The Spanish language evolved from Vulgar Latin, which was brought to the Iberian Peninsula by the Romans during the Second Punic War, beginning in 210 BC. Previously, several pre-Roman languages (also called Paleohispanic languages)—unrelated to Latin, and some of them unrelated even to Indo-European—were spoken in the Iberian Peninsula. These languages included Basque (still spoken today), Iberian, Celtiberian and Celtic.
The first documents to show traces of what is today regarded as the precursor of modern Spanish are from the 9th century. Throughout the Middle Agesand into the modern era, the most important influences on the Spanish lexicon came from neighboring Romance languages—Navarro-Aragonese, Leonese, Catalan, Portuguese, Galician, Occitan, and later, French and Italian. Spanish also borrowed a considerable number of words from Arabic, as well as a minor influence from Germanic languages through the migration of tribes and a period of Visigoth rule in Iberia. In addition, many more words were borrowed from Latin through the influence of written language and the liturgical language of the Church.
According to the theories of Ramón Menéndez Pidal, local sociolects of Vulgar Latin evolved into Spanish, in the north of Iberia, in an area centered in the city of Burgos, and this dialect was later brought to the city of Toledo, where the written standard of Spanish was first developed, in the 13th century.[32] In this formative stage, Spanish developed a strongly differing variant from its close cousin, Leonese, and, according to some authors, was distinguished by a heavy Basque influence (see Iberian Romance languages). This distinctive dialect spread to southern Spain with the advance of the Reconquista, and meanwhile gathered a sizable lexical influence from the Arabic of Al-Andalus, much of it indirectly, through the Romance Mozarabic dialects (some 4,000 Arabic-derived words, make up around 8% of the language today).[33] The written standard for this new language was developed in the cities of Toledo, in the 13th to 16th centuries, and Madrid, from the 1570s.[32]
In this exercise, we need to write a letter like the one Charlie and Sophie wrote to their family, but much shorter. So let's get started:
Queridos padres y abuelos:
¿Cómo están? ¡Deseo que bien!
Charlie y yo hemos disfrutado mucho de nuestra estadía en México y, sin lugar a dudas, es un país maravilloso. La comida, la cultura, los lugares, todo nos parece maravilloso. Nos encantó la música ranchera, mientras estuvimos en un café oímos canciones de Pedro Fernández, un famoso cantante que nació en Guadalajara. Por otro lado, también sonó la música de Vicente Fernández, y al parecer la gente de esa localidad lo prefiere a él pues le pidieron a los dueños del local que les colocaran más música de él. Queremos ir a Playa del Carmen, es una playa muy hermosa pues vimos las fotos. Además, estuvimos en Zócalo y Catedral de Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe, es un templo muy hermoso. México es un país muy religioso y conserva muchas tradiciones. Sin duda los extrañamos mucho y desearíamos que ustedes estuviesen aquí.
¡Muchos besos y abrazos!
Los quieren mucho,
Sophie y Charlie
