Unit 75
French in English
There is no doubt that today English is one of the most important and richest of the world's languages. Probably the most significant factor accounting for the latter quality was the Conquest of England by the Normans more than 900 years ago. The conquering Normans spoke French. Most of the inhabitants of the conquered nation spoke varieties of Anglo-Saxon of Germanic origin.
Of course, the Normans were stronger than the local inhabitants politically and naturally their language became the language of the King's court. It also became the language for written documents, together with Latin, and was generally regarded as "more literary" and somehow "better" than the language of the common people. In spite of apparently being "worse", however, the language of the ordinary inhabitants of England, and especially the language spoken by the inhabitants of the central part of the country, did not die out. For centuries, the two languages continued to exist side by side.
Besides this invasion French has influenced English in several others ways. First, France had its renaissance earlier than England and was a wealthier country than England for many centuries, so England borrowed many words and phrases for cooking, fashion, and arts from France. Second, French became the official language of diplomacy, so that many words and phrases for law, war, and travel came into English. These days, French has lost status because the United Nations has five official languages, not just one: English, French, Spanish, Russian, and Chinese.
The individual most responsible for bringing English and French together (and one of the greatest writer in English literature) was a customs official who lived in the late fourteenth century named Geoffrey Chaucer, whose Canterbury Tales is one of the most extraordinary works in English, practically created, or at least made acceptable, a new language, which was a combination of the more elegant French and the cruder but more powerful Germanic elements.
Since Chaucer's time the two languages have been woven closer and closer together, forming the single language that we now know as English. However, even today, vestiges of the differences survive, for words of French or Latin origin still tend to occur more frequently in formal written English than in spoken English. This naturally means that, for Spanish speakers, it is often easier to understand written English than spoken English. You can find evidence of this in this paragraph. Go through it and underline the words which are similar to words in Spanish. It is virtually certain that these will be words of Latin (or Greek) or French derivation, and probably they were brought to England by William the Conqueror and his men long ago. |