History of Portuguese

The Portuguese language developed in the Western Iberian Peninsula from Latin brought there by Roman soldiers and colonists starting in the 3rd century BC. It began to diverge from other Romance languages after the fall of the Western Roman Empire and the barbarian invasions in the 5th century, and started to be used in written documents around the 9th century. By the 13th century it had become a mature language with its own literature, called Galician-Portuguese. In all aspects — phonology, morphology, lexicon and syntax — it is essentially the result of an organic evolution of Vulgar Latin, with fairly minor influences from other languages.

ocial history

Romanization

Arriving on the Iberian Peninsula in 218 BC, the ancient Romans brought with them Latin, from which all Romance languages descend. The language was spread by arriving Roman soldiers, settlers and merchants, who built Roman cities mostly near the settlements of previous civilizations. Later, the inhabitants of the cities of Lusitania and rest of Romanized Iberia were recognized as citizens of Rome.

Roman control of the western part of Hispania was not consolidated until the campaigns of Augustus in 26 BC. Although the western territories to the south of the Tagus River were only conquered after the victory of Licinius Crassus in the year 93 BC, [ [http://www.arqueotavira.com/Mapas/Iberia/Populi.htm Detailed map of the Pre-Roman Peoples of Iberia (around 200 BC)] ] very few traces of the native languages persist in modern Portuguese. After 200 years of wars first with the Carthaginians and then the local inhabitants, emperor Augustus conquered the whole peninsula, which was named Hispania. He then divided it into three provinces, Hispania Tarraconensis, Hispania Baetica, and Lusitania, the latter of which included most of modern Portugal. In the 3rd century, emperor Diocletian split Tarraconensis into three, creating the adjacent province of Gallaecia, which geographically enclosed the remaining part of Portugal, and modern-day Galicia (in the northwestern region of Spain).

Iberian Romance

Between 409 A.D. and 711, as the Roman Empire was collapsing, the Iberian Peninsula was invaded by peoples of Germanic origin, known by the Romans as Barbarians. The Barbarians (mainly Suevi and Visigoths) largely absorbed the Roman culture and language of the peninsula; however, since the Roman schools and administration were closed and Europe entered the Dark Ages, the Latin Vulgar language was left free to evolve on its own and the uniformity of the Peninsula was soon disrupted. In the western part of the Peninsula (today's Northern Portugal and Galicia), Vulgar Latin gained some local characteristics and in that region the Suevi settled, leading to the formation of the "Lusitanian Romance Language". The Germanic languages influenced Portuguese in words linked to the military, such as "guerra" ("war") or "laverca" (lark).

From 711, with the Moorish invasion of the Peninsula, Arabic was adopted as the administrative language in the conquered regions. However, the population continued to speak their Romance dialects, known collectively as Mozarabic; so that when the Moors were overthrown, the influence that they had exerted on the language was small. Its main effect was in the lexicon: modern Portuguese still has a large number of words of Arabic origin, about 900, especially relating to food, agriculture and crafts, which have no cognates in other Romance languages, except Spanish. But there is no loan word in the lexicon related to human feelings, all being of Latin origin. The Arabic influence is also visible in placenames throughout the Southern provinces, such as Algarve, Alfama, or Fátima.

Proto-Portuguese

The earliest surviving records of a distinctively Portuguese language are administrative documents from the ninth century which contain bits of Romance interspersed in texts written essentially in Latin. Today this phase is known as "Proto-Portuguese" (spoken in the period between the 9th to the 12th century).

Galician-Portuguese period

What modern scholars call "Galician-Portuguese" was originally the native language of the region of the medieval region of Galicia, which at the start of the High Middle Ages included the northern part of present-day Portugal. It appears to have been used regularly in the Iberian Peninsula — and amost exclusively — as the language for lyric song. It was employed by poets from nearly everywhere in the Peninsula, including Leonese, Castilian, Aragonese and Catalan. It is also the language used in the "Cantigas de Santa Maria". These songs were traditionally attributed to Alfonso X, a Castilian king, though more recent work shows that they must have been composed in collaboration with many translators, poets and musicians. Later, when Spanish also came to be written in Castilian realms, Galicia fell under the influence of Castilian, and the southern variant of Galician-Portuguese became the language of Portugal.

eparation of Portugal from Galicia

Portugal was formally recognized as an independent country in 1143 by the Kingdom of León, into which Galicia was incorporated at the time, with Afonso Henriques as its first king. In 1290, king Diniz created the first Portuguese University in Lisbon (the "Estudo Geral") and decreed that Portuguese, then simply called the "Vulgar language" (i.e. Vulgar Latin) should be used in preference to Latin and known as the "Portuguese language". In 1296, Portuguese was adopted by the Royal Chancellary and was used not only in poetry but also when writing law and in notaries. In the first period of "Old Portuguese" (from 12th to the 14th century), the language came gradually to be used in official documents.

Discoveries period

In the second period of Old Portuguese, between the 14th and the 16th centuries, with the Portuguese discoveries, the Portuguese language spread to many regions of Asia, Africa and The Americas. Today most Portuguese speakers live in Brazil. By the 16th century it had become a "lingua franca" in Asia and Africa, used not only for colonial administration and trade but also for communication between local officials and Europeans of all nationalities. In Ceylon (modern Sri Lanka) several kings became fluent speakers of Portuguese, and nobles often took Portuguese names. The spread of the language was helped by mixed marriages between Portuguese and local people (also very common in other areas of the world) and its association with the Catholic missionary efforts, which led to its being called "Cristão" ("Christian") in many places. The "Nippo Jisho", a Japanese-Portuguese dictionary written in 1603, was a product of Jesuit missionary activity in Japan. The language continued to be popular in parts of Asia until the 19th century, despite the severe measures taken by the Dutch to abolish it in Ceylon and Indonesia.

Some Portuguese-speaking Christian communities in India, Sri Lanka, Malaysia and Indonesia preserved their language even after they were isolated from Portugal. The language has largely changed in these communities and has evolved through the centuries into several Portuguese creoles. Also, a considerable number of words of Portuguese origin are found in Tetum, the national language of East Timor, such as "lee" 'to read' (from "ler"), "aprende" 'to learn' (from "aprender") and "tenke" 'to have to' (from "tem que"). Portuguese words entered the lexicons of many other languages, such as "pan" 'bread' (from "pão") in Japanese (see Japanese words of Portuguese origin), "sepatu" 'shoe' (from "sapato") in Indonesian, "keju" 'cheese' (from "queijo"), in Malay and "meza" 'table' (from "mesa") in Swahili.

Modern Portuguese

The end of "Old Portuguese" was marked by the publication of the "Cancioneiro Geral" by Garcia de Resende, in 1516. The period of "Modern Portuguese" (from the 16th century to the present) saw an increase in the number of words of Classical Latin origin and erudite words of Greek origin borrowed into Portuguese during the Renaissance, further enriching the vocabulary of Portuguese.

Historical sound changes

Both in morphology and in syntax, Portuguese represents an organic transformation of Latin without the direct intervention of any foreign language. The sounds, grammatical forms, and syntactical types, with a few exceptions, are derived from Latin, and almost 90% of its vocabulary is still derived from the language of Rome. Some of the changes began during the Empire, others took place later. A few words remained virtually unchanged, like "carro," "taberna" ("tavern"), or even returned to a form close to the original, such as "coxa" ("thigh").

Learned latinisms were formed in the late Middle Ages, due to the use of Church Latin by the Catholic Church, and during the Renaissance, when Classical antiquity in general, and Literary Latin in particular, enjoyed great prestige. Thus, for example, Latin "AVRV", which had originated "ouro" ("gold") and "dourado" ("golden"), was re-introduced as the adjective "áureo" ("golden"). In the same way, "LOCALE" ("place"), which had evolved to "lugar", was later re-introduced as the more erudite "local". Many erudite Greek words and combining elements were also introduced or re-introduced in this way. Because of this, many Latin words are still familiar to Portuguese speakers.

N.B.: In the Latin examples below, we have used all-capitals so as to be in line with how the ancient language was actually written. Note also that the letter V was the vowel we know today as U, and that the C was always pronounced IPA| [k] , so CENTV was originally pronounced IPA| ['kentu] . Later latinisms are marked with (L).

Palatalization of voiceless stops — the consonants IPA| [k] and IPA| [t] assimilated with the high vowels IPA| [e] and IPA| [i] , and with the semivowel IPA| [j] .
* CENTV > IPA| [tj] ento > IPA| [ts] ento > cento (hundred)
* FACERE > faIPA| [tj] ere > faIPA| [ts] er > faIPA| [dz] er > fazer (to do)A more ancient evolution was
*FORTIA > forIPA| [ts] a > força (strength)

Voicing — some consonants did not disappear but rather evolved with voiceless stops becoming voiced stops and voiced stops becoming voiced fricatives in certain positions:
* MVTV > mudo (mute)
* LACV > lago (lake)
* FABA > fava (broadbean)
*LOCVSTA > lagosta (lobster)

Assimilation — consonant clusters, especially double consonants, were simplified:
* GVTTA > gota (drop)
* PECCARE > pecar (to sin)

Elision — the consonants IPA| [l] and IPA| [n] of Vulgar Latin were deleted between vowels, after which sometimes the vowels around them coalesced, or an epenthetic semivowel was introduced between them.
*DOLORE > door > dor (pain); (L) doloroso (painful)
* BONV > bõo > bom (good)
* ANELLV > ãelo > elo (bond); (L) anel (ring)
* SALIRE > sair (to get out)
* COLARE > coar
* NOTVLA > nódoa (stain)
* CATENA > cadeia

Palatalization of liquids and nasals — the consonants IPA| [l] and IPA| [n] assimilated with the semivowel IPA| [j] , producing the palatals "lh" IPA| [ʎ] and "nh" IPA| [ɲ] :
*MVLIER > mulher (woman)
*IVNIV > junho (June)

Regressive Nasalization — before [m] or [n] which were elided, or in syllable coda, some vowels became nasal. This happened between the 6th and the 7th centuries, possibly influenced by Celtic languages previously spoken in the Iberian Peninsula. This change produced one of the most striking phonological differences between Portuguese and Spanish. The history of nasal vowels in hiatus with a previous or following vowel is complex, depending on the identity of the two vowels and the position of the stress.

1. If the vowels were near each other, they collapsed into a single vowel (nasal or oral, according to the nasality of the stressed vowel):
*BONV > bõo > bom (good)
*CALENTE > caẽte > quente (hot)
*GANADU > gãado > gado (cattle)
*LANA > lãa > lã (wool)2. Otherwise, if the second vowel was more closed, the result was usually a nasal diphthong:
*MANV > mão (hand)
*CANES > cães (dogs)3. If the second vowel was more open, or as open, nasalization was lost:
*LVNA > lũa > lua (moon). Exception: VNA > ũa > uma (one)
*BONA > bõa > boa (good, fem.)
*PLENV > chẽo > cheio (full) 4. If the first vowel was IPA| [i] , however, nasalization evolved to a palatal nasal consonant, inserted between the two vowels:
*VINV > vĩo > vinho (wine)
*REGINA > *ragina > raĩa > rainha (queen)

Progressive Nasalization — The spread of nasalization forward from a nasal consonant, especially IPA| [m] .
*MADRE > made > mae > mãe (mother)
*AD NOCTE > ãnoite > ãõte > ontem IPA| [õtẽĩ] (yesterday).

Epenthesis — the insertion of a sound to break up a combination of vowels which was difficult to pronounce:
*ARENA > arẽa > areia (sand); (L) arena (arena)
*GALLINA > gal [ĩ] a > galinha (chicken)
*VINO > v [ĩ] o > vinho (wine)

Examples such as the former two have been used by some authors to argue that the digraph "nh" was a nasal glide in medieval Portuguese, and thus its pronunciation in some dialects of Brazil and São Tomé and Príncipe is the original oneFact|date=February 2007.

Dissimilation — Modification of a sound by the influence of neighbouring sounds; similar became different over time, so as to ease pronunciation.

1. Between vowels:
* LOCVSTA > lagosta (lobster)
* CAMPANA > campãa > campa (tomb)2. Between consonants:
* MEMORARE > nembrar > lembrar (to remember); (L) memorizar (to memorize)
*ANIMA > alma (soul); (L) animado (animated)
*LOCALE > logar > lugar; (L) local (place)

Metathesis — a sound change that alters the order of phonemes in a word. Semi-vowel metathesis:
*PRIMARIV > primeiro (first); (L) primário (primary)Consonant metathesis in [l] and [r] :
*TENEBRAS > teevras > trevas (darkness); this was rare in Portuguese; (L) tenebroso (dark)Vowel metathesis:
*GENUCULUM > genoclo > gẽoIPA| [lj] o > joelho (knee)

References

ee also

* Differences between Spanish and Portuguese
* Galician language
* History of Galicia
* History of Portugal
* Portuguese language
* Portuguese vocabulary
* Romance languages
* Spelling reforms of Portuguese