Old Spanish

(/s/ and /z/ were apico-alveolar.)

These were still distinct phonemes in Old Spanish, judging by the consistency with which the graphemes ⟨b⟩ and ⟨v⟩ were distinguished.^[a] Nevertheless, the two could be confused in consonant clusters (as in alba~alva “dawn”) or in word-initial position, perhaps after /n/ or a pause. /b/ and /β/ appear to have merged in word-initial position by about 1400 and in all other environments by the mid–late 16th century at the latest.^[2]

At an archaic stage, the realizations of /h/ (from Latin /f/) would have been approximately as follows:^[3]

• [ɸ] before [i e a] or [j ɾ l]
• [h]^[b] before [o] or [u]
• [ʍ] or [hɸ] before [w]

By early Old Spanish, [ɸ] had been replaced with [h] before all vowels^[4] and possibly before [j] as well.^[5]

In later Old Spanish, surviving [ɸ] and [ʍ]/[hɸ] were modified to [f] in urban speech, likely due to the influx of numerous French and Occitan speakers (and their particular pronunciation of Latin) beginning in the twelfth century.^[6] Various words with [f] were then borrowed into Spanish, leading to minimal pairs like [ˈfoɾma] “form” (a borrowing) and [ˈhoɾma] “shoemaker's last” (inherited from Latin forma). The result was a new phoneme /f/, distinct from /h/.^[7]

Possibly realized as [d͡ʒ] after pauses or certain consonants^[8] (judging by outcomes in Judeo-Spanish).^[9]

1. /t͡s d͡z/ deaffricated to /s̻ z̻/.^[c]
2. /z̻ z ʒ/ devoiced and merged into /s̻ s ʃ/.^[d]
3. /ʃ/ was retracted to /x/.
4. /s̻/ (depending on dialect) merged into /s/ or fronted to /θ/.

Old Spanish was generally written in some variation of the Latin script. It was also sometimes written in Arabic script in a practice called Aljamiado.

These sounds were spelt ⟨nn⟩ and ⟨ll⟩ respectively.^[e] ⟨nn⟩ was often abbreviated to ⟨ñ⟩, which went on to become the normal spelling of /ɲ/ in Modern Spanish.

Old Spanish featured the digraphs ⟨ch⟩, ⟨ph⟩, ⟨(r)rh⟩, and ⟨th⟩ which were simplified to ⟨c⟩, ⟨f⟩, ⟨(r)r⟩, ⟨t⟩ in Modern Spanish. Examples include:

• christiano (modern cristiano)
• triumpho (modern triunfo)
• myrrha (modern mirra)
• theatro (modern teatro)

⟨y⟩ often stood for /i/ in word-initial position. In this context it has since been respelt to ⟨i⟩ in Modern Spanish.

(The following table does not account for sandhi contexts.)

In Old Spanish, perfect constructions of movement verbs, such as ir ('(to) go') and venir ('(to) come'), were formed using the auxiliary verb ser ('(to) be'), as in Italian and French: Las mugieres son llegadas a Castiella was used instead of Las mujeres han llegado a Castilla ('The women have arrived in Castilla').

Possession was expressed with the verb aver (Modern Spanish haber, '(to) have'), rather than tener: Pedro ha dos fijas was used instead of Pedro tiene dos hijas ('Pedro has two daughters').

In the perfect tenses, the past participle often agreed with the gender and number of the direct object: María ha cantadas dos canciones was used instead of Modern Spanish María ha cantado dos canciones ('María has sung two songs'). However, that was inconsistent even in the earliest texts.

The prospective aspect was formed with the verb ir ('(to) go') along with the verb in infinitive, with the difference that Modern Spanish includes the preposition a:

Al Çid beso la mano, la senna ua tomar. (Cantar de mio Cid, 691)

Al Cid besó la mano, la enseña va a tomar. (Modern Spanish equivalent)

Personal pronouns and substantives were placed after the verb in any tense or mood unless a stressed word was before the verb.^{[example needed]}

The future and the conditional tenses were not yet fully grammaticalised as inflections; rather, they were still periphrastic formations of the verb aver in the present or imperfect indicative followed by the infinitive of a main verb.^[11] Pronouns, therefore, by the general placement rules, could be inserted between the main verb and the auxiliary in these periphrastic tenses, as still occurs with Portuguese (mesoclisis):

E dixo: ― Tornar-m-é a Jherusalem. (Fazienda de Ultra Mar, 194)

Y dijo: ― Me tornaré a Jerusalén. (literal translation into Modern Spanish)

E disse: ― Tornar-me-ei a Jerusalém. (literal translation into Portuguese)

And he said: "I will return to Jerusalem." (English translation)

En pennar gelo he por lo que fuere guisado (Cantar de mio Cid, 92)

Se lo empeñaré por lo que sea razonable (Modern Spanish equivalent)

Penhorar-lho-ei pelo que for razoável (Portuguese equivalent)

I will pawn them it for whatever it be reasonable (English translation)

When there was a stressed word before the verb, the pronouns would go before the verb: non gelo empeñar he por lo que fuere guisado.

Generally, an unstressed pronoun and a verb in simple sentences combined into one word.^{[clarification needed]} In a compound sentence, the pronoun was found in the beginning of the clause: la manol va besar = la mano le va a besar.^{[citation needed]}

The future subjunctive was in common use (fuere in the second example above) but it is generally now found only in legal or solemn discourse and in the spoken language in some dialects, particularly in areas of Venezuela, to replace the imperfect subjunctive.^[12] It was used similarly to its Modern Portuguese counterpart, in place of the modern present subjunctive in a subordinate clause after si, cuando etc., when an event in the future is referenced:

Si vos assi lo fizieredes e la ventura me fuere complida

Mando al vuestro altar buenas donas e ricas (Cantar de mio Cid, 223–224)

Si vosotros así lo hiciereis y la ventura me fuere cumplida,

Mando a vuestro altar ofrendas buenas y ricas (Modern Spanish equivalent)

Se vós assim o fizerdes e a ventura me for cumprida,

Mando a vosso altar oferendas boas e ricas. (Portuguese equivalent.)

If you do so and fortune is favourable toward me,

I will send to your altar fine and rich offerings (English translation)

The following is a sample from Cantar de Mio Cid (lines 330–365), with abbreviations resolved, punctuation (the original has none), and some modernized letters.^[13] Below is the original Old Spanish text in the first column, along with the same text in Modern Spanish in the second column and an English translation in the third column.

O glorious Lord, Father who art in Heaven,
Thou madest Heaven and Earth, and on the third day the sea,
Thou madest the stars and the Moon, and the Sun for warmth,
Thou incarnatedst Thyself of the Blessed Mother Mary,
In Bethlehem Thou appearedst, for it was Thy will,
Shepherds glorified Thee, they gave Thee praise,
Three kings of Arabia came to worship Thee,
Melchior, Caspar, and Balthazar; offered Thee
Gold, frankincense, and myrrh, for it was Thy will.
Thou savedst Jonah when he fell into the sea,
Thou savedst Daniel from the lions in the terrible jail,
Thou savedst Saint Sebastian in Rome,
Thou savedst Saint Susan from the false charge,
On Earth Thou walkedst thirty-two years, Spiritual Lord,
Performing miracles, thus we have of which to speak,
Of the water Thou madest wine and of the stone bread,
Thou revivedst Lazarus, because it was Thy will,
Thou leftest Thyself to be arrested by the Jews, where they call Mount Calvary,
They placed Thee on the Cross, in the place called Golgotha,
Two thieves with Thee, these of split paths,
One is in Paradise, but the other did not enter there,
Being on the Cross Thou didst a very great virtue,
Longinus was blind ever he saw Thee,
He gave Thee a blow with the lance in the broadside, where he left the blood,
Running down the arm, the hands Thou hadst spread,
Raised it up, as it led to Thy face,
Opened their eyes, saw all parts,
And believed in Thee then, thus saved them from evil.
Thou revivedst in the tomb and went to Hell,
For it was Thy will,
Thou hast broken the doors and brought out the holy fathers.
Thou art King of Kings and of all the world Father,
I worship Thee and I believe in all Thy will,
And I pray to Saint Peter to help with my prayer,
For my Cid the Champion, that God nurse from evil,
When we part today, that we are joined in this life or the next.

• History of the Spanish language
• Early Modern Spanish (Middle Spanish)
• Judeo-Spanish preserves some of the sounds and terms of Old Spanish that have been lost in Modern Spanish.

• Bradley, Travis G.; Lozano, Claire Julia (2022). "Language contact and phonological innovation in the voiced prepalatal obstruents of Judeo-Spanish". Languages. 7 (4): 313. doi:10.3390/languages7040313.
• Eberhard, David M.; Simons, Gary F.; Fennig, Charles D. (2020). Ethnologue: Languages of the World (23rd ed.). Dallas, Texas: SIL International. Archived from the original on 6 April 2006. Retrieved 22 June 2002.
• Hualde, José Ignacio (2013). "Intervocalic lenition and word-boundary effects". Diachronica. 30 (2): 232–266. doi:10.1075/dia.30.2.04hua.
• Lloyd, Paul M. (1987). From Latin to Spanish. Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society.
• Penny, Ralph (2002). A History of the Spanish Language (2nd ed.). Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0521011846.

• An explanation of the development of Mediaeval Spanish sibilants in Castile and Andalusia.

• Diccionario de la prosa castellana del rey Alfonso X (part of Dictionary of the Old Spanish Language)