Misplaced Pages

#405594

66-612: Vila Real is a rugged area of low mountains and narrow valleys. Historically it had always been cut off from the coast by the Marão, Gerês, and Cabreira mountains until a highway was cut through in the eighties. Due to poor soil, agriculture has always been a struggle, although wine grapes are produced in the south near the Douro River . Potatoes, corn, and rye have always been the traditional crops, as well as limited dairy farming . Extensive areas are covered in pine forest. Granite and

132-576: A West Germanic language that originated from the Anglo-Frisian dialects brought to Britain by Germanic settlers from various parts of what is now northwest Germany and the northern Netherlands. The resident population at this time was generally speaking Common Brittonic —the insular variety of Continental Celtic , which was influenced by the Roman occupation. This group of languages ( Welsh , Cornish , Cumbric ) cohabited alongside English into

198-559: A century as Received Pronunciation (RP). However, due to language evolution and changing social trends, some linguists argue that RP is losing prestige or has been replaced by another accent, one that the linguist Geoff Lindsey for instance calls Standard Southern British English. Others suggest that more regionally-oriented standard accents are emerging in England. Even in Scotland and Northern Ireland, RP exerts little influence in

264-508: A greater movement, normally [əʊ], [əʉ] or [əɨ]. Dropping a morphological grammatical number , in collective nouns , is stronger in British English than North American English. This is to treat them as plural when once grammatically singular, a perceived natural number prevails, especially when applying to institutional nouns and groups of people. The noun 'police', for example, undergoes this treatment: Police are investigating

330-406: A lesser class or social status and often discounted or considered of a low intelligence. Another contribution to the standardisation of British English was the introduction of the printing press to England in the mid-15th century. In doing so, William Caxton enabled a common language and spelling to be dispersed among the entirety of England at a much faster rate. Samuel Johnson's A Dictionary of

396-430: A population density of 22 per km, although the number of small villages scattered across the area gives a different impression. A closer look shows that many of the houses are no longer lived in and many have been abandoned. Much of this population still lives in villages, many of which have fewer than 100 inhabitants. Over seventy-five percent of the population in fact lives in centers with fewer than 5,000 people, which

462-659: A process called T-glottalisation . National media, being based in London, have seen the glottal stop spreading more widely than it once was in word endings, not being heard as "no [ʔ] " and bottle of water being heard as "bo [ʔ] le of wa [ʔ] er". It is still stigmatised when used at the beginning and central positions, such as later , while often has all but regained /t/ . Other consonants subject to this usage in Cockney English are p , as in pa [ʔ] er and k as in ba [ʔ] er. In most areas of England and Wales, outside

528-485: A prosperous tourist industry has developed based on river excursions from Porto to points along the Upper Douro valley. The Douro railway line ( Linha do Douro ) was completed in 1887; it connects Porto, Rio Tinto, Ermesinde, Valongo, Paredes, Penafiel, Livração, Marco de Canaveses, Régua, Tua and Pocinho. Pocinho is near the very small city of Foz Côa, which is close to Côa Valley Paleolithic Art site. This

594-520: A regional accent or dialect. However, about 2% of Britons speak with an accent called Received Pronunciation (also called "the King's English", "Oxford English" and " BBC English" ), that is essentially region-less. It derives from a mixture of the Midlands and Southern dialects spoken in London in the early modern period. It is frequently used as a model for teaching English to foreign learners. In

660-725: Is also due to London-centric influences. Examples of R-dropping are car and sugar , where the R is not pronounced. British dialects differ on the extent of diphthongisation of long vowels, with southern varieties extensively turning them into diphthongs, and with northern dialects normally preserving many of them. As a comparison, North American varieties could be said to be in-between. Long vowels /iː/ and /uː/ are usually preserved, and in several areas also /oː/ and /eː/, as in go and say (unlike other varieties of English, that change them to [oʊ] and [eɪ] respectively). Some areas go as far as not diphthongising medieval /iː/ and /uː/, that give rise to modern /aɪ/ and /aʊ/; that is, for example, in

726-824: Is cognate with modern Breton dour and Cornish dur "water" and results from a later typical Brittonic evolution of *dubro- , unknown in the Continental Celtic languages . The possible origin is the hydronymic root *dur- , which is Pre-Indo-European or Pre-Celtic . Albert Dauzat linked this river name to a Pre-Celtic hydronymic root *dor- , which is well attested in Western Europe : in France Doire , Doron , Douron, etc. and in Italy Dora , etc. The meaning of this element is, however, unknown. A folk-etymological derivation suggests that

SECTION 10

#1732797828406

792-569: Is considered important to the archaeological pre-historic patrimony, and it has been designated as a UNESCO World Heritage Site . Fifteen dams have been built on the Douro to regulate the water flow, generate hydroelectric power , and allow navigation through locks . Beginning at the headwaters, the first five dams are in Spain: Cuerda del Pozo , Los Rábanos , San José , Villalcampo and Castro Dams . The next five downstream are along

858-795: Is included in style guides issued by various publishers including The Times newspaper, the Oxford University Press and the Cambridge University Press . The Oxford University Press guidelines were originally drafted as a single broadsheet page by Horace Henry Hart, and were at the time (1893) the first guide of their type in English; they were gradually expanded and eventually published, first as Hart's Rules , and in 2002 as part of The Oxford Manual of Style . Comparable in authority and stature to The Chicago Manual of Style for published American English ,

924-415: Is the cutoff point for urbanization. If we take the total population of 230,000 in 1991 and single out the largest centers with more than 10,000 people—Chaves, and Vila Real—whose total population is under 30,000, we can see that over seventy five percent of the population is rural or semi-rural. This lack of middle-sized urban centers in the province is a reflection of the loss of population of

990-648: Is the largest river of the Iberian Peninsula by discharge. It rises near Duruelo de la Sierra in the Spanish province of Soria , meanders briefly south, then flows generally west through the northern part of the Meseta Central in Castile and León into northern Portugal . Its largest tributary (carrying more water than the Douro at their confluence) is the right-bank Esla . The Douro flows into

1056-547: The Chambers Dictionary , and the Collins Dictionary record actual usage rather than attempting to prescribe it. In addition, vocabulary and usage change with time; words are freely borrowed from other languages and other varieties of English, and neologisms are frequent. For historical reasons dating back to the rise of London in the ninth century, the form of language spoken in London and

1122-753: The Aldeadávila Dam impounds the river, there are protected areas: the International Douro Natural Park (on the Portuguese side) and the Arribes del Duero Natural Park (on the Zamoran margin). The Douro fully enters Portuguese territory just after the confluence with the Águeda River ; once the Douro enters Portugal, major population centres are less frequent along the river. Except for Porto and Vila Nova de Gaia at

1188-637: The Atlantic Ocean at Porto , the second largest city of Portugal. The scenic Douro railway line runs close to the river. Adjacent areas produce port (a mildly fortified wine) and other agricultural produce. A small tributary of the river has the Côa Valley Paleolithic Art site which is considered important to the archaeological pre-historic patrimony, designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site . Within Spain, it flows through

1254-571: The Douro Valley in Portugal, long devoted to vineyards , has been designated by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site . The wine was taken downriver in flat-bottom boats called rabelos , to be stored in barrels in cellars in Vila Nova de Gaia , just across the river from Porto . Nowadays port is transported there in tanker trucks. In the 1960s and 1970s, dams with locks were built along

1320-658: The East Midlands became standard English within the Court, and ultimately became the basis for generally accepted use in the law, government, literature and education in Britain. The standardisation of British English is thought to be from both dialect levelling and a thought of social superiority. Speaking in the Standard dialect created class distinctions; those who did not speak the standard English would be considered of

1386-599: The English language native to the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland . More narrowly, it can refer specifically to the English language in England , or, more broadly, to the collective dialects of English throughout the British Isles taken as a single umbrella variety, for instance additionally incorporating Scottish English , Welsh English , and Northern Irish English . Tom McArthur in

SECTION 20

#1732797828406

1452-644: The Oxford Guide to World English acknowledges that British English shares "all the ambiguities and tensions [with] the word 'British' and as a result can be used and interpreted in two ways, more broadly or more narrowly, within a range of blurring and ambiguity". Variations exist in formal (both written and spoken) English in the United Kingdom. For example, the adjective wee is almost exclusively used in parts of Scotland, north-east England, Northern Ireland, Ireland, and occasionally Yorkshire , whereas

1518-487: The Ribera del Duero wine region. Sheep rearing is also still important. The drainage basin borders those of Miño to the north, Ebro to the east, and Tajo to the south. For 112 kilometres (70 mi), the river forms part of the border between Spain and Portugal , in a region of narrow canyons . It formed a historical barrier to invasions, creating a cultural/linguistic divide. In these isolated areas, in which

1584-493: The Royal Spanish Academy with Spanish. Standard British English differs notably in certain vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation features from standard American English and certain other standard English varieties around the world. British and American spelling also differ in minor ways. The accent, or pronunciation system, of standard British English, based in southeastern England, has been known for over

1650-490: The Scots language or Scottish Gaelic ). Each group includes a range of dialects, some markedly different from others. The various British dialects also differ in the words that they have borrowed from other languages. Around the middle of the 15th century, there were points where within the 5 major dialects there were almost 500 ways to spell the word though . Following its last major survey of English Dialects (1949–1950),

1716-573: The University of Leeds has started work on a new project. In May 2007 the Arts and Humanities Research Council awarded a grant to Leeds to study British regional dialects. The team are sifting through a large collection of examples of regional slang words and phrases turned up by the "Voices project" run by the BBC , in which they invited the public to send in examples of English still spoken throughout

1782-610: The West Country and other near-by counties of the UK, the consonant R is not pronounced if not followed by a vowel, lengthening the preceding vowel instead. This phenomenon is known as non-rhoticity . In these same areas, a tendency exists to insert an R between a word ending in a vowel and a next word beginning with a vowel. This is called the intrusive R . It could be understood as a merger, in that words that once ended in an R and words that did not are no longer treated differently. This

1848-524: The concelho or municipality, which can be as large as 1,720.6 km (664.3 sq mi) ( Odemira in the district of Beja ) or as small as 8.11 km (3.13 sq mi) ( São João da Madeira in the district of Aveiro ), and another number for the main urban center itself. Often it is difficult to determine which parishes make up the urban center and which make up the rest of the concelho. Official census figures give populations of concelhos and not urban centers, so this can be misleading. Often

1914-629: The 21st century. RP, while long established as the standard English accent around the globe due to the spread of the British Empire , is distinct from the standard English pronunciation in some parts of the world; most prominently, RP notably contrasts with standard North American accents. In the 21st century, dictionaries like the Oxford English Dictionary , the Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English ,

1980-615: The Douro River are Valladolid and Zamora in Spain, and Porto and Vila Nova de Gaia in Portugal. The latter two are located at the mouth of the Douro at the Atlantic Ocean. In Portugal, the Douro flows through the districts of Bragança , Guarda , Viseu , Vila Real , Aveiro and Porto . Porto is the main hub city in northern Portugal. Its historic centre has been designated as a UNESCO World Heritage Site because of its significant architecture and history. These reaches of

2046-431: The Douro have a mesoclimate allowing for cultivation of olives , almonds , and especially grapes , which are important for making port . The region around Pinhão and São João da Pesqueira is considered to be the centre of port, with its quintas (or farms/estates) that extend along the steep slopes of the river valleys. In the 21st century, many of these are owned by multinational, reputed wine companies. Recently,

Vila Real District - Misplaced Pages Continue

2112-836: The English Language (1755) was a large step in the English-language spelling reform , where the purification of language focused on standardising both speech and spelling. By the early 20th century, British authors had produced numerous books intended as guides to English grammar and usage, a few of which achieved sufficient acclaim to have remained in print for long periods and to have been reissued in new editions after some decades. These include, most notably of all, Fowler's Modern English Usage and The Complete Plain Words by Sir Ernest Gowers . Detailed guidance on many aspects of writing British English for publication

2178-666: The Germanic schwein ) is the animal in the field bred by the occupied Anglo-Saxons and pork (like the French porc ) is the animal at the table eaten by the occupying Normans. Another example is the Anglo-Saxon cu meaning cow, and the French bœuf meaning beef. Cohabitation with the Scandinavians resulted in a significant grammatical simplification and lexical enrichment of the Anglo-Frisian core of English;

2244-553: The Iberian Peninsula after the Tagus and Ebro . Its total length is 897 kilometres (557 mi), of which only sections of the Portuguese section, being below a fall/rapids line, are naturally navigable, by modest rivercraft. The Douro River basin encompasses an area of approximately 97,290 square kilometres. In its Spanish section, the Douro crosses the great Castilian meseta and meanders through five provinces of

2310-922: The Oxford Manual is a fairly exhaustive standard for published British English that writers can turn to in the absence of specific guidance from their publishing house. British English is the basis of, and very similar to, Commonwealth English . Commonwealth English is English as spoken and written in the Commonwealth countries , though often with some local variation. This includes English spoken in Australia , Malta , New Zealand , Nigeria , and South Africa . It also includes South Asian English used in South Asia, in English varieties in Southeast Asia , and in parts of Africa. Canadian English

2376-524: The Portuguese-Spanish border; the first three are owned and operated by Portugal: ( Miranda , Picote and Bemposta Dams ), while the next two belong to Spain: ( Aldeadávila and Saucelle Dams ). The Douro's last five dams are in Portugal, and allow for navigation: Pocinho , Valeira , Régua , Carrapatelo , and Crestuma–Lever dams. Vessels with a maximum length of 83 metres (272 ft) and width of 11.4 metres (37 ft) can pass through

2442-712: The South East, there are significantly different accents; the Cockney accent spoken by some East Londoners is strikingly different from Received Pronunciation (RP). Cockney rhyming slang can be (and was initially intended to be) difficult for outsiders to understand, although the extent of its use is often somewhat exaggerated. Londoners speak with a mixture of accents, depending on ethnicity, neighbourhood, class, age, upbringing, and sundry other factors. Estuary English has been gaining prominence in recent decades: it has some features of RP and some of Cockney. Immigrants to

2508-550: The UK in recent decades have brought many more languages to the country and particularly to London. Surveys started in 1979 by the Inner London Education Authority discovered over 125 languages being spoken domestically by the families of the inner city's schoolchildren. Notably Multicultural London English , a sociolect that emerged in the late 20th century spoken mainly by young, working-class people in multicultural parts of London . Since

2574-576: The United Kingdom , as well as within the countries themselves. The major divisions are normally classified as English English (or English as spoken in England (which is itself broadly grouped into Southern English , West Country , East and West Midlands English and Northern English ), Northern Irish English (in Northern Ireland), Welsh English (not to be confused with the Welsh language ), and Scottish English (not to be confused with

2640-465: The West Scottish accent. Phonological features characteristic of British English revolve around the pronunciation of the letter R, as well as the dental plosive T and some diphthongs specific to this dialect. Once regarded as a Cockney feature, in a number of forms of spoken British English, /t/ has become commonly realised as a glottal stop [ʔ] when it is in the intervocalic position, in

2706-410: The adjective little is predominant elsewhere. Nevertheless, there is a meaningful degree of uniformity in written English within the United Kingdom, and this could be described by the term British English . The forms of spoken English, however, vary considerably more than in most other areas of the world where English is spoken and so a uniform concept of British English is more difficult to apply to

Vila Real District - Misplaced Pages Continue

2772-588: The autonomous community of Castile and León : Soria , Burgos , Valladolid , Zamora , and Salamanca , passing through the towns of Soria , Almazán , Aranda de Duero , Tordesillas , and Zamora . The most important tributaries in this region are the Pisuerga , passing through Valladolid , and the Esla , which passes through Zamora . This region is generally semi-arid plains, with wheat and in some places, especially near Aranda de Duero , with vineyards , in

2838-488: The award of the grant in 2007, Leeds University stated: that they were "very pleased"—and indeed, "well chuffed"—at receiving their generous grant. He could, of course, have been "bostin" if he had come from the Black Country , or if he was a Scouser he would have been well "made up" over so many spondoolicks, because as a Geordie might say, £460,000 is a "canny load of chink". Most people in Britain speak with

2904-622: The country. The BBC Voices project also collected hundreds of news articles about how the British speak English from swearing through to items on language schools. This information will also be collated and analysed by Johnson's team both for content and for where it was reported. "Perhaps the most remarkable finding in the Voices study is that the English language is as diverse as ever, despite our increased mobility and constant exposure to other accents and dialects through TV and radio". When discussing

2970-416: The district is sparse, 54 people per square kilometer. Most of this population lives in the concelhos of the south—Vila Real, Santa Marta, Régua, Sabrosa, and Alijó. The area between the district capital and the Douro river is especially more densely populated, with Régua having a population density of 212 per km, and Santa Marta with 128. There is a relatively populated area east of the capital. North

3036-667: The final vowel sound often changes with context, as in Latin). However, were that the case, the - b -, of which there remains no trace, would not have disappeared, as evidenced by place-names derived from Gaulish *dubron (plural dubra ), such as French Douvres and English Dover (3rd/4th-century Dubris ; Douvres in French), Spanish Dobra, German Tauber ( Dubra-gave 807), and Gaelic/ Old Irish dobur "water" and river name Dobhar in Ireland and Scotland. Modern Welsh dŵr "water"

3102-408: The five locks . The highest lock, at Carrapatelo Dam, has a maximum lift of 35 metres (115 ft). The waters of Pocinho lake reach 125 metres (410 ft) above sea level. Unannounced releases of water from upstream Spanish dams occasionally causes navigation issues in these locks. British English British English (abbreviations: BrE , en-GB , and BE ) is the set of varieties of

3168-498: The head of the municipality can be relatively small with most of the population residing in rural parishes. Chaves, for example has 12,000 in the urban parishes (2) and 29,000 in 49 rural parishes for a total municipality population of 41,000. In order of population, Vila Real capital has roughly 25,000 in the urban parishes, Chaves 12,000, followed by Valpaços, Peso da Régua , and the other seats of concelhos, all of which have fewer than 10,000 inhabitants. The population density of

3234-458: The idea of two different morphemes, one that causes the double negation, and one that is used for the point or the verb. Standard English in the United Kingdom, as in other English-speaking nations, is widely enforced in schools and by social norms for formal contexts but not by any singular authority; for instance, there is no institution equivalent to the Académie française with French or

3300-523: The last southern Midlands accent to use the broad "a" in words like bath or grass (i.e. barth or grarss ). Conversely crass or plastic use a slender "a". A few miles northwest in Leicestershire the slender "a" becomes more widespread generally. In the town of Corby , five miles (8 km) north, one can find Corbyite which, unlike the Kettering accent, is largely influenced by

3366-518: The later Norman occupation led to the grafting onto that Germanic core of a more elaborate layer of words from the Romance branch of the European languages. This Norman influence entered English largely through the courts and government. Thus, English developed into a "borrowing" language of great flexibility and with a huge vocabulary . Dialects and accents vary amongst the four countries of

SECTION 50

#1732797828406

3432-692: The manufacture of mineral water—the waters of Vidago and Pedras Salgadas are nationally famous—are two important industries. There was formerly a narrow gauge railway (the Corgo line ) which linked the town of Vila Real with Peso da Régua on the Douro River. Until 1990 the railway reached as far north as Chaves . The remaining, southern part of the Corgo line closed in 2009. The largest towns are all very small, when compared to provincial capitals in neighboring Spain . When we talk about population of urban centers two figures are used in Portugal, one number for

3498-457: The mass internal migration to Northamptonshire in the 1940s and given its position between several major accent regions, it has become a source of various accent developments. In Northampton the older accent has been influenced by overspill Londoners. There is an accent known locally as the Kettering accent, which is a transitional accent between the East Midlands and East Anglian . It is

3564-453: The middle of the autonomous community of Castile and León , with the basin spanning through the northern half of the Meseta Central . The latter includes wine producing areas such as the Ribera del Duero DOP. The Latin name Durius might have been a Celtic name before the overwhelming Romanization of Iberia. If so, the Celtic root could have been *dubro- (in that family of languages

3630-463: The modern period, but due to their remoteness from the Germanic languages , influence on English was notably limited . However, the degree of influence remains debated, and it has recently been argued that its grammatical influence accounts for the substantial innovations noted between English and the other West Germanic languages. Initially, Old English was a diverse group of dialects, reflecting

3696-431: The name comes from the Portuguese or Spanish term for "golden". In Roman times, the river was personified as a god, Durius . Part of the drainage basin might have been severely depopulated in the 8th century. According to Claudio Sánchez-Albornoz this was a deliberate act by Alfonso I of Asturias for the defence of his Kingdom , which led the area to be named Repoblación . The Douro vinhateiro (vine-land) of

3762-469: The population clusters follow the Corgo river valley with many small villages on the river valley or veiga south of Vila Pouca. The geological fault linking Vila Pouca with Chaves is also quite populated. Then north and south of Chaves population density increases (68 per km). The area to the west—the Barroso—;or to the east—Serra do Brunheiro is sparsely inhabited. Montalegre has

3828-736: The region as a whole over the last twenty years, due to lack of job possibilities. It also means that the Transmontano still has a rural lifestyle and all that this implies in cultural habits, including outlook towards education, innovation in business, and acceptance of different ideas. The district is composed of 14 municipalities: 41°17′46″N 7°44′46″W  /  41.29611°N 7.74611°W  / 41.29611; -7.74611 Douro River The Douro ( UK : / ˈ d ʊər oʊ , ˈ d ʊər uː / , US : / ˈ d ɔːr uː , ˈ d ɔːr oʊ / , Portuguese: [ˈdo(w)ɾu] , Mirandese : [ˈdowɾʊ] ; Spanish : Duero [ˈdweɾo] ; Latin : Durius )

3894-583: The river mouth, the only population centres of any note are Foz do Tua, Pinhão and Peso da Régua . Tributaries here are small, merging into the Douro along the canyons; the most important are Côa , Tua , Sabor , Corgo , Tavora , Paiva , Tâmega , and Sousa . None of these small, fast-flowing rivers is navigable. Major Spanish riverside towns include Soria , Almazán , Aranda de Duero , Tordesillas , Zamora and major Portuguese towns include Miranda do Douro , Foz Côa , Peso da Régua , Lamego , Vila Nova de Gaia , and Porto . The most populous cities along

3960-417: The river, allowing river traffic into the upper regions in Spain and along the border. In 1998, Portugal and Spain signed the Albufeira Convention, an agreement on the sharing of trans-boundary rivers to include the Douro, Tagus and Guadiana . The convention superseded an agreement on the Douro, signed in 1927, that was expanded in 1964 and 1968 to include tributaries. It is the third-longest river in

4026-401: The spoken language. Globally, countries that are former British colonies or members of the Commonwealth tend to follow British English, as is the case for English used by European Union institutions. In China, both British English and American English are taught. The UK government actively teaches and promotes English around the world and operates in over 200 countries . English is

SECTION 60

#1732797828406

4092-433: The theft of work tools worth £500 from a van at the Sprucefield park and ride car park in Lisburn. A football team can be treated likewise: Arsenal have lost just one of 20 home Premier League matches against Manchester City. This tendency can be observed in texts produced already in the 19th century. For example, Jane Austen , a British author, writes in Chapter 4 of Pride and Prejudice , published in 1813: All

4158-403: The traditional accent of Newcastle upon Tyne , 'out' will sound as 'oot', and in parts of Scotland and North-West England, 'my' will be pronounced as 'me'. Long vowels /iː/ and /uː/ are diphthongised to [ɪi] and [ʊu] respectively (or, more technically, [ʏʉ], with a raised tongue), so that ee and oo in feed and food are pronounced with a movement. The diphthong [oʊ] is also pronounced with

4224-577: The varied origins of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England. One of these dialects, Late West Saxon , eventually came to dominate. The original Old English was then influenced by two waves of invasion: the first was by speakers of the Scandinavian branch of the Germanic family, who settled in parts of Britain in the eighth and ninth centuries; the second was the Normans in the 11th century, who spoke Old Norman and ultimately developed an English variety of this called Anglo-Norman . These two invasions caused English to become "mixed" to some degree (though it

4290-501: The world are good and agreeable in your eyes. However, in Chapter 16, the grammatical number is used. The world is blinded by his fortune and consequence. Some dialects of British English use negative concords, also known as double negatives . Rather than changing a word or using a positive, words like nobody, not, nothing, and never would be used in the same sentence. While this does not occur in Standard English, it does occur in non-standard dialects. The double negation follows

4356-422: Was never a truly mixed language in the strictest sense of the word; mixed languages arise from the cohabitation of speakers of different languages, who develop a hybrid tongue for basic communication). The more idiomatic, concrete and descriptive English is, the more it is from Anglo-Saxon origins. The more intellectual and abstract English is, the more it contains Latin and French influences, e.g. swine (like

#405594