Timeline
A short history of the French language, from 842 to today
From the Strasbourg Oaths in 842 to the 1539 ordinance, the Académie française and today's feminised job titles: a timeline of how French became French.
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In short
French grew out of the Latin spoken in Gaul. Its first written trace is the Serments de Strasbourg (842). In 1539 the ordonnance de Villers-Cotterêts made French the language of law, in 1635 Richelieu founded the Académie française, and the 1990 spelling reform and recent feminised job titles show it still evolves.
Yellow the idea to rememberBlue French to learn
- 1er s. av. J.-C.Le latin populaire s'installe en Gaule.Popular Latin settles in Gaul after the Roman conquest.
- 842Les Serments de Strasbourg : premier texte en langue romane.The Strasbourg Oaths: the first text in a Romance language of France.
- XIIe s.Les chansons de geste et les romans courtois en ancien français.Epic poems and courtly romances in Old French.
- 1539L'ordonnance de Villers-Cotterêts impose le français dans les actes officiels.The Villers-Cotterêts ordinance imposes French in official documents.
- 1635Richelieu fonde l'Académie française.Richelieu founds the Académie française.
- 1794L'abbé Grégoire constate que beaucoup de Français ne parlent pas français.Abbé Grégoire finds many French people don't speak French.
- 1882L'école gratuite et obligatoire répand le français partout.Free, compulsory schooling spreads French everywhere.
- 1990Une réforme de l'orthographe simplifie certaines graphies.A spelling reform simplifies some spellings.
- 2019L'Académie accepte la féminisation des noms de métiers.The Académie accepts feminised job titles.
Key words
| French | English |
|---|---|
| le latin populaire | Vulgar Latin |
| l'ancien français | Old French |
| une ordonnance | a royal decree |
| l'orthographe | spelling |
| un patois | a local dialect |
| la francophonie | the French-speaking world |
As late as the Revolution, most people in France spoke regional languages or patois: Breton, Occitan, Alsatian, Basque, Corsican. Today about 320 million people speak French worldwide, more than half of them in Africa, so the future of French is largely African.
- L'Académie française a inventé le français.L'Académie française codifie le français.
It standardises; it didn't create the language.
- Le français vient du grec.Le français vient surtout du latin.
Latin is the main source, with Germanic and Celtic traces.