Was European Spanish (language) changed in any way by the Arabs, in their 700 years in the country?

Question

I know Andalucía/Andaluz means 'land of the vandals' - obviously that's a fair founded claim in the Torremolinos/Fuengirola of the early 20th century (British ex-pats, etc.), but is it only that part of Southern Spain where Arab still holds?

Answer 1

I did read that Ole! is actually a corruption of Allah. Probably not true but it's a good story.

Answer 2

Of course. Lots of Spanish words have an arabic origin

Answer 3

Very much so. Such a long occupation could not fail to have a substantial effect on other languages and cultures. As for the spread of arabic to other parts of Spain, you have to remember that they occupied the whole peninsula at one time and even went much further North well into France until they were beaten by Charles Martel at Poitiers.

There are thousands of Arabic words or derivatives in Spanish, and if you are familiar with Spanish you might like to look at the following website that not only explains how deep the influence of Arabic was, but also gives you hundreds of words of arabic origin in Spanish. It also gives you a list of geographical places the names of which have  Arabic roots at the end of the article.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arabic_infl...

The proportion of Arabic words in Modern Spanish explains why it is less close to Italian than one would think.

Answer 4

Absolutely. Spanish was influenced by the Arabs while they stayed in Spain all those centuries. Every language can be influenced by migrations, occupations, invasions,etc. Many words in Spanish have Arabian roots: "reloj" which means watch, for example. Almeria, the name of a southern city.

Alfalfa, alcoba,aceite, adobe, aduana,ajedrez, etc.