Nordic words in Spanish America.

Abstract

This article deals with loanwords from the Nordic languages borrowed into Spanish, and other Romance languages, via French. The history of the words is traced, their journey from French to Spanish examined and their adoption and assimilation to the system of the recipient languages discussed. The first written sources of the Nordic loanwords in France are Old Norman or French texts, mainly chronicles dating from the 12th, 14th and 15th century. The words were incorporated into the Spanish languages in the 14th and 15th century and onwards. Some of the words were brought to the New World at the end of 15th and the beginning of the 16th century. There they were incorporated into American Spanish and little by little they underwent semantic shifts and changes and were used, and are still today, with meanings that have nothing to do with the original one.

Keywords: lexicology, Nordic nautical loanwords, Spanish, navigation, America