Comparison of Portuguese and Spanish

Portuguese and Spanish, although closely related Romance languages, differ in many aspects of their phonology, grammar, and lexicon. Both belong to a subset of the Romance languages known as West Iberian Romance, which also includes several other languages or dialects with fewer speakers, all of which are mutually intelligible to some degree.

The most obvious differences between Spanish and Portuguese are in pronunciation. Mutual intelligibility is greater between the written languages than between the spoken forms. Compare, for example, the following sentences—roughly equivalent to the English proverb "A word to the wise is sufficient," or, a more literal translation, "To a good listener, a few words are enough.":

Al buen entendedor pocas palabras bastan (Spanish pronunciation: [al ˈβwen entendeˈðoɾ ˈpokas paˈlaβɾas ˈβastan])
Ao bom entendedor poucas palavras bastam (European Portuguese: [aw ˈβõ ẽtẽdɨˈðoɾ ˈpokɐʃ pɐˈlavɾɐʒ ˈβaʃtɐ̃w]).

There are also some significant differences between European and Brazilian Portuguese as there are between British and American English or Peninsular and Latin American Spanish. This article notes these differences below only where:

  • both Brazilian and European Portuguese differ not only from each other, but from Spanish as well;
  • both Peninsular (i.e. European) and Latin American Spanish differ not only from each other, but also from Portuguese; or
  • either Brazilian or European Portuguese differs from Spanish with syntax not possible in Spanish (while the other dialect does not).
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.