Koldo Zuazo

Who is Koldo Zuazo?

Koldo Zuazo is a Basque linguist, professor at the University of the Basque Country and specialist in Basque language dialectology and sociolinguistics.

He is famous because of his work on the Basque dialects, as he has drawn a new classification and a new map of these dialects—this has been a revolution in a field where few changes were made since the Louis Lucien Bonaparte's works. As the Basque linguist Koldo Mitxelena, he considers that the historical and present characteristics of the Basque language show that this language broke up into dialects in the Middle Ages. Zuazo has identified the places of origin that current Basque dialects derive from; this is the list of those language-innovation centres in chronological order:

⁕Pamplona: Upper Navarrese, Lower Navarrese, Lapurdian and Gipuzkoan dialects.

⁕Vitoria-Gasteiz: Biscayan dialect and the Goierri variant of the Gipuzkoan dialect.

⁕Mauléon-Licharre and Atharratze-Sorholüze: Souletin dialect.

⁕The axis comprising San Sebastián-Hernani-Andoain-Tolosa: Gipuzkoan dialect.

⁕The central area of Biscay, i.e. Durango-Amorebieta-Gernika-Bermeo: Biscayan dialect.