[6] The term Goral was first used in reference to the ethnolect by Pavol Jozef Šafárik in his book Slowanské starožitnosti,[7][8] and the term derives from the Slavic word for mountain (góra, hora) and the noun-forming suffix denoting people -al.[9] Due to their isolation, Goral dialects have many influences from Slovak, diverging significantly from the Polish literary standard and other dialects.

[11] Goral orthography is fairly unstandardized and may vary significantly dialect-to-dialect, most notably in the writing of the slanted vowels.

[17] The first person present/future singular of verbs is most commonly formed across the whole region with -m as a result of Slovak influence: bedem/bedym, idem/idym (Standard Polish będę, idę).

[21][22] In southern Spiš, many feminine nouns ending in -w are extended with mobile e: kerwi (Standard Polish krwi).

[21] Goral has a rich literary tradition reaching back to the 19th century with notable authors such as Władysław Orkan, Andrzej Stopka Nazimek or Kazimierz Przerwa Tetmajer.

The area was initially fully part of Vistulia and later Poland in the Middle Ages but was at the time very sparsely populated, with the possible exceptions of the Dunajec and Poprad valleys where the locals spoke a Lechitic dialect related to the Muszyna dialect and similar to Eastern Slovak explaining the many similarities in lexicon and partially phonology.

[24] This promoted settlement from the 13th to 17th century by Lesser Polish peasants, Germans and notably for the region migrating Vlachs (Rusyns and Slovaks) motivated by the lack of serfdom (similarly to Ukraine).

The mix of these languages and a unique history compared to the rest of Poland gave rise to Goral.

[30] Many features indicate a Lechitic origin for Goral: Ôjce nas, côś jes w niebié; niek sié świynci imié Twôjé; Niek przýdzié Twôjé królôwanié; Niek sié spełniyło Twôja wólo na ziymi, tak jakô i w niebié; Chlyba nasegô posedniygô dej nom dzisiok; I ôdpuść nom nase przewiny, tak jakô my darujemy tym, cô nom przewiniyli; I nié dej, côby my sié dali pôkusie, ba nos uchowoj ôde złegô Jamyn.