No, they are examples of changes in pronunciation. /ks/->/s/ is standard phonological shorthand for “x” turns into “s”.
Obviously there have been spelling changes too, but I wasn’t referring to those.
X in Italian is pronounced much the same as in English:
Xeno = kseno (Xenon - English makes a ‘z’ out of an initial ‘x’. Italian does not!)
Xeres = kseres (Sherry - the wine)
Xerocopia = kserocopia (a Xerox copy.)
There are very few other words that I am aware of. All of these are introduced words. Words from Mother Latin with X, as has been pointed out, reduce the ks to ss. (In at least one case it has been suppressed altogether: Latin ‘Rex’ is ‘Re’ in Italian.)
Si fanno i cazzi loro. Tsk! This is so gratuitous that it’s not funny.
The process /ks/ -> /s/ – is that called assimilation? Or what is the linguistic term for that process?
It’s interesting that sherry (Sp. xerez) comes from the Jerez de la Frontiera area – the town name changed but the wine did not.
Quercus and Nava, I note that when Bartolome de las Casas and the other friars turned the Mayan/Quiché languages into Spanish transliterations, they used X for the very common /sh/ sound – is there a possible Catalan influence there?
great post-poster combo.