Western Catalan

• North-Western Catalan
  • Ribagorçan -ribagorçà- (from Ribagorça)
  • Pallarès (from Pallars)
  • Lleidatà (from Lleida)
  • Transitional Valencian -tortosí- (from Tortosa)
• South-Western Catalan (Valencian)
  • Northern Valencian -castellonenc- (from region of Plana)
  • Central Valencian -apitxat-
  • Southern Valencian
  • Alacantí (from the Alicante/Alacant's metropolitan area and most of Vinalopó valley)
  • Majorcan Valencian (from Tàrbena and La Vall de Gallinera)

Eastern Catalan

• Northern Catalan -rossellonès- (from Roussillon)
• Central Catalan
  • Salat (from some coastal areas of Girona)
  • Barceloní (from Barcelona)
  • Tarragoní (from Tarragona)
  • Xipella (transitional Western–Eastern Catalan)
• Balearic
  • Majorcan -mallorquí- (from Majorca)
  • Minorcan -menorquí- (from Minorca)
  • Ibizan -eivissenc- (from Ibiza/Eivissa and Formentera)
• Alguerese -alguerès/alguerés- (from the Sardinian city of Alghero/L'Alguer)

File:Dialectes català

Standards[link]

Catalan is a pluricentric language with two main standards; one regulated by the Institut d'Estudis Catalans (IEC), general standard, with Pompeu Fabra's orthography as axis, keeping features from Central Catalan, and the other regulated by the Acadèmia Valenciana de la Llengua (AVL), restricted scale standard, focused on Valencian standardization on the basis of Normes de Castelló, that is, Pompeu Fabra's orthography but more adapted to Western Catalan pronunciation and features of Valencian dialects.

IEC's standard, apart from the basis of Central Catalan features, takes also other dialects' features in consideration as standard. Despite this, the most notable difference between both standards is some tonic ⟨e⟩ accentuation, for instance: francès, anglès (IEC) – francés, anglés (AVL) ('French, English'), cafè (IEC) – café (AVL) ('coffee'), conèixer (IEC) – conéixer ('to know'), comprèn (IEC) – comprén (AVL) ('he understands'). This is because of the different pronunciation of some stressed ⟨e⟩, especially tonic ē (long e) and i (short i) from Latin, in both Catalan blocks (/ɛ/ in Eastern Catalan and /e/ in Western Catalan). Nevertheless, AVL's standard keeps the grave accent ⟨è⟩, without pronouncing this ⟨e⟩ as /ɛ/, in some words like: què ('what'), València, èter ('ether'), sèsam ('sesame'), sèrie ('series') and època ('age').

There are also some other divergences like the digraph ⟨tl⟩ used by AVL in some words instead of ⟨tll⟩ like in ametla/ametlla ('almond'), espatla/espatlla ('back' an.) or butla/butlla ('bull'), the use of elided demonstratives (este 'this', eixe 'that' -near-) in the same level as reinforced ones (aquest, aqueix) or the use of many verbal forms common in Valencian, and some of these common in the rest of Western Catalan too, like subjunctive mood or inchoative conjugation in -ix- at the same level as -eix- or the priority use of -e morpheme in 1st person singular in present indicative (-ar verbs): jo compre instead of jo compro ('I buy').

In the Balearic Islands, IEC's standard is used but adapted for the Balearic dialect by the University of the Balearic Islands's philological section, Govern de les Illes Balears's consultative organ. In this way, for instance, IEC says it is correct writing cantam as much as cantem ('we sing') but the University says that the priority form in the Balearic Islands must be "cantam" in all fields. Another feature of the Balearic standard is the non-ending in the 1st person singular present indicative: jo compr ('I buy'), jo tem ('I fear'), jo dorm ('I sleep').

In Alghero, the IEC has adapted its standard to the Alguerese dialect. In this standard one can find, among other features: the definite article lo instead of el, special possessive pronouns and determinants la mia ('mine'), lo sou/la sua ('his/her'), lo tou/la tua ('yours'), and so on, the use of -v- /v/ in the imperfect tense in all conjugations: cantava, creixiva, llegiva; the use of many archaic words, usual words in Alguerese: manco instead of menys ('less'), calqui u instead of algú ('someone'), qual/quala instead of quin/quina ('which'), and so on; and the adaptation of weak pronouns.

In 2011, the Aragonese government passed a decree for the establishment of a new language regulator of Catalan in La Franja (the so-called Catalan-speaking areas of Aragon). The new entity, designated as Acadèmia Aragonesa del Català, shall allow a facultative education in Catalan and a standardization of the Catalan language in La Franja.

Status of Valencian

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Sub-varieties of Valencian

The official language academy of the Valencian Community (the Acadèmia Valenciana de la Llengua) considers Catalan and Valencian simply to be two names for the same language.^[16] All universities teaching Romance languages, and virtually all linguists, consider these two to be linguistic variants of the same language (similar to Canadian French versus Metropolitan French, and European versus Brazilian Portuguese).

There is a roughly continuous set of dialects covering the regional forms of Catalan/Valencian, with no break at the border between Catalonia and the Valencian Community,^{[citation needed]} and the various forms of Catalan and Valencian are mutually intelligible^[17] This is not to say that there are no differences between them; the speech of Valencians is recognizable both in pronunciation as well as in morphological and lexical peculiarities. However, these differences are not any wider than among North-Western Catalan and Eastern Catalan. In fact, Northern Valencian (spoken in the Castelló province and Matarranya valley, a strip of Aragon) is more similar to the Catalan of the lower Ebro basin (spoken in southern half of Tarragona province and another strip of Aragon) than to apitxat Valencian (spoken in the area of L'Horta, in the province of Valencia).

What gets called a language (as opposed to a dialect) is defined partly by mutual comprehensibility as well as political and cultural factors. In this case, the perceived status of Valencian as a dialect of Catalan has historically had important political implications including Catalan nationalism and the idea of the Catalan Countries. Arguing that Valencian is a separate language may sometimes be part of an effort by Valencians to resist a perceived Catalan nationalist agenda aimed at incorporating Valencians into what they feel is a "constructed" nationality centered on Barcelona.^{[citation needed]}

As such, the issue of whether Catalan and Valencian constitute different languages or merely dialects has been the subject of adversarial discussions for over a century and political agitation several times since the end of the Franco era.^{[citation needed]} The latest political controversy regarding Valencian occurred on the occasion of the drafting of the European Constitution in 2004. The Spanish government supplied the EU with translations of the text into Basque, Galician, Catalan, and Valencian, but the Catalan and Valencian versions were identical.^[18]

While professing the unity of the Catalan language, the Spanish government claimed to be constitutionally bound to produce distinct Catalan and Valencian versions because the Statute of Autonomy of the Valencian Community refers to the language as Valencian. In practice, the Catalan, Valencian, and Balearic versions of the EU constitution are identical: the government of Catalonia accepted the Valencian translation without any changes under the premise that the Valencian standard is accepted by the norms set forth by the IEC.^{[citation needed]}

Catalan may be seen instead as a multi-centric language (much like English); there exist two standards, one regulated by the IEC, which is centered on Central Catalan (with slight variations to include Balearic verb inflection) and one regulated by the AVL, centered on Valencian.

The AVL accepts the conventions set forth in the Normes de Castelló as the normative spelling, shared with the IEC that allows for the diverse idiosyncrasies of the different language dialects and varieties. As the normative spelling, these conventions are used in education, and most contemporary Valencian writers make use of them. Nonetheless, a small minority mainly of those who advocate for the recognition of Valencian as a separate language, use in a non-normative manner an alternative spelling convention known as the Normes del Puig.

Vocabulary[link]

The basic vocabulary shows more affinities with the Gallo-Romance group than with Ibero-Romance.^[19][20] These similarities are most notable with Occitan (examples below are from Languedocien).

• fenestra > finestra 'window' (Oc. fenèstra/finèstra/hinèstra, Fr. fenêtre, It. finestra) vs ventvs > ventana (Sp.) vs ianva > janela (Pt.)
• mandvcāre > menjar 'to eat' (Oc. manjar, Fr. manger, It. mangiare) vs comedere > comer (Sp. and Pt.)
• matvtīnvs > matí 'morning' (Oc. matin, Fr. matin, It. mattino/mattina) vs hora maneāna > mañana (Sp.), manhã (Pt.)
• parabolāre > parlar 'to speak' (Oc. parlar, Fr. parler, It. parlare) vs fābvlāre > hablar (Sp.), falar Pt.)
• tabvla > taula 'table' (Oc. taula, Fr. table, It. tavola) vs mensa > mesa (Sp. and Pt.)

Writing system[link]

The Catalan alphabet consists of the twenty-six letters of the basic Modern Latin alphabet: A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K, L, M, N, O, P, Q, R, S, T, U, V, W, X, Y and Z. The letters K, W and Y are only used in loanwords, and in the case of Y also in the palatal digraph ny. Modified letters with diacritics include À, É, È, Í, Ï, Ó, Ò, Ú, Ü and Ç.

The Catalan spelling has a number of distinctive features. The graph l·l (named ela geminada 'geminate-l') is composed of an interpunct (or middot) between two ⟨l⟩ (e.g. intel·ligent 'intelligent', novel·la 'novel') and is used to distinguish phonetically /lː/ from /ʎ/ (written ll as in Spanish). Another special grapheme is the digraph ny /ɲ/, found in Hungarian, Malay and in some African languages (e.g. banys 'baths'). Also of note is the final digraph ig, pronounced /tʃ/ after a vowel (e.g. raig 'ray', veig 'I see') and /itʃ/ after a consonant (e.g. mig 'half', desig 'desire'). The combination of t + nasal or lateral consonant is pronounced as a geminate of the second consonant: tm /mː/, tn /nː/, tl /lː/ and tll /ʎː/ (e.g. setmana 'week', cotna 'pork rind', Betlem 'Betlehem', bitllet 'bank note'), whereas t + sibilant consonant indicates affrication: tx /tʃ/, ts /ts/, tz /dz/, tg and tj /dʒ/ (e.g. fletxa 'arrow', potser 'maybe', dotze 'twelve', jutge 'judge', platja 'beach'). Similarly, the less common graphemes dj /dʒ/ and ds /ts/ also stand for affricates. Other digraphs are rr /r/, ss /s/, ix /ʃ/, gu /ɡ/ and qu /k/.

Catalan spelling utilizes ç (called ce trencada, literally 'broken cee') when ⟨c⟩ takes the soft sound /s/ before ⟨a, o, u⟩ (e.g. caça 'hunt') or in final position (e.g. dolç 'sweet'). The letter x is normally pronounced as a voiceless postalveolar /ʃ/ (usually affricated to /tʃ/ in many Western Catalan dialects); e.g. xic /ˈʃik/~/ˈtʃik/ ('little'). In Latin and Greek learned words it represents /ks/ (e.g. fixar 'fix') and /ɡz/ (e.g. exacte 'exact'), as in other closely related languages. The digraph ix instead, always represents /ʃ/ (/i̯ʃ/ in Western Catalan dialects); e.g. calaixos ('drawers').

Phonology[link]

Vowels[link]

Vowels of Standard Eastern Catalan, from Carbonell & Llisterri (1999:62)

Standard Catalan and Valencian has the typical seven-vowel system from Vulgar Latin (/a/, /ɛ/, /e/, /i/, /ɔ/, /o/, and /u/). Notable features:

• While Central Catalan has both /e/ and /ɛ/, the relation of these two sounds to the corresponding Proto-Romance sounds is quite complex. In most cases, in fact, original Proto-Romance /e/ and /ɛ/ actually swapped places, with an intermediary step being a separate phoneme /ǝ/ that still exists in the Balearic Islands (in Western Catalan, most original /ɛ/ turned into /e/).
• Catalan is notable for vowel reduction in unstressed syllables: Eastern Catalan vowels reduce to three (/a/, /ɛ/ and /e/ → [ə]; /ɔ/, /o/, and /u/ → [u]; and /i/ → [i], except for most of Majorcan where a fourth unstressed vowel may appear, that is, unstressed /ɔ/ and /o/ normally merge with [o]), while Western Catalan vowels reduce to five (/a/ → [a]; /ɛ/ and /e/ → [e]; /ɔ/ and /o/ → [o]; /u/ → [u]; and /i/ → [i]).

Consonants[link]

The consonant system of Catalan is rather conservative, shared with most modern Western Romance languages. Notable features:

• Most occurrences of /l/ are heavily velarized: [ɫ] (feature shared with European Portuguese).
• Voiced obstruents are devoiced word-finally (feature shared with Occitan).
• Voiced plosives /b d ɡ/ are lenited [β ð ɣ] after a continuant. Exceptions include /d/ after lateral consonants and /b/ after /f/ (feature shared with Ibero-Romance languages, such as Spanish, Galician or European Portuguese).
• Phonetic work done by Daniel Recasens shows the postalveolar sibilants /ʃ ʒ tʃ dʒ/ to be alveolo-palatal (palatalized postalveolars): [ɕ], [ʑ], [tɕ] and [dʑ], respectively (however, since ⟨ʃ ʒ tʃ dʒ⟩ are overwhelmingly used in the linguistic literature on Catalan and Valencian, those characters are also used at Wikipedia).
• In standard Catalan, original /dʒ/ remains as /tʃ/ word-finally, and elsewhere splits lexically into /ʒ/ and /dʒ/ (cf. French and Portuguese, where /dʒ/ never occurred word-finally and with uniform reduction to /ʒ/ elsewhere). In standard Valencian instead, the presence of /dʒ/ for /ʒ/ reflects the historical change /ʒ/ > /dʒ/ and the failure for /dʒ/ to become /ʒ/ (feature shared with Occitan and standard Italian).
• Unlike elsewhere, no native /tʃ/ ever arose in the medieval period. Current /tʃ/ are largely due to late strengthening of /ʃ/ in certain Catalan dialects (and in words borrowed from them into standard Catalan), or in foreign borrowings.
• Unlike most other Western Romance languages, Catalan has phonemic geminate consonants. These are restricted to nasals, laterals and the voiced plosives /b/ and /ɡ/.

Phonological evolution[link]

Catalan is one of the Western Romance languages, which forms a dialect chain running across Iberia from Portuguese through Astur-Leonese, Spanish and Aragonese. From there, the chain runs across the Pyrenees to various Occitan dialects: either northwest to Gascon and Limousin, or north to Languedocien; then from Languedocien, either north to Auvergnat and eventually French, northeast to Franco-Provençal and the Rhaeto-Romance languages, or east through Provençal and across to Ligurian and the other Gallo-Italian languages.

As a result, Catalan shares many of the basic features of the Western Romance languages, and more specifically evinces linguistic features similar to those of its closest neighbors (Occitan, Aragonese, Sardinian, Spanish and Italian). Catalan is most closely related to Occitan, only diverging from it towards the end of the first millennium AD. Since then, the Ibero-Romance languages have exerted a large conservatizing force over Catalan, preventing it from taking part in many later Occitan changes.

The following sections list:

1. The most important features grouping Catalan with the Western Romance languages against the Italo-Romance languages.
2. The main features shared with Occitan, usually considered the closest relative to Catalan.
3. Features not shared with Occitan, but shared with one or more Ibero-Romance language (often due to preservation where Occitan later innovated).
4. Features unique to Catalan.

Common features with Western Romance[link]

Common features with Western Romance languages, but not Italo-Romance:

• Palatalization of all coronal and velar consonants followed by yod /j/ (Latin -e-, -i-, -ae-, -oe- or -y-): caelvm 'sky, heaven' → Old Catalan cel /ˈtsɛl/ → modern /ˈsɛl/ (cf. Italian cielo /ˈtʃɛlo/).
• Voicing and lenition of intervocalic obstruents -p-, t- and -k-: capra 'goat' → cabra, catēna 'chain' → cadena, secūris 'safe' → segur (cf. Italian capra, catena, sicuro).
• Degemination of plosives: bvcca 'mouth' → boca, qvattvordecim 'fourteen' → catorze (cf. Italian bocca, quattordici).
• Development of c in -ct-, -cs- into palatal /j/ (vs. /tː/, /sː/ and /ʃː/ in Italian).
• Apico-alveolar pronunciation of /s/ and /z/, except for Valencian where they may be either apico-alveolar or lamino-alveolar (such minimal distinction was once common to all Western Romance languages, but has since disappeared from most).

Common features with Occitan[link]

Common features with Occitan, but not French and Spanish:

• Development of late final /v/ into /w/: nāvis 'ship' → nau (cf. French nef, Spanish non-final nave).
• Loss of word-final (originally intervocalic) -n: pānis 'bread' → pa, vīnvm 'wine' → vi (cf. French pain, vin; Spanish pan, vino; some Occitan dialects –e.g. Provençal– also keep the -n).

Common features with Southern Occitan but not Northern Occitan:

• Reduction of consonant cluster -nd- to -n-: mandāre 'to send' → manar, vnda 'wave' → ona (cf. Gascon and Southern Languedocien manar, ona; standard Occitan mandar, onda).^[22]
• Merger of Proto-Western-Romance /ð/ (from intervocalic -d-) and /dz/ (from intervocalic -ti-, -c(e)-, -c(i)-). The result was originally /z/ or /dz/, still preserved in Occitan and partly in Old Catalan, but in modern Catalan now developed to /w/ (in word-final position) or lost (in intervocalic position). See unique features of Catalan further below.
• Old intervocalic /dʒ/ (Latin -dvc-, -di(cv)-, -ti(cv)- and -nicv-) remains as modern /ʒ ~ dʒ/ (Catalan and Gascon) or /dʒ/ (Valencian and Occitan):
  • /dʒ/: medicvs 'doctor' → metge, silvaticvs 'wild' → salvatge (cf. Occitan mètge, salvatge; Provençal sauvatge).
  • /ʒ/: invidia 'envy' → enveja, diēs dominica 'Sunday' → diumenge (cf. Occitan enveja, dimenge; but diménegue in Provençal. In Valencian and most Occitan dialects merged with /dʒ/).

In final position, /dʒ/ became voiceless /tʃ/ in Catalan and Valencian, while in modern Occitan it was vocalized (to /i̯/ and /u̯/) in most cases: radivs 'ray' → raig, faciō 'I do' → faig, podivm 'balcony' → puig 'hill' (cf. Occitan rai, fau; but puèg or puòg). Note that in some nonstandard Catalan dialects (i.e. Pallarese, Ribagorçan and Northern Catalan) old /dʒ/ was also vocalized (to /i̯/) in the coda: podivm 'ray' → raig /ˈratʃ/ → [ˈraj] (cf. Occitan rai, Portuguese raio Spanish rayo).

Common features with Occitan and French, but not Spanish and Portuguese:

• Loss of final unstressed vowels except -a, and devoicing of newly final obstruents: mūrvm 'wall' → mur, capvt 'head' → cap, frīgidvs 'cold' → fred /ˈfɾɛd/ or /ˈfɾed/ → [ˈfɾɛt] or [ˈfɾet] (cf. Spanish muro, cabeza, frío; Portuguese muro, cabeça, frio).
• Conditioned diphthongization of Latin stressed -e- and -o- (short ⟨ĕ⟩ /ɛ/ and ⟨ŏ⟩ /ɔ/) before palatal consonants: coxa 'hip' → cuixa 'thigh', octō 'eight' → vuit/huit, but factvm 'done' → *feit → fet (cf. Spanish cojo 'lame', ocho, hecho; Portuguese coxa –earlier coixa, but oito, feito).
• Epenthesis of /ə/ (Eastern Catalan) or /e/ (Western Catalan) in syllable-final position after clusters: templvm 'temple' → temple, qvattvor 'four' → quatre (cf. Spanish templo, cuatro; Portuguese templo, quatro).
• Preservation of initial pl-, cl-, fl-: plicāre 'fold' → aplegar 'to reach', clāvis 'key' → clau, flamma 'flame' → flama (cf. Spanish llegar, llave, llama; Portuguese chegar, chave, chama).

Common features with Occitan, French, Galician and Portuguese, but not Spanish:

• Initial Vulgar Latin /j/ and palatalized /d/, /ɡ/ → */dʒ/ → /ʒ/ (standard Catalan) or /dʒ/ (standard Valencian), rather than Spanish /j/, and preserved in all cases, rather than lost in unstressed syllables: gelvm 'ice' → gel, iectāre 'to throw' → gitar 'to throw (out/up), lay down' (cf. Spanish hielo, echar).
• Initial /f/ remains as such, whereas in Spanish it became /h/ then silent before a vowel (i.e. unless preceding /ɾ/, /l/, /w/, /j/): filivs 'son' → fill; fāmes 'hunger' → fam (cf. Spanish hijo, hambre; Gascon actually develops /f/ into /h/ in all circumstances, even before consonants or semivowels).
• Western Romance /ʎ/ (from Latin -cvl-, -tvl-, -le- and -li-) remains rather than becoming Old Spanish */(d)ʒ/ (modern /x/): mvlier 'wife' → muller, avricvla 'ear' → orella, vetvlvs 'old' → vell (cf. Spanish mujer, oreja, viejo).
• Development of -ct- to /jt/ (then into /t/ in most cases), rather than further development to /tʃ/ (many Occitan dialects, in fact, also have /tʃ/): lac(te) 'milk' → *lleit → llet, lvcta 'fight' → lluita (cf. Spanish leche, lucha; Gascon lèit, luta; standard Occitan lach, lucha).

Common features with Occitan, French and Portuguese, but not Spanish and Galician:

• Medieval voiced sibilants remain as such (e.g. casa /ˈkazə/ or /ˈkaza/ 'house'), whereas in Spanish and Galician they merge into voiceless sibilants (cf. Spanish and Galician casa /ˈkasa/).

Common features with Occitan, Galician and Portuguese, but not French and Spanish:

• Preservation (non-diphthongization) of Vulgar Latin stressed -e- and -o- (short ⟨ĕ⟩ /ɛ/ and ⟨ŏ⟩ /ɔ/): mel 'honey' → mel, fortis 'strong' → fort (cf. Spanish miel, fuerte; French miel, but fort).

Features not in common with Occitan[link]

Common with Spanish:

• Development of -av- to /ɔ/ (/o/ in Spanish) and -ai- to /e/: cavla 'cabbage' → col, lāicvs 'laity' → llec –also laic– (cf. Spanish col, lego –also laico–, Occitan caulet, laic).
• Reduction of consonant cluster -mb- to -m-: camba 'leg' → cama, plvmbvs 'lead' (metal) → plom, colvmbvs 'dove' → colom (cf. Spanish cama 'bed', plomo, paloma; Portuguese cama 'bed', but lombo, pombo. In standard Occitan /mb/ is kept in intervocalic position: camba /ˈkambɔ/, while it is reduced to /n/ word-finally: colomb /kuˈlun/, plomb /ˈplun/. In Southern Occitan dialects, such as Gascon or Southern Languedocien, intervocalic /mb/ is simplified to /m/ as in Catalan or Spanish).
• Palatalization of intervocalic -ll- and -nn- to -ll- /ʎ/ and -ny- /ɲ/: caballvs 'horse' → cavall, annvs 'year' → any (cf. Spanish caballo, año; Portuguese cavalo, ano; Occitan caval, annada). In a few cases, /l/ appears as a result of early simplification of -ll- after a long vowel: vīlla 'town' → vila, st(r)ēlla 'star' → Western Catalan estrela, Eastern estrella –also estel– (cf. Spanish villa, estrella; Portuguese vila, estrela; Occitan vila, estela).

Common with Astur-Leonese, but not Portuguese or Spanish:

• Palatalization of initial l-: lūna 'moon' → lluna, lvpvs 'wolf' → llop (cf. Asturian lluna, llobu; Occitan luna, lop).

Common with Astur-Leonese, Galician, Portuguese and Spanish, but not French

• Preservation of Western Romance long ū /uː/ and short u /ʊ/ as /u/ and /o/, rather than Gallo-Romance /y/ and /u/: lūna 'moon' → lluna /ˈʎunə/~/ˈʎuna/, dvplvm 'double' → doble /ˈdobːlə/~/ˈdoble/ (cf. Spanish luna /ˈluna/, doble /ˈdoble/; Portuguese lua /ˈluɐ/, dobro –also duplo– /ˈdobɾu/; Occitan luna /ˈlynɔ/, doble /ˈduble/).

Common with Astur-Leonese, Galician, Portuguese and Italian, but not Spanish or French:

• Palatalization of -sc- and -ss- (before yod) and -x- to /(i̯)ʃ/: piscis 'fish' → peix, laxare 'to loosen' (later 'to let') → deixar (cf. Astur-Leonese pexe, dexar; Portuguese peixe, deixar; Gascon peish, deishar; standard Occitan peis, daissar/laissar). Especially visible in verbs of the third conjugation (-īre) that took what was originally an inchoative infix (-ēsc-/-īsc-): Vulgar Latin patēscit (Classical Latin patitvr) 'suffers' (present tense, 3rd person singular indicative) → pateix/patix (cf. Italian patisce, Occitan patís).

Unique features not found elsewhere[link]

• Unusual development of early /(d)z/, resulting from merger of Proto-Western-Romance /ð/ (from intervocalic -d-) and /dz/ (from intervocalic -ti-, -c(e)-, -c(i)-). In early Old Catalan, became /w/ finally or before a consonant, remained as /(d)z/ between vowels. In later Old Catalan, /(d)z/ lost between vowels in most cases:
  • pēs, pēdis 'foot' → *petz → peu
  • crvx, crvcis 'cross' → *crotz → (*crou) → creu and crēdit 'he believes' → *creu → (ell) creu
  • Verbs in second-person plural ending in -tis: mirātis 'you (pl.) look' → *miratz → mirau → mireu/mirau
  • ratiō 'reason' → *razó → raó
  • vīcīnvs 'neighbor' → *vezí → veí
  • recipere 'to receive' → *rezebre → rebre

• Nevertheless, /dz/ has been retained in intervocalic position in some exceptional cases (Latin -dec- followed by yod, rare instances of Latin intervocalic -c(e)-, -c(i)-, in Arabic loanwords and in Graeco-Latin learned words):
  • dvodecim 'twelve' → dotze
  • tredecim 'thirteen' → tretze
  • bucīna 'horn' → botzina
  • medicīna 'medicine' → metzina (Old Catalan) → medicina or medecina 'medicine' vs. metzines 'toxic substances'
  • sēdecim 'sixteen' → setze
  • ὁρίζωv trans. horizōn 'horizon' → horīzon → horitzó
  • زهر trans. zahr 'dice' → atzar 'chance, hazard'
  • Suffix -ιζειν trans. -izein '-ize or -ise' → -izāre → -itzar (e.g. realitzar 'realize/realise')
• Partial reversal of Proto-Western-Romance /e/ and /ɛ/, according to the following stages:
  • (1) Stressed /e/ → /ǝ/ in most circumstances
  • (2) Stressed /ɛ/ → /e/ in most circumstances
  • (3) Stressed /ǝ/ maintained as such (in Balearic Catalan); /ǝ/ → /ɛ/ (in Central Catalan); /ǝ/ → /e/ (in Western Catalan)

• Secondary development of doubled resonant consonants (/mː/, /nː/, /lː/ and /ʎː/): septimāna 'week' → setmana /səmˈmanə/, cvtina from cvtis 'skin' → cotna /ˈkonːə/ 'pork rind', atleta /əlˈlɛtə/, modvlvm 'mold' → motlle /ˈmɔʎːə/ 'mold, a spring' (however, /ʎː/ does not occur in Valencian and Balearic Catalan: motle /ˈmɔlːe/~/ˈmɔːlə/).

Grammar[link]

The first descriptive and normative grammar book of modern Catalan was written by Pompeu Fabra in 1918. In 1995, a new grammar by Antoni Maria Badia i Margarit was published, which also documents the Valencian and Balearic varieties.

The grammar of Catalan follows the general pattern of Western Romance languages. The primary word order is SVO (subject–verb–object).^[23]

Substantives and adjectives are not declined by case, as in Classical Latin. There are two grammatical genders—masculine and feminine.

Grammatical articles developed from Latin demonstratives. The form of the article depends on the gender and the number of the subject and the first sounds of the word and can be combined with prepositions that precede them. A unique feature of Catalan is a definite article that may precede personal names in certain contexts. Its basic form is en and it can change according to its environment: en Joan meaning 'John', na Maria meaning 'Mary' (note clitic en has also other lexical meanings). One of the common usages of this article is in the word can, a combination of la casa shortened to ca ('house', as French chez) and en, which here means 'the'. For example la casa d'en Sergi becomes can Sergi meaning 'the house of Sergi', 'Sergi's house'. Note here, other definite articles (el, la, els, les) can also be used with personal names like in Portuguese, as la Maria ('Mary', Portuguese a Maria).

Verbs are conjugated according to tense and mood similarly to other Western Romance languages. Present, imperfect and simple preterite are based on classical Latin present, imperfect and perfect respectively, future and conditional are formed from the infinitive followed by the present and imperfect form of the auxiliary verb haver (written together and not considered periphrastic). Periphrastic tenses are formed from the conjugated auxiliary verbs haver ('to have') and ésser ('to be') followed by the past participle. A unique tense in Catalan is the "periphrastic simple preterite," which is formed of vaig, vas (or vares), va, vam (or vàrem), vau (or vàreu) and van (there is the usual wrong idea these forms are the conjugated forms of anar, which means 'to go'), which is followed by the infinitive of the verb. Thus, jo vaig parlar (or more simply vaig parlar) means 'I spoke'.

Nominative pronouns are often omitted, as the subject can be usually derived from the conjugated verb. The Catalan rules for combination of the object pronoun clitics with verbs, articles and other pronouns are significantly more complex than in most other Romance languages; see Weak pronouns in Catalan.

Morphology[link]

• The definite articles el, la, els, les derive from Latin demonstratives ille, illa. The older forms lo (m. s.) and los (m. pl.) are still common nowadays in some western dialects and in Algherese. Several varieties of the Catalan language (Balearic Islands, Costa Brava, and Tàrbena) have maintained an article called salat (< Latin ipse, ipsa → es, sa), probably formed before the variants of ille developed. Singular articles are elided before vowel-initial words, in speech and writing: el + home > l'home 'the man', la + hora > l'hora 'the time'.
• Possessive adjectives are formed with the definite article (el meu gos 'my dog') like in Italian (il mio cane), Portuguese (o meu cão) and in many Occitan dialects (Languedocien and Pyrenean Gascon). Weak forms of possessive adjectives (mon, ma, mos, mes, etc.) are fossilized for certain usages, as close familiar relatives or in order to express a high degree of affection (for instance: mon pare 'my dad', ma mare 'my mum'; in Valencian ma casa 'my home', ma vida 'my life'). Also note the postposition of the possessive to express particular nuances, e.g. casa meva ('my home', literally 'a house of mine') as different from la meva casa ('my house').
• Plurals are formed in a number of ways:
  • -a becomes -es (e.g. casa 'house' > cases).
  • Most consonant- and vowel-final words (except -a) add -s: noi 'boy' > nois, detall 'detail' > detalls
  • Words ending in sibilants (-s, -ç, -x, -ig) form plurals with -os: gos 'dog' > gossos, peix 'fish' > peixos. Some plural words with -ig may alternate forming plural by adding -os or a silent -s: raig 'ray' > rajos/raigs.
  • Words ending in sibilant clusters (-sc, -st, -xt) may form plurals by adding -os or -s: bosc 'forest' > boscos/boscs, aquest 'this' > aquestos/aquests.
  • Words ending in a stressed vowel often take -ns: pi 'pine' > pins, cinturó 'belt' > cinturons (but esquí 'ski' > esquís, tabú 'taboo' > tabús). In Western Catalan dialects, some particular words ending in unstressed vowels may also form plural by adding -ns: home 'man' > hòmens (from Latin homo > homines).
• Partitive: While Catalan patterns with Ibero-Romance in the lack of a partitive article (e.g. vull pa 'I want some bread', cf. Spanish quiero pan but French je veux du pain), it does have a partitive pronoun, like in Gallo-Romance languages: jo en tinc tres 'I have three of them' (Spanish tengo tres but French j'en ai trois).
• The construction used to express punctual/perfective aspect in the past tense is one of the most distinctive features of Catalan. It is a periphrasis formed with a special conjugation of anar ('to go'), that comes from the Latin verb vadere, plus the infinitive form of the main verb. For example: jo vaig dir ('I said'). This construction has almost completely replaced the historical simple past form (jo diguí), which corresponds to the Spanish preterit or French passé simple.

Catalan names[link]

Catalan naming customs are similar to those of Spain and Portugal; people take two surnames–their father's and their mother's–which are separated by the particle i, meaning 'and' (in Spanish the equivalent particle is written y, but often omitted altogether).

For example, the full name of the architect Antoni Gaudí is Antoni Gaudí i Cornet after his parents: Francesc Gaudí i Serra and Antònia Cornet i Bertran, meaning he was son of Gaudí and Cornet.

Examples[link]