Namesakes

A namesake is un tocayo, so on meeting someone who shares his or her first name, a Spanish person is likely to remark soy tocayo tuyo or soy tocaya tuya as the case may be. Or, if you tend to look as things from your own point of view, eres tocayo mío / eres tocaya mía – you’re my namesake.

Tocayo is said only of first names and not a surname -  un apellido, possibly because usually there is little novelty value in coming across your own, especially if it happens to be García or Martínez – two of the world’s most common.  

Catalina, Jasper and Flora all have namesakes

 

But even the commonest Spanish surnames are special in their own way, though, because a woman does not relinquish hers on marriage and also bestows her surname on her children.

In earlier times when children tended to be born (if not always conceived - in wedlock, those who were not and whose fathers declined to acknowledge them and register the birth had to bear the burden of going through life with only the mother’s surname.

Society might have been paralytically rigid on the surface and the rules never openly flouted but they were bendable.  Before divorce was legalised, couples did separate and more than one baby from a second relationship was registered in the local records – registro and Libro de Familia (the Family Book or personal register issued on marriage) as though born to the father’s legal wife.

A man who could afford the expense (and many who could not) kept a mistress – una querida, literally a loved one.  Less-loved by the wife, she would unlovingly describe her as la otra – the other.

Even a superficial glance reveals how most Spanish surnames have English counterparts, although their prevalence or scarceness vary as widely as both societies at the time when people acquired them.

There’s probably level pegging between Pastor – Shepherd but Herrero, the Spanish equivalent of Smith, which is one of our commonest last names, is less common here. 

Mayordomo is not as widespread as Butler and nor is Tejero – Tiler (an English Tyler) but you’re more likely to find an Escribano than a Scrivener and will probably have a long wait before being introduced to a Tornero - Turner.

The surname Batanero – Fuller exists, but isn’t particularly popular, possibly because Spain was less bothered about processing cloth than exporting its raw materials. 

It’s easier to come across a Sastre – Tailor (an English Taylor) although you don’t often come across the equivalent to Fletcher which is an obliging Flechero.  Nevertheless you occasionally encounter the surname Flecha which – surprise, surprise – means Arrow. 

Christian names appear as surnames, too, of which María, Marías, Elvira, Elena, Ricardo, Bautista are just a few. Some bear a built-in –ez, the equivalent of an English son: González – son of Gonzálo; Benítez – son of Benito; Estebánez – son of Esteban  and Juanez, which is exactly the same as Johnson.

Towns, cities, provinces, countries or nationalities account for many Spanish surnames: Soler, Ocaña, Castilla, España, Catalán, Toledo, Madrid, Sevilla, Bilbao, Inglés, Francés and Alemán and so on and so on from one end of Spain to the other and half-way across Europe.

The prefixes Ben- and Ab- usually denote Jewish or Moslem origin, but city surnames – for instance Madrid, Toledo – are another indication of Jewish or Moorish ancestry. 

At the end of the fifteenth century the Reyes Católicos – Catholic Monarchs expelled all Jews and Moslems unless they converted to Christianity and many changed their names, adopting the name of the city where they lived.  Others chose a saint’s name: San Juan, Sanjuan, Santamaría, San Pedro or Sampedro  (where the –n becomes an –m in line with spelling rules). 

When a first name is used as a family name, it is often preceded by de: E de Juan or de Andrés for instance.  This also happens when a surname is a noun: Dolores del Río.

Some surnames originating as nicknames occur in in both languages: Rubio – Blond, Blanco – White, Valiente – Valiant but some, like Mago – Magician, Regatero – Bargainer and Izquierdo – Left, do not (although a telephone directory might say otherwise).

Others recall an employer or landmark: Conde – Count, Barón – Baron, Castillo – Castle, Sala – Hall, Ribera - Riverbank.  Spellings can vary, as in English, and for the same illiterate reasons on the part of clerics or registrars, which is why you get Rivera too. 

Spanish surnames are occasionally plural where ours aren’t and vice-versa: Molino – Mills, Tapias – Wall, Prado – Meadows but often they correspond exactly: Campos – Fields, Arenas – Sands.

Before migration and emigration, the prefixes in Macdonald, Fitzgerald, Tremayne were instant geographic markers for British surnames. Similarly, Ll at the beginning and –ll at the end of a name indicate Valencian, Catalonian or Balearic origin, as do surnames ending in –á: Llinares, Ripoll, Durá. 

Likewise -uru, -egui, -echea, -alday are classic Basque endings and González, Fernández and Hernández were originally Asturian; the last two are also a textbook example of how F morphed into H centuries ago.

Márquez, Marín or Carrasco originated in Andalusia.  Other surnames traditionally – but not exclusively – belonged to gypsies: Carmona, Cortés, Montés, Montoya, Correa, Reyes, Heredia, Giménez and Jiménez.

Every language possesses surnames that defy categorisation and their owners must regret that legal name-changing in Spain is such a palaver.  Like the man overheard giving his name to an hotel receptionist and who, with the weary air of one who knows what to expect because it has happened so often before, reluctantly spelt out J-o-d-a-s. 

The startled young woman looked up and exclaimed ¡no jodas! - a favourite but extremely rude phrase approximate to You don’t say!

It's all in the family

Family is a familiar-looking familia but the nearest translation for it’s all in the family would be todo se queda en casa - it all stays indoors. 

As an adjective familiar refers to family so anything proclaimed to be tamaño familiar will be family-sized. Lazos familiars are family ties (literally bows, ribbons) and un negocio familiar is a family-owned business. 

As a noun, un familiar is a family member, usually closely-related while relatives who are more distant are usually parientes.

In Spanish words hijo and hija - son and daughter crop up outside the family, too, so as well as its obvious meaning, the word is an endearment, especially in diminutive form.  ¿Qué quieres hijito? - what do you want, sonny? can be said to a two-year-old, a twenty-year-old and even a forty-year-old, if you go in for that sort of thing. 

Men rarely use hijo amongst themselves, although the paternalistic like to address women as hija, while girls and women use the word all the time, with or without a touch of irony or sarcasm.

Those with sharp ears might – but probably not often these days - still hear conscientious socialists, union members and extinct communists using the traditional hermano or hermana - brother or sister.  Outside the family, the words apply to a monk or a nun and are not used in the wise-cracking American manner.

Un tío is an uncle and una tía is an aunt, but both are much-used slang for man and woman.  The most polite way to attract someone's attention is not necessarily ¡eh tío! but a good chap won't object to being described as un buen tío.  On the other hand, un tío bueno might be both avuncular and good but this generally implies an attractive male.

 ¡Tía buena! is what workmen on building-suites call out to passing females and is an abbreviated example of a cherished Spanish tradition known as el piropo – compliment.  These can be imaginatively elaborate and although they were rarely coarse the more respectable a female deemed herself, the less respectful she would deem these kind words.

Piropos are still around and, while now tending to be more explicit, they have also moved with the times: quisiera ser página para que me agregaras a tus favoritos – I’d like to be a web page so you could add me to your Favourites.

Un tíovivo, literally a live man, isn't the opposite of a dead man but a Spanish merry-go-round.  Un primo and una prima mean a male and female cousin respectively and are also slang for a dupe.

Abuelo, abuela and the diminutives abuelito and abuelita mean grandfather and grandmother, but un abuelete or una abueleta is an old man and an old woman.  These aren't discourteous but may not be too well-received by those not feeling their age. 

The Spanish way to blow your own trumpet is no tener abuela - not to have a grandmother, since grandmothers are internationally notorious for boasting about their grandchildren.



...grandmothers are internationally notorious for boasting



¡Tu padre! however, is an abbreviated form of a traditional insult that involves one's own bowels and someone else's father.  While on the subject of insults, it is advisable to avoid hijo de puta, which means son of a whore. 

It's not a nice thing to say in any language but is so offensive in Spanish that some years ago a variety of fish was renamed palometa in order to avoid the phonetic embarrassment of asking for half a kilo of japuta.

Knowing this, you'd imagine es de puta madre is even worse as insults go.   Instead it is an incredibly uncouth but enthusiastic and vehement way to announce that something or someone is really very, very good and very, very special. 

¡Madre mia! ¡mi madre! and ¡anda mi madre! are all said when surprised, impressed or exasperated.

¡La madre que te parió! - the mother who bore you!  is an exclamation that can be a sour reaction to something said or done to you. 

Inconsistently, it can be yet another piropo if addressed to a woman, but as for the reason why, that is probably something only oedipally-challenged Spaniards – mothers’ boys all – would be capable of explaining.

Talking turkey

In times that were more austere than these and could sometimes be downright frugal Christmas Eve dinner – la cena de Nochebuena, was a high point of the year, foodwise.  Presents did not appear until 6th January, the Día de Reyes – the Epiphany and Christmas Eve and Christmas Day – el Día de Navidad were a time for eating, drinking and making merry.

They still are and Christmas Eve dinner remains the most important meal of the holiday.  In some regions, particularly the North, the table will groan under the weight of shellfish and seafood – marisco. 

In the centre of Spain, chickpea-based cocido – similar to couscous without the couscous - is another choice although it is gradually losing its appeal, being regarded as too hearty, too inelegant and no longer special enough for such a gastronomically special occasion.

A great many English-speaking foreign residents are under the impression that they are responsible for the popularity of turkey - pavo.  In fact it has been a favourite for so long that pavo became slang for a five-peseta piece, the price of a Christmas turkey in the early twentieth century.

Turkey crops up in other slangy contexts, so pelar el pavo has nothing to do with plucking a turkey but would describe the billings and cooings – ñoñerías exchanged between a courting couple, a former ritual now more outdated than a five-peseta piece. 

Anything termed a turkey because it is a flop, failure or disaster would be un fracaso, un desastre or un bodrio.  To talk turkey is ir al grano or hablar a las claras but la edad del pavo tells you nothing about the sell-by date of your Christmas dinner and is the awkward age of adolescence. 

Translated word-for-word moco de pavo is totally unedifying turkey snot but in fact this is the snood or pendulous piece of skin that hangs from a turkey’s beak and proves yet again how easy it is to get the wrong end of the translating stick.  The phrase is rarely used in a zoological sense but crops up more usually in the phrase eso no es moco de pavo – that’s something not to be sneezed at.

A peacock loses much of its glamour in the Spanish version of pavo real or royal turkey although the verb pavonearse is an ostentatious to strut, show off or brag.

Una pava is a female turkey but is also a kettle although this largely Latin American term can produce a blank reaction from European Spanish-speakers who, despite painstaking explanations, still want to refer to this as una tetera.   This is literally a teapot and could be one of the reasons why Spanish tea is never quite like mother makes.

Flora, flowerpots and... kettle

If eating out, or invited to dine in someone’s home in Levante and particularly the Murcia region you might be offered paella de pava but don’t expect it to contain the remains of the Christmas dinner.   It will indeed contain pava, a regional word for cauliflower, which might be fine for vegetarians but not what a carnivore hopes for at any time of the year.

Briefly speaking

Briefly speaking is en pocas palabras, theoretically in few words and a practice that is not remarkably Spanish.  Even our hurried half a mo’ which requests (or commands) forbearance when time is short becomes a ponderous un momento while sometimes a lengthening diminutive turns it into a barked momentito.  The use of  -ito is deliberate because Spanish resorts to suffixes to soften plain speaking or discourtesy.

The Spanish loathe being thought bad-mannered which, together with a tendency to associate formality with verborrhoea, gave rise in the past to letters which routinely ended with a compassionate …que Dios le guarde muchos años – may God grant you long life.  

Owing to lack of space, solicitous leave-takings in bureaucratic dealings were routinely abbreviated to a tangle of initials: S.S.B.S.M. – Servidor seguro besa su mano: a trusted servant kisses your hand although un servidor has lately acquired the new and not at all subservient role of an Internet server.

Public speakers in Spain are notoriously long-winded and writers often portentously prolix but the sporadic conciseness of Spanish can break through like a ray of sunshine piercing fog.  S.M. stands for Su Majestad – His or Her Majesty but SSMM is an admirably economical Their Majesties.  This plurality is also responsible for the apparently mystifying abbreviation of EEUU for Estados Unidos (United States) and CCOO for the trade union, Comisiones Obreras. 

Less a question of economy and more a matter of laziness is the shortening of señorita to seño when addressing a female schoolteacher, single or married: hoy se enfadó la seño – today Miss got cross.  El director is frequently shortened to el dire by schoolchildren when referring to a headmaster – un director de colegio.

Children’s abbreviations have infiltrated adult conversation, so adults say el super for supermercado, la pelu for la peluquería (hairdresser’s), el frigo for el frigorífico (refrigerator) and el cole instead of colegio.  Many adults as well as children use  porfa for por favour (please) when speaking to those they are at ease with but que pases un buen finde is teen-speak for que pases un buen fin de semana (have a good weekend).

Catalina - who answers to Cata - and Jasper, who answers to no-one

Names get contracted, too, so someone called Esperanza is called Espe and María Teresa become Maite. Once you realise that the cut-off point in a Spanish name doesn’t necessarily arrive where you’d expect, it’s easier to see why Asunción answers to Asun.

Concepción is reduced to Concha, Conchi or Conchita and Merche to Mercedes although on birth certificates, these will often be preceded by Maria de as in María de la Concepción although prepositions can be avoided: María Mercedes or María Cristina.

Sometimes the final a is dropped María into Mari or the familiar-looking Mary, a common practice amongst girls saddled with names like María de la Buena Leche

Men’s names get a similar treatment, so Jesús turns into Chus and Joaquín into Chimo,  while José María can be Josema or Chema; many a Manuel is called Manolo although some answer to Lolo too and Sebastián gets called Sebas.

There are Josés who prefer to remain José but others are happy with Pepe.  Pepe is the spoken version of the letters P.P. which in more pious times followed the name of San José – St. Joseph and stood for Padre Putativo – substitute or stand-in father (to Christ).

Francisco and Francisca almost always answer to Paco and Paca and this is the responsibility of San Francisco de Asís (St. Francis of Asisi) who, having founded the Franciscan order, was referred to as Pater Communitatis (Father of the Community).  

In classic Spanish fashion which likes verbal short cuts just as much as the long way round, they took first two syllables of each word to come up with PaCo.  And the interesting thing is that many a Paco or Paca is blissfully unaware of this – try asking them!

Joking apart

Every language and country has its sayings – refranes or  proverbs – proverbios and Spanish not only does the favour of translating proverbial as proverbial but provides consabido, too.

There’s nothing like proverbs for catching a glimpse of how people view or face up to trouble and it’s fascinating to see how Spanish and English-speakers say the same thing in different ways.



Riada



Llover sobre mojado means pretty much the same as it never rains but it pours, although gloomy recognition that problems never arrive singly is more often conveyed with a perro flaco todo son pulgas.  

There is something infinitely more resigned about a skinny dog is all fleas than the prospect of a great deal of rain – not that rain is troublefree in a country as susceptible to flash flooding – una riada as drought – sequía.

Sequía

Del agua mansa me libre Dios, que de la brava me guardaré yo is supposed to correspond to still waters run deep although its literal translation of God protect me from calm water and I’ll protect myself from the rough resembles our God protect me from my friends and I’ll protect myself from my enemies.

But éramos pocos y parió la abuela as well as si no te gusta el caldo, dos tazas and monta un circo y le crecen los enanos are supremely Spanish and supremely revealing.   

The first explains the Spanish sense of the ridiculous, the second illustrates the Spanish tendency to expect the worst and the third demonstrates Spanish acceptance that the worst will happen.

The literal translation of éramos pocos y parió la abuela is there weren’t many of us and Grandma gave birth.  This is a variation on the straw that broke the camel’s back but the joke is that the phrase means precisely the opposite to what it says.  Without enough room to swing a cat, Grandma – not supposed to be of childbearing age – complicates things by adding another occupant. 

Si no te gusta el caldo, dos tazas means if you don’t like soup, you get two bowls and implies that aversion to something dooms you to having it shoved down your throat.  The more modern and defiantly politically incorrect monta un circo y le crecen los enanos conjures up someone who has such bad luck that if he had a circus, the dwarfs would grow.

These are prime examples of the Spanish irony - ironía which is not always present in Spanish humour.  Nation shall speak unto nation by learning a foreign language but the joke that nation tells unto nation is often harder to understand.

Understanding the punch line of a Spanish joke – un chiste español entails more than vocabulary and does not guarantee that you will split your sides with laughter. 

Although a una comedia is now regarded as a comedy, originally it was no laughing matter and meant any kind of play, not specifically a funny one. Un comediante was an actor and describing someone as un comediante or una comedianta still implies that he or she is a hypocrite.  Onstage a comedian was and is un cómico although a printed comic is un tebeo.

Joke-y verbs are bromear and gastar una broma when playing a joke or saying joking apart – bromas aparte.  But to tell one is contar un chiste and not the tempting chistar, which means means to draw attention to, usually with the psst that a Spanish-speaker hears as chssss.

Lo hice sin chistar means I did it without saying a word, so the implication is not that I did it silently but did it without complaining., all of which confirms that there’s nothing very funny about chistar (or many a chiste español for that matter).   

Counting Sheep

To paraphrase the Beatles, there’s nothing you can say that can’t be translated but some words are undeniably peculiar to a particular language. That’s what happens with trashumancia although if you look in the right kind of erudite place you will be presented with transhumance.   Ever used it, though? 

Migrancy is a less scholarly translation although this can mean anything from aimless drifting to upping and leaving one’s home for another country.  Trashumancia refers specifically to the seasonal movement of people with their livestock over relatively short distances, typically to higher pastures in summer and lower valleys in winter. 

Another definition says much the same thing while disagreeing about mileage: the movement of cattle or other grazing animals to new pastures, often quite distant, according to the change in season. 

These grazing animals were usually sheep – ganado ovino, as beef cattle – ganado bovino or ganado vacuno were never particularly important to Spain, apart from fighting bulls – toros bravos or toros de lídia.

Via pecuaria, Altea

Whatever the animals involved, many roads today follow ancient trails or cañadas - some prehistoric - used by trashumantes.  Keep an eye open and you will often be rewarded by a sign identifying the road you are travelling as una cañada or via pecuaria, which amounts to the same thing.   

Even now drovers retain the rights and free movement granted centuries ago to the Honrada Concejo de la Mesta, the powerful sheep breeding and raising association which was the only commercial activity once deemed fit for a gentleman.  This was when Spain’s sheep produced the world’s finest merino wool – lana merino and the Spanish empire was so cash-rich thanks to Latin America’s riches that no-one thought twice about exporting shorn wool  – lana esquilada that was later reimported at considerable expense as woven cloth.  

There is still no wool-weaving industry here but periodically, principally to remind the government of their financial plight, sheep-breeders drive their drive flocks – rebaños through Madrid’s Paseo de la Castellana and Calle Recoletos. Traffic there is so dense that a few hundred sheep hardly make things worse although no-one could do anything about it, even if they wanted to.

To count sheep as an insomnia remedy remains unchanged in translation as contar ovejas but a sheep dog becomes un perro pastor, literally a shepherd dog. Like everyone else, the Spanish can have a black sheep or una oveja negra in the family, a term which, despite being feminine, applies principally to men. 

sheep and goats ...after the sheep moved

Cada oveja con su pareja –  each sheep with its partner is the Spanish version of our birds of a feather flock together.  Another saying, to separate the sheep from the goats diverges to become separar el grano de la paja – to sort the grain from the straw.

Sheepish is usually agreed by dictionaries to be avergonzado which is actually closer to shamefaced, sheepishness evidently not forming part of Spain’s repertoire of looks.

Borrego means both a sheepskin as well as a sheep or lamb and our mackerel sky is seen as un cielo aborregado, with clouds resembling a fleece instead of the pattern on a mackerel’s back.   

Where there are sheep there has to be mutton – carnero but lamb or cordero is preferred by the Spanish.  Lamb chops – chuletas de cordero are fried – fritas or eaten grilled – a la plancha, but the only way to eat a leg or shoulder of lamb is roasted  - al horno. Until comparatively recently not every Spanish kitchen had an oven - horno and roast lamb – cordero asado was usually a treat to be eaten out. 

One way of getting round this was to take the joint to the nearest local baker - panadero to roast it in his own oven once the bread was done. Unlike trendy restaurants where diners must eat their lamb pink, both baker and housewife always knew that it had to be crisp outside and falling moistly off the bone inside. 

And no doubt that’s just the way that Alonso Quijano a.k.a. Don Quijote, whose La Mancha stamping ground produced most of Spain’s lamb and mutton, ate it too.

 

Flans and fiestas

Flans and fiestas are potential disappointments for newcomers to Spain.  An English-speaker’s flan is generally an exciting affair involving fruit, jelly, cream, sponge and other calorie-laden ingredients but a Spanish flan reaches the table as an unexciting version of crème caramel. 

A flan may now be disguised with different flavours and an unexpected addition or two – pine nuts, for instance, or cheese.  Sadly, there is no denying that underneath the tarting-up a flan is no tart and resembles solidified custard.

What European English speakers identify as custard is crema inglesa (really English cream).  When thicker and gooier it is a plural natillas, always eaten cold and so popular that they are made on an industrial scale and sold alongside yoghourts – yogures and another favourite, rice pudding – arroz con leche and again, never eaten warm. 

Another setback is discovering that una fiesta is what we know as a Bank Holiday, which comes as a welcome break but does not entail all-singing, all-dancing jollity with bunting, streamers and lots to drink.  This type of event is instead referred to in the plural – how not in a language which consistently pluralises what is so often singular in any other? – as fiestas. 

Some fiestas are more mdest than others...

Cities, towns, villages and hamlets all have yearly fiestas patronales in honour of a locally-revered saint, holy patron or sacred event.  Based on piety they have evolved into entertainment that is more profane than sacred and a very merry time is had by all.  Things get even more cheerful during the Moors and Christians fiestas – fiestas de Moros y Cristianos which are a salute southern Spain’s Moorish past. 

The first were held in 1588 in Caudete (now in Albacete province, but then part of Valencia) although the most famous belong to Alcoy and Villajoyosa, which are both in Alicante. 

These fiestas provide a chance to dress up, let off fireworks, fight mock battles, eat and (especially) drink.  It is telling that they are known as Moors and Christians, not Christians and Moors, and although the invaders always lose the last mock battle, more people want to be Moors than Christians. 

Back in the singular, una fiesta is a party where food, wine, conversation and music all flow. Un festejo is more of a festivity or celebration and the verb festejar means to celebrate and/or to feast. 

This could also be translated into English with the French borrowing to fete which strictly speaking should be written as fête with a circumflex denoting the former presence of a long-lost letter S.  And there we are, almost back to fiesta.

For many, a fête conjures up a rained-upon, washed-out garden fête, a fate worse than summery death.  This type of fate is translated as destino, suerte (which in this context means luck in the sense of lot) and sino which leads a hectic double life as an occasional substitute for but.

The Spanish are supposed to have a personal, gloomy and even doomed relationship with fate.  Possibly because of this, destino is synonymous with destination as well as destiny so there is nothing preordained or fatalistic about un tren con destino Madrid, which is merely a Madrid-bound train. 

The adjective fatal is no less fatal in Spanish than English but is a preferred adjective for hypochondriacs and me encuentro fatal means I feel awful even when the complainer has a 100 per cent chance of survival.  Fatal is also a favourite with the hypercritical and esa blusa te sienta fatal is an unforgiving you look awful in that blouse.