The Catalan language according to the foreign travellers in the last third of the Nineteenth century

This paper examines the descriptions of the Catalan language by foreign travellers who travelled through the Catalan-speaking territories in the last third of the 19th century. It also analyses their observations and linguistic perceptions of the Catalan language, as well as the language spoken by the inhabitants of these territories. Regarding the second objective, we are particularly interested in knowing if they recognise that the language spoken by Valencians is the same as that of the Catalans, Majorcans, and other neighbours of the Catalan-speaking world; what position occupy the Catalan language among the rest of the Romance languages; if they consider that Catalan has the same status as Spanish and French or if they considered it was a dialect. In many cases they do not talk about the language in such detail because the purpose of their travels was different, but often from their different descriptions and statements we can deduce their positions and opinions to answer these questions. In the late 19th century, when Romance philology was a recently created discipline and it was not fully accepted that Catalan is an independent Romance language.