Norman’s ethnic cleansing

I've been checking and all what I've found says that Gascon is Occitanian (but see below!) and that Occitanian is Ibero-Romance (with Iberian tongues) and not Gallo-Romance (with Oil and Nord-Italian tongues). See: http://www.ethnologue.com/show_lang_family.asp?code=gsc.

On Gascon being Occitanian or not, I've found the following:

A practical excecise:
Comparison between Provenzal, Auvergnois and Gascon (the parabole of the prodigal son) (http://www.lexilogos.com/francais_enfant_prodigue.htm):

Proven�al (Occitanian):
Et soun fieou li diguet : Moun pa�r�
ai peccat contro lou ciel et contro de vous,
noun siou pas dign� d'estre appelat vouestre fieou.
Alors, lou p�ro diguet � seis domestiquos :
Adduses sa premiero raoubo,
et vestisses lou ;
mettes-li une bague oou det
et de souliers eis peds.
Adus�s lou vedeou gras et tuas lou,
mangens e faguem boumban�o.

Auvergnat (Occitanian):
Et soun fieou li diguet : Moun pa�r�
ai peccat contro lou ciel et contro de vous,
noun siou pas dign� d'estre appelat vouestre fieou.
Alors, lou p�ro diguet � seis domestiquos :
Adduses sa premiero raoubo,
et vestisses lou ;
mettes-li une bague oou det
et de souliers eis peds.
Adus�s lou vedeou gras et tuas lou,
mangens e faguem boumban�o.

Gascon (Occitanian???):
E soun hil qu'eou digouc : Moun pay,
qu'ey peccat cost'oou ceo � daouant bous :
nou souy pas mes digne deou noum de boste hil.
Lou pay que digouc a sous baylets :
Biste, biste, pourtat sa prum�ro raoubo
� boutats l'oc ;
boutats lou la bago aou dit,
� caoussats lou.
Amiats lou bedet gras, � tuats lou :
minjen � hascan uo gran' hesto.

While Proven�al and Auvergnat are identical (and very simmilar to what I know of Catalonian), Gascon is very different.

One explanation, that of strong Basque influence specially in pronunciation, can be found here: http://membres.lycos.fr/simorre/oc/gascon.html. This is a very important trait that Gascon, Ancient Aragonese and Castilian (Spanish) share. Yet, unlike Castilian, that is more hybrid, Gascon is almost exclussively a Romance spoken solely by (former) Basques.

Well, the link I provided was very authoitative but yours (or rather others I've found following it) seem to be authoritative as well. Personally I think that those clasifications may be a little arbitrary, after all the evolutionary path is just: Latin -> Vulgar Latin ->  Medieval Romances -> Modern Romanic tongues, there was never an intermediate Gallo-Roman or Ibero-Roman intermediate dialect from which these languages sprung, at least not one that covered all the area that modern classifications do, so no wonder there are discrepancies regarding wether Catalano-Occitan is one or the other.

I think that they should classify them in the following groups (I will ignore Romances east of the Alps, specially because I don't know much about them):

• Western Iberian: Galaico-Portugese, Asturian, Ancient Leonese, Mozarabic and...
• Castilian (Spanish), separated due to Basque influx
• Ibero-Provenzal: Occitan, Catalan and...
• Gascon, separated due to Basque influx
  
• Aragonese (I doubt seriously that Upper Aragonese can be classified with Western Iberian languages), also with Basque influx (but unrelated to Gascon as far as I know). Maybe it should be apart?
  
• Franco-Romanic: Oil languages

Many (if not most) Catalans want their country separated and have good reasons for it: basically lack of federalism, excessive centralism of Spain and France (there are also Catalans in France), lack of union of their country and, finally, that they have waged at least a war for independence (that they lost) and today is the conmemoration: the no-independence day of Catalonia: the Diada.

Yet, while Basques were clearly forced into both Spain and France, Catalans weren't forced in Spain so clearly. In fact, initially they supported the union of Aragon and Castile. But soon after they found themselves trapped under the foreign (Castilian) majority, so they started a war for independence against the heirs of Philip II, occasion that the Portugese used to get rid of the Spanish opression. Emtre Espanha e o Oceano, o Oceano!

Nowadays nations (peoples) need their own states to be able to survive so the sense of urgency is even greater, specially after centralist policies that have plagued Europe in the last centuries.

Well, I can tell you that when I go to the North, I make myself understand in Basque - my French is very limited and everybody speaks Basque, at least in the rural areas. An overwhelming majority of Basques, including all local members of pan-French parties, support the Basque Department (to start with). 

I know the history of Navarre, I wrote an article for the site on the Basque People in the Middle Ages. But you must know that Navarre wasn't absorbed by Castile (only conquered) until the 19th century. Until 1833, the economic frontier was in the Ebro river and the port of Navarre was Baionne. Navarre suffered a lot economically from the forced change of economic borders.

Equally in the North, the Revolution with its centralist Jacobine policies destroyed the socioeconomical structure of the Basque provinces. That's, why in both sides of the muga, Basques, who needed no revolution, as they had always had democratic states and mostly non-feudal society, joined the reactionary parties in search of retaining their freedoms.


Edited by Maju

Originally posted by Exarchus That surprises me, in Biarritz and Bayonne the language you have to use is French without doubt.

It's the same in all big cities, in Bilbao you have to use Spanish most of the time, that doesn't mean a lot of people doesn't speak Basque. Anyhow I know better rural Lapurdi (Labourd) and Benabarre (Navarre) than the coast.

But in the rural area, indeed Basque might still be present but that everybody speaks it really amaze me.

Everybody or almost. It's not compulsory of course.

You can travel through large parts of the Basque Country using only Basque as communication language, that includes most of the North (except possibly the BAB).

The southwestern France has always been rather rich. The Basque country being the exeption I wonder why. Pau, Bordeaux, Auch, Lourdes..... those always have done well and both Lourdes and Pau were in the Kingdom of Navarre (I could also mention Toulouse which is the frontier between Gascony and Languedoc).

The original name of Tolouse, Tolosa, is totally Basque. It means something bended or twisted (from tolestu: to bend). There is another Tolosa in Gipuzkoa. I guess the name comes because the river makes a twist there or something like that.

Yeah, the Basque department makes it's idea it's true. But that's definitely not independantism or regionalism. It's more a question of structure (...)

It's a must. While Bearnois are historical relatives they don't feel Basque anymore nor they speak the language, so a Basque territory of some kind, with co-oficiality for Euskara (or Eskuera, as they say oin the North) is absolutely necessary. Anyhow, Basque nationalist candidates are all the time getting more and more votes, probably because state-wide parties are showing their unwillingness to compromise. Yet the majoritarian electoral system and the artificial drawing of circunscriptions plays against them, along with the well stabilished French nationalism.

I saw that article on the Basque people, one thing bugged me. It's true Caesar said the Aquitanians had a distinct culture of the Gauls. But at the same time he said the people of Aquitaine could teach the Romans themselves to speak Latin more correctly.

I doubt he said that, seriously. Maybe the Aquitanians of later times... but when Caesar conqueed Gaul I don't think that Latin had still spread outside the borders of the Roman Province.

Still, if some Basques (Aquitanians) of the time could speak Latin they would surely make good use of declinations, because Basque is also a declinative language. Maybe also the 5-vowel system helped to make Basque-spoken Latin sound cleaner, without Celtisms nor prepositions. Just speculating, anyhow.

I hope you won't be suggesting that Caesar's times Aquitanians were the lost tribe of Rome or something like that... that would make no sense. To start with because Caesar used the term Iberi, to define them, not Romani.

Originally posted by Quetzalcoatl     Apparently the normans reign in England was tyrranny. According to that article the normans never tried to make any efforts to assimilate with the English. And there were a system of apartheid between the English and Normans. Could that be the origin of English hatred for the french. And also could that be the origin of the Upper class accent. You have to admitt that in England not so long ago they existed a caste system there. The article itself is controversial but nevertheless a good read. Somehow, I no longer feel proud of having a norman ancestry anymore. http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/lj/conquestlj/conquered_01.shtm l?site=history_conquestlj_conquest

The Normans were barbarians who killed the rightful king, stole the land of the nobility, enslaved the Saxon peasantry, and abolished democracy. Under Edward the Confessor it was normal to elect a king. William the Bastard replaced this ancient system with primogeniture