Aranese: the language of the Aran Valley

Aranese is a variety of the Occitan language spoken in the Aran Valley, a Pyrenean region in the province of Lleida, Spain. It belongs to the Gascon branch of Occitan, a Romance language that during the Middle Ages stretched across the whole of southern France, from Bordeaux to Nice. The Aran Valley is the only territory in the entire Occitan-speaking world where the language has official recognition and institutional protection.

Around 5,000 people speak Aranese. 62.2% of the valley's population understands it, compared to 16% of Occitan speakers across southern France. It is a living language: used in the streets, in local government, in schools and on the signage of every village in the valley.

Origin of Aranese

Aranese descends from the Vulgar Latin spoken in the central Pyrenees during the early Middle Ages. As Latin fragmented into Romance languages, the variant spoken in the valleys on the northern slope evolved into Gascon, one of the branches of Occitan.

The geographical isolation of the Aran Valley (surrounded by mountains above 2,000 metres and with the Vielha Tunnel as the only direct link to Spain until 1948) preserved archaic phonetic and grammatical features that French Gascon gradually lost. That preservation makes Aranese one of the purest surviving variants of Gascon Occitan.

The word "Aran" itself comes from ancient Basque, meaning "valley". Val d'Aran translates literally as "valley of the valley", a redundant place name that reveals its age: it existed before Romance speakers understood its meaning.

Where is Aranese spoken?

Aranese is spoken in the Aran Valley, a region of 620 km² at the north-western tip of Catalonia, in the province of Lleida. It covers 33 villages spread between the Upper Aran (Salardú, Tredòs, Arties, Bagergue, Unha, Gessa, Garós) and the Lower Aran (Vielha, Les, Bossòst, Canejan, Es Bòrdes, Bausen).

The Aran Valley is the only valley on the Spanish side of the Pyrenees that sits on the northern slope of the mountain range. That geographical position, with rivers flowing towards France (the Garonne rises here and reaches the sea at Bordeaux), explains why the local language belongs to the Occitan family rather than to Catalan or Spanish.

In daily life, Aranese coexists with Spanish and Catalan. Spanish is the most widely used language day to day (especially in Vielha), followed by Aranese and then Catalan. The balance varies by village: in the smaller settlements of the Upper Aran, Aranese has a stronger presence than in the capital.

Aranese, a co-official language in Spain

Aranese has been co-official in the Aran Valley since Law 16/1990 on the special regime of the Aran Valley. Since 2006, the Statute of Autonomy of Catalonia extended that co-official status to the whole of Catalonia, although its real use remains concentrated in the valley.

This means Aranese has the same legal standing as Catalan and Spanish within the Aran Valley. Citizens can address the local administration in Aranese, official signs are in Aranese (village names only have an official form in Aranese: Vielha, not Viella; Bossòst, not Bosost), and the language is taught at every level of compulsory education.

The Conselh Generau d'Aran (General Council of the Aran Valley) uses Aranese as its working language. Catalunya Ràdio broadcasts programming in Aranese, and TV3 offers a weekly news summary in the language.

The Aran Valley is the only territory in the whole of historical Occitania (southern France, Monaco, Italian valleys) where Occitan has official recognition. In France, Occitan has no official status.

Is Aranese a language or a dialect?

Linguistically, Aranese is a variety of Gascon Occitan. The classification depends on the criteria applied: in sociolinguistics, a language is a dialect with an army and a navy (that is, with political recognition). Aranese has that recognition: it is a co-official language with a standard grammar, a dictionary, regulated teaching and administrative use.

From a legal standpoint, Aranese is a co-official language in Spain. It is not a dialect of Catalan (despite sharing the same autonomous community) or of Spanish. It is a variety of the Occitan language, an independent Romance language with its own history.

The confusion arises from its small number of speakers (5,000) and its geographical proximity to Catalan. But Aranese and Catalan are mutually unintelligible: a Catalan speaker cannot understand Aranese without prior study.

Characteristics of Aranese

Aranese has distinctive features that set it apart from standard Occitan and neighbouring languages:

Phonetics. The aspiration of the initial Latin "f" is one of the most recognisable Gascon traits. "Hijo" in Spanish, "fill" in Catalan, "hilh" in Aranese (with an aspirated h). It also preserves the labiodental "v" (distinguishing between "b" and "v", unlike Spanish).

Vocabulary. Aranese retains pre-Roman terms of Basque and Celtic origin that do not exist in other Romance languages. Words like "arriu" (river), "naut" (high) and "baish" (low) appear in place names across the valley: Naut Aran (Upper Aran), Baish Aran (Lower Aran).

Grammar. It has its own articles (eth, era, es, eres), verb conjugations with archaic forms and a pronoun system different from both Catalan and Spanish.

Writing. Aranese uses the classical Occitan orthography, standardised by the Institut d'Estudis Aranesi. It is written in Latin characters with its own spelling rules.

Basic Aranese words and their meaning

Some everyday words and expressions in Aranese:

• Adiu — Hello / Goodbye
• Se vos platz — Please
• Mercés — Thank you
• Bon dia — Good morning
• Bona nuèit — Good night
• Còm vas? — How are you?
• Òc — Yes (from Latin "hoc", the same root as "langue d'Oc")
• Non — No
• Eth — The (masculine singular article)
• Era — The (feminine singular article)
• Arriu — River
• Montanha — Mountain
• Hilh — Son
• Òme — Man
• Hemna — Woman
• Nèu — Snow

Village signs throughout the Aran Valley are written in Aranese: Vielha (not Viella), Bossòst (not Bosost), Tredòs (not Tredós). When you visit the valley, you will see them at every village entrance, on information panels and on restaurant menus.

Aranese and Occitan

Aranese is to Occitan what Andalusian is to Spanish or Québécois is to French: a regional variety of a larger language. Occitan (or langue d'Oc) was spoken across the whole of southern France during the Middle Ages. It was the language of the troubadours and of a literary tradition that rivalled French.

With the spread of French from Paris (especially after the Revolution of 1789), Occitan steadily lost speakers and status. Today, between 100,000 and 800,000 people speak it in France (depending on the source), but without official recognition. In Spain, Aranese survived thanks to the isolation of the Aran Valley and the legal recognition it obtained in 1990.

Curiosities about Aranese

Aranese is the only official language in Spain that belongs to the Occitan-Romance group. Spain has five languages with some degree of official status (Spanish, Catalan, Galician, Basque, Aranese) and Aranese is the least widely spoken of all.

The word "Aran" appears in Basque, Gascon and Aranese itself with the meaning of "valley". It is one of the oldest place names on the Iberian Peninsula.

Aranese shares more vocabulary with French than with Spanish or Catalan. An Aranese speaker can reasonably understand a Gascon speaker from southern France, but not a Catalan speaker from Barcelona.

All official village names in the Aran Valley are in Aranese. If you look for accommodation in Vielha or apartments in Salardú, you will notice that signs and local signage use the Aranese spelling. Visiting the Aran Valley means, among other things, discovering a language that refuses to disappear and that shapes the identity of each of its villages.