French

How Gaulish and Frankish shaped French

Latin reached Gaul with Roman rule, but Gaulish probably survived into the sixth century and left its mark on the sounds and vocabulary. The Petit Robert attributes 154 standard French words to it, 240 counting dialects, many of them rural: chêne, mouton, cheval, arpent, lieue. The Frankish superstrate came next, supplying around 15% of modern vocabulary. It also gave the pronoun on and the word français itself.

Old French ran from the late 8th to the mid-14th century. Its earliest traces are the Oaths of Strasbourg and the Sequence of Saint Eulalia, and its literature includes the Chanson de Roland. During the Crusades it took Arabic words such as amiral, alcool, coton and sirop, and scientific terms such as algèbre and zéro.

When French replaced Latin in law

The nobles of the Kingdom of Jerusalem codified the Assizes of Jerusalem in Outremer French in the mid-13th century, before France itself used the vernacular for law. The Aosta Valley adopted French as its official language in 1536. Three years later the Ordinance of Villers-Cotterêts made French the only language of legal acts in France, ending Latin's official role there. Cardinal Richelieu founded the Académie française in the 17th century, and French replaced Latin as the language of diplomacy until the middle of the 20th century.

Why France's regional languages lost ground

In 1794 Henri Grégoire presented a report on the need to annihilate the patois and make French universal. Compulsory public schooling taught only French and punished pupils who spoke anything else, and teachers in Finistère were told they had been posted to kill the Breton language, and in the Occitan south the shame instilled in speakers had a name, Vergonha.

Where French is gaining and losing standing

Several Sahelian states have formally curtailed French. About 80% of pupils in French-language schools are in Africa, and in Kinshasa, Brazzaville, Abidjan and Yaoundé many children acquire French as a de facto first language. Youth sociolects such as Camfranglais in Cameroon and Nouchi in Côte d'Ivoire have spread into music and social media. Mali's constitutional referendum of July 2023 demoted French from official to working status, and Québec's Bill 96, assented on 1 June 2022, reaffirmed French as the official and common language of the province.