Development of French language
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URL: http://www.allempires.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=29190
Printed Date: 23-Apr-2024 at 02:32
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Topic: Development of French language
Posted By: Lady Deborah
Subject: Development of French language
Date Posted: 25-Feb-2011 at 17:10
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Hello all. New to this forum--looks wonderful!
Any experts out there in the development of French language? Specifically how Latin and Celtic and Germanic (?) all blended together and became Old French by about 1200 CE? many thanks. |
Replies:
Posted By: opuslola
Date Posted: 25-Feb-2011 at 20:15
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I am sorry My Lady, to inform you that all it seems I do, is to compare French, German, Flemish, etc., to English words! And, according to some retorts I have received, I do a bad job of it!
For example, I look at old maps, etc., and see words describing the same place spelled in many differing forms! But, it seems that modern historians mostly disreard these spelling when writing their reports, or conclusions, etc.! Thus the problem with the French/Dutch/Flemish/ Friesian spellings of the famous city called mostly today as "Lille!" Just how many variations of this city can you present? Yes! This is a test of your abilities! Regards, Ron Huges ------------- http://www.quotationspage.com/subjects/history/ |
Posted By: red clay
Date Posted: 26-Feb-2011 at 11:20
In far fewer words, he doesn't have a clue. ------------- "Arguing with someone who hates you or your ideas, is like playing chess with a pigeon. No matter what move you make, your opponent will walk all over the board and scramble the pieces". Unknown. |
Posted By: Cyrus Shahmiri
Date Posted: 26-Feb-2011 at 15:14
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I think there was also an almost strong influence of Alanic language in the development of French language, I don't talk about the relation between Merovingians and the Sicambri: http://www.spiritus-temporis.com/sicambri/ - http://www.spiritus-temporis.com/sicambri/ but Alans migration to Gaul in the fifth century and formation of a kingdom in the central France, as you know the city of Orleans, southwest of Paris, was the capital of this kingdom and one of the greatest kings was Sangiban who fought against Attila.
One interesting thing for me in the French is "zh" sound, I had posted an Alanic (Ossetian) song in this thread: http://www.allempires.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=24824 - Speak Iranian (Zhurut Ironau) , I don't know the link still works or not but it really sounds similar to French too.
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Posted By: Lady Deborah
Date Posted: 04-Mar-2011 at 10:55
| Thank you for your replies. I didn't know about the Alanic (?) migration and will check into that. |
Posted By: Cryptic
Date Posted: 04-Mar-2011 at 12:57
As a vague side note, French diverged from Latin several centuries before Spanish and Italian did. This may have influenced borrowings from other languages.
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Posted By: Diviacus
Date Posted: 06-Mar-2011 at 16:12
As far as I know (I am French), there are no Alanic influences in the development of French language.
French is coming from Latin. There are still some Celtic words (about 200, which is few), and a certain number of Germanic words, coming from the Merovingians.
There were some Alans around Orleans (but not a kingdom !). They left some place names (as Allainville, Allainvilliers, south of Paris), but I don't know one word coming from Alanic language.
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Posted By: medenaywe
Date Posted: 06-Mar-2011 at 16:19
| we are following your story!Just go on,with days and actors we have to blame for this?Was Caxton in French language as in English?Were those,virtual ones! |
Posted By: Cyrus Shahmiri
Date Posted: 07-Mar-2011 at 08:11
Ok, I know neither French nor Alanic language but I know Persian and a little English, the clear fact is that Alanic was an Iranian language, so there are certainly a large number of similar words in Persian and Alanic languages, there is a big distance between Persia and France and as far as I know there was no cultural relation between the people of these two countries, but if you look at an English dictioanry then you will see that most of Persian-origin words in English, come through Old French, such as:
azure
from Old French azur from Persian lazhward (as though the -l- were the French article l') bedeguar
from Old French bédégar from Persian badgwar bezique
from Old French bésigue from Persian bazigar bezoar
from Old French bezoard from Persian padzahr bronze
from Old French bronze from Persian brinj calabash
from Old French calebasse from Persian xarbuza caravan
from Old French carouan from Persian karovan check
from Old French eschec from Persian schah checkmate
from Old French eschec mat from Persian schah mat hazard
from Old French hasard from Persian azar julep
from Old French julep from Persian gulab kaftan
from Old French cafetan from Persian kaftan orange
from Old French orenge from Persian narang lilac
from Old French lilac from Persian lilak spinach
from Old French espinache from Persian aspanach tabor
from Old French tabour from Persian tabura taffeta
from Old French taffetas from Persian taftan tass
from Old French tasse from Persian tasht tulip from Old French tulipe from Persian dulband -------------
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Posted By: Diviacus
Date Posted: 07-Mar-2011 at 09:35
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Certainly, there is a certain number of Iranian (or Persian) words in French. But that does not mean they came through Alans.
By instance :
- Tulip : the flower has been introduced in Europe at the end of the XVIth century, and the word "Tulipa"in latin has been created at that time (from persian word)
- Check : the game has been introduced in France during the Middle Age, coming from Persia, throug Arabic countries and Spain
- Hasard : comes from arabic words al-zahr (dices game) and is known in French only since the XIIth century.
- Bronze : the French word comes from the Italian one (bronzo) and has been attested only from the XIIIth century
Almost all the words you mentioned are words used in many languages, so Alans are not responsible of that.
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Posted By: Cyrus Shahmiri
Date Posted: 07-Mar-2011 at 14:25
I don't know why we should deny the Alanic influence, you yourself mentioned some place names with Alanic origin in the northern France, the Alanic migration from the south of Russia to the north of France is an undeniable historical fact, for example we know the largest and most important river in the land of Alans is Don River: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don_River_%28Russia%29 - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don_River_(Russia) and we see in remembrance of their original land, they named one of the most important rivers in their new land "Don River": http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don_%28Vilaine%29 - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don_(Vilaine)
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Posted By: Diviacus
Date Posted: 07-Mar-2011 at 16:37
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I know that the Alanic migration is an historical fact. I don't want to deny it.
We know they arrived in the Gaul at the beginning of the 5th century.
Historians assume they were several thousands of warriors so let's say between 15 000 and 40 000 people.
The discussion is the Alanic influence on the French language.
Why did they not influence the French language ?: because they were very few, compared to the several millions of Gaulish people (speaking or Celtic or Latin languages).
Why did they give their names to villages ?: because, when they establish in a place, this place was named by the other inhabitants "town of the Alans", which gave a dozen of villages nowadays called "Allainville", "Allainvilliers" or "Alaincourt" (with one or two "l").
Why is it very unlikely they gave the name of "Don" to a nowadays French river ?: because we know that rivers names are naturally much older than village names. The river Don existed before they arrived. In France, most of rivers names are pre-Celtic, even pre-indo-european, and only few are Celtic, even if the Celtic language has been used for more than 1000 years, much before the Alans came.
Moreover, the "Don" name comes from indo-european danu (Don, Donets, Danube, ...) meaning "river", and there is no need of Alans to have such a name in France.
And by the way, around the French "Don" river, there is no toponym which can be attributed to Alans.
But be sure I have nothing against the Alans
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Posted By: Cryptic
Date Posted: 07-Mar-2011 at 22:39
Which of the river names are pre Indo European? Are they in the southwest?
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Posted By: opuslola
Date Posted: 07-Mar-2011 at 22:56
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May I intrude and ask, if you would condsider that the word "Alan" could not be related to "Cat-alan?", since both were reknowned "merc's"?
That is, out for hire! Regards, Ron ------------- http://www.quotationspage.com/subjects/history/ |
Posted By: Cyrus Shahmiri
Date Posted: 08-Mar-2011 at 09:10
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Diviacus, the population of the Republic of South Ossetia, a self-proclaimed independent country, is about 55,000. If just this number of Ossetians migrated to another land 1600 years ago then many things could be changed there. Those who research about the French language certainly know that there are some influences from Alanic language and they consider this language to find the origin of French words, for example, as I found, Old French pautre (Modern French pote) and Breton paotr come from Ossetian (Alanic) pautra, the Avestan word is puthra and Modern Persian pusar (boy). -------------
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Posted By: medenaywe
Date Posted: 08-Mar-2011 at 12:35
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Official Franks were: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franks |
Posted By: Diviacus
Date Posted: 08-Mar-2011 at 15:44
According to French toponymists, the following roots (among others) are pre-indo-european :
- ar (ahuar, ahar)
- dur, dor
- el (il)
- sam, som
From the root "ar-" we can find many european rivers (Aar, ...)
The roots "dur, dor" are mostly found in the south of France (Dordogne, Durance, ...)
The roots "el, i"l or "sam, som" are mostly found in the north of France (Somme, Sambre,...°
I don't have statistics to know if there are more pre-indo-european hydronyms south of France, even if it would be easier to explain (due to the presence of Basque and Iberian, non indo-european languages spoken a long time in south of France).
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Posted By: Diviacus
Date Posted: 08-Mar-2011 at 15:53
First, I don't understand your note about Ossetians
Secondly, I would be interested to know names of people working on French language who certainly know that there are some influences from Alanic language. I don't know them...
I found your hypothesis of "pote" coming from "paotr" coming from "pruta" ( meaning son in sanskrit) in the French wiktionnaire.
But there is another hypothesis of "pote" coming from French word "poteau".
And I asked specialists of breton language that confim more likely the second hypothesis (poteau), and who agree with me that the Breton word "paotr" may have a common indo-european root as "pruta", but who totally disagree with the hypothesis that Breton "paotr" may come from the sanskrit word (even less the Ossetian one).
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Posted By: opuslola
Date Posted: 08-Mar-2011 at 18:11
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A while ago, Cryptic wrote;
"As a vague side note, French diverged from Latin several centuries before Spanish and Italian did. This may have influenced borrowings from other languages." I would ask Cryptic, just which French language are you discussing?, or mentioning? Basically, France (as we see it today) was divided by both language, and religion for hundreds of years, and still fights the language part untill today! Until certain positions and impostions had been forced upon the people, the unification of Parisian French, (Much like Castillian Spanish, and Roman Italian, etc.) was fought far and wide until a unification, and enforcement, from a central authority was forced upon the populace. I think it only recently occured during the times of the Emperor(s) Napolean! Regards, Ron ------------- http://www.quotationspage.com/subjects/history/ |
Posted By: Cyrus Shahmiri
Date Posted: 09-Mar-2011 at 08:58
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Diviacus, do you know someone who knows both Old French and Alanic language and has really researched about the possible connection between these two languages? I believe they should certainly consider Alanic language to find the origin of some French words. We know about some sound changes in the Iranian languages, for example about the English word five from proto-IE *penkwe, there are Avestan panca (Persian penj) and Alanic fondz. You probably know about the Avestan word pairidaeza which can be found in different European and Semitic language as "Paradise" (Such as Old French paradis and Arabic fardaus) and about very Iranian mythical creature in the paradise: Avestan pairikā (Persian peri) and Alanic fairia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peri - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peri Alanic fairia is exactly the same as fairy: a small imaginary winged being of human form. According to etymonline website: http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?search=fairy - http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?search=fairy the English word fairy comes from Old French faerie but it says the Old French word relates to Latin fata which means "fate"!!! I think they could also find a Latin origin for "Paradise", like palaestra "wrestling school", anyway they are similar words!! -------------
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Posted By: medenaywe
Date Posted: 09-Mar-2011 at 10:31
| http://www.realfrench.net/pdf/origins.pdf |
Posted By: Diviacus
Date Posted: 09-Mar-2011 at 12:59
No, I definitely don't (personally) know people knowing both old French and Alanic language; that's why I strongly doubt about your sentence "Those who research about the French language certainly know that there are some influences from Alanic language and they consider this language to find the origin of French words".
I have read a certain number of books about French and IE languages. I have never noticed one mention of Alanic language as a possible origin of some French words.
In fact, I don't know why you want to demonstrate the common words between French and "Persian / Sanskrit / Iranian" are due to Alans (which, historically is very unlikely). Why not Sarmatians ? Why not, as almost everybody thinks, due to the common IE origin ?
Yes, all the explanations (on French sites) about the origin of French fée coming from old French faerie say that it comes from latin fata.
And all the explanations of French paradis come from Avestan pairidaeza (and not palaestra or similar words) !
Just to conclude : when you give me an argument, I answer. And then, you answer with another "proof", not discussing my answer. I am not ready to examine all the french words origins.
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Posted By: Cyrus Shahmiri
Date Posted: 09-Mar-2011 at 15:22
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As I said before, the Alanic migration to France is a historical fact, they established the kingdom of Alans in France and we know some of their kings, such as Goar, Sangiban, Respendial, ... it is not possible to believe there is absolutely no trace of them in the culture of people who live in the same region.
There are also some nationalists in Iran who also try to deny the influence of Greek language in the development of Middle Persian language, the historical fact is that Macedonians and Greeks conquered Iran in the fourth century BC and ruled there for at least 60 years, those who really research about the Middle Persian language certainly know that there are some influences from Greek language and they consider this language to find the origin of Middle Persian words. The same thing can be said about the linguistic influence of other people in other lands.
May I know why? Isn't it just because the lack of knowledge of authors of those books about the Alanic language?
historically is very unlikely?!! Persian, Sanskrit and languages of other Asian languages can't be related to the languages of western Europe, other than that common Indo-European origin, I'm not really talking about some loanwords which can be found in every languages around the world but the influence of a language in the development of another language.
For example if we want to compare French to Urdu (official languages of Pakistan), we know about Romance and Indian origin of them but the developments of these languages were also influenced by some other languages, for this purpose we should know about the people who lived in the regions where these languages were developed, you can't deny the influence of Celtic and Frankish languages in the first one or Persian and Arabic languages in the second one, but there were certainly also some influnces from Alanic and Chagatai in those languages. -------------
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Posted By: Diviacus
Date Posted: 09-Mar-2011 at 16:37
I also said the Alanic migration to France was a historical fast. We don't discuss about that.
I translate hereafter a sentence from Iaroslav Lebedynsky (Les Alains - 2005 - 280 pages) :
" The only political structures created by Alans (In Europe) had a very short life : the kingdom created by Respendial, then Addac, in Spain from 411 to 418, and the kingdom of Gallia ulterior, north of the Loire river, around 442-453 (Goar and Sangiban)..."
This doesn't have to be compared to Greek or Macedonians that ruled Iran for 60 years ! And another sentence :
"In opposition to german people, the Alans didn't left any trace in the gallo-roman language. The French words that some people wanted to be due to them ("sur" or "cotte") are words borrowed to germanic languages, at a non defined period, to Iranian languages ( more likely Sarmatian), then passed through vulgar Latin to Roman" (ancestor of French language).
Perhaps, ... or perhaps because of what is said above.
We also can compare Alans to Wisigoths, that ruled a great part of France for more than 300 years.
Despite this long period when Wisigoths ruled this part of the country, few French words are proved to come from that.
And Wisigoths have been staying at least 20 times longer, on a territory at least 50 times wider !
That's my explanation why no French historian consider Alans as roots of some French words.
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Posted By: Cyrus Shahmiri
Date Posted: 10-Mar-2011 at 03:32
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That Alanic kingdom could be just the beginning of a political and cultural influence of Alans in France, we should know what happened afterwards, you can read part of the book "From Scythia to Camelot" by C. Scott Littleton and Linda A. Malcor here: http://ossetians.com/eng/news.php?newsid=370 - http://ossetians.com/eng/news.php?newsid=370
"In the seventeenth century the Rohan family of the village of Josselin claimed that their lineage was more ancient than that of the kings of France, tracing their roots to the legendary Conan Meriadoc, who appears in the writings of Geoffrey of Monmouth. According to Bachrach this illustrious ancestor reputedly cut out the tongues of the Alanic women and children (the men were executed) whom he captured "so that the strange barbarian speech from the steppes would not corrupt the purity of the conquerors' language." Some scholars, however, argue that Meriadoc's barbaric treatment of the Alans is an onomastic legend rather than historical fact. Historical evidence indicates that a number of Alans survived this violent conflict with the Celts, with the Celts slotting into the existing social system in Brittany below the level of the nobility. Since at least some of these Alans appear to be ruling in the vicinity of Vannes throughout much of the Middle Ages, Meriadoc's people probably intermarried eventually with these powerful local Alans, if for no other reason than political expediency. Given the number of Alains in the Rohan line alone, this family at the very least seems to have adopted this practice."
About the cultural influence of Alans, for example it says "Markale argues that the religion of fifth-century Gaul was a synthesis of "oriental" cults, druidism, and Roman traditions. One of these "oriental" religions was that of the non-Christian Alans. ... Given the number of Alans who were in the church of Gaul by this time, there may well have been Alans among these monks. Alan mercenaries may have accompanied these monks as well. Perhaps this missionary activity was responsible for the legends of Joseph of Arimathea's arrival in Europe via Marseilles, of his missionary work in Britain, and of his carrying the Grail to that country, in the company of a bodyguard of soldiers from the East. "
Some loanwords can't prove anything, there can be hundreds of them in a language but it can't show the linguistic influence of a language in the development of another language, but there are many other things which can prove this influence, one thing that I mentioned in my first post in this thread is the frequency of the voiced palato-alveolar fricative (zh sound) in the French and Alanic languages, bonjour!
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Posted By: Cryptic
Date Posted: 12-Mar-2011 at 09:47
A good guestion. Though the book just said "French", the author was probably refering to most, or all of the latin based, French languages in the region which later became France. My guess is that Rome lost political control over Gaul earleir than they did Spainish and of course, Italian areas. This then led to an ealier break with latin.
Thanks for the interesting information.
Do you know the name of the other non Indo European language in southeren France that was able to survive into the early Middle Ages?
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Posted By: opuslola
Date Posted: 12-Mar-2011 at 17:33
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Seeing all of the relationships between Parisian French and Persian, can anyone not conceed that sometimes these words (Parisian and Persian) were somewhat confused by historians?
After all, the Parisian French considered themselves as "From the Isles", etc.!, and the "peoples of the isles" attacked Egypt and N. Africa numerous times, as did France (Paris?)! Just a note! Regards, Ron ------------- http://www.quotationspage.com/subjects/history/ |
Posted By: Diviacus
Date Posted: 13-Mar-2011 at 14:26
The only two names of non Indo European languages spoken on the actual French territory are the Basque (or Vascon) and the Iberian. Obviously, that doesn't mean there have not been others, and there have been others, but we don't know their names. And these two languages have been spoken in the south west part of France.
After the Roman conquest, Latin has been the "official" language, and little by litthe the Celtic and the Iberian languages have disappeared. The Celtic language has been spoken, in remote parts of France, until the VIth or VIIth century. We can assume that the Iberian disppeared befor, as it was spoken (in France) only by a few people.
Only the Basque survived, and untill now.
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Posted By: Diviacus
Date Posted: 13-Mar-2011 at 14:48
1- Rome lost political control of Gaul, Spain and Italy about at the same time, against German peoples.
In Gaul, we have the great invasion of 406, and then the Frank invasion, end of the Vth century.
In Spain, the Wisigoths invaded the countyry in the Vth century.
In Italy, The Ostrogoths invaded the country end of the Vth century.
2- We have to reminder that the spoken Latin was different from the written one.
As the written Latin remained quite unchanged and became a dead language, but commonly used for centuries in all the territory corresponding to the Roman Empire, the Vulgar Latin (the spoken language) began to diverge from the classic one very soon, and in every country about at the same time.
That's in Spain that the Vulgar Latin is most likely to have diverged the sooner, because the country was at the end of the Empire. And then the Wisigoths and the Arabs altered the language.
And also, the first written texts in Roman languages have been written at about the same time, in the IXth century, in Italy and in France.
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Posted By: Cryptic
Date Posted: 14-Mar-2011 at 11:08
There was a third as well. Here is the information about the one that I was looking for earlier.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aquitanian_language - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aquitanian_language
In the end, is French more diverged from Latin than Spanish and Italian? Also, are Spanish and Italian closer together than they are to French? The Sardinian language / dialects are said to be closest to Latin.
If French is more diverged from Latin and less closely related to Italian and Spanish, there could be other explanations besides losing political control. Perhaps the density of latin speakers was higher in Spain and Italy. So when political control was lost, latin still had a large number of daily users in Italy and Spain?
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Posted By: Diviacus
Date Posted: 14-Mar-2011 at 12:02
OK, for me, the Aquitanian language (we should say the Aquitanian languages) is from the same family as Basque (or Vascon), and as it is said in your Wikipedia sum-up, where it is described as a precursor of the (nowadays) Basque language.
It cannot be counted as a third one.
About your other comment, I have to think ...
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Posted By: opuslola
Date Posted: 28-Jul-2011 at 14:24
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In many ways the "langue d'Lac" or "dulac?", or "d'luc" (d'Oc), etc. (you can supply your most correct form in your reply) was as dissimilar to a Parisian as the Italian language of both Northern and Southern Italy was to a native of Rome in the late 19th century CE!, and even later.
These regional accents were even harder for most Italians to understand than was the difference between Southern English and Northern English in America, about 100 years ago. Regards, ------------- http://www.quotationspage.com/subjects/history/ |
Posted By: opuslola
Date Posted: 08-Dec-2013 at 17:46
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I will try to revive this line of postings. This very fact was not, very well developed during the life time of this line.
In fact there were at least two lines of French existing side by side in France for hundreds of years. And why no one responded to my last post, as seen above, a couple of years ago is a wonder. So do any of you guys/gals want to again "go into the fray?" Regards, Ron ------------- http://www.quotationspage.com/subjects/history/ |