La Haquetía [English version]

*La  Haquetía
by Alicia Sisso Raz 

[Este artículo en Haquetía – English]

Haquetia (also Haquitía, Hakitía, Haketía, or Jaquetía), the Judeo-Spanish vernacular mostly spoken in northern Morocco, is predominantly composed of Medieval Castilian  infused with vocabulary from other linguistic sources. Nevertheless, amusing as it may seem now, many of its speakers in the past considered it to be Spanish.  In recent generations, words in modern Spanish have been usurping their archaic counterparts in Haquetia. This  process, already noticeable by the end of the nineteenth century, has accelerated during the twentieth century.  As a result, the vernacular has changed drastically in recent generations and became a mixture of contemporary Spanish and Haquetia.  The descendants of the community, fluent in contemporary Spanish for generations already, still tend to pepper their Spanish with vocabulary and expressions  in Haquetia without paying attention to, at times even without noticing,  the different linguistic source of the words. It is important to note however, whereas the Haquetia has been the spoken language, Ladino was the literary language of the community.

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The majority of the Jews who were expelled from Spainin 1492 settled around the Mediterraneanand in the Balkans.  However, most of the megorashim (expelled) who fled to the nearby shores of North Africa, established themselves for the most part in Morocco and Algiers. As time went by, a large number of them assimilated into the local Jewish communities and gradually adopted their languages and customs.  Indeed, the megorashim who wandered to the southern parts of Morocco slowly substituted most of their Spanish with the local Judeo-Moroccan Arabic dialect.  Thus, not all the descendants of the expelled Sephardim (in Hebrew: Jews from Spain) who arrived in Morocco held on to their Judeo-Spanish until present days.  For example, the Jews of Fez, Morocco, spoke Spanish for generations after the expulsion;  the Takkanot, the ordinances for the Castilian community inMorocco by the Rabbis of Fez, were written in Spanish until they were gradually replaced by the local Judeo-Moroccan Arabic vernacular during the eighteenth century.  Nonetheless, there are still many words in Spanish and Portuguese in their local Judeo-Moroccan Arabic dialect.

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This was not the case, however, with the Sephardim who settled in northern Morocco and in the Ottoman Empire. These Sephardim preserved their medieval Spanish, albeit adding words borrowed from their new surrounding throughout the centuries. Whereas the Judeo-Spanish vernaculars of eastern Mediterranean communities incorporated words in Greek, Turkish, Hebrew, Slavic and French, the imported additions to the Haquetia were from different sources: primarily local Judeo-Moroccan Arabic, Hebrew, Portuguese, French, as well as some English and Italian – languages of the nations that exerted influence on the Moroccan Jewry by way of political control or business ties during various periods.

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According to scholars, even before the expulsion from Spainthe Jews spoke among themselves a somewhat culturally modified Spanish that was scattered with Hebrew words and Jewish expressions. Interestingly, it seems that this peculiarity was not unfamiliar to the general public. The philologists José Benoliel and Isaac Benharroch mention several authors who incorporated in their works Judeo-Spanish vocabulary.  In Miguel de Cervantes’ The Fraudulent Marriage we come across characteristic expressions as: «dezMAZALado» (the Hebrew word «MAZAL» = «good  luck», with the distinctive Spanish prefix and suffix that alter its meaning to «unlucky») and «el Dio» («God» in Judeo-Spanish,   unlike «Dios»  in Spanish)  Similarly,  Luis Henrriques, the sixteenth century Portuguese poet, incorporated considerable number of them, such as:   beraha (blessing), minha, (an afternoon prayer) kadosh (holy), shabbat,  (Saturday), guay (woe– exclamation of grief or distress),  dafina (the traditional Saturday dish of the Moroccan Jewry, slowly cooked since Friday afternoon).

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The pronunciation and the conjugation of the verbs in Haquetia adhere to the archaic Castilian rules in most cases. For example, the consonant «j», which in contemporary Spanish  sounds  quite similar to the Hebrew «?», is pronounced in Haquetia similar to the French “j” ( as in Jardin). The archaic sound «sh» (which was represented by the letter «x» in the past) does not exist in contemporary Spanish, while it has been preserved in Haquetia.   Likewise, the verbs are conjugated differently than the contemporary pattern.  For example: «caminIMOS«, «viniTES« and «tenGOY»  instead of the contemporary «caminAMOS«, «viniSTE» and «tenGO»  (meaning: [we] «walked», [you] «came», [I] «have»).   Additionally, the words imported to the Haquetia from other languages were Hispanicize by applying Spanish morphological rules.  This element in the vernacular consists of the root word in various languages with the typical Spanish prefix and suffix. For example, «mudda« = «sleep» in local Judeo-Moroccan Arabic, will assume the Spanish suffix «AR» and becomes «muddEAR«, meaning «to sleep» in Haquetia.  Likewise, the equivalent term in Haquetia for the Spanish «curar« (to cure) is «roffeAR« (from roffe = doctor in Hebrew). The word: atorNAR  originated in «attorney»,  and indeed in Haquetia it means to protect or to come to the defense of someone.  The archaic Spanish vocabulary that forms the basis of the Haquetia has been preserved either in its original form: cuarterón and  faldriquera as oppose to the contemporary cuarto  and bolsillo (quarter and pocket), or with some modification:  nublina  and  oscuraña, as oppose to the modern neblina and oscuridad (fogy and darkness).

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The syntax, on the other hand, has been evolving, and it has been following more and more the contemporary Spanish rules with some exceptions: purposefully playful composed sentences with an unconventional order of words, aphorisms, blessings etc. Interestingly enough, there is a slight variation in the Haquetia that was spoken in the various Moroccan towns. In Tetuan, for example, the Haquetia kept most of its archaic Spanish and there are less imported words, whereas in Tangier, the Haquetia contained a larger number of imported words from French and from  the local Judeo-Moroccan Arabic. In the Atlantic coastal cities, on the other hand, Portuguese and even English had a stronger presence.

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Whereas Haquetia was the daily vernacular, the literary language remained the Ladino, whose archaic Castilian vocabulary has been preserved to date. The rabbis in Spain used a unique method for translating Hebrew biblical and liturgical texts (example: Haggadah for Pesah).  It was a word-for-word (claque) translation into medieval Spanish while following the Hebrew syntax rules; this linguistic fusion was called Ladino. Indeed, the Rabbis used to refer to their way of translating the texts as «doing it in Ladino» or «A Ladinar» (meaning «To Ladinize»). «Ladino«, was a derivative from the word «Latino«, which was how the rabbis in medieval Spain used to refer to the Spanish language. The sermons at the synagogues as well as  the written texts and community records were also conducted and written in Ladino (or in Hebrew). This unique translation-method was maintained for generations throughout the Sephardic Diaspora, and it was written in the past in hasi-kolmos characters (Sephardic cursive script=Solitreo).

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Haïm-Vidal Sephiha, the foremost scholar on Judeo-Spanish languages, the historian Paloma Díaz-Mas, as well as other philologists, argue that Ladino was never used for daily communication; pure  Ladino can only be found in religious texts, since it was not a spoken language at all. Contrary to the hermetic character of the Ladino, all the Judeo-Spanish vernaculars are scattered with a considerable amount of vocabulary imported from the surrounding communities. The Ladino was the literary language of all the Sephardic communities in the world, and its archaic Castilian vocabulary is the basis of the Judeo-Spanish from Morocco – Haquetia, as well as the basis of the various Judeo-Spanish vernaculars from the Balkans, Turkey and Greece. In recent years, however, the Judeo Spanish vernaculars of the eastern Mediterranean — the Djudezmo, Spaniolit, Judeo-Espaniol etc. (as they were called  until quite recently) — are being erroneously called  Ladino.  There is a categorical objection among the scholars for this name-change, and they maintain  that the Judeo-Spanish vernaculars from the Balkans, Turkey and Greece are not Ladino.

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It  is worth noting that the ballads (called «romances«) which have been preserved by the expelled Sephardim, who continued singing and cherishing them throughout the centuries, are in Ladino; they are almost devoid of any imported words. In his monumental ballad collection, Romances de Tetuan, the renowned Spaniard musicologist Arcadio de Larrea Palacín wrote that Spanish Ballads from the fifteenth century, otherwise lost to the Spaniards, were preserved thanks to the Sephardim.  Interestingly, similar ballads are found in the musical compendium of the eastern and western Mediterranean communities. But, whereas the lyrical versions of both communities are nearly the same, the melodies differ from each other. Ethnomusicologists, the late Henrietta Yurchenco for example, argue that while the ballads of the Sephardim in the eastern Mediterranean incorporated Balkan musical influences, the melodies of the ballads which have been preserved to date by the Jews of northernMorocco, are almost faithful to the original medieval melodies.

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There are several theories regarding the origin of the word «Haquetia«.  Some  scholars think that it probably stemmed from the Arabic word «HAKKA» which means «to chat» or «to tell». Although others, especially the philologists Joseph Toledano and Isaac B. Benharroch, argue that the word «Haquetia» alludes to the Hebrew name Is.haq (Isaac), which was the generic name for Jewish. The use of diminutive form is very characteristic of the Sephardic culture. Is.haquito, the diminutive of Is.haq, evolved to Haquito and by extension to «Haquetia», meaning the language of the Haquitos = Isaac’s children (Jewish).  Additionally, Benharroch points out that the term «Haquetia» was not mentioned, used or documented prior to 1919, when it appeared for the first time in the book of Manuel Ortega, Los Hebreos de Marruecos (The Hebrews of Morocco).  However, it was José Benoliel who coined the term in his Dialecto Jodeo-Hispano=Marroqui O Hakitia (originally published between 1926 – 1952). Indeed, years ago, we used to refer to our spoken language as Español and not «Haquetia«, because to us it was Spanish and nothing else.

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Whatever the origin of the name is, Haquetia has encapsulated the innocent piousness, warmth and grace; laughter and wits; accompanied by a generous spirit, intrinsic elements in the culture of the Moroccan Sephardic Jewry.  Haquetia has a wealth of terms and synonyms; it is a rich language that many cultural and linguistic fountains have irrigated it. It has a typical melodious rhythm; singing rather than speeking. The Haquetia is a humorist language, a comical one that allows for grammatical freedom either in the syntax, or by twisting and bending words and expressions. This «linguistic liberty» garnishes the conversation with irony and Picardy  and with innumerable witty and funny expressions: Ferazmal is a common term for a close and dear person, but given to the  context, it can assume an ironic meaning as well.  The term is created from three words: Fera[z] de Mal, which mean “out of all calamity” (Fera is the archaic word for the contemporary Fuera). Cazzamento means marriage (a slight change to the Spanish Casamiento), and  CazzaPRETO is the comical term for signaling a sour marriage (preto in Portuguese means dark or black, and in Haquetia it stands for something negative and bad). In his book El Libro de Selomó, Solly Levy noted a similar rebellious spirit that pays no head to linguistic rules, in the dialects of Quebec and Buenos Aires; the «Jual» and the «Lunfardo Porteño«.

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Unfortunately, Haquetia has been a spoken language, and as such it was not esteemed. Until about the last years of the nineteenth century, anything written in Haquetia (and in Ladino), was in hasi-kolmos. Latin characters started replacing the hasi-kolmos script in the twenties century, though there are no fixed orthographic rules yet. While the Rabbis continued carrying out their sermons and their writings in Ladino or in Hebrew (and since the twenties century in Spanish as well), the educated elite abandoned the Haquetia in favor of contemporary Spanish or French. The Haquetia was looked down upon, as if it was the «poor relative» of Spanish. It was put aside, far from ears and eyes, together with the women’s colorfully fringed headgear and stately dress (called traje de berberisca in Haquetia  or keswa kbira in local Judeo-Moroccan dialect, which means «the grand dress»).  The proximity to Spain, the occupation of Tetuan by the Spaniards in 1860, the establishment of the schools of «Alliance Israelite Universelle» and the Spanish and French protectorate since 1912, intensified  the hispanization of the Haquetia, which resulted in substituting many archaic Castilian terms with modern ones, and in continuously updating the Haquetia to the contemporary spoken Spanish.

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The Moroccan Jewry, numbered close to 300,000 in 1948, is dispersed all over the world now. The creation ofIsrael, the Arab – Israeli wars and the regained Moroccan independence fromSpainandFrance, casted a heavy blow on the community. Its members emigrated mainly toIsrael,Spain,France,England,Belgium,Switzerland, North andLatin America. The community inMoroccohas dwindled to a couple of thousands.

The distance from its emotional, spiritual and cultural springhead; living far from the fountain that had been nourishing the roots for centuries, is affecting the Haquetia.  Presently, not  many can speak it fluently, but fortunately there are innumerable Haquetia aficionados who strive to preserve the language by infusing vocabulary and aphorism Haquetiescos in their Spanish.

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Thus, despite the fact that descendents of the community grew up in different parts of the world, Haquetia remained the language of the soul; the language of affection that brings smiles to our faces and warmth to our hearts.  It is a language that carries on  unique traditions and glorious memories, albeit distanced.  Though these memories have been orally transmitted and not first hand experiences, they are planted in our hearts, minds and souls. Therefore it is our duty to cherish it and keep the Haquetia language alive, as our forefathers did. After all, it is the debt we owe to our forefathers, the Haquitos.

 

Pronunciation

H = to the Hebrew «?» (???).

 

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New York, January, 2010

The article is at the Data Base of Beit Hatefutsot, theMuseumofJewish Diaspora, Tel Aviv