Andalusian Arabic

Andalusian Arabic appears to have spread rapidly and been in general oral use in most parts of Al-Andalus between the 9th and 15th centuries. The number of speakers is estimated to have peaked at around 5–7 million speakers around the 11th and 12th centuries before dwindling as a consequence of the Reconquista, the gradual but relentless takeover by the Christians. In 1502, the Muslims of Granada were forced to choose between conversion and exile; those who converted became known as the Moriscos. In 1526, this requirement was extended to the Muslims elsewhere in Spain (Mudéjars). In 1567, Philip II of Spain issued a royal decree in Spain forbidding Moriscos from the use of Arabic on all occasions, formal and informal, speaking and writing. Using Arabic in any sense of the word would be regarded as a crime. They were given three years to learn a "Christian" language, after which they would have to get rid of all Arabic written material. This triggered one of the largest revolts, the Rebellion of the Alpujarras (1568–71). Still, Andalusian Arabic remained in use in certain areas of Spain (particularly the inner regions of the Kingdom of Valencia) until the final expulsion of the Moriscos at the beginning of the 17th century.[2]

As in every other Arabic-speaking land, native speakers of Andalusian Arabic were diglossic, that is, they spoke their local dialect in all low-register situations, but only Classical Arabic was resorted to when a high register was required and for written purposes as well.

Andalusian Arabic belongs to the pre-Hilalian dialects of the Maghrebi Arabic family, with its closest relative being Moroccan Arabic. Like other Maghrebi Arabic dialects, Andalusian does not differentiate between sedentary and bedouin varieties. By contrast, Andalusian does not show any detectable difference between religious communities, such as Muslim Muladis, Christian Mozarabs, and Jews, unlike in North Africa where Judeo-Arabic dialects were common.

The oldest evidence of Andalusian Arabic utterances can be dated from the 10th and 11th century, in isolated quotes, both in prose and stanzaic Classical Andalusi poems (muwashahat), and then, from the 11th century on, in stanzaic dialectal poems (zajal) and dialectal proverb collections, while its last documents are a few business records and one letter written at the beginning of the 17th century in Valencia.[2]

Andalusi Arabic is still used in Andalusian classical music and has significantly influenced the dialects of such towns as Sfax in Tunisia, Tétouan and Tangier in Morocco, Nedroma, Tlemcen, Blida, and Cherchell in Algeria, and Alexandria in Egypt.[3] Modern Spanish converts to Islam have tried to revive the language.

The language also exerted some influence on Mozarabic, Spanish (particularly Andalusian), Ladino, Catalan-Valencian-Balearic, Portuguese, Classical Arabic and Moroccan, Tunisian, Egyptian, Hassani and Algerian Arabics.

Many features of Andalusian Arabic have been reconstructed by Arabists using Hispano-Arabic texts (such as the azjāl of ibn Quzman, al-Shushtari and others) composed in Arabic with varying degrees of deviation from classical norms, augmented by further information from the manner in which the Arabic script was used to transliterate Romance words.

• Varieties of Arabic
• Maghrebi Arabic
• Imala
• Aljamiado

• Corriente, Frederico (1997), A Dictionary of Andalusi Arabic, New York: Brill
• Singer, Hans-Rudolf (1981), "Zum arabischen Dialekt von Valencia", Oriens, Brill, 27, pp. 317–323, doi:10.2307/1580571, JSTOR 1580571
• Corriente, Frederico (1978), "Los fonemas /p/ /č/ y /g/ en árabe hispánico", Vox Romanica, 37, pp. 214–18