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Hard to say. Portuguese women do look different from Spanish ones. I would not have expected them to look that much different, after all it is the neighboring country. There is a certain north-south divide in terms of pigmentation. Plus, there are a lot of blond and even some red-haired women in the north, especially in the cities such as Porto. Probably the result of those ancient Germanic kingdoms in northern Portugal. Here in the South, though, almost all women are the dark type. Even those that are pale, usually have black hair. In the cities a lot of girls and young women tend to dye their hair blond, because it is my impression that the Portuguese have low self-esteem and thus try to copy everything from the US or Germany. Outside big cities people are much more proud of their being Portuguese.
A major difference between Spain and Portugal is of course the large number of African and Brazilian immigrants because of history. There are a lot of mixed relationships and the children look accordingly.
Well, you got me interested in Portugal than
Black hair is always attractive to me...even if dyed blond...there is a skin pigment feature in the skin that betrays it to its true color. Nontheless, nice to me.
I also like the Brazilian/Cape Verdean/etc. look. Nice that they are in and around Portugal, and intermarrying.
Lisbon is solidly in the southern sphere? Or is that in the mix between the two areas?
In Lisbon you will find everything as it is the absolute hub of the country and thus a lot of people from all over the country have moved there.
I like the African input, too. I remember visiting the immigration office a couple of years ago and 9 out of 10 people there were black or at least mixed-race. I was the only northern person there
Despite tensions between Portugal and Brazil (again because of the low self-esteem of the Portuguese), women here increasingly emulate Brazilian women, especially regarding beach wear. Probably because they see that in the telenovelas on TV.
I assume there is no similarly great influence on Spanish women as there is hardly a country in Latin America that is bigger than Spain in terms of population, nor any that has such a distinct culture as Brazil.
Lookswise, they are not that exotic-looking. They're actually quite plain and very European-looking. Not to say there aren't beautiful girls, just that the average Spanish girl isn't all that special.
For some reason, whoever speaks Spanish is Spanish for some Americans.
This is not really the case. Many Americans link Spanish speaking to Mexico, Cuba, Puerto Rico, or South America nations with mostly Amerindian heritage. This is where our Spanish speaking population comes from, so Spain is not really on our radar.
You will find very few people in the U.S. who have their roots in Spain. The majority of Spanish speaking immigrants into the U.S. are mestizo from the nations I listed above, so they have features that are more Amerindian than European. Americans are just not used to seeing light skinned people speaking Spanish, so in the U.S. Spanish speaking is associated with non-whites. An exception may be with Cubans, who are more likely to appear European.
I will have to say that when I see someone who clearly has a light skinned European look speaking fluent Spanish I assume they are a tourist from Spain or perhaps Argentina or another South American nation of mostly European heritage. This is rare though, as most Spanish speakers around me are clearly Mexican and not white.
To make things worse I have actually had multiple Puerto Ricans tell me that their ethnic background is "Spanish." I don't know where this comes from, but they obviously have no regard or knowledge to what being Spanish really means.
The most impressive women in Spain are Andalusian women followed by women from the Canary Islands, and you can't distinguish a Spanish from a Portuguese, Italian or French.
As Rebel Rouser explained, there's no real etnic differentiation between Spanish people. You might find a large proportion of blondes in some secluded regions of Galicia, Cantabria, Asturias, Andalusia and elsewhere due to the influence of Britons, Germanic invasions, German settlers, Irish refugees and French and Swiss immigrants that settled in Catalonia and Navarre.
The war of Reconquest that ended in 1492, as Rebel Rouser explained, led to the resettlement of previously muslim areas by Northeners and most of the inhabitants in those areas were Islamized Spanish (muladies) and Islamized Christian (mozarabes), many were descendants of Goths and hordes of Northen Europeans (known as Slavs) brought by the Caliphat as mercenaries and menial workers.
You can't distinguish a Castillian from a Catalan, Andalusian or Basque.
Of course, you might find nationalists in every Spanish region claiming to be from different stock, mostly hogwash.
Actually, I think your view is nationalist as you try to make all Spaniards alike. Even though I am not a specialist on Spain, I see no reason why there would not be internal ethnic differences from region to region, just they way there are such differences within Portugal. Consider for instance this:
"Sub-Saharan genetic markers in Iberia
Portugal is also the region in Europe with the highest frequency of the female mediated mtDNA haplogroup L of Sub-Saharan origin. In 2003, a study by Brehm at al. which analysed 525 Portuguese individuals reported mtDNA L haplogroups at 11.8% in the south (the region makes up only 9% of the entire Portuguese population) 8.1% in the center, 3.3% in the north and also found a significant Sub-Saharan imprint in the Autonomous regions of Portugal, with L haplogroups constituting about 13% of the lineages in Madeira and 3.4 % in the Azores[19] In a 2005 study by Pereira et al. that analysed 549 Portuguese individuals, sub-Saharan mtDNA L haplogroups were found at rates of 11.38% in the south, 5.02% in the center and 3.21% in the north.[14] A more a recent study by Beleza et al. (2005–2006) recorded only 0.3% Sub-Saharan Y-DNA frequencies in a nationwide sampling of nearly 700 participants."
And this is not theory, you can see it when you open your eyes. I have lived in various parts of Portugal and there clearly are ethnic differences. And when one can already notice them with the naked eye within Portugal, it is reasonable to assume that the differences between, say, Northern Portuguese and Spaniards from Andalusia are even greater.
Of course there are blond people in both countries and one cannot tell their nationality, but regarding the bulk of the population in any given region there are clear characteristics.
Hard to say. Portuguese women do look different from Spanish ones. I would not have expected them to look that much different, after all it is the neighboring country. There is a certain north-south divide in terms of pigmentation. Plus, there are a lot of blond and even some red-haired women in the north, especially in the cities such as Porto. Probably the result of those ancient Germanic kingdoms in northern Portugal. Here in the South, though, almost all women are the dark type. Even those that are pale, usually have black hair. In the cities a lot of girls and young women tend to dye their hair blond, because it is my impression that the Portuguese have low self-esteem and thus try to copy everything from the US or Germany. Outside big cities people are much more proud of their being Portuguese.
A major difference between Spain and Portugal is of course the large number of African and Brazilian immigrants because of history. There are a lot of mixed relationships and the children look accordingly.
I don't think all of this is accurate. Actually I find some points ridiculous. And I'm not saying Portuguese girls are not like that, let me explain:
To start with Spain and Portugal have been mixing with one another for centuries, also take into account Spain is much bigger (504,000 km2 vs 93,000 Km2), much more populated (46 millions vs 12 millions), and with far far far more amount of foreign population. So, I highly doubd Portuguese girls are that "special" that can't be found here in Spain, specially, yes, also with the historical ties.
And nothing you described there makes any difference with what you can find in Spain.
We also have the pigmentation difference from north to south (some times it's natural, other times it's caused by the sun), also a lot of blondes and redheads (even more in Spain than in Portugal) and a lot of mixed childs, specially in Madrid and Barcelona (these two regions alone are more populated than the entire Portugal and with far more foreign population). Africans and Latinamericans? Much more here in Spain than in Portugal. We also have had a lot of ties with Latinamerica and I think we come second or third regarding african population in Europe. Just look at the immigration charts.
Actually no offense, but as I said we have much more people of all kind here as we are more populated and bigger, so I don't think Portuguese girls are that "different" that can't be found in a country with such a lot of variated people as is Spain, and so close to Portugal.
Last edited by AdamChobits; 12-21-2010 at 07:50 PM..
I want to keep clear that I'm talking all the time about appearance. Regarding culture or personality Spain did never addopted anything from LatinAmerica, I'm agree.
Actually we've addopted far more from the USA than from anyother Latam country in terms of culture.
Shes an amerindian us american that was adopted by italian inmigrants
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