“Nave” y “nao” en castellano medieval: historia de una sustitución léxica

Abstract

All along the Spanish texts of the late Middle Ages, one can notice the coexistence of the words nave and nao, denotating both of them a big merchant ship. But this apparent synonymy hides in fact a lexical substitu­tion: since the second half of the 14th century the traditional word nave began to be dislodged by nao, a technicism used by the sailors of the Bay of Biscay. The fortune of this neologism can be undoubtly explained by the spreading of new techniques of shipbuilding developped in the Atlantic area which penetrated as well in the Mediterranean. Extremely striking is the fact that the word nao first appeared in documents closely related to navi­gation; but in the 15th century it often turned up in all types of texts, while nave became rapidly obsolete and it remained only as a historical term.