Dragon27 wrote:Cainntear wrote:So which seems more likely: that over a millennium ago, a country that had castles in it was found surprising enough in a time when all countries had them that it was called "Castleland"
Well, the country was at war with the Moors, so it doesn't seem so far-fetched that the (originally small) region was especially fortified. The region expanded in the process of regaining control over the peninsula and the name stuck.
The alternative explanation seems to me to require more assumptions or steps without much evidence to support them.
OK, then what about the other speakers who took on the Castlese name for their language...?
Consider that the people of Castle-unya tend to reject the similarity between their variant of the word Castlese and the other word Castlese. The way I understand it, this similarity has in the past been used to justify the Spanish line that Castlese is "just a dialect" of Castlese, and is therefore not worthy of full language status. There's been significant study into the grammar of Castilian and Catalan to show that they're both part of a broader dialect continuum, and that Catalan has features that are present further east than Castilian -- eg Catalan numbers shows a similar logic to French (eg 16) that suggests parallel evolution to Castilian, rather than an evolution from it.
The acceptance of the received wisdom etymology of "castellano" by both sides is probably why Catalans have ignored the similarity in terms and actively rejected it.
But if we look at the two languages and recognise the documented history (and linguistic evidence of parallel evolution), why couldn't they both just be named after how they started: as international commerce languages used in castles?
I mean, look at stereotypical representations of market English "You like? I give you very good price!" and it really isn't that big of a stretch to imagine a parallel universe where planes and the internet hadn't been invented, where the languages of various countries end up being called "Markit"...
Btw, when did the term "castellano" itself first appeared?
I cannot state with certainty, but I believe I read that the first written evidence of Catalan is older. I have no recollection of ever hearing a proposed etymology for the name "Catalan", and I personally believe that an etymology of "Castlese" would make perfect sense. I admit that it's a personal belief, but it was something I noticed after reading the alternative hypothesis of the etymology of castellano.
Cainntear wrote:Regardless of the specifics, I am 100% certain that the origin of Cockney H-dropping is due to French ancestry.
In the meantime, I'm going to treat this as a hypothesis (or should it be an 'ypothesis?).
OK, that was too absolute of me. To correct:
I am 100% certain that I have seen detailed evidence that the origin of Cockney H-dropping is due to French ancestry, including pictures of medieval art depicting the French-speaking mercantile settlement.Cockney dialect is said to have originated among the working class of the East End of London and later influenced by all sorts of immigrants coming into region (including, of course, the French ones).
Googling got me the fact that Huguenot asylum seekers ended up in Spitalfields during the reformation later on, which does ring a bell with me. I don't know if I'm making this up, but I think the claim was that they ended up there because of existing French-speaking populations in neighbouring Hackney, and that this essentially provided evidence of continuing use of the French language in that area for centuries. Maybe a bit of a speculative claim, though.