VOLUME XI SLICE I Franciscans to French Language (continued 11)

(d) Orthography.—The history of French spelling is based on that of French sounds; as already stated, the former (apart from a few Latinisms in the earliest documents) for several centuries faithfully followed the latter. When the popular Latin of Gaul was first written, its sounds were represented by the letters of the Roman alphabet; but these were employed, not in the values they had in the time of Caesar, but in those they had acquired in consequence of the phonetic changes that had meantime taken place. Thus, as the Latin sound u had become ó (close o) and ū had become y (French u, German ü), the letter u was used sometimes to denote the sound ó, sometimes the sound y; as Latin k (written c) had become tsh or ts, according to dialect, before e and i, c was used to represent those sounds as well as that of k. The chief features of early French orthography (apart from the specialities of individual MSS., especially the earliest) are therefore these:—c stood for k and tsh or ts; d for d and dh (soft th); e for é, è, and ǝ; g for g and dzh; h was often written in words of Latin origin where not sounded; i (j) stood for i, y consonant, and dzh; o for ó (Anglo-Norman u) and ò; s for s and z; t for t and th; u (v) for ó (Anglo-Norman u), y and v; y (rare) for i; z for dz and ts. Some new sounds had also to be provided for: where tsh had to be distinguished from non-final ts, ch—at first, as in Italian, denoting k before i and e (chi = ki from qvī)—was used for it; palatal l was represented by ill, which when final usually lost one l, and after i dropped its i; palatal n by gn, ng or ngn, to which i was often prefixed; and the new letter w, originally uu (vv), and sometimes representing merely uv or vu, was employed for the consonant-sound still denoted by it in English. All combinations of vowel-letters represented diphthongs; thus ai denoted a followed by i, ou either óu or òu, ui either ói (Anglo-Norman ui) or yi, and similarly with the others—ei, eu, oi, iu, ie, ue (and oe), and the triphthong ieu. Silent letters, except initial h in Latin words, are very rare; though MSS. copied from older ones often retain letters whose sounds, though existing in the language of the author, had disappeared from that of the more modern scribe. The subsequent changes in orthography are due mainly to changes of sound, and find their explanation in the phonology. Thus, as Old French progresses, s, having become silent before voiced consonants, indicates only the length of the preceding vowel; e before nasals, from the change of ē (nasal e) to ã (nasal a), represents ã; c, from the change of ts to s, represents s; qu and gu, from the loss of the w of kw and gw, represent k and g (hard); ai, from the change of ai to è, represents è; ou, from the change of òu and óu to u, represents u; ch and g, from the change of tsh and dzh to sh and zh, represent sh and zh; eu and ue, originally representing diphthongs, represent œ (German ö); z, from the change of ts and dz to s and z, represents s and z. The new values of some of these letters were applied to words not originally spelt with them: Old French k before i and e was replaced by qu (evesque, eveske, Latin episcopum); Old French u and o for ó, after this sound had split into eu and u, were replaced in the latter case by ou (rous, for ros or rus, Latin russum); s was accidentally inserted to mark a long vowel (pasle, pale, Latin pallidum); eu replaced ue and oe (neuf, nuef, Latin novum and novem); z replaced s after é (nez, nes, nāsum). The use of x for final s is due to an orthographical mistake; the MS. contraction of us being something like x was at last confused with it (iex for ieus, oculōs), and, its meaning being forgotten, u was inserted before the x (yeux) which thus meant no more than s, and was used for it after other vowels (voix for vois, vōcem). As literature came to be extensively cultivated, traditional as distinct from phonetic spelling began to be influential; and in the 14th century, the close of the Old French period, this influence, though not overpowering, was strong—stronger than in England at that time. About the same period there arose etymological as distinct from traditional spelling. This practice, the alteration of traditional spelling by the insertion or substitution of letters which occurred (or were supposed to occur) in the Latin (or supposed Latin) originals of the French words, became very prevalent in the three following centuries, when such forms as debvoir (dēbēre) for devoir, faulx (falsum) for faus, autheur (auctōrem, supposed to be authōrem) for auteur, poids (supposed to be from pondus, really from pēnsum) for pois, were the rule. But besides the etymological, there was a phonetic school of spelling (Ramus, in 1562, for instance, writes èime, èimates—with e = é, è = è, and ę = ǝ—for aimai, aimastes), which, though unsuccessful on the whole, had some effect in correcting the excesses of the other, so that in the 17th century most of these inserted letters began to drop; of those which remain, some (flegme for flemme or fleume, Latin phlegma) have corrupted the pronunciation. Some important reforms—as the dropping of silent s, and its replacement by a circumflex over the vowel when this was long; the frequent distinction of close and open e by acute and grave accents; the restriction of i and u to the vowel sound, of j and v to the consonant; and the introduction from Spain of the cedilla to distinguish c = s from c = k before a, u and o—are due to the 16th century. The replacement of oi, where it had assumed the value è, by ai, did not begin till the last century, and was not the rule till the present one. Indeed, since the 16th century the changes in French spelling have been small, compared with the changes of the sounds; final consonants and final e (unaccented) are still written, though the sounds they represent have disappeared.

Still, a marked effort towards the simplification of French orthography was made in the third edition of the Dictionary of the French Academy (1740), practically the work of the Abbé d’Olivet. While in the first (1694) and second (1718) editions of this dictionary words were overburdened with silent letters, supposed to represent better the etymology, in the third edition the spelling of about 5000 words (out of about 18,000) was altered and made more in conformity with the pronunciation. So, for instance, c was dropped in beinfaicteur and object, ç in sçavoir, d in advocat, s in accroistre, albastre, aspre and bastard, e in the past part. creu, deu, veu, and in such words as alleure, souilleure; y was replaced by i in cecy, celuy, gay, joye, &c. But those changes were not made systematically, and many pedantic spellings were left untouched, while many inconsistencies still remain in the present orthography (siffler and persifler, souffler and boursoufler, &c). The consequence of those efforts in contrary directions is that French orthography is now quite as traditional and unphonetic as English, and gives an even falser notion than this of the actual state of the language it is supposed to represent. Many of the features of Old French orthography, early and late, are preserved in English orthography; to it we owe the use of c for s (Old English c = k only), of j (i) for dzh, of v (u) for v (in Old English written f), and probably of ch for tsh. The English w is purely French, the Old English letter being the runic Þ. When French was introduced into England, kw had not lost its w, and the French qu, with that value, replaced the Old English cÞ (queen for cÞen). In Norman, Old French ó had become very like u, and in England went entirely into it; o, which was one of its French signs, thus came to be often used for u in English (come for cume). U, having often in Old French its Modern French value, was so used in England, and replaced the Old English y (busy for bysi, Middle English brud for brŷd), and y was often used for i (day for dai). In the 13th century, when ou had come to represent u in France, it was borrowed by English, and used for the long sound of that vowel (sour for sūr); and gu, which had come to mean simply g (hard), was occasionally used to represent the sound g before i and e (guess for gesse). Some of the Early Modern etymological spellings were imitated in England; fleam and autour were replaced by phlegm and authour, the latter spelling having corrupted the pronunciation.

(e) Inflections.—In the earliest Old French extant, the influence of analogy, especially in verbal forms, is very marked when these are compared with Latin (thus the present participles of all conjugations take ant, the ending of the first, Latin antem), and becomes stronger as the language progresses. Such isolated inflectional changes as saveit into savoit, which are cases of regular phonetic changes, are not noticed here.

(i.) Verbs.—(1) In the oldest French texts the Latin pluperfect (with the sense of the perfect) occasionally occurs—avret (habuerat), roveret (rogāverat); it disappears before the 12th century. (2) The u of the ending of the 1st pers. plur. mus drops in Old French, except in the perfect, where its presence (as ǝ) is not yet satisfactorily explained—amoms (amāmus, influenced by sūmus), but amames (amāvimus). In Picard the atonic ending mes is extended to all tenses, giving amomes, &c. (3) In the present indicative, 2nd person plur., the ending ez of the first conjugation (Latin atis) extends, even in the earliest documents, to all verbs—avez, recevez, oez (habetis, recipĭtis, auditis) like amez (amatis); such forms as dites, faites (dicĭtis, facĭtis) being exceptional archaisms. This levelling of the conjugation does not appear at such an early time in the future (formed from the infinitive and from habētis reduced to ētis); in the Roland both forms occur, portereiz (portare habētis) assonating on rei (roi, rēgem), and the younger porterez on citet (cité, cīvitātem), but about the end of the 13th century the older form -eiz, -oiz, is dropped, and -ez becomes gradually the uniform ending for this 2nd person of the plural in the future tense. (4) In Eastern French the 1st plur., when preceded by i, has e, not o, before the nasal, while Western French has u (or o), as in the present; posciomes (posseāmus) in the Jonah homily makes it probable that the latter is the older form—Picard aviemes, Burgundian aviens, Norman aviums (habēbāmus). (5) The subjunctive of the first conjugation has at first in the singular no final e, in accordance with the final vowel laws—plur, plurs, plurt (plōrem, plōrēs, plōret). The forms are gradually assimilated to those of the other conjugations, which, deriving from Latin am, as, at, have e, es, e(t); Modern French pleure, pleures, pleure, like perde, perdes, perde (perdam, perdās, perdat). (6) In Old French the present subjunctive and the 1st sing. pres. ind. generally show the influence of the i or e of the Latin iam, eam, iō, eō—Old French muire or moerge (moriat for moriātur), tiegne or tienge (teneat), muir or moerc (moriō for morior), tieng or tienc (teneō). By degrees these forms are levelled under the other present forms—Modern French meure and meurs following meurt (morit for morītur), tienne and tiens following tient (tenet). A few of the older forms remain—the vowel of aie (habeam) and ai (habeō) contrasting with that of a (habet). (7) A levelling of which instances occur in the 11th century, but which is not yet complete, is that of the accented and unaccented stem-syllables of verbs. In Old French many verb-stems with shifting accent vary in accordance with phonetic laws—parler (parabolāre), amer (amāre) have in the present indicative parol (parabolō), paroles (parabolās), parolet (parabolat), parlums (parabolāmus), parlez (parabolātis), parolent (parabolant); aim (amō), aimes (amās), aimet (amat), amums (amāmus), amez (amātis), aiment (amant). In the first case the unaccented, in the second the accented form has prevailed—Modern French parle, parler; aime, aimer. In several verbs, as tenir (tenēre), the distinction is retained—tiens, tiens, tient, tenons, tenez, tiennent. (8) In Old French, as stated above, ié instead of é from a occurs after a palatal (which, if a consonant, often split into i with a dental); the diphthong thus appears in several forms of many verbs of the 1st conjugation—preier (= prei-ier, precāre), vengier (vindicāre), laissier (laxāre), aidier (adjūtāre). At the close of the Old French period, those verbs in which the stem ends in a dental replace ie by the e of other verbs—Old French laissier, aidier, laissiez (laxātis), aidiez (adjūtātis); Modern French laisser, aider, laissez, aidez, by analogy of aimer, aimez. The older forms generally remain in Picard—laissier, aidier. (9) The addition of e to the 1st sing. pres. ind. of all verbs of the first conjugation is rare before the 13th century, but is usual in the 15th; it is probably due to the analogy of the third person—Old French chant (cantō), aim (amō); Modern French chante, aime. (10) In the 13th century s is occasionally added to the 1st pers. sing., except those ending in e (= ǝ) and ai, and to the 2nd sing. of imperatives; at the close of the 16th century this becomes the rule, and extends to imperfects and conditionals in oie after the loss of their e. It appears to be due to the influence of the 2nd pers. sing.—Old French vend (vendō and vende), vendoie (vendēbam), parti (partīvī), ting (tenuī); Modern French vends, vendais, partis, tins; and donne (dōnā) in certain cases becomes donnes. (11) The 1st and 2nd plur. of the pres. subj., which in Old French were generally similar to those of the indicative, gradually take an i before them, which is the rule after the 16th century—Old French perdons (perdāmus), perdez (perdātis); Modern French perdions, perdiez, apparently by analogy of the imp. ind. (12) The loss in Late Old French of final s, t, &c., when preceding another consonant, caused many words to have in reality (though often concealed by orthography) double forms of inflection—one without termination, the other with. Thus in the 16th century the 2nd sing. pres. ind. dors (dormīs) and the 3rd dort (dormit) were distinguished as dòrz and dòrt when before a vowel, as dòrs and dòrt at the end of a sentence or line of poetry, but ran together as dòr when followed by a consonant. Still later, the loss of the final consonant when not followed by a vowel further reduced the cases in which the forms were distinguished, so that the actual French conjugation is considerably simpler than is shown by the customary spellings, except when, in consequence of an immediately following vowel, the old terminations occasionally appear. Even here the antiquity is to a considerable extent artificial or delusive, some of the insertions being due to analogy, and the popular language often omitting the traditional consonant or inserting a different one. (13) The subsequent general loss of e = ǝ in unaccented final syllables has still further reduced the inflections, but not the distinctive forms—perd (perdit) and perde (perdat) being generally distinguished as pèr and pèrd, and before a vowel as pèrt and pèrd.

(ii.) Substantives.—(1) In Early Old French (as in Provençal) there are two main declensions, the masculine and the feminine; with a few exceptions the former distinguishes nominative and accusative in both numbers, the latter in neither. The nom. and acc. sing, and acc. plur. mas. correspond to those of the Latin 2nd or 3rd declension, the nom. plur. to that of the 2nd declension. The sing, fem. corresponds to the nom. and acc. of the Latin 1st declension, or to the acc. of the 3rd; the plur. fem. to the acc. of the 1st declension, or to the nom. and acc. of the 3rd. Thus masc. tors (taurus), lere (latrō); tor (taurum), laron (latrōnem); tor (taurī), laron (latrōnī for -nēs); tors (taurōs), larons (latrōnēs); but fem. only ele (āla and ālam), flor (flōrem); eles (ālās), flors (flōrēs nom. and acc.). About the end of the 11th century feminines not ending in e = ǝ take, by analogy of the masculines, s in the nom. sing., thus distinguishing nom. flors from acc. flor. A century later, masculines without s in the nom. sing. take this consonant by analogy of the other masculines, giving leres as nom. similar to tors. In Anglo-Norman the accusative forms very early begin to replace the nominative, and soon supersede them, the language following the tendency of contemporaneous English. In continental French the declension-system was preserved much longer, and did not break up till the 14th century, though acc. forms are occasionally substituted for nom. (rarely nom. for acc.) before that date. It must be noticed, however, that in the current language the reduction of the declension to one case (generally the accusative) per number appears much earlier than in the language of literature proper and poetry; Froissart, for instance, c. 1400, in his poetical works is much more careful of the declension than in his Chronicles. In the 15th century the modern system of one case is fully established; the form kept is almost always the accusative (sing. without s, plural with s), but in a few words, such as fils (fīlius), sœur (soror), pastre (pastor), and in proper names such as Georges, Gilles, &c., often used as vocative (therefore with the form of nom.); the nom. survives in the sing. Occasionally both forms exist, in different senses—sire (senior) and seigneur (seniōrem), on (homō) and homme (hominem). (2) Latin neuters are generally masculine in Old French, and inflected according to their analogy, as ciels (caelus for caelum nom.), ciel (caelum acc.), ciel (caelī for caela nom.), ciels (caelōs for caela acc.); but in some cases the form of the Latin neuter is preserved, as in cors, now corps, Lat. corpus; tens, now temps, Lat. tempus. Many neuters lose their singular form and treat the plural as a feminine singular, as in the related languages—merveille (mīrābilia), feuille (folia). But in a few words the neuter plural termination is used, as in Italian, in its primitive sense—carre (carra, which exists as well as carrī), paire (Lat. paria); Modern French chars, paires. (3) In Old French the inflectional s often causes phonetic changes in the stem; thus palatal l before s takes t after it, and becomes dental l, which afterwards changes to u or drops—fil (fīlium and fīlii) with palatal l, filz (fīlius and fīliōs), afterwards fiz, with z = ts (preserved in English Fitz), and then fis, as now (spelt fils). Many consonants before s, as the t of fiz, disappear, and l is vocalized—vif (vīvum), mal (malum), nominative sing. and acc. plur. vis, maus (earlier mals). These forms of the plural are retained in the 16th century, though often etymologically spelt with the consonant of the singular, as in vifs, pronounced vis; but in Late Modern French many of them disappear, vifs, with f sounded as in the singular, being the plural of vif, bals (formerly baux) that of bal. In many words, as chant (cantūs) and champs (campōs) with silent t and p (Old French chans in both cases), maux (Old French mals, sing. mal), yeux (oculōs, Old French œlz, sing. œil) the old change in the stem is kept. Sometimes, as in cieux (caelōs) and ciels, the old traditional and the modern analogical forms coexist, with different meanings. (4) The modern loss of final s (except when kept as z before a vowel) has seriously modified the French declension, the singulars fort (fòr) and forte (fòrt) being generally undistinguishable from their plurals forts and fortes. The subsequent loss of ǝ in finals has not affected the relation between sing. and plur. forms; but with the frequent recoining of the plural forms on the singular present Modern French has very often no distinction between sing. and plur., except before a vowel. Such plurals as maux have always been distinct from their singular mal; in those whose singular ends in s there never was any distinction, Old French laz (now spelt lacs) corresponding to laqveus, laqveum, laqveī and laqveōs.

(iii.) Adjectives.—(1) The terminations of the cases and numbers of adjectives are the same as those of substantives, and are treated in the preceding paragraph. The feminine generally takes no e if the masc. has none, and if there is no distinction in Latin—fem. sing. fort (fortem), grant (grandem), fem. plur. forz (fortēs), granz (grandēs), like the acc. masc. Certain adjectives of this class, and among them all the adjectives formed with the Latin suffix -ensis, take regularly, even in the oldest French, the feminine ending e, in Provençal a (courtois, fem. courtoise; commun, fem. commune). To these must not be added dous (Mod. Fr. dolz, dous), fem. douce, which probably comes from a Low Latin dulcius, dulcia. In the 11th century some other feminines, originally without e, begin in Norman to take this termination—grande (in a feminine assonance in the Alexis), plur. grandes; but other dialects generally preserve the original form till the 14th century. In the 16th century the e is general in the feminine, and is now universal, except in a few expressions—grand’mère (with erroneous apostrophe, grandem, mātrem), lettres royaux (literās rēgālēs), and most adverbs from adjectives in -ant, -ent—couramment (currante for -ente mente), sciemment (sciente mente). (2) Several adjectives have in Modern French replaced the masc. by the feminine—Old French masc. roit (rigidum), fem. roide (rigidam); Modern French roide for both genders. (3) In Old French several Latin simple comparatives are preserved—maiur (majōrem), nom. maire (major); graignur (grandiōrem), nom. graindre (grandior); only a few of these now survive—pire (pejor), meilleur (meliōrem), with their adverbial neuters pis (pejus), mieux (melius). The few simple superlatives found in Old French, as merme (minimum), pesme (pessimus), proisme (proximum), haltisme (altissimum), this last one being clearly a literary word, are now extinct, and, when they existed, had hardly the meaning of a superlative. (4) The modern loss of many final consonants when not before vowels, and the subsequent loss of final ǝ, have greatly affected the distinction between the masc. and fem. of adjectives—fort and forte are still distinguished as fòr and fòrt, but amer (amārum) and amère (amāram), with their plurals amers and amères, have run together.

(f) Derivation.—Most of the Old French prefixes and suffixes are descendants of Latin ones, but a few are Teutonic (ard = hard), and some are later borrowings from Latin (arie, afterwards aire, from ārium). In Modern French many old affixes are hardly used for forming new words; the inherited ier (ārium) is yielding to the borrowed aire, the popular contre (contrā) to the learned anti (Greek), and the native ée (ātam) to the Italian ade. The suffixes of many words have been assimilated to more common ones; thus sengler (singulārem) is now sanglier.

(g) Syntax.—Old French syntax, gradually changing from the 10th to the 14th century, has a character of its own, distinct from that of Modern French; though when compared with Latin syntax it appears decidedly modern.

(1) The general formal distinction between nominative and accusative is the chief feature which causes French syntax to resemble that of Latin and differ from that of the modern language; and as the distinction had to be replaced by a comparatively fixed word-order, a serious loss of freedom ensued. If the forms are modernized while the word-order is kept, the Old French l’archevesque ne puet flechir li reis Henris (Latin archiepiscopum nōn potest flectere rex Henricus) assumes a totally different meaning—l’archevêque ne peut fléchir le roi Henri. (2) The replacement of the nominative form of nouns by the accusative is itself a syntactical feature, though treated above under inflection. A more modern instance is exhibited by the personal pronouns, which, when not immediately the subject of a verb, occasionally take even in Old French, and regularly in the 16th century, the accusative form; the Old French je qui sui (ego qvī sum) becomes moi qui suis, though the older usage survives in the legal phrase je soussigné.... (3) The definite article is now required in many cases where Old French dispenses with it—jo cunquis Engleterre, suffrir mort (as Modern French avoir faim); Modern French l’Angleterre, la mort. (4) Old French had distinct pronouns for “this” and “that”—cest (ecce istum) and cel (ecce illium), with their cases. Both exist in the 16th century, but the present language employs cet as adjective, cel as substantive, in both meanings, marking the old distinction by affixing the adverbs ci and là—cet homme-ci, cet homme-là; celui-ci, celui-là. (5) In Old French, the verbal terminations being clear, the subject pronoun is usually not expressed—si ferai (sīc facere habeō), est durs (dūrus est), que feras (quid facere habēs)? In the 16th century the use of the pronoun is general, and is now universal, except in one or two impersonal phrases, as n’importe, peu s’en faut. (6) The present participle in Old French in its uninflected form coincided with the gerund (amant = amantem and amandō), and in the modern language has been replaced by the latter, except where it has become adjectival; the Old French complaingnans leur dolours (Latin plaṇgentēs) is now plaignant leurs douleurs (Latin plaṇgendō). The now extinct use of estre with the participle present for the simple verb is not uncommon in Old French down to the 16th century—sont disanz (sunt dīcentēs) = Modern French ils disent (as English they are saying). (7) In present Modern French the preterite participle when used with avoir to form verb-tenses is invariable, except when the object precedes (an exception now vanishing in the conversational language)—j’ai écrit les lettres, les lettres que j’ai écrites. In Old French down to the 16th century, formal concord was more common (though by no means necessary), partly because the object preceded the participle much oftener than now—ad la culur muée (habet colōrem mūtātam), ad faite sa venjance, les turs ad rendues. (8) The sentences just quoted will serve as specimens of the freedom of Old French word-order—the object standing either before verb and participle, between them, or after both. The predicative adjective can stand before or after the verb—halt sunt li pui (Latin podia), e tenebrus e grant. (9) In Old French ne (Early Old French nen, Latin nōn) suffices for the negation without pas (passum), point (puṇctum) or mie (mīcam, now obsolete), though these are frequently used—jo ne sui lis sire (je ne suis pas ton seigneur), autre feme nen ara (il n’aura pas autre femme). In principal sentences Modern French uses ne by itself only in certain cases—je ne puis marcher, je n’ai rien. The slight weight as a negation usually attached to ne has caused several originally positive words to take a negative meaning—rien (Latin rem) now meaning “nothing” as well as “something.” (10) In Old French interrogation was expressed with substantives as with pronouns by putting them after the verb—est Saul entre les prophètes? In Modern French the pronominal inversion (the substantive being prefixed) or a verbal periphrasis must be used—Saul est-il? or est-ce que Saul est?

(h) Summary.—Looking at the internal history of the French language as a whole, there is no such strongly marked division as exists between Old and Middle English, or even between Middle and Modern English. Some of the most important changes are quite modern, and are concealed by the traditional orthography; but, even making allowance for this, the difference between French of the 11th century and that of the 20th is less than that between English of the same dates. The most important change in itself and for its effects is probably that which is usually made the division between Old and Modern French, the loss of the formal distinction between nominative and accusative; next to this are perhaps the gradual loss of many final consonants, the still recent loss of the vowel of unaccented final syllables, and the extension of analogy in conjugation and declension. In its construction Old French is distinguished by a freedom strongly contrasting with the strictness of the modern language, and bears, as might be expected, a much stronger resemblance than the latter to the other Romanic dialects. In many features, indeed, both positive and negative, Modern French forms a class by itself, distinct in character from the other modern representatives of Latin.

IV. Bibliography.—The few works which treat of French philology as a whole are now in many respects antiquated, and the important discoveries of recent years, which have revolutionized our ideas of Old French phonology and dialectology, are scattered in various editions, periodicals, and separate treatises. For many things Diez’s Grammatik der romanischen Sprachen (4th edition—a reprint of the 3rd—Bonn, 1876-1877; French translation, Paris, 1872-1875) is still very valuable; Burguy’s Grammaire de la Langue d’Oïl (2nd edition—a reprint of the 1st—Berlin, 1869-1870) is useful only as a collection of examples. Schwan’s Grammatik des Altfranzösischen, as revised by Behrens in the 3rd edition (Leipzig, 1898; French translation, Leipzig and Paris, 1900), is by far the best old French grammar we possess. For the history of French language in general see F. Brunot, Histoire de la langue française des origines à 1900 (Paris, 1905, 1906, &c.). For the history of spelling, A. F. Didot, Observations sur l’orthographe ou ortografie française suivies d’une histoire de la réforme orthographique depuis le XVe siècle jusqu’à nos jours (2nd ed., Paris, 1868). For the history of French sounds: Ch. Thurot, De la prononciation française depuis le commencement du XVIe siècle, d’après les témoignages des grammairiens (2 vols., Paris, 1881-1883). For the history of syntax, apart from various grammatical works of a general character, much is to be gathered from Ad. Tobler’s Vermischte Beiträge zur französischen Grammatik (3 parts, 1886, 1894, 1899, parts i. and ii. in second editions, 1902, 1906). G. Paris’s edition of La Vie de S. Alexis (Paris, 1872) was the pioneer of, and retains an important place among, the recent original works on Old French. Darmesteter and Hatzfeld’s Le Seizième Siècle (Paris, 1878) contains the first good account of Early Modern French. Littré’s Dictionnaire de la langue française (4 vols., Paris, 1863-1869, and a Supplement, 1877); and Hatzfeld, Darmesteter and Thomas, Dict. général de la langue française, more condensed (2 vols., Paris, 1888-1900), contain much useful and often original information about the etymology and history of French words. For the etymology of many French (and also Provençal) words, reference must be made to Ant. Thomas’s Essais de philologie française (Paris, 1897) and Nouveaux essais de philologie française (Paris, 1904). But there is no French dictionary properly historical. A Dictionnaire historique de la langue française was begun by the Académie française (4 vols., 1859-1894), but it was, from the first, antiquated. It contains only one letter (A) and has not been continued. The leading periodicals now in existence are the Romania (Paris), founded (in 1872) and edited by P. Meyer and G. Paris (with Ant. Thomas since the death of G. Paris in 1903), and the Zeitschrift für romanische Philologie (Halle), founded (in 1877) and edited by G. Gröber. To these reference should be made for information as to the very numerous articles, treatises and editions by the many and often distinguished scholars who, especially in France and Germany, now prosecute the scientific study of the language. It may be well to mention that, Old French phonology especially being complicated, and as yet incompletely investigated, these publications, the views in which are of various degrees of value, require not mere acquiescent reading, but critical study. The dialects of France in their present state (patois) are now being scientifically investigated. The special works on the subject (dictionaries, grammars, &c.) cannot be fully indicated here; we must limit ourselves to the mention of Behren’s Bibliographie des patois gallo-romans (2nd ed., revised Berlin, 1893), and of Gilliéron and Edmont’s Atlas linguistique de la France (1902 et seq.), a huge publication planned to contain about 1800 maps.

(H. N.; P. M.)