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In Spanish, it's "ajolote". In the Spanish of the 1490s and early 1500s, there was a "SH" sound, spelled with X, the same way there is today in other Iberian l
by asveikau 6mo ago
In Spanish, it's "ajolote".
In the Spanish of the 1490s and early 1500s, there was a "SH" sound, spelled with X, the same way there is today in other Iberian languages like Portuguese, Galician, Catalan, or Basque. They got to Mexico and wrote many indigenous words with "SH" sounds (like "Mexico" and "axolotl") with X. Shortly after this, the pronunciation shifted to the modern Spanish J sound (which in much of the Spanish speaking world is like the CH in loch, but in some countries is like an H sound).
- pezezin 6mo agoI am Spanish myself and didn't know about this fact until recently. It explains many "old-fashioned" spellings like México, Pedro Ximenez, or Don Quixote (nowadays usually written as Quijote, but you will find the old spelling in other languages). For those who are curious enough, this article explains the evolution of the Spanish sibilants and why our languages uses J and Z in a very different way from pretty much any other language: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phonological_history_of_Spanish_coronal_fricatives https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phonological_history_of_Spanis...