Two novel contributions by Emilio Alarcos on the diachrony of Spanish

Abstract

The article describes two proposals by Emilio Alarcos on the history of Spanish. First, it deals with the origin and spread of Castilian. Alarcos considers that it is the contact of romanized peoples with Basque populations that constitutes the germ of Castilian in Old Castile. He accepts the persistence of the population, although scarce, not only up to the Arlanzón, but also in the Duero Valley and that the subsequent contact with populations from the kingdom of Toledo is important in the configuration of the standardized language in the 13th century. What is most original is that, according to Alarcos, features of the previous speech of all these people also contribute to the final configuration of Spanish. Linguistic contact is also at the origin of diphthongization. For Alarcos, the diphthongization of E and O brief tonics in Latin is due to the articulatory effort of speakers who have difficulty reproducing the differences between open and closed vowels. Alarcos differentiates a first stage of the diphthongization process, strictly phonetic, and a second phonological, without it being important in the early stages which segment the accent falls on. In the conclusion, it is argued that Alarcos does not renounce the principles of the Spanish historical school represented by Menéndez Pidal, but introduces decisive functionalist remarks.