Judaeo-Spanish has been known also by other names, such as: Español (Espanyol, Spaniol, Spaniolish, Espanioliko), Judió (Judyo, Djudyo) or Jidió (Jidyo, Djidyo), Judesmo (Judezmo, Djudezmo), Sefaradhí (Sefaradi) or Ḥaketía (in North Africa).

Judaeo-Spanish, once the Jewish lingua franca of the Adriatic Sea, the Balkans, and the Middle East, and renowned for its rich literature, especially in Salonika, today is under serious threat of extinction.

[14] The language is also called Judeo-Espanyol,[note 1] Judeoespañol,[15] Sefardí, Judío, and Espanyol or Español sefardita; Haketia (from Arabic: حكى, romanized: ḥakà 'tell') refers to the dialect of North Africa, especially Morocco.

Before the expulsion of Jews from Spain, the word meant "literary Spanish" as opposed to other dialects,[citation needed] or "Romance" in general as distinct from Arabic.

There was, however, a special style of Spanish used for purposes of study or translation, featuring a more archaic dialect, a large number of Hebrew and Aramaic loanwords and a tendency to render Hebrew word order literally (ha-laylah ha-zeh, meaning 'this night', was rendered la noche la esta instead of the normal Spanish esta noche[24]).

The Judaeo-Spanish pronunciation of s as "[ʃ]" before a "k" sound or at the end of certain words (such as seis, pronounced [seʃ], for 'six') is shared with Portuguese (as spoken in Portugal, most of Lusophone Asia and Africa, and in a plurality of Brazilian varieties and registers with either partial or total forms of coda |S| palatalization) but not with Spanish.

The majority of Judaeo-Spanish speaking people resided in the Ottoman Empire, although a large minority on the northern Coast of Morocco and Algeria existed.

Due to the influence of the Alliance Israélite Universelle in the westernization and modernization of Judeao-Spanish speaking communities, many words of French origin were adopted.

The dialect spoken in the Macedonian city of Bitola (traditionally referred to as Monastir) has relatively many lexical differences as compared with other varieties of Judeao-Spanish.

Jews in the Ottoman Balkans, Western Asia (especially Turkey), and North Africa (especially Morocco) developed their own Romance dialects, with some influence from Hebrew and other languages, which became what is now known as Judaeo-Spanish.

Additionally, itinerant rabbis who preached in the vernacular contributed to the spread and standardization of Judeo-Spanish among diverse Sephardic congregations, including those in Greek- and Arabic-speaking regions.

[40] The closeness and mutual comprehensibility between Judaeo-Spanish and Spanish favoured trade among Sephardim, often relatives, from the Ottoman Empire to the Netherlands and the conversos of the Iberian Peninsula.

In the late 18th century, Ottoman poet Enderunlu Fazıl (Fazyl bin Tahir Enderuni) wrote in his Zenanname: "Castilians speak the Jewish language but they are not Jews."

Despite the Great Fire of Thessaloniki and mass settlement of Christian refugees, the language remained widely spoken in Salonica until the deportation of 50,000 Salonican Jews in the Holocaust during the Second World War.

[43] Judaeo-Spanish was also a language used in Donmeh rites (Dönme being a Turkish word for 'convert' to refer to adepts of Sabbatai Tsevi converting to Islam in the Ottoman Empire).

The Castilian colonisation of Northern Africa favoured the role of polyglot Sephards, who bridged between Spanish colonizers and Arab and Berber speakers.

The Sephardic Synagogue Ezra Bessaroth in Seattle, Washington, United States, was formed by Jews from Turkey and the Greek island of Rhodes, and it uses the language in some portions of its Shabbat services.

Additionally, at the end of Shabbat services, the entire congregation sings the well-known Hebrew hymn Ein Keloheinu, which is Non Como Muestro Dio in Judaeo-Spanish.

[57] Hazzan Isaac Azose, cantor emeritus of Synagogue Ezra Bessaroth and second-generation Turkish immigrant, has performed an alternative Ottoman tune.

[44][68] In Israel, Moshe David Gaon Center for Ladino Culture at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev is leading the way in education (language and literature courses, Community oriented activities) and research (a yearly scientific journal, international congresses and conferences etc.).

[74] Esther Benbassa and Aron Rodrigue, authors of Sephardi Jewry: A History of the Judeo-Spanish Community, 14th-20th Centuries, wrote that the AIU institutions "gallicized" people who attended.

Although Mary Altabev in 1994 observed limited use of Ladino at home among educated Turkish Jews, Melis Alphan wrote in Hürriyet in 2017 that the Judaeo-Spanish language in Turkey was heading to extinction.

Luego a las comadres encomendava que toda mujer que prenyada quedara si no pariera al punto, la matara que havía de nascer Abraham Avinu.

En fin de nueve meses parir quería iva caminando por campos y vinyas, a su marido tal ni le descubría topó una meara, allí lo pariría After nine months she wanted to give birth She was walking through the fields and vineyards Such would not even reach her husband She found a cave; there, she would give birth.

Anachronistically, Abraham—who in the Bible is an Aramean and the very first Hebrew and the ancestor of all who followed, hence his appellation Avinu (Our Father)—is in the Judeo-Spanish song born already in the djudería (modern Spanish: judería), the Jewish quarter.

In essence, unlike its Biblical model, the song is about a Hebrew community persecuted by a cruel king and witnessing the birth of a miraculous saviour—a subject of obvious interest and attraction to the Jewish people who composed and sang it in medieval Spain.

There are a number of groups in Turkey that sing in Judeo-Spanish, notably Janet – Jak Esim Ensemble, Sefarad, Los Pasharos Sefaradis and the children's chorus Las Estreyikas d'Estambol.

[79] The Jewish Bosnian-American musician Flory Jagoda recorded two CDs of music taught to her by her grandmother, a Sephardic folk singer, among a larger discography.

[81] The cantor Ramón Tasat, who learned Judeo-Spanish at his grandmother's knee in Buenos Aires, has recorded many songs in the language, with three of his CDs focusing primarily on that music.

Robin Greenstein, a New York-based musician, received a federal CETA grant in the 1980s to collect and perform Sephardic Music under the guidance of the American Jewish Congress.