Catalan and other languages in contact in the court and in the chancellery in Naples of Alfonso the Magnanimous (1443-1458)

Abstract

The move of the court of the king Alfonso V of Aragon from Valencia (1416-1430) to Italy (1432) and their settlement in Naples (1443-1458) implied the emigration of a numerous human group, which was perceived as a duality by the Neapolitans (catalani et hispani: Catalan speaking people and Spanish speaking people), and also a royal administration where Catalan was the preferred language by the government and state, even though the king used to speak in Spanish. The numerous court, who was almost bilingual in most cases, was involved —in greater or lesser proportion— in a plurality of linguistic expressions, both orally and written: there were bureaucrats and knights mainly from Valencia; Castilian song poets; humanists who used to write in perfect Latin; native barons who spoke in a napoletano misto, influenced by the literary Tuscan; scriveners from the chancery who wrote in Sicilian dialect, merchants from Florence, etc. Altogether, this makes the court in Naples of Alfonso the Magnanimous a very interesting object of study for the field of the history of the language (leaving aside now the idiomatic adaptation of the literary expressions, being also an aspect that deserves to be studied).