Someone recently asked about the word Spaniard, and I’m excited to delve into one of my favorite processes in etymology – metathesis (the swapping of sounds within a word). The term first appeared in English around the early 15th century, spelled as Spaignarde. Over time, it went through various spellings like Spaynard, Spaynnarde, Spainierd, and Spayneyarde. It wasn’t until the mid-16th century that the palatal glide before the letter n shifted to the second part of the word due to natural pronunciation errors. Unsurprisingly, the word comes from the Old French equivalent of Spain, Espaigne, which in turn originates from the Ancient Greek Hispania with the same meaning. It is believed that Hispania itself is derived from a Phoenician term meaning “land of the hyraxes”, a small mammal similar to a groundhog.
