Breton (, ;
or in Morbihan
Morbihan ( , ; br, Mor-Bihan ) is a department in the administrative region of Brittany, situated in the northwest of France. It is named after the Morbihan (''small sea'' in Breton), the enclosed sea that is the principal feature of the coastli ...
) is a
Southwestern
The points of the compass are a set of horizontal, radially arrayed compass directions (or azimuths) used in navigation and cartography. A compass rose is primarily composed of four cardinal directions—north, east, south, and west—each sepa ...
Brittonic
Brittonic or Brythonic may refer to:
*Common Brittonic, or Brythonic, the Celtic language anciently spoken in Great Britain
*Brittonic languages, a branch of the Celtic languages descended from Common Brittonic
*Britons (Celtic people)
The Br ...
language of the
Celtic language family
The Celtic languages ( usually , but sometimes ) are a group of related languages descended from Proto-Celtic. They form a branch of the Indo-European language family. The term "Celtic" was first used to describe this language group by Edward ...
spoken in
Brittany
Brittany (; french: link=no, Bretagne ; br, Breizh, or ; Gallo language, Gallo: ''Bertaèyn'' ) is a peninsula, Historical region, historical country and cultural area in the west of modern France, covering the western part of what was known ...
, part of modern-day France. It is the only Celtic language still widely in use on the European mainland, albeit as a member of the
insular branch instead of the
continental
Continental may refer to:
Places
* Continent, the major landmasses of Earth
* Continental, Arizona, a small community in Pima County, Arizona, US
* Continental, Ohio, a small town in Putnam County, US
Arts and entertainment
* ''Continental'' (al ...
grouping.
Breton was brought from Great Britain to
Armorica
Armorica or Aremorica (Gaulish: ; br, Arvorig, ) is the name given in ancient times to the part of Gaul between the Seine and the Loire that includes the Brittany Peninsula, extending inland to an indeterminate point and down the Atlantic Coast ...
(the ancient name for the coastal region that includes the Brittany peninsula) by migrating
Britons
British people or Britons, also known colloquially as Brits, are the citizens of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, the British Overseas Territories, and the Crown dependencies.: British nationality law governs mo ...
during the
Early Middle Ages
The Early Middle Ages (or early medieval period), sometimes controversially referred to as the Dark Ages, is typically regarded by historians as lasting from the late 5th or early 6th century to the 10th century. They marked the start of the Mi ...
, making it an
Insular Celtic language
Insular Celtic languages are the group of Celtic languages of Brittany, Great Britain, Ireland, and the Isle of Man. All surviving Celtic languages are in the Insular group, including Breton, which is spoken on continental Europe in Brittany, ...
. Breton is most closely related to
Cornish, another Southwestern Brittonic language.
Welsh
Welsh may refer to:
Related to Wales
* Welsh, referring or related to Wales
* Welsh language, a Brittonic Celtic language spoken in Wales
* Welsh people
People
* Welsh (surname)
* Sometimes used as a synonym for the ancient Britons (Celtic peop ...
and the extinct
Cumbric
Cumbric was a variety of the Common Brittonic language spoken during the Early Middle Ages in the ''Hen Ogledd'' or "Old North" in what is now the counties of Westmorland, Cumberland and northern Lancashire in Northern England and the souther ...
, both
Western Brittonic languages
Western Brittonic languages ( cy, Brythoneg Gorllewinol) comprise two dialects into which Common Brittonic split during the Early Middle Ages; its counterpart was the ancestor of the Southwestern Brittonic languages. The reason and date for the ...
, are more distantly related.
Having declined from more than one million speakers around 1950 to about 200,000 in the first decade of the 21st century, Breton is classified as "severely endangered" by the
UNESCO
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) aimed at promoting world peace and security through international cooperation in education, arts, sciences and culture. It ...
''
Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger
The UNESCO ''Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger'' is an online publication containing a comprehensive list of the world's endangered languages. It originally replaced the ''Red Book of Endangered Languages'' as a title in print after a ...
''. However, the number of children attending bilingual classes rose 33% between 2006 and 2012 to 14,709.
__TOC__
History and status
Breton is spoken in
Lower Brittany
Lower Brittany ( br, Breizh-Izel; french: Basse-Bretagne) denotes the parts of Brittany west of Ploërmel, where the Breton language has been traditionally spoken, and where the culture associated with this language is most prolific. The name is ...
( br, Breizh-Izel), roughly to the west of a line linking
Plouha
Plouha (; ; Gallo: ''Plóha'') is a town and commune in the Côtes-d'Armor department of Brittany in northwestern France.
Population
Inhabitants of Plouha are called ''plouhatins'' in French.
Twin towns
Plouha is twinned with:
* Killorglin in ...
(west of
Saint-Brieuc
Saint-Brieuc (, Breton: ''Sant-Brieg'' , Gallo: ''Saent-Berioec'') is a city in the Côtes-d'Armor department in Brittany in northwestern France.
History
Saint-Brieuc is named after a Welsh monk Brioc, who Christianised the region in the 6th c ...
) and
La Roche-Bernard (east of
Vannes
Vannes (; br, Gwened) is a commune in the Morbihan department in Brittany in north-western France. It was founded over 2,000 years ago.
History Celtic Era
The name ''Vannes'' comes from the Veneti, a seafaring Celtic people who lived ...
). It comes from a Brittonic language community that once extended from Great Britain to
Armorica
Armorica or Aremorica (Gaulish: ; br, Arvorig, ) is the name given in ancient times to the part of Gaul between the Seine and the Loire that includes the Brittany Peninsula, extending inland to an indeterminate point and down the Atlantic Coast ...
(present-day Brittany) and had even established a toehold in
Galicia (in present-day Spain). Old Breton is attested from the 9th century. It was the language of the upper classes until the 12th century, after which it became the language of commoners in Lower Brittany. The nobility, followed by the
bourgeoisie
The bourgeoisie ( , ) is a social class, equivalent to the middle or upper middle class. They are distinguished from, and traditionally contrasted with, the proletariat by their affluence, and their great cultural and financial capital. They ...
, adopted
French. The written language of the
Duchy of Brittany
The Duchy of Brittany ( br, Dugelezh Breizh, ; french: Duché de Bretagne) was a medieval feudal state that existed between approximately 939 and 1547. Its territory covered the northwestern peninsula of Europe, bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to ...
was
Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
, switching to French in the 15th century. There exists a limited tradition of
Breton literature
Breton literature may refer to literature in the Breton language (''Brezhoneg'') or the broader literary tradition of Brittany in the three other main languages of the area, namely, Latin, Gallo and French – all of which have had strong mutual ...
. Some
philosophical
Philosophy (from , ) is the systematized study of general and fundamental questions, such as those about existence, reason, knowledge, values, mind, and language. Such questions are often posed as problems to be studied or resolved. Some ...
and scientific terms in Modern Breton come from Old Breton. The recognized stages of the Breton language are: Old Breton – c.800 to c.1100, Middle Breton – c.1100 to c.1650, Modern Breton – c.1650 to present.
The French monarchy was not concerned with the
minority languages of France
Of the languages of France, French is the sole official language according to the second article of the French Constitution. French, a Gallo-Romance language, is spoken by nearly the entire population of France.
In addition to French, several ...
, spoken by the lower classes, and required the use of French for government business as part of its policy of national unity. During the
French Revolution
The French Revolution ( ) was a period of radical political and societal change in France that began with the Estates General of 1789 and ended with the formation of the French Consulate in November 1799. Many of its ideas are considere ...
, the government introduced policies favouring French over the regional languages, which it pejoratively referred to as . The revolutionaries assumed that
reactionary
In political science, a reactionary or a reactionist is a person who holds political views that favor a return to the ''status quo ante'', the previous political state of society, which that person believes possessed positive characteristics abse ...
and
monarchist
Monarchism is the advocacy of the system of monarchy or monarchical rule. A monarchist is an individual who supports this form of government independently of any specific monarch, whereas one who supports a particular monarch is a royalist. ...
forces preferred
regional language
*
A regional language is a language spoken in a region of a sovereign state, whether it be a small area, a federated state or province or some wider area.
Internationally, for the purposes of the European Charter for Regional or Minority Lan ...
s to try to keep the peasant masses under-informed. In 1794,
Bertrand Barère
Bertrand Barère de Vieuzac (, 10 September 175513 January 1841) was a French politician, freemason, journalist, and one of the most prominent members of the National Convention, representing the Plain (a moderate political faction) during the F ...
submitted his "report on the " to the
Committee of Public Safety
The Committee of Public Safety (french: link=no, Comité de salut public) was a committee of the National Convention which formed the provisional government and war cabinet during the Reign of Terror, a violent phase of the French Revolution. S ...
in which he said that "federalism and superstition speak Breton".
Since the 19th century, under the
Third
Third or 3rd may refer to:
Numbers
* 3rd, the ordinal form of the cardinal number 3
* , a fraction of one third
* Second#Sexagesimal divisions of calendar time and day, 1⁄60 of a ''second'', or 1⁄3600 of a ''minute''
Places
* 3rd Street (d ...
,
Fourth and now
Fifth Republics, the French government has attempted to stamp out minority languages—including Breton—in state schools, in an effort to build a national culture. Teachers humiliated students for using their regional languages, and such practices prevailed until the late 1960s.
In the early 21st century, due to the political centralization of France, the influence of the media, and the increasing mobility of people, only about 200,000 people are active speakers of Breton, a dramatic decline from more than 1 million in 1950. The majority of today's speakers are more than 60 years old, and Breton is now classified as an
endangered language
An endangered language or moribund language is a language that is at risk of disappearing as its speakers die out or shift to speaking other languages. Language loss occurs when the language has no more native speakers and becomes a "dead langu ...
.
At the beginning of the 20th century, half of the population of Lower Brittany knew only Breton; the other half were bilingual. By 1950, there were only 100,000
monolingual
Monoglottism (Greek μόνος ''monos'', "alone, solitary", + γλῶττα , "tongue, language") or, more commonly, monolingualism or unilingualism, is the condition of being able to speak only a single language, as opposed to multilingualism. ...
Bretons, and this rapid decline has continued, with likely no monolingual speakers left today. A statistical survey in 1997 found around 300,000 speakers in Lower Brittany, of whom about 190,000 were aged 60 or older. Few 15- to 19-year-olds spoke Breton. In 1993, parents were finally legally allowed to give their children Breton names.
Revival efforts
![Affiche Charrue Huard](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f2/Affiche_Charrue_Huard.jpg)
In 1925, Professor
Roparz Hemon
Louis-Paul Némo (18 November 1900 – 29 June 1978), better known by the pseudonym Roparz Hemon, was a Breton author and scholar of Breton expression. He was the author of numerous dictionaries, grammars, poems and short stories. He also found ...
founded the Breton-language review . During its 19-year run, tried to raise the language to the level of a great international language. Its publication encouraged the creation of original literature in all genres, and proposed Breton translations of internationally recognized foreign works. In 1946, replaced . Other Breton-language periodicals have been published, which established a fairly large body of literature for a minority language.
In 1977,
Diwan schools were founded to teach Breton by
immersion
Immersion may refer to:
The arts
* "Immersion", a 2012 story by Aliette de Bodard
* ''Immersion'', a French comic book series by Léo Quievreux#Immersion, Léo Quievreux
* Immersion (album), ''Immersion'' (album), the third album by Australian gro ...
. Since their establishment, Diwan schools have provided fully immersive primary school and partially immersive secondary school instruction in Breton for thousands of students across Brittany. This has directly contributed to the growing numbers of school-age speakers of Breton.
The ''
Asterix
''Asterix'' or ''The Adventures of Asterix'' (french: Astérix or , "Asterix the Gaul") is a ''bande dessinée'' comic book series about a village of indomitable Gaulish warriors who adventure around the world and fight the Roman Republic, wi ...
'' comic series has been translated into Breton. According to the comic, the
Gaul
Gaul ( la, Gallia) was a region of Western Europe first described by the Romans. It was inhabited by Celtic and Aquitani tribes, encompassing present-day France, Belgium, Luxembourg, most of Switzerland, parts of Northern Italy (only during ...
ish village where Asterix lives is in the
Armorica peninsula, which is now Brittany. Some other popular comics have also been translated into Breton, including ''
The Adventures of Tintin
''The Adventures of Tintin'' (french: Les Aventures de Tintin ) is a series of 24 bande dessinée#Formats, ''bande dessinée'' albums created by Belgians, Belgian cartoonist Georges Remi, who wrote under the pen name Hergé. The series was one ...
'', , ''
Titeuf
''Titeuf'' (known sometimes as ''Tootuff'' in English) is a French comic series created by Swiss comic books creator Zep in 1992, which was adapted into a 2001 animated TV series and a 2011 film of the same name. It also appears in the dedica ...
'', ''
Hägar the Horrible
''Hägar the Horrible'' is the title and main character of an American comic strip created by cartoonist Dik Browne and syndicated by King Features Syndicate. It first appeared in February 1973 and was an immediate success. Since Browne's reti ...
'', ''
Peanuts
''Peanuts'' is a print syndication, syndicated daily strip, daily and Sunday strip, Sunday American comic strip written and illustrated by Charles M. Schulz. The strip's original run extended from 1950 to 2000, continuing in reruns afterward. ' ...
'' and ''
Yakari
''Yakari'' is a Franco-Belgian comic book series, aimed at a younger audience, originally written by Job, and illustrated by Derib, both from Switzerland. The series is now written by Frenchman Joris Chamblain.
''Yakari'' is one of the best-kno ...
''.
Some original media are created in Breton. The sitcom, , is in Breton.
Radio Kerne
Radio Kerne is a radio station that broadcasts exclusively in the Breton language. It broadcasts on FM in south Finistère, the westernmost ''département in France, département'' of Brittany, France, and on the Internet to the rest of the worl ...
, broadcasting from
Finistère
Finistère (, ; br, Penn-ar-Bed ) is a department of France in the extreme west of Brittany. In 2019, it had a population of 915,090. , has exclusively Breton programming. Some movies (''
Lancelot du Lac'', ''
Shakespeare in Love
''Shakespeare in Love'' is a 1998 romantic period comedy-drama film directed by John Madden, written by Marc Norman and playwright Tom Stoppard, and produced by Harvey Weinstein. It stars Gwyneth Paltrow, Joseph Fiennes, Geoffrey Rush, Col ...
'', ''
Marion du Faouet'', ''
Sezneg'') and TV series (''
Columbo
''Columbo'' () is an American crime drama television series starring Peter Falk as Lieutenant Columbo, a homicide detective with the Los Angeles Police Department. After two pilot episodes in 1968 and 1971, the show originally aired on NBC f ...
'', ''
Perry Mason
Perry Mason is a fictional character, an American criminal defense lawyer who is the main character in works of detective fiction written by Erle Stanley Gardner. Perry Mason features in 82 novels and 4 short stories, all of which involve a cli ...
'') have also been translated and broadcast in Breton. Poets, singers, linguists, and writers who have written in Breton, including
Yann-Ber Kalloc'h,
Roparz Hemon
Louis-Paul Némo (18 November 1900 – 29 June 1978), better known by the pseudonym Roparz Hemon, was a Breton author and scholar of Breton expression. He was the author of numerous dictionaries, grammars, poems and short stories. He also found ...
,
Anjela Duval,
Xavier de Langlais
Xavier de Langlais (April 26, 1906 in Sarzeau – June 15, 1975) was a Breton painter, printmaker and writer. He usually signed his work with the name Langleiz, a Breton language version of his surname.
Early career
Langlais studied art in Nante ...
,
Pêr-Jakez Helias
Pêr-Jakez Helias, baptised Pierre-Jacques Hélias, ''nom de plume'' Pierre-Jakez Hélias (1914–1995) was a Breton stage actor, journalist, author, poet, and writer for radio who worked in the French and Breton languages. For many years he di ...
,
Youenn Gwernig
Youenn Gwernig (10 May 1925 – 29 August 2006; born in Scaër, Douarnenez) was a Breton-American poet, writer and singer. He was a painter, sculptor and a TV presenter on the French channel France 3.
He was born in 1925 in the town of Scaër ( ...
,
Glenmor
Glenmor was the stage name of Emile Le Scanf (1931–1996), a Breton protest singer who sought to preserve the Breton language and adapt local traditions of folk singing to the radical culture of the 1960s and 70s. He is also known by the Breton na ...
,
Vefa de Saint-Pierre and
Alan Stivell
Alan Stivell (; born Alan Cochevelou on 6 January 1944) is a French, Breton and Celtic musician and singer, songwriter, recording artist, and master of the Celtic harp. From the early 1970s, he revived global interest in the Celtic (specifically ...
are now known internationally.
Today, Breton is the only living
Celtic language
The Celtic languages ( usually , but sometimes ) are a group of related languages descended from Proto-Celtic. They form a branch of the Indo-European language family. The term "Celtic" was first used to describe this language group by Edward ...
that is not recognized by a national government as an official or regional language.
The first Breton dictionary, the ''
Catholicon'', was also the first French dictionary. Edited by Jehan Lagadec in 1464, it was a trilingual work containing Breton, French and Latin. Today bilingual dictionaries have been published for Breton and languages including English, Dutch, German, Spanish and Welsh. A monolingual dictionary, was published in 1995. The first edition contained about 10,000 words, and the second edition of 2001 contains 20,000 words.
In the early 21st century, the ("Public Office for the Breton language") began a campaign to encourage daily use of Breton in the region by both businesses and local communes. Efforts include installing bilingual signs and posters for regional events, as well as encouraging the use of the
Spilhennig to let speakers identify each other. The office also started an
Internationalization and localization
In computing, internationalization and localization (American) or internationalisation and localisation (British English), often abbreviated i18n and L10n, are means of adapting computer software to different languages, regional peculiarities and ...
policy asking
Google
Google LLC () is an American multinational technology company focusing on search engine technology, online advertising, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, artificial intelligence, and consumer electronics. ...
,
Firefox
Mozilla Firefox, or simply Firefox, is a free and open-source web browser developed by the Mozilla Foundation and its subsidiary, the Mozilla Corporation. It uses the Gecko rendering engine to display web pages, which implements current and ...
and
SPIP
SPIP (''Système de Publication pour l'Internet'') is a free software content management system designed for web site publishing, oriented towards online collaborative editing.
The software is designed for easy setup, use and maintenance, and is ...
to develop their interfaces in Breton. In 2004, the
Breton Wikipedia
The Breton Wikipedia ( br, Wikipedia e brezhoneg) is the Breton language version of Wikipedia, run by the Wikimedia Foundation.
History
The Breton Wikipedia was established in June 2004. As of August 2008 it had over 20,000 articles, making it ...
started, which now counts more than 75,000 articles. In March 2007, the signed a
tripartite agreement with
Regional Council of Brittany
The Regional Council of Brittany (, ) is the regional legislature of the region of Brittany in France. It is composed of 83 councillors, elected in 2015, in office for six years until 2021.
Seats
By Departments
*17 councillors for Côtes-d ...
and
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational technology corporation producing computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services headquartered at the Microsoft Redmond campus located in Redmond, Washing ...
for the consideration of the Breton language in Microsoft products. In October 2014,
Facebook
Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin M ...
added Breton as one of its 121 languages after three years of talks between the and Facebook.
France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...
has twice chosen to enter the
Eurovision Song Contest
The Eurovision Song Contest (), sometimes abbreviated to ESC and often known simply as Eurovision, is an international songwriting competition organised annually by the European Broadcasting Union (EBU), featuring participants representing pr ...
with songs in Breton; once in
1996
File:1996 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: A Centennial Olympic Park bombing, bomb explodes at Centennial Olympic Park in Atlanta, set off by a radical Anti-abortion violence, anti-abortionist; The center fuel tank explodes on TWA Flight 8 ...
in Oslo with "" by
Dan Ar Braz
Dan Ar Braz (; born Daniel Le Bras on 15 January 1949 in Quimper) is a Breton guitarist-singer-composer and the founder of L'Héritage des Celtes, a 50-piece Pan-Celt band. Leading guitarist in Celtic music, Dan Ar Braz has recorded as a solo ...
and the fifty piece band
Héritage des Celtes, and most recently in
2022
File:2022 collage V1.png, Clockwise, from top left: Road junction at Yamato-Saidaiji Station several hours after the assassination of Shinzo Abe; 2022 Sri Lankan protests, Anti-government protest in Sri Lanka in front of the Presidential Secretari ...
in Turin with "" by
Alvan Morvan Rosius and vocal trio
Ahez
Ahez is a French vocal group from Carhaix, Brittany, consisting of Marine Lavigne, Sterenn Diridollou and Sterenn Le Guillou. The trio represented France in the Eurovision Song Contest 2022 together with Alvan with the song " Fulenn".
Histo ...
. These are two of five times France has chosen songs in one of its
minority languages
A minority language is a language spoken by a minority of the population of a territory. Such people are termed linguistic minorities or language minorities. With a total number of 196 sovereign states recognized internationally (as of 2019) and ...
for the contest, the others being in
1992
File:1992 Events Collage V1.png, From left, clockwise: 1992 Los Angeles riots, Riots break out across Los Angeles, California after the Police brutality, police beating of Rodney King; El Al Flight 1862 crashes into a residential apartment buildi ...
(bilingual French and
Antillean Creole
Antillean Creole (Antillean French Creole, Kreyol, Kwéyòl, Patois) is a French-based creole that is primarily spoken in the Lesser Antilles. Its grammar and vocabulary include elements of Carib, English, and African languages.
Antillean Creol ...
),
1993
File:1993 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The Oslo I Accord is signed in an attempt to resolve the Israeli–Palestinian conflict; The Russian White House is shelled during the 1993 Russian constitutional crisis; Czechoslovakia is peace ...
(bilingual French and
Corsican), and
2011
File:2011 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: a protester partaking in Occupy Wall Street heralds the beginning of the Occupy movement; protests against Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi, who was killed that October; a young man celebrate ...
(Corsican).
Geographic distribution and dialects
![Breton dialectes-en](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/57/Breton_dialectes-en.svg)
Breton is spoken mainly in Lower Brittany, but also in a more dispersed way in Upper Brittany (where it is spoken alongside
Gallo
Gallo may refer to:
*Related to Gaul:
** Gallo-Roman culture
**Gallo language, a regional language of France
**Gallo-Romance, a branch of Romance languages
**Gallo-Italic or Gallo-Italian language, a branch spoken in Northern Italy of the Romance ...
and French), and in areas around the world that have Breton emigrants.
The four traditional dialects of Breton correspond to medieval bishoprics rather than to linguistic divisions. They are (, of the
county of Léon), (, of
Trégor
Trégor (; br, Treger, ), officially the Land of Trégor (french: pays du Trégor, link=no; br, Bro-Dreger, link=no, ) is one of the nine traditional provinces of Brittany, in its northwestern area. It comprises the western part of the Côte ...
), (, of ), and (, of
Vannes
Vannes (; br, Gwened) is a commune in the Morbihan department in Brittany in north-western France. It was founded over 2,000 years ago.
History Celtic Era
The name ''Vannes'' comes from the Veneti, a seafaring Celtic people who lived ...
). was spoken up to the beginning of the 20th century in the region of
Guérande
Guérande (; br, Gwenrann, ; french: label=Gallo, Geraundd) is a medieval town located in the department of Loire-Atlantique, and the region of Pays de la Loire, Western France.
The inhabitants are referred to as ''Guérandais'' (masculine), and ...
and
Batz-sur-Mer
Batz-sur-Mer (, literally ''Batz on Sea''; br, Bourc'h-Baz) is a commune in the Loire-Atlantique department in western France.
The commune is situated on a former island that, until around the 9th century, was separate from the mainland at Gu ...
. There are no clear boundaries between the dialects because they form a
dialect continuum
A dialect continuum or dialect chain is a series of Variety (linguistics), language varieties spoken across some geographical area such that neighboring varieties are Mutual intelligibility, mutually intelligible, but the differences accumulat ...
, varying only slightly from one village to the next. , however, requires a little study to be intelligible with most of the other dialects.
[Kergoat, Lukian]
"Breton Dialects" in ''Celtic Culture'', pp. 250 ff
ABC-CLIO ( Sta. Barbara), 2006.
Official status
Nation
As noted, only French is an
official language
An official language is a language given supreme status in a particular country, state, or other jurisdiction. Typically the term "official language" does not refer to the language used by a people or country, but by its government (e.g. judiciary, ...
of
France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...
. Supporters of Breton and other minority languages continue to argue for their recognition, and for their place in education, public schools, and public life.
Constitution
In July 2008, the legislature amended the
French Constitution
The current Constitution of France was adopted on 4 October 1958. It is typically called the Constitution of the Fifth Republic , and it replaced the Constitution of the Fourth Republic of 1946 with the exception of the preamble per a Constitu ...
, adding article 75-1: (the
regional languages
*
A regional language is a language spoken in a region of a sovereign state, whether it be a small area, a federated state or province or some wider area.
Internationally, for the purposes of the European Charter for Regional or Minority Lan ...
belong to the heritage of
France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...
).
The
European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages
The European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages (ECRML) is a European treaty (CETS 148) adopted in 1992 under the auspices of the Council of Europe to protect and promote historical regional and minority languages in Europe. However, the ...
, which obliges signatory states to recognize minority and regional languages, was signed by France in 1999 but has not been ratified. On 27 October 2015, the
Senate
A senate is a deliberative assembly, often the upper house or chamber of a bicameral legislature. The name comes from the ancient Roman Senate (Latin: ''Senatus''), so-called as an assembly of the senior (Latin: ''senex'' meaning "the el ...
rejected a draft constitutional law ratifying the charter.
Region
Regional and departmental authorities use Breton to a very limited extent. Some bilingual signage has also been installed, such as street name signs in Breton towns. One station of the
Rennes metro system has signs in both French and Breton.
Under the French law known as
Toubon, it is illegal for commercial signage to be in Breton alone. Signs must be bilingual or French only. Since commercial signage usually has limited physical space, most businesses have signs only in French.
, the Breton language agency, was set up in 1999 by the Brittany region to promote and develop the daily use of Breton. It created the campaign, to encourage enterprises, organisations and communes to promote the use of Breton, for example by installing bilingual signage or translating their websites into Breton.
Education
![Breton school sign in Rennes](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b0/Breton_school_sign_in_Rennes.jpg)
In the late 20th century, the French government considered incorporating the independent Breton-language immersion schools (called ) into the state education system. This action was blocked by the French
Constitutional Council Constitutional Council might refer to:
* Constitutional Council (Chad)
* Constitutional Council (France)
* Constitutional Council (Ivory Coast)
* Constitutional Council (Sri Lanka)
* Constitutional Council (Cambodia)
* Constitutional Council (Kaz ...
based on the 1994 amendment to the Constitution that establishes French as the language of the republic. Therefore, no other language may be used as a language of instruction in state schools. The
Toubon Law implemented the amendment, asserting that French is the language of public education.
The
Diwan schools were founded in Brittany in 1977 to teach Breton by
immersion
Immersion may refer to:
The arts
* "Immersion", a 2012 story by Aliette de Bodard
* ''Immersion'', a French comic book series by Léo Quievreux#Immersion, Léo Quievreux
* Immersion (album), ''Immersion'' (album), the third album by Australian gro ...
. Since their establishment, Diwan schools have provided fully immersive primary school and partially immersive secondary school instruction in Breton for thousands of students across Brittany. This has directly contributed to the growing numbers of school-age speakers of Breton. The schools have also gained fame from their high level of results in school exams, including those on French language and literature. Breton-language schools do not receive funding from the national government, though the Brittany Region may fund them.
Another teaching method is a bilingual approach by ("Two Languages") in the State schools, created in 1979. ("Awakening") was created in 1990 for bilingual education in the Catholic schools.
Statistics
In 2018, 18,337
pupils (about 2.00% of all pupils in Brittany) attended , and schools, and their number has increased yearly. The goal of
Jean-Yves Le Drian
Jean-Yves Le Drian (; born 30 June 1947) is a French politician who served as Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs, Minister of Europe and Foreign Affairs in the First Philippe government, governments of Prime Ministers Édouard Philippe and ...
(president of the
Regional Council) of 20,000, and of “their recognition” for “their place in education, public schools, and public life”, by 2010, was not achieved, but he describes being encouraged by their progress.
In 2007, some 4,500 to 5,000 adults followed such a Breton language course as an evening or correspondence one. The transmission of Breton in 1999 is estimated to be 3 percent.
Municipalities
Other forms of education
In addition to bilingual education (including Breton-medium education) the region has introduced the Breton language in primary education, mainly in the department of Finistère. These "initiation" sessions are generally one to three hours per week, and consist of songs and games.
Schools in secondary education ( and ) offer some courses in Breton. In 2010, nearly 5,000 students in Brittany were reported to be taking this option. Additionally, the University of Rennes 2 has a Breton language department offering courses in the language along with a master's degree in Breton and Celtic Studies.
Phonology
Vowels
Vowels in Breton may be
short or long. All unstressed vowels are short; stressed vowels can be short or long (vowel lengths are not noted in usual orthographies as they are implicit in the phonology of particular dialects, and not all dialects pronounce stressed vowels as long). An emergence of a schwa sound occurs as a result of vowel neutralization in post-tonic position, among different dialects.
All vowels can also be
nasalized
In phonetics, nasalization (or nasalisation) is the production of a sound while the velum is lowered, so that some air escapes through the nose during the production of the sound by the mouth. An archetypal nasal sound is .
In the Internationa ...
, which is noted by appending an 'n' letter after the base vowel, or by adding a combining tilde above the vowel (most commonly and easily done for ''a'' and ''o'' due to the
Portuguese letters), or more commonly by non-ambiguously appending an letter after the base vowel (this depends on the orthographic variant).
Diphthongs are .
Consonants
* The pronunciation of the letter varies nowadays: is used in the French-influenced standard language and, generally speaking, in the central parts of Lower Brittany (including the south of Trégor, the west of Vannetais and virtually all parts of Cornouaille) whereas is the common realisation in Léon and often in the Haut-Vannetais dialect of central Morbihan (in and around the city of Vannes and the Pays de Pontivy), though in rapid speech mostly a tapped occurs. In the other regions of Trégor or even may be found.
* The voiced dental fricative () is a conservative realisation of the
lenition
In linguistics, lenition is a sound change that alters consonants, making them more sonority hierarchy, sonorous. The word ''lenition'' itself means "softening" or "weakening" (from Latin 'weak'). Lenition can happen both synchronic analysis, s ...
(or the "spirant mutation" in cases where the phenomenon originates from the mutation of , respectively) of the consonants and which is to be found in certain varieties of Haut-Vannetais. Most of the Breton dialects do not inherit the sound and thus it is mostly not orthographically fixed. The ''Peurunvan'', for instance, uses for both mutations, which are regularly and more prominently pronounced in Léonais, Cornouaillais, Trégorrois and Bas-Vannetais. In traditional literature written in the Vannetais dialect, two different graphemes are employed for representing the dental fricative, depending on the scripture's historical period. There once was a time when was used to transcribe the sound, but today mostly the regular is instead used, and this practice can be traced back to at least the end of the 17th century. The area this phenomenon has been found to be evident in encompasses the towns of
Pontivy
Pontivy (; ) is a commune in the Morbihan department in Brittany in north-western France. It lies at the confluence of the river Blavet and the Canal de Nantes à Brest. Inhabitants of Pontivy are called ''Pontivyens'' in French.
Map
History
...
and
Baud
In telecommunication and electronics, baud (; symbol: Bd) is a common unit of measurement of symbol rate, which is one of the components that determine the speed of communication over a data channel.
It is the unit for symbol rate or modulatio ...
and surrounding smaller villages like
Cléguérec
Cléguérec (; br, Klegereg) is a commune in the Morbihan department of Brittany in north-western France.
Geography
The town is located northwest of Pontivy. Cléguérec is border by Séglien and Silfiac to the west, by Sainte-Brigitte a ...
,
Noyal-Pontivy
Noyal-Pontivy (; ) is a commune in the Morbihan department of Brittany in north-western France. Inhabitants of Noyal-Pontivy are called in French ''Noyalais''.
Breton language
The municipality launched a linguistic plan through Ya d'ar brezhone ...
, Pluméliau, Saint-Allouestre, St. Allouestre, Saint-Barthélemy, Morbihan, St. Barthélemy, Pluvigner and also parts of Belle Île, Belle-Île. The only known place where the mutation occurs outside of the Vannes country is the Île de Sein, an island located off
Finistère
Finistère (, ; br, Penn-ar-Bed ) is a department of France in the extreme west of Brittany. In 2019, it had a population of 915,090. 's coast. Some scholars also used as the symbol for the sound to indicate that it was rather an "infra-dental" consonant than a clear interdental, which is the sound the symbol is usually describes. Other linguists, however, did not draw that distinction, either because they identified the sound to actually be an interdental fricative (such as Roparz Hemon in his phonetic transcription of the dialect used in Pluméliau or Joseph Loth in his material about the dialect of Sauzon in Belle-Île) or due to the fact that they attached no importance to it and ascertained that their descriptions were not in need of a further clarification of the sound's phonetic realisation as it was a clearly distinguishable phoneme.
* The digraph ''zh'' represents a variable sound that may exhibit as /s/, /z/, or /h/, and descends from a now-extinct sound , which is still extant in Welsh as ''th''.
Grammar
Nouns
Breton nouns are marked for gender and number. While Breton gender is fairly typical of gender systems across western Europe (with the exception of Basque and modern English), Breton number markers demonstrate rarer behaviors.
Gender
Breton has two genders: masculine () and feminine (), having largely lost its historic neuter () as has also occurred in the other Celtic languages as well as across the Romance languages. Certain suffixes (''-ach/-aj,
[ -(a)dur,][ -er, -lec'h, -our, -ti, -va'']) are masculine, while others (''-enti, -er, -ez, -ezh, -ezon, -i'', ''-eg'', ''-ell'', and the singulative ''-enn'') are feminine. The suffix ''-eg'' can be masculine or feminine.[
There are certain non-determinant factors that influence gender assignment. Biological sex is applied for animate referents. Metals, time divisions (except for "hour", "night" and "week") and mountains tend to be masculine, while rivers, cities and countries tend to be feminine.]
However, gender assignment to certain words often varies between dialects.[
]
Number
Number in Breton is primarily based on an opposition between singular and plural. However, the system is full of complexities[ in how this distinction is realized.
Although modern Breton has lost its ancestral dual number marker, relics of its use are preserved in various nouns pertaining to body parts, including the words for eyes, ears, cheeks, legs, armpits, arms, hands, knees, thighs, and wings. This is seen in a prefix (formed in , or ) that is etymologically derived from the prefixation of the number two.][ The dual is no longer productive, and has merely been lexicalized in these cases rather than remaining a part of Breton grammar. The (etymologically) already dual words for eyes () and ears () can be pluralized "again" to form and .][
Like other Brythonic languages, Breton has a singulative suffix that is used to form singulars out of collective nouns, for which the morphologically less complex form is the plural. Thus, the singulative of the collective "mice" is "mouse".][ However, Breton goes beyond Welsh in the complications of this system. Collectives can be pluralized to make forms which are different in meaning from the normal collective-- "fish" (singular) is pluralized to , singulativized to , referring to a single fish out of a school of fish, and this singulative of the plural can then be pluralized again to make "fishes".][
On top of this, the formation of plurals is complicated by two different pluralizing functions. The "default" plural formation is contrasted with another formation which is said to "emphasize variety or diversity" – thus two semantically different plurals can be formed out of : "parks" and "various different parks".][ Ball reports that the latter pluralizer is used only for inanimate nouns.][ Certain formations have been lexicalized to have meanings other than that which might be predicted solely from the morphology: "water" pluralized forms which means not "waters" but instead "rivers", while now has come to mean "running waters after a storm". Certain forms have lost the singular from their paradigm: means "news" and is not used, while has become the regular plural,][ ‘different news items’.
Meanwhile certain nouns can form doubly marked plurals with lexicalized meanings – "child" is pluralized once into "children" and then pluralized a second time to make "groups of children".][
The diminutive suffix also has the somewhat unusual property of triggering double marking of the plural: means "little child", but the doubly pluralized means "little children"; boat has a singular diminutive and a simple plural , thus its diminutive plural is the doubly pluralized .][
As seen elsewhere in many Celtic languages, the formation of the plural can be hard to predict, being determined by a mix of semantic, morphological and lexical factors.
The most common plural marker is , with its variant ;][ most nouns that use this marker are inanimates but collectives of both inanimate and animate nouns always use it as well.][
Most animate nouns, including trees, take a plural in .][ However in some dialects the use of this affix has become rare. Various masculine nouns including occupations as well as the word ("Englishman", plural ) take the suffix , with a range of variants including , , and .][
The rare pluralizing suffixes / and are used for a few nouns. When they are appended, they also trigger a change in the vowel of the root: triggers a vowel harmony effect whereby some or all preceding vowels are changed to ( "cousin" → "cousins"; "crow" → "crows"; "'partridge" → "partridges); the changes associated with / are less predictable.][
Various nouns instead form their plural merely with ablaut: or in the stem being changed to : "wing" → "wings"; "tooth" → "teeth"; "rope" → "ropes".][
Another set of nouns have lexicalized plurals that bear little if any resemblance to their singulars. These include "girl" → , "pig" → , "cow" → , and "dog" → .][
In compound nouns, the head noun, which usually comes first, is pluralized.][
]
Verbal aspect
As in other Celtic languages as well as English language, English, a variety of verbal constructions is available to express grammatical aspect, for example: showing a distinction between progressive tense, progressive and habitual actions:
Inflected prepositions
As in other modern Celtic languages, Breton pronouns are fused into preceding prepositions to produce a sort of inflected preposition. Below are some examples in Breton, Cornish, Welsh
Welsh may refer to:
Related to Wales
* Welsh, referring or related to Wales
* Welsh language, a Brittonic Celtic language spoken in Wales
* Welsh people
People
* Welsh (surname)
* Sometimes used as a synonym for the ancient Britons (Celtic peop ...
, Irish language, Irish, Scottish Gaelic, and Manx language, Manx, along with English translations.
Note that in the examples above the Goidelic languages (Irish, Scottish Gaelic, and Manx) use the preposition meaning ''at'' to show possession, whereas the Brittonic languages use ''with''. The Goidelic languages, however, do use the preposition ''with'' to express "belong to" (Irish , Scottish , Manx , The book belongs to me).
The Welsh examples are in literary Welsh morphology#Prepositions, literary Welsh. The order and preposition may differ slightly in colloquial Welsh morphology#Prepositions, colloquial Welsh (Formal , North Wales , South Wales ).
Initial consonant mutations
Breton has four initial consonant mutations: though modern Breton lost the nasal mutation of Welsh
Welsh may refer to:
Related to Wales
* Welsh, referring or related to Wales
* Welsh language, a Brittonic Celtic language spoken in Wales
* Welsh people
People
* Welsh (surname)
* Sometimes used as a synonym for the ancient Britons (Celtic peop ...
(but for rare words such the word "door": "dor" "an nor"), it also has a "hard" mutation, in which voiced stops become voiceless, and a "mixed" mutation, which is a mixture of hard and soft mutations.
Word order
Normal word order, like the other Insular Celtic languages, is at its core verb–subject–object word order, VSO (verb-subject-object), which is most apparent in embedded clauses. However, Breton finite verbs in main clauses are additionally subject to V2 word order in which the finite main clause verb is typically the second element in the sentence. That make it perfectly possible to put the subject or the object at the beginning of the sentence, largely depending on the focus of the speaker. The following options are possible (all with a little difference in meaning):
*the first places the verbal infinitive in initial position (as in (1)), followed by the Auxiliary verb, auxiliary 'to do'.
*the second places the Auxiliary verb 'to be' in initial position (as in (2)), followed the Subject, and the construction ''+ infinitive''. At the end comes the Object. This construction is an exception to verb-second.
*the third places the construction ''+ infinitive'' in the initial position (as in (3)), followed by the Auxiliary verb , the Subject, and the Object.
*the fourth option places the Object in initial position (as in (4)), followed by an inflected verb, followed by the Subject.
*the fifth, and originally least common, places the Subject in initial position (as in (5)), followed by an inflected verb, followed by the Object, just like in English (SVO).
Vocabulary
Breton uses much more borrowed vocabulary than its relatives further north; by some estimates a full 40% of its core vocabulary consists of loans from French.[Fortson, Benjamin W. 2005. ''Indo-European Language and Culture''. Page 295: "Breton has also borrowed much more heavily from French throughout its history than any of the other British Celtic languages ever have from English, to the extent that two-fifths of the ordinary vocabulary is of French origin, according to some extents".]
Orthography
The first extant Breton texts, contained in the Leyde manuscript, were written at the end of the 8th century: 50 years prior to the Strasbourg Oaths, considered to be the earliest example of French. Like many medieval orthographies, Old- and Middle Breton orthography was at first not standardised, and the spelling of a particular word varied at authors' discretion. In 1499, however, the '' Catholicon'', was published; as the first dictionary written for both French and Breton, it became a point of reference on how to transcribe the language. The orthography presented in the ''Catholicon'' was largely similar to that of French, in particular with respect to the representation of vowels, as well as the use of both the Latinate digraph —a remnant of the sound change /kʷ/ > /k/ in Latin—and Brittonic or to represent /k/ before front vowels.
As phonetic and phonological differences between the dialects began to magnify, many regions, particularly the Vannes country, began to devise their own orthographies. Many of these orthographies were more closely related to the French model, albeit with some modifications. Examples of these modifications include the replacement of Old Breton with to denote word-final /x~h/ (an evolution of Old Breton /θ/ in the Vannes dialect) and use of to denote the initial mutation of /k/ (today this mutation is written ). and thus needed another transcription.
In the 1830s Jean-François Le Gonidec created a modern phonetic system for the language.
During the early years of the 20th century, a group of writers known as elaborated and reformed Le Gonidec's system. They made it more suitable as a super-dialectal representation of the dialects of Cornouaille, Leon and Trégor (known as from , and in Breton). This KLT orthography was established in 1911. At the same time writers of the more divergent Vannetais dialect developed a phonetic system also based on that of Le Gonidec.
Following proposals made during the 1920s, the KLT and Vannetais orthographies were merged in 1941 to create an orthographic system to represent all four dialects. This ("wholly unified") orthography was significant for the inclusion of the ''zh'' Digraph (orthography), digraph, which represents a in Vannetais and corresponds to a in the KLT dialects.
In 1955 François Falc'hun and the group Emgleo Breiz proposed a new orthography. It was designed to use a set of graphemes closer to the conventions of French. This ("University Orthography", known in Breton as ) was given official recognition by the French authorities as the "official orthography of Breton in French education." It was opposed in the region and today is used only by the magazine and the publishing house Emgléo Breiz.
In the 1970s, a new standard orthography was devised — the or . This system is based on the derivation of the words.
Today the majority of writers continue to use the ''Peurunvan orthography'', and it is the version taught in most Breton-language schools.
Alphabet
Breton is written in the Latin script. ''Peurunvan'', the most commonly used orthography, consists of the following letters:
: a, b, ch, c'h, d, e, f, g, h, i, j, k, l, m, n, o, p, r, s, t, u, v, w, y, z
The circumflex, grave accent, trema (diacritic), trema and tilde appear on some letters. These diacritics are used in the following way:
: â, ê, î, ô, û, ù, ü, ñ
Differences between and
Both orthographies use the above alphabet, although ''é'' is used only in .
Differences between the two systems are particularly noticeable in word endings. In Peurunvan, final obstruents, which are devoiced in absolute final position and voiced in sandhi before voiced sounds, are represented by a grapheme that indicates a voiceless sound. In OU they are written as voiced but represented as voiceless before suffixes: (big), (bigger).
In addition, Peurunvan maintains the KLT convention, which distinguishes noun/adjective pairs by nouns written with a final voiced consonant and adjectives with a voiceless one. No distinction is made in pronunciation, e.g. ''Breton language'' vs. ''Breton (adj)''.
Some examples of words in the different orthographies:
Pronunciation of the Breton alphabet
Notes:
# Vocative particle: O Brittany!
# Word-initially.
# Word-finally.
# Unwritten lenition of ''ch, c'h, f, s'' and spirantization of ''p'' > ''f'' .
# Unstressed vowels ''e, eu, o'' are pronounced in Leoneg but in the other dialects. The pronunciation appears mainly in front of clusters ''lc'h, rc'h'' (less often also before ''c'h''), before semivowels , before other clusters beginning with ''r, l'' and before ''rr''. Stressed long ''e, eu, o'' are realized as .
# In Gwenedeg velars or labialized velars are palatalized when followed by ''e'' and ''i'': ''k, g, kw/kou, c'hw/c'hou, gw/gou, w/ou, sk'' to . Instead of also may appear.
# In Gwenedeg word-final ''g'' and ''k'' is palatalized to [c] after preceding ''i''.
# But before a vowel other than ''i'' the digraph ''ni'' is written instead of ''gn'', e.g. to drive', radical , 1PS preterite , 3PS preterite .
# But mute in words such as ''ha(g), he(c'h), ho(c'h), holl, hon/hor/hol''. Silent in Gwenedeg and Leoneg.
# ''I'' is realized as when it precedes or follows a vowel (or when between vowels), but in words such as ''lien, liorzh, rakdiazezañ'' the letter ''i'' is pronounced as (in orthography ''ï'' may be used:''lïen, lïorzh, rakdïazezañ'').
# Group ''ilh'' is pronounced when it follows a vowel, following a consonant the group is pronounced [iʎ]. But before a vowel other than ''i'' ''li'' is written instead of ''ilh'', e.g. to follow, radical , 1PS preterite , 3PS preterite . In some regions instead of may appear pronunciation .
# Word-finally following a cluster of unvoiced consonants.
# In front of ''k, g''.
# The digraph ''ou'' is realized same as the letter ''w'' when preceded or followed by a vowel (or when between vowels), but in words such as ''Doue, douar, gouarn'' the digraph ''ou'' is pronounced .
# The digraph ''où'' marks plural ending. Its pronunciation varies throughout Brittany: rating geographically from Northwest Leon to Southeast Gwened.
# The letter ''v'' is usually pronounced , but word-finally (except word-final ''ñv'') is pronounced usually as or in KLT, as in Gwenedeg and as in Goëlo. The pronunciation is retained word-finally in verbs. In words ''bliv, Gwiskriv, gwiv, liv, piv, riv'' are ''v'' is pronounced in KLT, in Gwenedeg and in Goëlo. Word-finally following ''r, l, n, z'' it is pronounced .
# But mute in words such as ''gouez, bloaz, goaz, ruziañ, kleiz, rakdïazezañ, bezañ, Roazhon, dezhañ, kouezhañ, 'z, az, ez, da'z, gwirionez, enep(g)wirionez, moneiz, falsvoneiz, karantez, kengarantez, nevez, nevezc'hanet, nadozioù, abardaez, gwez, bemdez, kriz, bleiz, morvleiz, dezhi ''. ''Z'' is generally mute in Kerneweg, Tregerieg and Gwenedeg, but in Leoneg ''z(h)'' is always pronounced.
# Used to distinguish words ''stêr'' river, ''hêr'' heir, ''kêr'' town (written also ''kaer'') from ''ster'' sense, ''her ''bold, ''ker'' dear.
# Used to distinguish ''trôad'' circuit/tour from ''troad'' foot.
# In northern dialects (mainly in Leoneg), there is a tendency to voice ''c'h'' between vowels. Pronunciation appears also in forms of lenition of ''g, c'h'' and mixed mutation of ''g''.
# The lenition of ''d'' and the spirantization of ''t'' is also transcribed as ''z'' and is most prominently pronounced although in certain regions also (for ''t'', particularly in Cornouaille) and (in some Haut-Vannetais varieties, see note 31) occur.
# Pronunciation of ''r'' varies in Brittany, nowadays uvular (or ) is a standard; in Leoneg ''r'' is pronounced , in Tregerieg or , in Kerneveg and are most common, in Gwenedeg occur.
# In Gwenedeg unstressed ''e'' often .
# Lenited varieties of ''r, l, n'' may appear word-initially in case of soft mutation.
# In Leoneg in front of a nasal.
# In Leoneg ''w'' in front of ''e, i'' .
# In Leoneg ''z(h)'' in front of ''i'' or .
# In Leoneg ''gwr'' .
# Before a vowel.
# Forms of the indefinite article.
# A conservative realisation of the initial mutation of ''d'' and ''t'', used in certain parts of the Vannes country.
Examples
Lord's Prayer
: ''Hon Tad,''
: ''c'hwi hag a zo en Neñv,''
: ''ra vo santelaet hoc'h anv.''
: ''Ra zeuio ho Rouantelezh.''
: ''Ra vo graet ho youl war an douar evel en neñv.''
: ''Roit dimp hiziv bara hor bevañs.''
: ''Distaolit dimp hon dleoù''
: ''evel m'hor bo ivez distaolet d'hon dleourion.''
: ''Ha n'hon lezit ket da vont gant an temptadur,''
: ''met hon dieubit eus an Droug.''
Words and phrases in Breton
Visitors to Brittany may encounter words and phrases (especially on signs and posters) such as the following:
Language comparison
{, class="wikitable"
! English !! French !! Breton !! Cornish !! Welsh !! Scottish Gaelic !! Irish
, -
, earth , , , , , , , , , , , ,
, -
, sky , , , , (older ) , , , , , , , ,
, -
, heaven , , , , , , , , , , , ,
, -
, food , , , , , , (older ) , , , , , ,
, -
, house , , , , , , , , , , , , (south )
, -
, church , , , , , , , , , , , ,
, -
, person, man , , , , , , , , , , , ,
, -
, dog , , , , , , , , , , , , ( hound)
, -
, sell , , , , , , , , , , , , trade, pay
, -
, eat , , , , , , , , , , ( feed) , , ( feed)
, -
, drink , , , , , , , , , , (archaic ) , , (archaic )
, -
, see , , , , , , , , , , (fut. ) , , (south )
, -
, black , , , , , , , , , , , ,
, -
, white , , , , , , , , , , ( 'fair') , ,
, -
, green , , , , , , , , , , , ,
, -
, red , , , , , , , , (also: ) , , (hair, etc. ) , , (hair, etc. )
, -
, yellow , , , , , , , , , , , ,
, -
, book , , , , , , , , , , , ,
, -
, day , , , , , , , , , , , , (also in names of weekdays)
, -
, year , , , , , , , , , , , ,
, -
, beer , , , , , , , , , , , , ale
, -
, go , , , , , , , , , , (verbal noun ) , , (verbal noun, )
, -
, come , , , , , , , , , , {{lang, thig (verbal noun, {{lang, gd, tighinn) , , {{lang, ga, tar (participle, {{lang, ga, ag teacht)
, -
, cat , , {{lang, fr, chat, chatte , , {{lang, br, kazh , , {{lang, kw, kath , , {{lang, cy, cath , , {{lang, gd, cat , , {{lang, ga, cat
, -
, live , , {{lang, fr, vivre , , {{lang, br, bevañ , , {{lang, kw, bewa , , {{lang, cy, byw , , {{lang, gd, beò , , {{lang, ga, beo
, -
, dead , , {{lang, fr, morte , , {{lang, br, marv , , {{lang, kw, marow , , {{lang, cy, marw , , {{lang, gd, marbh , , {{lang, ga, marbh
, -
, name , , {{lang, fr, nom , , {{lang, br, anv , , {{lang, kw, hanow , , {{lang, cy, enw , , {{lang, gd, ainm , , {{lang, ga, ainm
, -
, water , , {{lang, fr, eau , , {{lang, br, dour , , {{lang, kw, dowr , , {{lang, cy, dŵr , , {{lang, gd, uisge (dobhair) , , {{lang, ga, uisce, dobhar
, -
, true , , {{lang, fr, vrai, vraie , , {{lang, br, gwir , , {{lang, kw, gwir , , {{lang, cy, gwir , , {{lang, gd, fìor , , {{lang, ga, fíor
, -
, wife , , {{lang, fr, femme , , {{lang, br, gwreg , , {{lang, kw, gwreg , , {{lang, cy, gwraig , , {{lang, gd, bean , , {{lang, ga, bean
, -
, sheep , , {{lang, fr, mouton, brebis , , {{lang, br, dañvad , , {{lang, kw, davas , , {{lang, cy, dafad , , {{lang, gd, caora 'sheep' ({{lang, gd, damh 'stag', 'ox';) , , {{lang, ga, damh 'stag', 'ox'; {{lang, ga, caora 'sheep'
, -
, better , , {{lang, fr, mieux , , {{lang, br, gwell, gwelloc'h , , {{lang, kw, gwell , , {{lang, cy, gwell , , {{lang, gd, feàrr , , níos fearr
, -
, say , , {{lang, fr, dire , , {{lang, br, lavarout , , {{lang, kw, leverel , , {{lang, cy, siarad (also: {{lang, cy, llefaru) , , {{lang, gd, can ({{lang, gd, labhair speak) , , {{lang, ga, deir ({{lang, ga, labhair speak)
, -
, night , , {{lang, fr, nuit , , {{lang, br, noz , , {{lang, kw, nos , , {{lang, cy, nôs , , {{lang, gd, a-nochd 'tonight'; {{lang, gd, oidhche 'night' , , {{lang, ga, anocht 'tonight'; {{lang, ga, oíche 'night'
, -
, root , , {{lang, fr, racine , , {{lang, br, gwrizienn , , {{lang, kw, gwreydhen , , {{lang, cy, gwreiddyn , , {{lang, gd, freumh , , {{lang, ga, fréamh, (south {{lang, ga, préamh)
, -
, iron , , {{lang, fr, fer , , {{lang, br, houarn , , {{lang, kw, horn , , {{lang, cy, haearn , , {{lang, gd, iarann , , {{lang, ga, iarann
, -
, summer , , {{lang, fr, été , , {{lang, br, hañv , , {{lang, kw, hav , , {{lang, cy, haf , , {{lang, gd, samhradh , , {{lang, ga, samhradh
, -
, winter , , {{lang, fr, hiver , , {{lang, br, goañv , , {{lang, kw, gwav , , {{lang, cy, gaeaf , , {{lang, gd, geamhradh , , {{lang, ga, geimhreadh
Borrowing from Breton by other languages
The English words {{lang, en, dolmen and {{lang, en, menhir have been borrowed from French, which took them from Breton. However, this is uncertain: for instance, {{lang, en, menhir is {{lang, br, peulvan or {{lang, br, maen hir ("long stone"), {{lang, br, maen sav ("straight stone") (two words: noun + adjective) in Breton. ''Dolmen'' is a misconstructed word (it should be {{lang, br, taol-vaen). Some studies state[{{Cite book, last=Strang, first=Barbara M. H, title=A History of English, publisher=Routledge, year=2015, isbn=978-1317421917, pages=94] that these words were borrowed from Cornish. {{lang, cy, Maen hir can be directly translated from Welsh as "long stone" (which is exactly what a {{lang, en, menhir or {{lang, br, maen hir is). The Cornish surnames Mennear, Minear and Manhire all derive from the Cornish {{lang, kw, men {{lang, kw, hyr ("long stone"), as does {{lang, kw, Tremenheere "settlement by the long stone".
The French word {{lang, fr, baragouiner ("to jabber in a foreign language") is derived from Breton {{lang, br, bara ("bread") and {{lang, br, gwin ("wine"). The French word {{lang, fr, goéland ("large seagull") is derived from Breton {{lang, br, gwelan, which shares the same root as English "gull" (Welsh {{lang, cy, gwylan, Cornish {{lang, kw, goelann).
See also
* Armoricani
* Gaelic revival, Irish language revival
* Julian Maunoir, 17th-century Breton language orthographer
* List of Celtic-language media
* {{lang, br, Stourm ar Brezhoneg an association promoting the language
References
Notes
{{reflist
Further reading
;Overviews
* {{Cite book, title=The Celtic languages, 2nd Edition, last=Press, first=Ian, publisher=Routledge, year=2010, location=Abingdon; New York, pages=427–487, chapter=Breton, editor-last=Ball, editor-first=Martin J., editor-last2=Fife, editor-first2=James
*{{Cite book, title = The Celtic languages, last = Stephens, first = Janig, publisher = Routledge, year = 1993, isbn = 978-0415280808, location = Abingdon; New York, pages = 349–409, chapter = Breton, chapter-url = https://books.google.com/books?id=BP9QCJ2FQzYC&q=%22the%20celtic%20languages%22&pg=PA349, editor-last = Ball, editor-first = Martin J., editor-last2 = Fife, editor-first2 = James, series = Routledge language family descriptions
* {{Cite book, title = The Celtic languages, last = Ternes, first = Elmar, publisher = Cambridge University Press, year = 1992, isbn = 978-0521231275, location = Cambridge; New York; Oakleigh, pages = 371–452, chapter = The Breton language, chapter-url = https://books.google.com/books?id=y3kIq1DYAkMC&q=%22the%20celtic%20languages%22&pg=PA371, editor-last = MacAulay, editor-first = Donald, series = Cambridge language surveys
;Historical development
* Hemon, Roparz. ''A Historical Morphology and Syntax of Breton''. Dublin: Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies, 1975.
* {{Cite book, title = A historical phonology of Breton, last = Jackson, first = Kenneth H., publisher = Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies, year = 1967, isbn = 978-0-901282-53-8, location = Dublin
* {{Cite book, title = Brythonic Celtic – Britannisches Keltisch: From medieval British to modern Breton, last = Schrijver, first = Peter, publisher = Hempen Verlag, year = 2011, isbn = 9783934106802, location = Bremen, pages = 359–430, editor-last = Ternes, editor-first = Elmar, chapter = Middle and early modern Breton
* {{Cite book, title = Brythonic Celtic – Britannisches Keltisch: From medieval British to modern Breton, last = Schrijver, first = Peter, publisher = Hempen Verlag, year = 2011, isbn = 9783934106802, location = Bremen, pages = 1–84, editor-last = Ternes, editor-first = Elmar, chapter = Old British
* {{Cite book, title = Brythonic Celtic – Britannisches Keltisch: From medieval British to modern Breton, last = Ternes, first = Elmar, publisher = Hempen Verlag, year = 2011, isbn = 9783934106802, location = Bremen, pages = 431–530, editor-last = Ternes, editor-first = Elmar, chapter = Neubretonisch
;Grammars and handbooks
* {{cite book, first = Yann , last = Desbordes , title = Petite grammaire du breton moderne , location = Lesneven , publisher = Mouladurioù Hor Yezh , date = 1990 , isbn = 978-2868630520
* {{cite book, first = François , last = Falc'hun , author-link = François Falc'hun , title = Le système consonantique du breton avec une étude comparative de phonétique expérimentale , location = Rennes , publisher = Plihon , date = 1951
* Favereau, Francis. ''Grammaire du breton contemporain''. Morlaix: Skol Vreizh, 1997.
* Hemon, Roparz. ''Breton Grammar'', 3rd edn. Trans. & rev'd by Michael Everson. Westport: Evertype, 2011.
* {{cite book, first = Frañsez , last = Kervella , title = Yezhadur bras ar brezhoneg , location = Brest , publisher = Al Liamm , date = 1947
* McKenna, Malachy. ''A handbook of modern spoken Breton''. Tübingen: Max Niemeyer, 1988 (repr. 2015).
* {{cite book, first = Ian , last = Press , title = A grammar of modern Breton , location = Berlin , publisher = Mouton de Gruyter , date = 1986 (repr. 2011).
* Press, Ian & Hervé Le Bihan. ''Colloquial Breton: the complete course for beginners''. London: Routledge, 2004 (repr. 2007, 2015).
External links
{{Commons category, Breton language
{{InterWiki, code=br
{{WikisourceWiki, code=br
{{Wikiquote, code=br
{{wikibooks, Brezhoneg, Breton
{{sister project, project=Wikiversity
, text=v:Topic:Breton, Wikiversity offers lessons in the Breton language
{{Wiktionary category, type=Breton, category=Breton language
* Ofis Publik ar Brezhoneg]
official website
* {{Citation , url = http://www.france3breizh.fr/ , title = France 3 breizh, the public Breton TV channel.
* {{Citation , url = http://www.breizh.net/icdbl/saozg/endangered.htm , title = Endangered , publisher = Breizh net: an essay about the situation of the Breton language.
* {{Citation , url = http://www.breizh.net/saozneg/mahtmls.php , title = 100 Breton Internet-related words , publisher = Breizh , access-date = 2005-10-15 , archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20071212162707/http://www.breizh.net/saozneg/mahtmls.php , archive-date = 2007-12-12 , url-status = dead
* {{Citation , url = http://www.agencebretagnepresse.com/index.php?langue=bzh/ , title = Amsez Wask Breizh , publisher = Agence bretagne presse: news in Breton.
* {{Citation , url = http://blog.breizh.bz/ , format = blog , title = Breizh , access-date = 2006-07-07 , archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20110612022201/http://blog.breizh.bz/ , archive-date = 2011-06-12 , url-status = dead : Brittany information, articles about Breton.
* {{Citation , url = http://www.summerlands.com/crossroads/celticlanguage/labara6.html , title = A Taste of Breton Verse , publisher = Summerlands.
* {{Citation , url = http://www.omniglot.com/writing/breton.htm , title = Breton , publisher = Omniglot , access-date = 2008-01-20 , archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20080215210058/http://www.omniglot.com/writing/breton.htm , archive-date = 2008-02-15 , url-status = dead .
Dictionaries
A multilingual dictionary containing many Breton words alongside those of other languages
Learning
Breton site including online lessons
Audio CD, workbooks, software in English to learn Breton
* Breton site with learners' forum and lessons (mostly in French with some English)
* Jouitteau, M.
Grammaire du breton
', (extensive Breton grammar in French, with glossed examples and typological comparisons), IKER, CNRS, 2009 > 2017].
Bible
Ar Bibl Santel (Jenkins) 1897 (JEN1897). History of Bible translation in Breton and Breton Bible
{{Celtic languages
{{Languages of France
{{Celtic nations, state=autocollapse
{{Languages of Europe
{{Authority control
{{DEFAULTSORT:Breton Language
Breton language,
Languages attested from the 9th century
Southwestern Brittonic languages
Brittany, *
Breton culture, *
History of Brittany
Endangered Celtic languages
Languages of France
Verb–subject–object languages
Severely endangered languages