See the PDF of the text published in Les Nouveaux Cahiers

Although it is, in sum, only one of my first reviews of a work in Spanish, I hold this article very dear. Indirectly, it bears traces both of my studies in classical Spanish and of my exploits in the French translation of the Fable of Polyphemus and Galatea (1612) by Luis de Gongora, of which my master Robert Jammes, at the University of Grenoble, was the specialist, and of my investigations in Spain, very timid at the time when the dictator Franco (1892-1975) was still manifesting his obscurantist violence. I was pursuing both a degree in Spanish and another in French, imagining that I could pursue an international career outside the civil service (then forbidden to former tuberculosis patients). Curiously, this work in Spanish on literature in Ladino was not defended in Spain but in France, by a priest studying at the Catholic Faculty of Letters in Paris. Damian Alonso Garcia spent about fifteen years teaching his native language to young French people. He was also the author of a series of highly regarded textbooks. I therefore attended his thesis defense and thus met an enthusiastic, warm and friendly researcher. He had become not only a perfect connoisseur of the lengua de mosotros, but also a passionate disseminator of this oral literature. He gave me a copy of his work (which he later sent me in the form of the book I mention below). This is why my article was so substantial. It was time, it seemed to me, to make known, both to Spaniards and French, this creative activity of an exiled people, keeping alive their language of belonging. Driven from a country they had helped to build and enrich, they kept their own speech, their songs and their tales as they kept the key to their house, wherever they went afterwards. I specify that the translation of the cited texts is my own work, at a time when the Judeo-Spanish dictionary did not yet exist.

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Everyone knows Théophile Gautier's Journey to Spain, for the definition he gives there of the Spanish inn, where one finds only what one brings. But the origin he attributes to Toledo, the ancient capital of the Catholic kings, is perhaps less famous. Our romantic traveler reports that some attribute the honor of having laid its first stone to the Jews "who entered Spain with Nebuchadnezzar, relying on the etymology of Toledo which comes from Toledoth, Hebrew word meaning generations, because the twelve tribes had contributed to building and populating it". And there, we are not far from the thesis recently defended at the Faculty of Letters of the Catholic Institute of Paris by a Spanish priest, Brother Damian Alonso Garcia. Examining the oral literature of "Ladino" (or Judeo-Spanish), among the Sephardim of the East, through the Spanish Romancero, he came to expose before the jury that the Jews would have settled in Spain from the 2nd century, since a funerary slab attesting to this was discovered in Malaga. It is certain that by the 4th century, Jews were already spread throughout the peninsula. For him, the Jews, far from having constituted a separate and minor element of Spanish literature, would rather be at its origin, jointly with the Arabs and Christians. Recent research shows that Spanish popular lyric poetry would not come from Provençal lyric poetry, but from Arabic lyric poetry, of a popular character, reinforced by Jewish lyric poetry, equally popular. In sum, the first Spanish lyric poet whose name is known would not be Gonzalo de Berceo (died 1268) but Judah Levi, or Yehuda Halevy, born around 1070, and here is one of his jarchas (love song whose form is inherited from the Arabs):

Vayse meu corachon de mib. Ya, Rab, si se me tornarad ? Tan mal meu doler li-l-habib ! Enfermo yed, cuando sanarad ?

My heart separates from me. Tell me, Rab, will it return to me? So strong is my pain for my beloved! He is sick, when will he heal?

The interest of this song, beyond the religious, almost mystical feelings it expresses, is especially in this mixture of medieval Castilian, Arabic and Hebrew which makes all its untranslatable charm (1). It should be noted that rhymes already appear, instead of the simple assonance of Castilian or French poems of the same period, which would tend to confirm the hypothesis of a Semitic origin of rhymed versification.

But above all for Damian Alonso Garcia, Spanish literature would not have reached the heights to which it once attained without the contribution of the Jews of Spain. We know the important role that Rav. Don Santo de Carrion (Dom Sem Tob) could play both in literature and in the movement of Ideas of his time. The Marquis of Santillane said about him: — there was at that time a Jew named Rabi Santo who wrote very good things, among others Moral Proverbs of truly very commendable purpose. I have counted him among such noble persons in his capacity as a great poet, for, as he himself says:

"No vale el Azor menos Por nascer en vil nio, Nin los extemplos buenos Por los decir Judío."

The goshawk is worth no less Because he was born in a vile nest, Nor the good examples, Because it's a Jew who says them.

This quatrain is one of the 476 stanzas that make up Don Sem Tob's work entitled: Consejos y documentos del ludio Rabi don Santo al Rey Pedro. [Advice and indications of the Jew Rabi Don Sem Tob to King Peter]. It is, of course, about King Peter I the Cruel of Castile, to whom our author gives wise advice so that he governs Christianly, exhorting him to imitate the king his father. In this poem, Don Sem Tob declares that he is Jewish, and that he was already old when he wrote it. Alonso Garcia also reminds us that chapter IV of Cervantes' Galatea is entirely borrowed from Leon Hebreo (who was called Abrabanel), that Fernando de Rojas, the incomparable author of the dramatic masterpiece of all times and all countries that is La Celestina or the tragicomedy of Calixto and Melibea was Jewish, and even Saint Teresa of Avila, born into a Jewish family, her father, Juan Sanchez, having converted to Catholicism but in fact continuing the practices of his former religion, and for this condemned to wear the San Benito. All this research into the Jewish origins of each of the great names of Spanish literature could lend itself to smiles if it were not carried out by a priest who, with only the concern for truth, comes to regret the cruel tearing apart. To better exalt the vivifying presence of an entire group which, because it was different from the rest of the population but felt at home in Spain, was able to make the Renaissance take place there a century before all other European countries. Because, also, it served as a point of contact with Arab civilization, itself bearer of Greek thought and texts.

After this general preamble, which shows in what spirit and with what fervor the investigation was conducted, let us examine the manuscript thesis (written in Spanish) that the author was kind enough to entrust to us for Les Nouveaux Cahiers. His precise goal was to compare the Spanish Romancero to the oral literature transmitted from generation to generation by the Jews who emigrated from Spain from 1391 (date of the first mass exodus, following the persecutions provoked by the population) and took refuge both in Salonika and Constantinople or Monastir. For this purpose, sources are not lacking: for a century already, Jewish and non-Jewish scholars have been concerned with transcribing this abundant oral literature, which is disappearing. Among the first let us cite, among others, Yaacob Abraham Yona, of Salonika, Rabi Abraam Danon, Galante, Hemsi and, for the most recent Michael Molho and Moshé Attias; among the second Marcelino, Menendez Pelayo and Menendez Pidal, certainly the most erudite and who have done the most to orient research in this direction.

From the outset, a series of questions comes to mind:

• how have Spanish Jews preserved the language since their expulsion?
• in what way has the Jews' attachment to Spain been translated into literature?
• How is it that Spanish civilization attaches itself to people who have passed through the country in such an imperative way?

Let us be certain that these problems guided Alonso Garcia's investigation, which however did not have to treat them, and that they often maintained his optimism in the difficult moments of his work; for the author was not content to compile the works of the libraries of Madrid, Lisbon, Rome, Paris, he also conducted an investigation among Eastern Jews in Paris, thus confirming the transcriptions of his predecessors. We would have wished that he took advantage of it to make a perhaps broader enumeration, with a tape recorder, to record not only the words, but also the melody of this precious folklore which, we will not cease to repeat, is disappearing. This is all the more important because, very often, these popular songs, these romances of which we will see that they are purely Spanish, are no longer sung or recited in their country of origin. We call with all our wishes for the one who will come, like Federico Garcia Lorca in Spain, or Bela Bartok in Hungary, to record the melody of these old cantares which rocked our childhood, which accompanied each of our daily gestures: when it was too hot in the house, doors and windows had to be opened: "Abrid puertas y ventanas" or when we went to bathe:

"Fuérame à bañar" A orias del rio etc.

Alonso Garcia, after having defined the terms Sepharad (from Hebrew "West", designating Spain) and Ladino ("Latin" language, as opposed to Hebrew, which now serves, in scientific vocabulary, to designate Judeo-Spanish), examines the phonetic and grammatical system of this language, practically assimilable to that of Nebrija, the first grammarian of the Castilian language. We will not return, on this subject, to the reasons for astonishment of which we have already made part to our readers (cf. Nouveaux Cahiers, n° 6, June 1966), but let us say frankly that we do not share the exaltation of Professor Baiche who, during the defense, in his philosemitic enthusiasm, thought that the word ladino was a testimony of superiority rendered to the Jews by the Christians and that it was used as well, in the noble sense, for Jews and Christians. Certainly, the testimonies of Covarrubias' dictionary as well as César Houdin's Treasury are probative: those who worked on the Latin language, who were learned and wise and, in sum, experts in foreign languages, were called "ladinos", but we will not be contested that, despite Covarrubias, the word has taken a pejorative meaning, as moreover everything that attaches to the Jews in Spain, and that often it means "sly", "cunning", "stingy", even "wicked".

The author groups the collected Romances into three large categories. First, those that come from Spain and present a stupefying identity with the Spanish Romances: thus "Très falcones van bolando" belongs to the folklore of all countries, "Las altas mares" is the Romance of "Don Bueso", "En el vergel de la Reina" is the Romance of Conde Olinos. Sometimes even the identity of the Ladino and Castilian versions serves to prove the contested authenticity of certain Spanish Romances: for example "Por los palacios del Rey". It is always the themes of the Spanish Romancero that reappear, without any modification. They appeal to notions of purely Spanish civilization, unfindable in the host countries. Was the escarino (nostalgia) of Sepharad so strong that it was transmitted until our days? Let us imagine expatriated French people, would they still recite the Song of Roland, the Coronation of Louis? Yet this is what happened in Constantinople, where the Sephardim orally transmitted historical Romances, songs of deeds, like those of Bernardo del Carpio, of the Siete infantes de Lara, of Gaifers also where we find a well-known character of the French epic tradition. It is not the least merit of Alonso Garcia to have brought them closer to the original, to have revealed their "authenticity".

For the task was not easy: often the names of places or characters have changed. Thus constitutes a group of Romances of doubtful attribution, which are probably inherited from Spain, but which may have been composed in exile, with references to traditional themes, which conferred on them a "respectable antiquity". In this regard, I submit to his sagacity the following poem, which I have just collected and which I transcribe as I heard it, with the irregular octosyllables that oral tradition transmits. It is impossible that it does not allude to a news item that once took place in Spain, an extraordinary recognition as there may have been at the time of the great adventurers who were going to make their way to the New World, it is the return of the prodigal son, dramatically told:

Dos hijicos tengo lloran y demandan pan me meti a la ventana vide al capitan. "Asi biva el capitan de qué mares venid Pedri a mi hijo capitan en la mare." — Yo lo vi al vuestro hijo vuestro hijo capitan de la mar la piedra por cavecera la tierra por cuvierta — Si es verdad que ya lo viteis que signas mos vais a dar ? — Debaxo del braso siedro ya tiene un buen lunar. Esto qu'oyo la su madre a la mar se fue a echar. "Non vos eches la mi madre ni vos dexo yo echar yo so el vuestro hijo vuestro hijo el coronal."

I have two little boys they cry and ask for bread I went to the window I saw the captain. "Tell me on your faith captain from what seas do you come? I lost my son captain of the sea. — I saw your son your son captain of the sea stone for pillow earth as blanket — If it's true that you saw him what signs will you give us? — Under the left arm he has a good mole." When she heard this the mother went to throw herself into the sea "Don't throw yourself, my mother and I won't let you throw yourself I am your son your son the colonel,"

The same difficulty is found for the biblical Romances, which the Spaniards may have composed, even when they were in the Catholic Kingdom.

Then comes the third group, that of Romances elaborated in exile, and which obey the rules of Romance structure (and sometimes even its traditional thematics). Some are purely original, while appealing to a conception of life typically Spanish. Others proceed from contaminations, witness "Se pasea el pastor fiel" which takes up a prayer to the Virgin by adding a prayer to the God of Israel which, finally, is the only one to save the ships in distress. The concern for edification is undeniable. Sometimes, a rabbi feeling the need to raise the moral level of his flock, composed Romances that recall the Ten Commandments or the duties imposed by charity. And this is important: to better communicate his teaching, the anonymous author had to resort to a poetic and popular form while expressing himself in vulgar language, that is to say in Ladino. Let us take for example the beginning of the Romance Cualos son estos pecados:

Cualos son estos pecados, los pecados qu'hice yo; de matar a padre y madre y un hermano más mayor, y'a una hermana que tenía yo le hice traición. Que me hagan todas las penas las penas que merezco yo, que m'arrastren por los campos, que todo lo merezco yo, que aciendan un pavil de cera el de dientro seria yo.

What are these sins, these sins that I did: I killed my father and mother, and my elder brother, and a sister I had, I betrayed her. Let all the pains be inflicted on me, the pains I deserve, let me be dragged through the fields, I have deserved everything, let a wax candle be lit, I will be the wick.

But inspiration is not always so serious, we also find a humorous and popular vein, which makes us think of the Jews of the banks of the Rhine as Apollinaire saw them in the Synagogue, poem of Alcools, thus allowing us to bring the Ashkenazi closer to his Sephardi brother through Noah: Hacino estaba Apatuso.

Hacino estaba Apatuso hacino por murir. Si te mueres, mi haber que me dejas de herencia ? Una manta y una estera y un cujin de cabecera Ya se muería Apatuso Ya le llevan a enterrer Por el medio del camino Sintió vino apregonar : — Esperad mis haberim, Cuando lo iré á gostar. Los haberim que esto oyeron Lo dejaron y se fueron Lo dejaron y se fueron Y a reir se mitieron. — Qué vos reís hijos d'un perro Que borracho n'osto yo !

Apatuso was sick, Sick to death. If you die, my comrade, What will you leave me as inheritance? A blanket and a mat, and a pillow. Apatuso is dead, They carry him to the grave, Halfway there he hears wine being sold at auction: "Wait, my companions, let me go taste it." The companions who heard this, Left him and went away, Left him and went away, And began to laugh. Why do you laugh, sons of a dog, I am not drunk, me!

In this third section, of Romances composed in exile, Alonso Garcia devotes several chapters to Romances of religious inspiration (episodes from the Bible and the Haggadah, poems for religious holidays, lamentations for the 9th of Av, etc.). Let us note well that not all poems in Ladino are Romances, of which they preserve neither the content nor the poetic structure. Some are simply translations from Hebrew, others certainly have a precise poetic air. This is because Hebrew, sacred language reserved for the study of the Torah, ceased to be understood by all, women particularly; thus developed a poetry in Ladino on biblical themes: Joshua stops the sun, Judith and Holofernes, David and Goliath, David and Absalom. David and Tamar, Sad is King David, King David has a son. Most of these romances have moreover been already published in Spain by Augustin Duran in his general Romancero and were, according to this scholar, composed in the 16th century and doubtless carried to the Balkans by the marranos (false converts) at their successive departures. This leads Alonso Garcia to a seductive hypothesis, which he proposes to explain the origin of the Romances about Moses, sung by women in the days preceding Pesah, at the time of the great cleaning. These songs had no reason to be for those who had the Haggadah in Hebrew and Spanish at their disposal, but the marranos, particularly watched by the Inquisition at the time of the holidays, had to hide themselves, which is why these Romances about Moses were sung in the days preceding Easter, but not the eve nor during the commemorative week. It would then be the marranos who would have introduced their songs into the Sephardic communities of the Levant.

Here is an example of a biblical Romance, one of the most widespread and most beautiful:

The twelve flowers walk

Se pasean las doce flores entre medio una conjá.