Township of Winston, Estados Unidos
The Latin sequences ‑ngul‑ in words such as cingulum, ungulam or singulos have evolved into two possible outcomes in Spanish: a palatal sonorant ([ɲ] or [ʎ]), or [nd]. The purpose of this paper is to provide a phonetically-based explanation to account for the sound changes that led to these outcomes in Old Spanish, as well as in other Ibero-Romance languages. In this regard, it will be shown that palatalization and nasalization were competing processes in the development of the sequences ‑ngul‑, as well as in the other structurally comparable sequences ‑ndul‑ and ‑mbul‑.