21:30:24 -0700 Received: from u3.farm.idt.net (root@u3.farm.idt.net [169.132.8.12]) by mxu2.u.washington.edu (8.9.3+UW00.02/8.9.3+UW99.09) with ESMTP id VAA21785 for ; Thu, 7 Sep 2000 21:30:24 -0700 Received: from 18spd (ppp-30.ts-2-bay.nyc.idt.net [169.132.216.78]) by u3.farm.idt.net (8.9.3/8.9.3) with SMTP id AAA29917; Fri, 8 Sep 2000 00:30:20 -0400 (EDT) Reply-To: From: "Christopher Robbins" To: Cc: Subject: Visigoths, Latin & Spanish (was: Re: The evolution of Latin into...) Date: Fri, 8 Sep 2000 00:30:20 -0400 Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable X-Priority: 3 (Normal) X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook IMO, Build 9.0.2416 (9.0.2911.0) X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2615.200 In-Reply-To: <000701c01884$09e62000$5d509318@ne.mediaone.net> Daniel Ria=C3=B1o Rufilanchas wrote: >Christopher Robbins writes [yet further edited by CRR]: >>The Visigoths [... had] just a few years short of three full >>centuries of political dominance and linguistic influence [in >>the peninsula ...] Yet in modern Spanish there is effectively >>no hint of Germanic influence > >By the time the Visigoths entered Spain (414) they had been deeply >"latinized". The docti in the Spanish Visigothic Court would use a >scholastic Latin; the educated ones would speak a highly romanced=20 >vulgar Latin; and the rustici would speak but romance (see M.Pidal = "Origenes... p. 502 ss). This and the fact that for some time the=20 >Gothi lived socially unmixed with the romani in the Peninsula (the=20 >mixed marriages where permitted only in mid VII century) would=20 >explain the paucity of gothic vocabulary in the languages there.=20 >Leaving aside those Germanic words which entered Spanish via=20 >Provenzal, French, etc., most of the German vocabulary in Spanish=20 >is of later date (mostly scientific vocabulary, but also such=20 >strange modern coinages as "estraperlo" for "black market"). The=20 >literary influence, on the contrary, was very important (all the=20 >Spanish epic is of the German type). Te agradezco tu respuesta, Daniel, y lamento haber tardado unos = d=C3=ADas en contestarte, debido a que tuviera que salir para otra = ciudad por un d=C3=ADa para asistir a una reuni=C3=B3n concertada hace = poco. In the final analysis, however, it rather seems to me that we are = quite in agreement on this matter and to some measure for the reasons = you stated. The perhaps the more interesting question that remains would concern how = distinct Visigothic speech at the economic and political interface truly = was from the ambient speech in the peninsular regions which fell = ultimately to their control. I would agree that the Visigoths were = semi-civilized and partially Romanized by the early c5 (though we might = quibble a bit on your characterization as "deeply"), and I hope I had = tempered my original analogy sufficiently with the clause, "Part of the = looseness lies in the extent we may accept that the language of the = Alani, Suevi, Vandals, and Visigoths, who swept over Iberia in the early = c5, was 'Germanic',..." I do feel care is required, Daniel, in summoning as evidence the work of = court docti. Virtually all of the early barbarian kingdoms - and indeed = many of the most prominent for centuries to come - had Latin literati = and clerics as recorders and administrators whose accounts were drafted = in a cultivated Latin for ruling barbarian aristocracies which remained = wholly ignorant of letters. One salient and illustrative example would = be the Rollonids of the late c11 and the conquest of a highly literate = and culturally advanced late Saxon England by a Norman aristocracy that = was illiterate from top to bottom. But the Norman archives were drafted = in a high scholastic Latin nonetheless, albeit of an idiosyncratic = medieval variety. I would thus respectfully suggest that the product of = Visigothic court docti will serve of little value to the inquiry that is = actually at hand. What then of speech, for it is here that one might expect the influence = to be largely be found as between a conquering aristocracy and its = antecedent and subject populations. I don't think we disagree that the = ambient speech was that which might be called a sort of proto-castellano = that evolved from the vulgar Latin of Roman legionnaires over the period = from the taking of Cartegena in BC 209 to the arrival of the Germanic = barbarians some six centuries later, even if Roman consolidation was not = fully achieved until Augustus. To the extent that courtiers, docti, and = elites of Visigothic Spain tended to remove themselves and live apart, = as you note, the extent of their potential linguistic influence would be = equally removed. But surely one objective of the conquest was to seize the riches of this = granary of Rome, once considered the Empire's wealthiest province. And = from his tenure as procurator, Pliny recorded some 360 distinct Spanish = cities. So there was no small measure of urban organization emergent = from the Via Augusta with which to contend. And some functionary level = within Visigothic Spain, amid its own incessant internecine squabbles, = had to effect this as regards the management of tribute, the projection = of martial and political authority, et alia. And it was at THAT = interface of economy and power that the linguistic influence would, to = my view, have been primarily expressed. Why then the dearth of linguistic residue from this period, upon which = we both agree? To my view, that the Visigoths were partially Romanized = is a somewhat contributory yet quite insufficient explanation. It would = seem to premise that the ambient proto-castellano (to use that term) and = the speech of the relevant level of Visigoth function were effectively = identical. It is a premise that I would be hard pressed to accept in = light of the intense regionalization of language that has plagued (or = enriched?) Spanish history and the certainty that the speech of the = Visigothic court at any level was not that of the written language of = its scribal docti and rather likely also not fully free of its = idiosyncratic Germanic barbarian roots. The lack of effect from three centuries of predominance cannot, to my = view, be simply brushed aside by an allusion to some vague Romanization = alone, as documented as that is in at least some general sense. A more = penetrating investigation and a greater level of evidence would be = required to resolve the question, in my opinion. But that is a = challenging task indeed for the speech on both sides that was not = recorded in writing. =20 Otherwise we are left with one or two seemingly reasonable hypotheses, = with which I shall not further tire the list in this already overlong = message. Best regards, CRR=20 PD: Por cierto, Daniel, citaste la obra _Or=C3=ADgenes..._ por Pidal, a = la que no puedo recurrir. Por si ella est=C3=A1 disponible todav=C3=ADa = [o sea =C2=ABin print=C2=BB], =C2=BFme podr=C3=ADas mandar un correo-e = privado para enterarme del ISBN para que pueda yo intentar a lograrla? = Gracias de antemano. Chris .