Francien is a 19th-century term in
linguistics that was applied to the
French dialect that was spoken in the
ÃŽle-de-France region (with
Paris at its centre) before the establishment of the
French language
French ( or ) is a Romance language of the Indo-European family. It descended from the Vulgar Latin of the Roman Empire, as did all Romance languages. French evolved from Gallo-Romance, the Latin spoken in Gaul, and more specifically in Nor ...
as a
standard language
A standard language (also standard variety, standard dialect, and standard) is a language variety that has undergone substantial codification of grammar and usage, although occasionally the term refers to the entirety of a language that includes ...
.
["Ce terme est une dénomination linguistique du XIXe siècle. En effet, avant on parlait tout simplement de françoys ou de françois (prononcé rãswèpuis rãsè" (French Wikipedia).]
According to one theory of the development of French, Francien was chosen out of all the competing
''oïl'' languages as an
official language (
Norman and
Picard being the main competitors in the medieval period). The theory currently prevailing, however, is that Francien was one of the
dialects in the
dialect continuum on top of which an administrative language, untrammeled by perceived regionalisms, was imposed as a compromise means of communication and record to replace
Latin.
The existence and definition of Francien were put forward in the 19th century, partly to support the idea of the French language as enjoying a direct and pure lineage from Latin and to minimize the contributions of the various
Romance 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 ...
. Nowadays, the question of Francien is a controversial topic in discussions of
language policy in France.
See also
*
Old French
*
Ordinance of Villers-Cotterêts
*''
Jordain de Blaivies'', a chanson de geste in this dialect
Notes
Oïl languages
Obsolete scientific theories
Spurious languages
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