Hype for the Future 52N: Portugal, the Beginning of Europe

Background

Portugal 🇵🇹 is the westernmost country in the European mainland, even further west than the western extent of Galicia within neighboring Spain 🇪🇸. While both share the Iberian Peninsula and possibly with the Pyrenees of Andorra 🇦🇩 occasionally included, the cultural traits of each nation are quite distinct, not just across borders, but often internally so as well. For Portugal, the southern part of the nation is quite far from the vast majority of the Portuguese population, and the same is generally true regarding Spain. However, the Portuguese culture relies on proximity to the ocean, whereas the Spanish culture often does not.

Cultural Influences

Though both Portugal and Spain have Mediterranean climate areas within the Iberian Peninsula, Spain extends into a mostly semi-arid region on the European continent and contains the driest areas within the entire continent. While common wisdom may suggest that no such desert exists in Europe, a small section located in Spain may be considered desert in proper terms.

Both Spain and Portugal face the Atlantic Ocean to the west and the Mediterranean Sea to the south. However, Spain also has coastlines expanding in nearly every direction, with the obvious exception of the Pyrenees Mountains along the borders with Andorra 🇦🇩 and France 🇫🇷. The siesta culture is usually only in select parts of Spain and typically a cultural trait associated with the summer months, while Portugal lacks a similar cultural trait. Perhaps the seafaring identity of Portugal plays a major role in distinguishing the nation from neighboring Spain to the east and northeast.

Hype for the Future 49E: Not All Spanish Life is Castilian

Apart from the Castilian Spanish heritage of the nation, Spain is also home to relatively outlying areas including (from west to east) Galicia, the Basque Country, and Catalonia—all on the northern side of the nation. The native name associated with Galicia is officially Galicia; however, the local name is often associated with the spelling and pronunciation of Galiza, though Reintegrationism may advocate for Galiça instead. Beyond the Galician realm, the Basque Country is natively known as Euskadi and Catalonia as Catalunya, respectively.

Hype for the Future 49B: Artifacts of Portuguese Culture

Portuguese culture in the modern European sense covers the modern-day mainland of Portugal, as well as the associated islands and related regions, particularly Madeira and the Azores Islands. Also of note from a Portuguese context is the orthography, which often prefers “m” at the end of words and famously seems to nasalize almost everything, particularly with the suffix “-ão” common to the language. Also a common feature of the Portuguese language is the letter “ç,” as Portugal does not claim the letters “k” nor “z” are truly legible domestically. Instead of “kilo-,” for instance, the national identity may prefer “quilo-,” and the orthographic preferences also associated with the Portuguese also contain the digraphic preferences of “lh” and “nh.” The latter, “nh,” is actually derived from the traditional orthography of the palatalized “n,” referring, of course, to the historic notation of “nn” for both Portuguese and Spanish (the latter of which has a tilde accent above the “n” nowadays).