Nomina agentis en el español medieval y el rumano antiguo

Abstract

In this paper we analyse the word formation of agent names in Spanish and Romanian according to crafts and labour terms used in the Middle Ages. The development of agent names can be traced back to Indo-European, Greek and Latin formulas. From a traditional perspective, in vulgar Latin, Middle Ages vocabulary contained suffixed words called nomina agentis, the most used elements being -tor and -ārius. Initially, the Romance languages preserved these agent suffixes, but in time, due to phonetic, morphological and semantic influences, new lexical elements were added with rural and urban values. We will study Latin suffixes in Romanian, we will compare them with those in Spanish, and we will analyse their productivity in these languages.