Last week I wrote about the Valley of Aran, which has historical and linguistic connections to the Basque Country. In the Valley of Aran, the local language is Occitan, which is related to Gascon, which has its own connections to Euskara. In fact, the words Gascon and Basque come from the same Latin root.

• Gascon is related to Occitan. Some linguists consider it a dialect of Occitan while others classify it as its own language. Regardless, the two languages are clearly related: both Romance languages derived from Latin. One way they differ is in the underlying linguistic substrate.
• While Occitan has influences from the Gauls, Gascon is influenced by Euskara. There are a few ways this influence manifests itself in the language:
  • Words that in Latin would begin with /f/ instead begin with /h/.
  • Words cannot start with /r/. Instead, such words have to have a vowel added to their beginning.
  • There are some words in Gascon that don’t appear in other Romance languages. One example is sarri, meaning chamois, which in Basque is sarrio.
  • Some of these features are actually something Gascon has in common with Spanish and Portuguese, implying a Basque influence on those languages as well.
• Finally, the word Gascon comes from same Latin root vasco/vasconem that gives us the word Basque. Gascon is primarily spoken in southwest France, in Gascony and Béarn. At one time, the region was part of the Duchy of Gascony or, alternatively, the Duchy of Vasconia. There are dialects of Gascon, such as Aranese which is a co-official language of Catalunya.
• Similarly, Gascon has influenced Basque. One clear example is the word for glass, which in Basque is beira. Further, Gascon was widely spoken in Basque cities such as Donostia at least until the 18th century.
• Some historians suggest that Gascons are Proto-Basques that became Romanized.

A full list of all of Buber’s Basque Facts of the Week can be found in the Archive.

Primary sources: Gascon dialect, Wikipedia; Gascón (occitano), Wikipedia; Cierbide Martinena, Ricardo. Gascón. Auñamendi Encyclopedia. Available at: https://aunamendi.eusko-ikaskuntza.eus/en/gascon/ar-149610/