[HANASHIR:12302] Re Ladino language

[JAH29 <JAH29...>]

Dear Ellen & all interested in Ladino,
     The following is copied from the Ladino language homepage.  Ladino 
speakers who have helped me with songs over the years have pointed out words 
that have also entered from languages in the lands where the Spanish Jews 
took refuge - "kashkaval", a Greek cheese, and "raki", a Greek liquor, for 
example.  Also the closeness to words in modern Portugese (see note below) - 
"onde" for "where" instead of the Spanish "donde", "mancevico" for young 
man/lad where the current Portugese is "mancebo" and the current Spanish is 
"joven".
     Our congregation was founded in 1733 by descendants of conversos and one 
Ladino melody, the "El Nora" of Yom Kippur, complete with the "ng" 
pronounciation for the ayin letter, has been handed down and sung solo each 
year since then by a congregant.   I have our rabbi's blessing to now teach 
and use more Sephardic melodies and Ladino lyrics both in our services and 
"benching" after meals, some of the melodies from our still-orthodox "mother 
congregation" Bevis Marks in London.
     Julie Hirsch
     PRF and cantorial soloist
     Congregation Mickve Israel
     Savannah, GA

History The majority of the Jews, expelled in 1492, fled mainly to the 
Ottoman empire and settled in the Balkans (especially in Thesaloniki in 
modern Greece, Constantinople, Sarajevo, Izmir), the Middle East and North 
Africa (Tangier, Tetuán, Fez, Algiers, Cairo), while others found havens in 
Portugal, which soon afterwards, in 1497, has to made the practice of Judaism 
a crime punishable by death, and in Italy. During the course of the next 
century and a half, many Jews that were obliged to convert (called conversos, 
cristianos novos new Christians or marranos swines), also left the Iberian 
peninsula and settled in the Ottoman empire and Amsterdam. There they 
returned to the practice of Judaism. 

     These Jews also continued to speak Spanish and added to the ranks of the 
older Judeo-Spanish speaking communities, perhaps intensifying certain 
features of Judeo-Spanish that resemble <A 
HREF="http://www.orbilat.com/Modern_Romance/Ibero-Romance/Portuguese/Portuguese.html";>Portuguese</A>.
  (underlining mine-jh)

     However, we may appropriately characterize Judeo-Spanish as an heir to 
the Castilian Spanish spoken in Spain at the close fifteenth century and the 
beginning of the sixteenth. Earlier refugees, who settled in the Middle East, 
continued to produce learned works in a literary archaic form of 
Judaeo-Spanish (called Judesmo). 

     The spoken dialects have differentiated considerably from this written 
language, mainly by borrowing from Hebrew and local languages, and, after 
further dispersion during and after World War II, these dialects are now 
threatened with extinction, though Judesmo survives with a mainly religious 
function. 
  Linguistic Features Ladino uses the <A 
HREF="http://www.orbilat.com/General_References/Alphabets/The_Hebrew_Alphabet.html";>Hebrew
 alphabet</A>. Since the 20th century 
the <A HREF="http://www.orbilat.com/Latin/Grammar/Latin-Alphabet.html";>Latin 
alphabet</A> is also used for non-religious writings. The 
orthographical conventions differ, however, from those of modern <A 
HREF="http://www.orbilat.com/Modern_Romance/Ibero-Romance/Spanish/Spanish.html";>Spanish</A>.
 

     In phonology, Ladino is rather conservative, preserving the 15th century 
Spanish pronunciation with some kind of a Portuguese bias. Its grammar also 
has archaic features -- some Old Spanish verbal endings were preserved and 
the usted / ustedes forms were never adopted. Vocabulary is rich in 
Hebraisms, concerning the religious practices and private life aspects, and 
Arabisms. 

     A lot of Oriental words (mainly Turkish) were adopted after the 
Sephardim established in the Ottoman empire. Later on the vocabulary 
underwent an intensive French influence.