“The Vile Gallicisms, which Today Make Ugly Many Translations”: The Influence of the French Language on Iberian Translations from the Turn of the Eighteenth to the Nineteenth Century

Abstract

From the final decades of the Eighteenth century, in the speeches of Iberian literate elites, we can notice a systematic effort to diminish or avoid the influence of the French language on texts written in Portuguese and Spanish, originals or translations from French, particularly what is defined as “Gallicism”. Considering the enormous editorial volume of written, printed or translated books into French in the second half of the century, Iberian censors, translators, editors and commentators point to the presence of “French” words and constructions in the Portuguese and Castilian printed word. This study tries to see this issue in the light of the use of Gallicisms as part of the neologisms necessary to understand the advances in science and the arts in the Iberian Peninsula of the period.