The preterite of Spanish andar: An “unbiased” history of non-standard vs. standard forms

Abstract

Abstract Alongside the standard irregular preterite of Sp. andar (anduve ‘I walked’) there exist non-standard regular forms (andé ‘I walked’). Scholars have assumed that the non-standard regular forms have resulted from analogy with the preterite of regular -ar verbs, agree that the irregular preterite of andar was formed by analogy with the etymological irregular preterite of estar, and have assumed that the earliest forms were the irregular ones. But if the preterite of andar was formed by analogy with that of estar, what were the etymological forms of the preterite of andar inherited from Latin? This question has not been raised hitherto because of “standard language bias”, a phenomenon recently introduced by Maiden (2022). It will be revealed here that non-standard forms in and- appear by the early thirteenth century. Their early appearance, together with comparative Romance evidence, points to the likelihood that they were not formed by later processes of analogy and regularization, but that they were, and are, direct descendants of one of a number of possible Latin etyma. Finally, it will be explained why forms in anduv- eclipsed the original forms in and-, eventually becoming the standard, as well as why they have persisted as such to date.