Basque ethnography at a glance

Bilbao at the end of the 19th century.

The Basque language or Euskara, at least from what we know, is a small language in terms of the number of speakers and the area of use, but it has had to live alongside great languages throughout its long history. He had Celtic and Iberian as neighbors until Romans brought their imperial language to our surroundings. The Euskara lived for a long time near the strong Latin, and is now bordering on the great French and Spanish languages which are descendants of that Latin. The ancient influence of Latin is evident in current Basque, both in the lexicon and in the morphosyntax. Also that of later Spanish and French. But hasn’t our little Euskara left any trace in the great languages around it?

The Minotauro Publishing House published in 1960 the work Lexicón bilbaíno (Lexicon from Bilbao), by composer and poet Emiliano Arriaga Ribero (original from 1896). In this work Arriaga collected and commented on a number of curious words produced by the influence of the Basque language in the Spanish language of Bilbao at the end of the 19th century. On the other hand, the association called Mendebalde Kultura Alkartea published in 2011 (original 1976) the book Influencias del vascuence en la lengua castellana (Influences of the Vascuence in the Spanish language), by Mikel Zarate Lejarraga, priest writer of Lezama (Bizkaia, Txorierri). Zarate explained the trail left in Spanish by the Basques of Txorierri and Bilbao at the end of the 20th century.

Well, with both of these interesting works in mind, we are going to offer here a series of articles to delight fans of linguistic curiosities. The work will therefore be placed between the end of the 19th century and the end of the 20th century, and our eyes will be fixed on the Basque substrate of Spanish in and around Bilbao. On this occasion, however, we will leave aside the sociological and/or political problems that have been part of this influence and that, because –although it could be an interesting and fruitful study– the size of this publication would not allow us to carry it out rigorously. So, we will focus on the linguistic aspect of the phenomenon, but not on the philosophical level, but on the level of dissemination, so that anyone can understand it.
In this first step, we will focus on phonetics. In the next one in the morphosyntax, and in the last ones we will attend the lexicon.

C/Z and S

The Basques from the sorroundings of Bilbao were alien to the interdental phoneme z, and therefore pronounced s when they said words that contained c or z: Haser y deshaser, todo es haser (Do and undo, everything is to do). Ahí está, sin saber qué haser (There he is, not knowing what to do). Amarra bien los sapatos para no caer (Tie your shoes properly so you don’t fall). Yo la consiensia tranquila tengo (I have a clear conscience). Si no te llega, pasiensia! (If you don’t get it, be patient!).

D at the end of the word

In words that ended with the phonem d, the Basques around Bilbao did not pronounce it: Todavía no has hecho los deberes, verdá? (You have not made your homework yet, have you?). Me emosiona su caridá (I am touched by her charity). Hay mucha desigualdá entre los dos equipos (There is a lot of inequality between the two teams). Arriaga said it was better to do it than the Spanish speakers did. They put the z phonema in place of d: Yo siempre digo la verdaz (I always tell the truth). Su bondaz era infinita (Her kindness was infinite).

R and RR

The soft r was easily pronounced by the basque speakers of the time, but since the multiple vibrant rr was tougher in Basque than in Spanish, they articulated it notably louder when speaking in Spanish: ¡Desirr también! (How could you say that?). Rrasón tienes (You’re right). ¡Ya fue a la rromería, llevaba tiempo esperando y! (She already went to the pilgrimage, because she had been waiting for a long time!). No me hagas rrepetir las cosas trres veses. (Don’t make me repeat things three times). ¡Jesuuus, me rrompes el corasón! (Jesuuus, you break my heart!).

CH and TX

The Basque tx and Spanish ch phonemes are not exactly the same, although they have a similar pronunciation. The one in Basque is somewhat more palatal, and that is why the words that had ch were peculiarly pronounced by Basque speakers: Etxa un poco de letxe a la tasa (Pour some milk into the cup). Antes no era fásil etxarse novia si eras muy murco (In the past it was not easy to find a girlfriend if you were very shy). Primero has bujero con el asadutxu y luego mete la planta (First make a hole with the small hoe and then insert the plant). Ahí siempre andan txavales (There are always kids there).

F and P

I always tell an anecdote to explain the confusion between these two phonemes. At the end of the last century I met a bricklayer named Aurelio. He was from Basauri, but his whole life had been spent in Castilla making the typical ovens of those lands. Aurelio left his house very young. After many years among Spanish speakers, he completely forgot Basque. However, his accent and way of speaking remained practically intact. The fact is that he spent some time in our house doing masonry work and I perfectly remember the phrase that he gave me once, when I asked him where his assistant Fran was: ¿Pran? ¡Ha ido a la por! (Pran? He has gone for it!). I didn’t get it. ‘Habrá ido a por algo’ (he must have gone for something) I thought. So, I insisted: ¿Cómo a la por? (Go for what?). And he answered me: Ha ido a la por, a arreglar la purgoneta (He has gone to por, to fix the van). From there I deduced that that ‘por’ would be Ford, because that Fran had a Ford brand van. So, this would be Aurelio’s decrypted answer: ¡Fran ha ido a la Ford a arreglar la furgoneta! (¡Pran ha ido a la Por a arreglar la purgoneta!) (Fran has gone to Ford to fix the van!).

It seems that in another time the Basques had trouble pronouncing the f of Spanish and that is why they used p instead of f. Our bricklayer Aurelio would be one of them. But then the Basques learned to pronounce the f and the opposite phenomenon began to take place, that is, some began to use the f where the p was needed, and vice versa. In this sense, I cannot forget the example that the former philologist and linguist Alfonso Irigoien once set for the Basque Philology students at the university of Deusto.
A Basque once said, after a copious meal: …eta orain, kapea, kofa and furua!!! (…and now coffee, spirits and cigar!!!) (with both phonemes f and p exactly reversed). It is what we call hypercorrection, that is to say, using the reverse analogy for wanting to speak super well to end up saying thiongs backwards.

Joseba Santxo Uriarte – Philologist and researcher