Madrid has its own ‘dead language’ with dictionary and translations. There are those who resist that they fall into oblivion

In Spain there is an official language, Spanish, and A handful of co -official languages. The country’s complete linguistic photo is however much (much) richer and includes a wide range of Dialectal varietiesin addition to countless jargon and Sociolectsways to use language limited to a specific group. For years Madrid managed his own, Chelia speech that left a mark in the Royal Academy, inspired novelists and film directors, and even has its own dictionary and several translations.

His golden age may be behind, but that does not mean that there are people who still claims its value and fight so that (if not spoken) at least it is talk about him.

What is Chelii? A sociolect, a speech, a kind of dialect without fix but with abundant vocabulary, a sign of identity associated with a city (Madrid) and a time (especially the 80s and the first 90), a “Generational slang”in the words of the novelist Paco Umbral … or If we ask him to the RAE dictionary, a “jargon with castizos, marginal and countercultural elements.”

Cheli is all that and some more things, like a improbable link of union between Camilo José Cela, Enrique Tierno Galván, Ramoncín and Antoine de Saint-Exupéry; But above all it is a rich, spontaneous and diverse way of communicating that enjoyed its particular golden age mainly during the movement.

What is its origin? It is counted that the term as Francisco Umbral coined it in The countrybut As I remembered a couple of years ago Álvaro de Benito, journalist and passionate about linguistics, one thing is the baptismal act and a very different birth. To know the origins of Cheli you have to probably go back much further back, the 18th century and the rise of the Casticism. Over time he gained background and form, vocabulary, expressions and style. It expanded.

His great era was, however, the last decades of the twentieth. It is in that period, in the late 70s, when places its hatching The French linguist Henriette Walterwho came to dedicate a couple of pages in his essay ‘The adventure of languages ​​in the West’published in 1994. “It began to speak in Madrid in the criminal environments, is inspired by the drug slaughter and in the caló,” says the expert, who refers to him as “Cheli, passage or roll language.”

Who spoke it? As I remembered A few years ago The journalist Arsenio School, Walter places the origins of “El Pasota” between Barcelona and Seville, but the land in which he managed to consecrate “as a social phenomenon” was another: the Madrid. There he fell deep. The neighborhoods were linked in a moment of profound political and social changes and sneaked into stores, taverns, factories, markets … although as with most languages ​​and dialects, Cheli was not an unalterable, unidimensional and static reality.

In An article Posted a few weeks ago in The Spanish newspaper (EPE) Pedro del Corral remembered that depending on the age and training of speakers it was used in one way or another. It was also linked to some neighborhoods. All this served to somewhat cheli will be used for more than talking: it was a sign of identity between groups.

Was it only used in the street? No. Cheli reached the screens and books, institutional acts and even aroused the interest of laureate singers and novelists. They reproduced him in some of his works Rafael Sánchez Ferlosio and Camilo José Celait rang in ‘The glass ball’ or the movie ‘Navajeros’ from Eloy de la Iglesia and threshold dedicated him in 1983 A dictionary whose presentation It was headed by the tierra Galván mayor, who even started talking to the public at the Palacio del Conde-Duque in Madrid.

It was not the only one. In 1993 Ramoncín launched ‘El Toccho Cheli’that self -defined as a “dictionary of jargon, Germanías and jerigonzas”, and three years later it followed ‘The new billy cheli’. Entremedias, in 1994, Antonio Alonso, chaplain of the Carabanchel prison, decided to go further and develop an adaptation to Cheli of the ‘New Testament’. He titled it ‘El Chuli, the colleagues and the basca’a declaration of intentions: in its pages Jesus becomes Chuchi, the Apartlets in colleagues and the fishermen in Basca.

Is it the only translation? The answer is not again. And explain why Cheli has become news again in recent years. In 2022, after an investigation of year and a half Álvaro de Benito, journalist and passionate about languages ​​and dialects, decided to launch A translation to the Cheli of one of the great classics of universal literature, ‘Le Petit Prince’of the French writer Antoine de Saint-Exupéry.

The adaptation is already reflected in the same title of the work: ‘The main kids (with the fetal ticks of the Menda)’. 92 pages that are a vindication of Madrid slang and have served to return it to the spotlights.

Why ‘the Little Prince’? De Benito explained it clearly in an interview to Madrid Secret. “Regardless of whether we like it or not, ‘the Little Prince’ is a universal and valid tool for the dissemination of languages. Every time something comes out of it, a stir is assembled,” confesses. Cheli is not in fact the only adaptation published by its editorial, From tuma. In Your catalog There are others in Cantabrian, Manchego, fritter, Hoketía, Gacería or the Talk about rebollar.

How was the process? Álvaro de Benito was born in 1980, so that during the years of splendor of Cheli was still a child. In addition to pulling your own experience It was documented With philological studies, articles, magazines, films, novels … the result, however, is not the same as a conventional translation into an official language with an academy behind it in charge of defining its canon.

“In English you can translate well or badly, but Cheli can only adapt it. It is not a matter of doing it right or badly,” Explain from Benito. “I picked up the greatest possible vocabulary. There have been people who have told me that it is exactly as I talked, others say it cost them to read it,” added the journalist recently in An interview with The newspaper.

Your goal in any case is clear: to raise a “Cultural claim”“recognize the importance” that Cheli had and add it to the long list of adaptations and translations (more than 500) that exist from ‘the Little Prince’.

Has Cheli died? “There are waste left, nobody speaks in that way”, Assume from Benito. “It is something that has been lost, do not listen to people to speak like this and there are words and idioms, but it is not exactly what the young people of now would talk.” One thing is, however, it has declined and a very different one that its footprint no longer exists. Some of their voices They have entered In the RAE dictionary and there are certain expressions that even today can continue to be listened to. Both within Madrid and outside, in other parts of Spain.

What expressions are Cheli? In the 90 walter documented A good handful: “To the parrot!, Basca, Bocata, Bofia, Chachi, Chungo, eating the coconut, cubata, currant, drug trafficking …” and thus a long list of words and phrases made that in some cases still have echoes in 2025. “Cut the roll”, “fetén” or “suck their finger” also connect with that cheli spee With suffixes as -ATa, -ales or -ares.

Image | Mickroch (Flickr)

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