Papers by Juan Luis García-Alonso
Journal of Celtic Linguistics, 26, 2025
This paper analyses the first mentions of the Celts and their geographical
location in ancient so... more This paper analyses the first mentions of the Celts and their geographical
location in ancient sources, paying special attention to Herodotus, whom
it attempts to contextualise by also considering later authors, both Greek
(Polybius, Diodorus Siculus and Strabo) and Roman (Pliny and Tacitus). This
analysis is set in the context of recent debates on the linguistic nature of
‘Tartessian’, a little-known language of SW Hispania (considered Celtic by some
scholars), as well as of the discussion of different theories on the geographical
location of both Proto-Celtic and historic Celtic peoples and languages (‘Celtic
from the West’, ‘Celtic from the East’, ‘Celtic from the Centre’). Herodotus
places the Celts in Mediterranean Gaul, the Pyrenees marking their boundary
with the Iberians. However, he also mentions that they can be reached by
crossing the Strait of Gibraltar and sailing through Atlantic waters beyond the
lands of the Kynesians in southwestern Iberia. The misconception of a North /
South orientation of the Pyrenees in several authors is also addressed, as
well as the extent to which we may or may not interpret Herodotus as having
accurate geographical, ethnographic or linguistic information.
Palaeohispanica, 24, 2024
En este trabajo se hace un estudio comparado de la adaptación del abjad fenicio al ... more En este trabajo se hace un estudio comparado de la adaptación del abjad fenicio al alfabeto griego en el S. IX a. C. y a los semisilabarios paleohispánicos a partir del S. VII a. C., buscando argumentos para la discusión acerca de si la adaptación hispánica sufrió alguna intermediación helénica. Así como los alfabetos anatolios o itálicos, usados para diferentes lenguas, sabemos que no son adaptaciones directas del abjad fenicio, sino que han pasado un filtro “griego”, en el caso de la Península Ibérica, la investigación ha valorado tradicionalmente que la inspiración directa en un modelo fenicio es evidente, pero se mostró durante mucho tiempo dubitativa acerca de una posible interferencia de un modelo griego, con diferentes investigadores manifestándose de modo más o menos claro a favor o en contra de esta posibilidad. Si bien estas dudas en los últimos años parece que se han ido disipando, parece conveniente confirmar en lo posible la postura que hoy parece dominante. Para ello se analizan en detalle los procesos paralelos de generación de nuevas letras para sonidos no reflejados en la escritura fenicia y se estima hasta qué punto es verosímil que respondan a procesos independientes, alcanzándose la conclusión de que una hipotética intermediación griega no es demostrable y resulta de hecho poco probable.
Palaeohispanica, 2023
Resumen: En este artículo se analiza la posibilidad de que algunos de los rasgos fonológicos más ... more Resumen: En este artículo se analiza la posibilidad de que algunos de los rasgos fonológicos más característicos de las lenguas célticas (la lenición) puedan relacionarse con los valores fonéticos de las consonantes de una lengua de substrato afín al vascónico-aquitano en la que, hipotéticamente, la oposición fonológica en el seno de cada punto de articulación estuviera basada en diferentes grados de intensidad articulatoria y no en el grado de sonoridad (según una hipótesis defendida para el protovasco en el pasado por Martinet, Mitxelena y más recientemente retomada por Lakarra). Ello podría explicarse y podría implicar un contacto lingüístico estrecho y muy antiguo entre el pre-protocéltico y el protovascónico posiblemente en la mitad meridional de la Galia.
Voprosy Onomastiki, 2023
This paper revisits the Greek *-nthos-and *-ssos/*-ttos names and analyzes them in the context of... more This paper revisits the Greek *-nthos-and *-ssos/*-ttos names and analyzes them in the context of the language contacts between the Pre-Proto-Greek peoples arriving in Greece and the Pre-Greek populations already in place. It starts overviewing the prehistoric process of formation of the Greek language from Proto-Indo-European. A few concepts are defi ned, such as Pre-Proto-Greek, Proto-Greek, Common Greek and Pre-Greek. After an update on the main hypotheses regarding the dates of entry into Greece, the author stresses the role of the Pre-Greek substratum in the shaping of Proto-Greek due to the implicit phenomenon of language shift completed by the Pre-Greek population, and proceeds to an initial analysis, on the basis of the limited data available, of the Pre-Greek language(s), making use of Pre-Greek onomastics as the main, albeit indirect, source of information. With these names on the table, it is postulated that the phonological structure of the Proto-Greek plosive consonants (the fact, in particular, that the inherited voiced aspirated plosives appear as voiceless aspirated plosives in Greek) may show the eff ect of Pre-Greek, whose linguistic affi liation has given rise to several confl icting theories and many doubts. Even if the Anatolian hypothesis has seduced many researchers, a non-Indo-European option seems preferable. After considering diff erent Pre-Indo-European proposals (Beekes, Facchetti, Schrijver), conclusions are drawn about possible coincidences between the Pre-Greek and Etruscan phonological systems and what this may imply. Schrijver's recent suggestion that perhaps the language of the Minoans could be distantly related to Hattic is also considered. This could constitute an alternative explanation to the toponymic coincidences between the two regions: they could be sharing a pre-Indo-European substratum.
Journal of Celtic Linguistics, 2023
This paper provides a linguistic and epigraphic context to the so-called 'Tartessian' or 'Southwe... more This paper provides a linguistic and epigraphic context to the so-called 'Tartessian' or 'Southwestern' inscriptions from ancient Hispania. Starting from the general linguistic landscape in the Iberian Peninsula in pre-Roman and Roman times, with an overview of Lusitanian, in the vicinity of these texts, and of the relatively well-known Celtiberian and pre-Indo-European languages (Iberian and Vasconic-Aquitanian), a description of the Palaeo-Hispanic variety of the writing system used in these texts is offered. In the final section, analysing in detail some of the arguments to defend the Celticity of these inscriptions, a conclusion is reached that the large funerary stone stelae from Southern Portugal are not written in Celtic or any other Indo-European language, but rather in a largely unknown non-Indo-European agglutinative language.
INDO-EUROPEAN LINGUISTICS AND CLASSICAL PHILOLOGY XXVI, pp. 262-276, 2022
Утверждено к печати Институтом лингвистических исследований РАН Конференция проходит в рамках пос... more Утверждено к печати Институтом лингвистических исследований РАН Конференция проходит в рамках постоянно действующей Школы индоевропейского сравнительно-исторического языкознания при ИЛИ РАН
Voprosy Onomastiki, 2022
Determining the languages spoken in the south of the Iberian Peninsula in antiquity, in pre-Roman... more Determining the languages spoken in the south of the Iberian Peninsula in antiquity, in pre-Roman times and during Romanization, is no easy task. Although we have an important corpus of indigenous inscriptions, the different writing systems identified have not been fully deciphered, which is especially true for the southern varieties of the complex Palaeohispanic
family of scripts. In this paper, after a brief introduction to the different epigraphic areas of the southern Iberian Peninsula and after discussing the special situation of the southwest, it is pointed out that the T artessian label should be limited to a territory in a specific region of the central and lower Guadalquivir valley and that the region of southern Portugal (in the Algarve) where an important collection of about 100 large funerary stelae has been found, seems to be outside or at least on the periphery of the T artessian world, even if these inscriptions are called “Tartessian” by many researchers. To date, there are different ways of interpreting the language(s) reflected in the southern epigraphic texts, especially those from the central and western regions of A ndalusia and southern Portugal. The I berian language inscriptions found in the southeast are comparatively better read and understood. The present paper seeks further arguments in the discussion of southern languages by analysing a set of onomastic elements (personal and place names) distributed over a wide region of the central and lower Guadalquivir valley and southern Portugal, attested in antiquity. Some conclusions are drawn as to what they may imply in terms of the linguistic map of the area, as well as in terms of the different linguistic strata during the centuries before the arrival of the Romans.
CVRIOSITAS NIHIL RECVSAT STVDIA ISABEL MORENO FERRERO DICATA, Juan Antonio González Iglesias, Julián Méndez Dosuna y Blanca M. Prósper Pérez (eds.), pp. 157-178, 2021
Resumen:
El sudeste peninsular viene siendo considerado tradicionalmente la región desde la que ... more Resumen:
El sudeste peninsular viene siendo considerado tradicionalmente la región desde la que la lengua ibérica se difundió de modo que, tanto en los testimonios epigráficos indígenas como en las fuentes grecorromanas, nos la encontramos en una amplia región que abarca desde los límites de la Andalucía oriental hasta el Rosellón francés. En este trabajo se analiza la relevancia de la región en relación con la historia de la escritura y con nuestros conocimientos lingüísticos sobre el ibérico, sin dejar de lado la posible presencia de otras lenguas a partir de datos onomásticos.
Palabras clave: Ibérico, vasco, escrituras paleohispánicas, celtibérico, lenguas prerromanas de Hispania, onomástica.
Abstract
The southeast of the Iberian Peninsula has traditionally been considered the region from which the Iberian language spread, so that, both in the indigenous epigraphic testimonies and in the Greco-Roman sources, we find it in a wide region that stretches from the limits of eastern Andalusia to the French Roussillon. This paper analyses the relevance of the region in relation to the history of writing and to our linguistic knowledge of Iberian, without neglecting the possible presence of other languages on the basis of onomastic data.
Keywords: Iberian, Basque, Palaeo-Hispanic scripts, Celtiberian, pre-Roman languages of Hispania, onomastics.
Greek Paideia and Local Tradition in the Graeco-Roman East, 2020
From the 1st century AD an adaptation of the Greek alphabet was used for Coptic. But before this ... more From the 1st century AD an adaptation of the Greek alphabet was used for Coptic. But before this adaptation, some Demotic speakers of Hellenistic times had to learn Greek. After contextualising the arrival and teaching of the Greek language in Egypt in the linguistic landscape of the different periods, we will have a look at some linguistic interferences between Greek and Egyptian in Hellenistic times. We will analyse certain vocalic ‘mistakes’ pointing at the efforts of Demotic-speakers learning Greek and try to draw a few conclusions from them and from later Coptic texts, in order to (1) have an idea of the details of both vocalic systems at those times; (2) add arguments concerning some doubts in modern research about the quality of the vowel system of Ancient Egyptian and (3) analyse how both languages co-existed and interfered each other in a society that was, up to a certain extent, bilingual. Coptic language scholars still disagree on the phonetic interpretation of the writing system of Coptic vowels. There are two main theories: length theory (the different letters represent differences in length) and vowel quality theory (the different letters represent differences in vowel quality).
Buenas Prácticas en Calidad en la Universidad de Salamanca, 2019
FOCO (https://foco.usal.es) es un portal colaborativos multilingüe de alcance global dedicado a l... more FOCO (https://foco.usal.es) es un portal colaborativos multilingüe de alcance global dedicado a la enseñanza de lenguas en cualquier contexto, perfil de alumnado y nivel educativo en las que intervengan las tecnologías de la información y la comunicación al servicio de la excelencia docente.
Javier de Hoz (1940-2019) Necrológica, Veleia, 2019
El pasado 12 de enero de 2019 Jesús Javier de Hoz Bravo falleció en Las Rozas. Nacido en Madrid e... more El pasado 12 de enero de 2019 Jesús Javier de Hoz Bravo falleció en Las Rozas. Nacido en Madrid el 29 de julio de 1940, se había jubilado como catedrático de Filología Griega en la universidad Complutense de Madrid en el año 2010, tras una larga e intensa carrera caracterizada tanto por un mérito académico incuestionable, como, sobre todo, por una encomiable actitud ante la vida científica y una singular capacidad de transmisión de valores con el ejemplo. a lo largo de su vida muchos estudiosos lo admiraron como científico, mientras muchos discípulos y colegas aprendieron a estimar a la persona, por su integridad y su buen hacer.
Círculo de Lingüística Aplicada a la Comunicación, 2018
This paper offers two examples of the applicability of ICT-supported language teaching in two dif... more This paper offers two examples of the applicability of ICT-supported language teaching in two different contexts: social integration and international cooperation. A search for methodologically innovative approaches in this field inspires a series of collaborative international projects involving Egypt and several European countries. The introduction of best practices in this field brings an improvement in the language teaching and learning process in Egyptian universities, as well as meaningful insights on the advantages and shortcomings of the different options available. ICT facilitates the creation of open access materials available to disadvantaged groups (refugees or immigrants) that are outside conventional educational contexts but need tools and resources for a fast acquisition of foreign languages. An example of these tools is the development of a new multilingual smartphone app based on communication needs. The app is currently being developed within an international consortium including 6 European and 6 Egyptian universities. Another example of interesting use of ICT-based methodologies is the MOOC-based teaching and learning of languages at Cairo University, an experience resulting from the collaboration with the European Universities that are partners in different international projects.
Studia Philologica et Diachronica in Honorem Joaquin Gorrochategui. Indoeuropaea et Palaeohispanica, José María Vallejo, Iván Igartúa y Carlos García Castillejo (eds.), Vitoria, 2018
Identity(ies): A multicultural and multidisciplinary approach, Ana Paula Arnaut (ed.), Coimbra, 2017
In this presentation I will look at the central role played in Ancient Greek identity formation b... more In this presentation I will look at the central role played in Ancient Greek identity formation by the duality Greek / Barbarian, originally constructed on linguistic grounds, but eventually evolving into other significant cultural areas. Bárbaroi was how the Ancient Greeks referred to all the foreign peoples around them whose language was not understandable. It was, of course, an onomatopoeia that allowed them to imitate the apparent stammer of those who were speaking so “strangely”. Interestingly enough the word, particularly with its passage through Latin, became to be the base of something different, to be perceived in the concept of barbaric. And so, those who could not or did not speak your language became uncivilized. People(s) not knowing the Greek language, not participating in Greek civilization, religion or literature started to be perceived not only as “different” but as somehow “inferior”. One of the legacies of Ancient Greece is then the word “barbarian”, still used today in English and many modern languages. This question has been studied extensively, as it says a lot about Greek and Roman culture in general. However, what has been not so much looked at is the extent of negativity in the attitudes towards immigrants and foreigners in Greek and Roman society. I will reflect in all these questions, and on how this is echoed in more recent times.
Caracteres. Estudios culturales y críticos de la esfera digital , 2017
Caracteres es una revista académica interdisciplinar y plurilingüe orientada al análisis crítico ... more Caracteres es una revista académica interdisciplinar y plurilingüe orientada al análisis crítico de la cultura, el pensamiento y la sociedad de la esfera digital. Esta publicación prestará especial atención a las colaboraciones que aporten nuevas perspectivas sobre los ámbitos de estudio que cubre, dentro del espacio de las Humanidades Digitales. Puede consultar las normas de publicación en la web
Tempus en Misr, Rodrigo Mora, M.J., A. Pano & S. Betti (eds.), Bolonia: I libri di Emil, 2016
La palabra española "tiempo" deriva del sustantivo latino "tempus". Hoy en español tiene hasta 18... more La palabra española "tiempo" deriva del sustantivo latino "tempus". Hoy en español tiene hasta 18 acepciones principales, según la RAE, pero las que más me interesan en estos momentos son las siguientes: " 1. Magnitud física que permite ordenar la secuencia de los sucesos, estableciendo un pasado, un presente y un futuro, y cuya unidad en el sistema internacional es el segundo." " 2. Oportunidad, ocasión o coyuntura de hacer algo." " 3. Estado atmosférico." Fundamentalmente, el término "tiempo" representa, en la mente del hispanohablante contemporáneo, un eje que nos une con el pasado y nos da esperanzas de futuro. Ese tiempo, que, parafraseando al poeta latino Virgilio (70 a. C. -19 a. C.), se nos escapa, huye entre nuestros dedos. "Tempus fugit" ('el tiempo huye, el tiempo se escapa, el tiempo vuela' 1 ) es la conocida expresión que hace referencia explícita al veloz transcurso del tiempo y deriva de un verso de las Geórgicas (Georgicae, III, 284,) que dice de un modo más completo: "Sed fugit interea, fugit irreparabile tempus" ("Pero huye entre tanto, huye irreparablemente el tiempo").
L. A. Guichard, J. L. García-Alonso, M. P. de Hoz (eds.), The Alexandrian Tradition: interactions between science, religion and literature, Bern, Peter Lang , 2014
Continental Celtic Word Formation: Onomastic Data, J. L. García-Alonso (ed.), Salamanca: Ediciones Universidad de Salamanca, Dec 2013
The Forgotten Origins of Universities in Europe, Bogdan-Petru Maleon (editor), Iasi, 2011
A Greek Man in the Iberian Street, Festschrift Javier de Hoz, Juan Luis García Alonso y Eugenio Luján Martínez eds., Innsbruck, pp. 175-190, 2011
Uploads
Papers by Juan Luis García-Alonso
location in ancient sources, paying special attention to Herodotus, whom
it attempts to contextualise by also considering later authors, both Greek
(Polybius, Diodorus Siculus and Strabo) and Roman (Pliny and Tacitus). This
analysis is set in the context of recent debates on the linguistic nature of
‘Tartessian’, a little-known language of SW Hispania (considered Celtic by some
scholars), as well as of the discussion of different theories on the geographical
location of both Proto-Celtic and historic Celtic peoples and languages (‘Celtic
from the West’, ‘Celtic from the East’, ‘Celtic from the Centre’). Herodotus
places the Celts in Mediterranean Gaul, the Pyrenees marking their boundary
with the Iberians. However, he also mentions that they can be reached by
crossing the Strait of Gibraltar and sailing through Atlantic waters beyond the
lands of the Kynesians in southwestern Iberia. The misconception of a North /
South orientation of the Pyrenees in several authors is also addressed, as
well as the extent to which we may or may not interpret Herodotus as having
accurate geographical, ethnographic or linguistic information.
family of scripts. In this paper, after a brief introduction to the different epigraphic areas of the southern Iberian Peninsula and after discussing the special situation of the southwest, it is pointed out that the T artessian label should be limited to a territory in a specific region of the central and lower Guadalquivir valley and that the region of southern Portugal (in the Algarve) where an important collection of about 100 large funerary stelae has been found, seems to be outside or at least on the periphery of the T artessian world, even if these inscriptions are called “Tartessian” by many researchers. To date, there are different ways of interpreting the language(s) reflected in the southern epigraphic texts, especially those from the central and western regions of A ndalusia and southern Portugal. The I berian language inscriptions found in the southeast are comparatively better read and understood. The present paper seeks further arguments in the discussion of southern languages by analysing a set of onomastic elements (personal and place names) distributed over a wide region of the central and lower Guadalquivir valley and southern Portugal, attested in antiquity. Some conclusions are drawn as to what they may imply in terms of the linguistic map of the area, as well as in terms of the different linguistic strata during the centuries before the arrival of the Romans.
El sudeste peninsular viene siendo considerado tradicionalmente la región desde la que la lengua ibérica se difundió de modo que, tanto en los testimonios epigráficos indígenas como en las fuentes grecorromanas, nos la encontramos en una amplia región que abarca desde los límites de la Andalucía oriental hasta el Rosellón francés. En este trabajo se analiza la relevancia de la región en relación con la historia de la escritura y con nuestros conocimientos lingüísticos sobre el ibérico, sin dejar de lado la posible presencia de otras lenguas a partir de datos onomásticos.
Palabras clave: Ibérico, vasco, escrituras paleohispánicas, celtibérico, lenguas prerromanas de Hispania, onomástica.
Abstract
The southeast of the Iberian Peninsula has traditionally been considered the region from which the Iberian language spread, so that, both in the indigenous epigraphic testimonies and in the Greco-Roman sources, we find it in a wide region that stretches from the limits of eastern Andalusia to the French Roussillon. This paper analyses the relevance of the region in relation to the history of writing and to our linguistic knowledge of Iberian, without neglecting the possible presence of other languages on the basis of onomastic data.
Keywords: Iberian, Basque, Palaeo-Hispanic scripts, Celtiberian, pre-Roman languages of Hispania, onomastics.
location in ancient sources, paying special attention to Herodotus, whom
it attempts to contextualise by also considering later authors, both Greek
(Polybius, Diodorus Siculus and Strabo) and Roman (Pliny and Tacitus). This
analysis is set in the context of recent debates on the linguistic nature of
‘Tartessian’, a little-known language of SW Hispania (considered Celtic by some
scholars), as well as of the discussion of different theories on the geographical
location of both Proto-Celtic and historic Celtic peoples and languages (‘Celtic
from the West’, ‘Celtic from the East’, ‘Celtic from the Centre’). Herodotus
places the Celts in Mediterranean Gaul, the Pyrenees marking their boundary
with the Iberians. However, he also mentions that they can be reached by
crossing the Strait of Gibraltar and sailing through Atlantic waters beyond the
lands of the Kynesians in southwestern Iberia. The misconception of a North /
South orientation of the Pyrenees in several authors is also addressed, as
well as the extent to which we may or may not interpret Herodotus as having
accurate geographical, ethnographic or linguistic information.
family of scripts. In this paper, after a brief introduction to the different epigraphic areas of the southern Iberian Peninsula and after discussing the special situation of the southwest, it is pointed out that the T artessian label should be limited to a territory in a specific region of the central and lower Guadalquivir valley and that the region of southern Portugal (in the Algarve) where an important collection of about 100 large funerary stelae has been found, seems to be outside or at least on the periphery of the T artessian world, even if these inscriptions are called “Tartessian” by many researchers. To date, there are different ways of interpreting the language(s) reflected in the southern epigraphic texts, especially those from the central and western regions of A ndalusia and southern Portugal. The I berian language inscriptions found in the southeast are comparatively better read and understood. The present paper seeks further arguments in the discussion of southern languages by analysing a set of onomastic elements (personal and place names) distributed over a wide region of the central and lower Guadalquivir valley and southern Portugal, attested in antiquity. Some conclusions are drawn as to what they may imply in terms of the linguistic map of the area, as well as in terms of the different linguistic strata during the centuries before the arrival of the Romans.
El sudeste peninsular viene siendo considerado tradicionalmente la región desde la que la lengua ibérica se difundió de modo que, tanto en los testimonios epigráficos indígenas como en las fuentes grecorromanas, nos la encontramos en una amplia región que abarca desde los límites de la Andalucía oriental hasta el Rosellón francés. En este trabajo se analiza la relevancia de la región en relación con la historia de la escritura y con nuestros conocimientos lingüísticos sobre el ibérico, sin dejar de lado la posible presencia de otras lenguas a partir de datos onomásticos.
Palabras clave: Ibérico, vasco, escrituras paleohispánicas, celtibérico, lenguas prerromanas de Hispania, onomástica.
Abstract
The southeast of the Iberian Peninsula has traditionally been considered the region from which the Iberian language spread, so that, both in the indigenous epigraphic testimonies and in the Greco-Roman sources, we find it in a wide region that stretches from the limits of eastern Andalusia to the French Roussillon. This paper analyses the relevance of the region in relation to the history of writing and to our linguistic knowledge of Iberian, without neglecting the possible presence of other languages on the basis of onomastic data.
Keywords: Iberian, Basque, Palaeo-Hispanic scripts, Celtiberian, pre-Roman languages of Hispania, onomastics.
at a conference held in Beaulieu-surmer,
in France, in March 2016, that was the
starting point of the association Etygram,
whose participants are working on an
open-access online dictionary of Ancient
and Medieval etymologies.
introd. y notas de G. CRUZ ANDREOTTI, M. GARCÍA
QUINTELA y J. GÓMEZ ESPELOSÍN, Madrid: Alianza
Editorial, 2007. 557 páginas, 10 ilustraciones,
ISBN: 978-84-206-6172-8.