The ''langues d'oïl'' are 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 ...

that includes standard French and its closest relatives historically spoken in the northern half of

France France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...

, southern

Belgium Belgium, officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. Situated in a coastal lowland region known as the Low Countries, it is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeas ...

, and the

Channel Islands The Channel Islands are an archipelago in the English Channel, off the French coast of Normandy. They are divided into two Crown Dependencies: the Jersey, Bailiwick of Jersey, which is the largest of the islands; and the Bailiwick of Guernsey, ...

. They belong to the larger category of Gallo-Romance languages, which also include the historical languages of east-central France and western

Switzerland Switzerland, officially the Swiss Confederation, is a landlocked country located in west-central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the south, France to the west, Germany to the north, and Austria and Liechtenstein to the east. Switzerland ...

, southern France, portions of northern Italy, the Val d'Aran in

Spain Spain, or the Kingdom of Spain, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe with territories in North Africa. Featuring the Punta de Tarifa, southernmost point of continental Europe, it is the largest country in Southern Eur ...

, and under certain acceptations those of

Catalonia Catalonia is an autonomous community of Spain, designated as a ''nationalities and regions of Spain, nationality'' by its Statute of Autonomy of Catalonia of 2006, Statute of Autonomy. Most of its territory (except the Val d'Aran) is situate ...

. Linguists divide the

Romance languages The Romance languages, also known as the Latin or Neo-Latin languages, are the languages that are Language family, directly descended from Vulgar Latin. They are the only extant subgroup of the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-E ...

, and especially of Medieval France, into two main geographical subgroups: the ''langues d'oïl'' to the North, and the '' langues d'oc'' in the Southern half of France. Both groups are named after the word for "yes" in their recent ancestral languages. The most common modern ''langue d'oïl'' is standard French, in which the ancestral "oïl" has become .

Terminology

''Langue d'oïl'' (in the singular), ''Oïl dialects'' and ''Oïl languages'' (in the plural) designate the ancient northern Gallo-Romance languages as well as their modern-day descendants. They share many linguistic features, a prominent one being the word ''oïl'' for ''yes''. (''Oc'' was and still is the southern word for ''yes'', hence the ''langue d'oc'' or ''

Occitan language Occitan (; ), also known by its native speakers as (; ), sometimes also referred to as Provençal, is a Romance language spoken in Southern France, Monaco, Italy's Occitan Valleys, as well as Spain's Val d'Aran in Catalonia; collectively, ...

s''). The most widely spoken modern Oïl language is French (''oïl'' was pronounced or , which has become , in modern French ''oui''). There are three uses of the term ''oïl'': #Langue d'oïl #Oïl dialects #Oïl languages

Langue d'oïl

In the singular, ''langue d'oïl'' refers to the mutually intelligible linguistic variants of ''lingua romana'' spoken since the 8th century in northern France and southern Belgium (

Wallonia Wallonia ( ; ; or ), officially the Walloon Region ( ; ), is one of the three communities, regions and language areas of Belgium, regions of Belgium—along with Flemish Region, Flanders and Brussels. Covering the southern portion of the c ...

), since the 10th century in the

, and between the 11th and 14th centuries in

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

(the Anglo-Norman language). ''Langue d'oïl'', the term itself, has been used in the singular since the 12th century to denote this ancient linguistic grouping as a whole. With these qualifiers, ''langue d'oïl'' sometimes is used to mean the same as

Old French Old French (, , ; ) was the language spoken in most of the northern half of France approximately between the late 8th varieties of the ancient ''langue d'oïl''.

Oïl languages

''Oïl languages'' are those modern-day descendants that evolved separately from the varieties of the ancient ''langue d'oïl''. Consequently, ''langues d'oïl'' today may apply either: to all the modern-day languages of this family ''except'' the French language; or to this family ''including'' French. "''Oïl'' dialects" or "French dialects" are also used to refer to the ''Oïl languages except French''—as some extant Oïl languages are very close to modern French. Because the term ''dialect'' is sometimes considered pejorative, the trend today among French linguists is to refer to these languages as ''langues d'oïl'' rather than ''dialects''.

Varieties

Five zones of partially mutually intelligible Oïl dialects have been proposed by Pierre Bec:

Franconian zone (''zone francique'')

* Picard * Walloon * Lorrain *Northern Norman (spoken north of the Joret line) including: '' Anglo-Norman; Dgèrnésiais (spoken in Guernsey), Jèrriais (spoken in Jersey), Auregnais (spoken in Alderney), Sercquiais (spoken in Sark)'' * Eastern Champenois

Francien zone (''zone francienne'')

* Standard French Non-standard varieties: * Orléanais *, not to be confused with the * Berrichon * Bourbonnais * Western Champenois (or Eastern Francien)

Burgundian zone (''zone burgonde'')

* Bourguignon * Franc-Comtois

Armorican zone (''zone armoricaine'')

*Eastern Armorican: Angevin; ; Manceau ( and ); Southern Norman (spoken south of the Joret line) *Western Armorican: Gallo Gallo has a stronger Celtic substrate from Breton. Gallo originated from the oïl speech of people from eastern and northern regions: Anjou;

Maine Maine ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the United States, and the northeasternmost state in the Contiguous United States. It borders New Hampshire to the west, the Gulf of Maine to the southeast, and the Provinces and ...

( Mayenne and Sarthe); and

Normandy Normandy (; or ) is a geographical and cultural region in northwestern Europe, roughly coextensive with the historical Duchy of Normandy. Normandy comprises Normandy (administrative region), mainland Normandy (a part of France) and insular N ...

; who were in contact with Breton speakers in Upper Brittany. See Marches of Neustria

Poitevin-Saintongeais zone (''zone poitevine'' and ''zone saintongeaise'')

Named after the former provinces of Poitou and Saintonge * Poitevin * Saintongeais

Development

''For the history of phonology, orthography, syntax and morphology, see '' History of the French language'' and the relevant individual Oïl language articles.'' Each of the Oïl languages has developed in its own way from the common ancestor, and division of the development into periods varies according to the individual histories. Modern linguistics uses the following terms: *9th–13th centuries **

Old French Old French (, , ; ) was the language spoken in most of the northern half of France approximately between the late 8th -4; we might wonder whether there's a point at which it's appropriate to talk of the beginnings of French, that is, when it wa ...

**Old Norman **etc. *French **Middle French for the period 14th–15th centuries **16th century: ''français renaissance'' (Renaissance French) **17th to 18th century: ''français classique'' (Classical French)

History

Romana lingua

In the 9th century, ''romana lingua'' (the term used in the '' Oaths of Strasbourg'' of 842) was the first of the Romance languages to be recognized by its speakers as a distinct language, probably because it was the most different from

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

compared with the other Romance languages (see '' History of the French language''). Many of the developments that are now considered typical of Walloon appeared between the 8th and 12th centuries. Walloon "had a clearly defined identity from the beginning of the thirteenth century". In any case, linguistic texts from the time do not mention the language, even though they mention others in the Oïl family, such as Picard and Lorrain. During the 15th century, scribes in the region called the language "Roman" when they needed to distinguish it. It is not until the beginning of the 16th century that we find the first occurrence of the word "Walloon" in the same linguistic sense that we use it today.

Langue d'oïl

By late- or post-Roman times

Vulgar Latin Vulgar Latin, also known as Colloquial, Popular, Spoken or Vernacular Latin, is the range of non-formal Register (sociolinguistics), registers of Latin spoken from the Crisis of the Roman Republic, Late Roman Republic onward. ''Vulgar Latin'' a ...

within France had developed two distinctive terms for signifying assent (''yes''): ''hoc ille'' ("this (is) it") and ''hoc'' ("this"), which became ''oïl'' and ''oc'', respectively. Subsequent development changed "oïl" into "oui", as in modern French. The term ''langue d'oïl'' itself was first used in the 12th century, referring to the Old French linguistic grouping noted above. In the 14th century, the Italian poet

Dante Dante Alighieri (; most likely baptized Durante di Alighiero degli Alighieri; – September 14, 1321), widely known mononymously as Dante, was an Italian Italian poetry, poet, writer, and philosopher. His ''Divine Comedy'', originally called ...

mentioned the ''yes'' distinctions in his '' De vulgari eloquentia''. He wrote in

Medieval Latin Medieval Latin was the form of Literary Latin used in Roman Catholic Church, Roman Catholic Western Europe during the Middle Ages. It was also the administrative language in the former Western Roman Empire, Roman Provinces of Mauretania, Numidi ...

: "''nam alii oc, alii si, alii vero dicunt oil''" ("some say 'oc', others say 'sì', others say 'oïl'")—thereby distinguishing at least three classes of Romance languages: ''oc languages'' (in southern France); ''si languages'' (in

Italy Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe, Western Europe. It consists of Italian Peninsula, a peninsula that extends into the Mediterranean Sea, with the Alps on its northern land b ...

and Iberia) and ''oïl languages'' (in northern France). Other Romance languages derive their word for "yes" from the classical Latin '' sic'' , such as the Italian ''sì'', Spanish and Catalan ''sí'', Portuguese ''sim'', and even French ''si'' (used when contradicting another's negative assertion). Sardinian is an exception in that its word for "yes", ''eja'', is from neither origin. Similarly Romanian uses ''da'' for "yes", which is assumed to be of Slavic origin, but may be from Latin ''ita vero'', "truly so". However, neither ''lingua romana'' nor referred, at their respective time, to a single homogeneous language but to mutually intelligible linguistic varieties. In those times, spoken languages in Western Europe were not codified (except Latin and Medieval Latin), the region's population was considerably lower than today, and population centers were more isolated from each other. As a result, mutually intelligible linguistic varieties were referred to as one language.

French (Old French/Standardized Oïl) or lingua Gallicana

In the 13th century these varieties were recognized and referred to as ''dialects'' ("idioms") of a single language, the ''langue d'oïl''. However, since the previous centuries a common literary and juridical "interdialectary" langue d'oïl had emerged, a kind of koiné. In the late 13th century this common langue d'oïl was named ''French'' (''françois'' in French, ''lingua gallica'' or ''gallicana'' in Medieval Latin). Both aspects of ''"dialects of a same language"'' and ''"French as the common langue d'oïl"'' appear in a text of

Roger Bacon Roger Bacon (; or ', also '' Rogerus''; ), also known by the Scholastic accolades, scholastic accolade ''Doctor Mirabilis'', was a medieval English polymath, philosopher, scientist, theologian and Franciscans, Franciscan friar who placed co ...

, '' Opus maius'', who wrote in Medieval Latin but translated thus: "''Indeed, idioms of a same language vary amongst people, as it occurs in the French language which varies in an idiomatic manner amongst the French, Picards,

Normans The Normans (Norman language, Norman: ''Normaunds''; ; ) were a population arising in the medieval Duchy of Normandy from the intermingling between Norsemen, Norse Viking settlers and locals of West Francia. The Norse settlements in West Franc ...

and

Burgundians The Burgundians were an early Germanic peoples, Germanic tribe or group of tribes. They appeared east in the middle Rhine region in the third century AD, and were later moved west into the Roman Empire, in Roman Gaul, Gaul. In the first and seco ...

. And terms right to the Picards horrify the Burgundians as much as their closer neighbours the French"''. It is from this period though that definitions of individual Oïl languages are first found. The Picard language is first referred to by name as ''"langage pikart"'' in 1283 in the '' Livre Roisin''. The author of the ''Vie du bienheureux Thomas Hélye de Biville'' refers to the Norman character of his writing. The ''Sermons poitevins'' of around 1250 show the Poitevin language developing as it straddled the line between oïl and oc. As a result, in modern times the term ''langue d'oïl'' also refers to that

Old French Old French (, , ; ) was the language spoken in most of the northern half of France approximately between the late 8th [2-4; we might wonder whether there's a point at which it's appropriate to talk of the beginnings of French, that is, when it wa ...

which was not as yet named ''French'' but was already—before the late 13th century—used as a literary and juridical ''interdialectary language''. The term '' Francien'' is a linguistic neologism coined in the 19th century to name the hypothetical variant of Old French allegedly spoken by the ''late 14th century'' in the ancient province of ''Pays de France''—the then Paris region later called ''

Île-de-France The Île-de-France (; ; ) is the most populous of the eighteen regions of France, with an official estimated population of 12,271,794 residents on 1 January 2023. Centered on the capital Paris, it is located in the north-central part of the cou ...

''. This ''Francien'', it is claimed, became the Medieval French language. Current linguistic thinking mostly discounts the ''Francien'' theory, although it is still often quoted in popular textbooks. The term ''francien'' was never used by those people supposed to have spoken the variant; but today the term could be used to designate that specific ''10th-and-11th centuries'' variant of langue d'oïl spoken in the Paris region; both variants contributed to the koine, as both were called ''French'' at that time.

Rise of French (Standardized Oïl) versus other Oïl languages

For political reasons it was in Paris and Île-de-France that this koiné developed from a written language into a spoken language. Already in the 12th century Conon de Béthune reported about the French court who blamed him for using words of Artois. By the late 13th century the written koiné had begun to turn into a spoken and written standard language, and was named ''French''. Since then French started to be imposed on the other Oïl dialects as well as on the territories of ''langue d'oc''. However, the Oïl dialects and ''langue d'oc'' continued contributing to the lexis of French. In 1539 the French language was imposed by the Ordinance of Villers-Cotterêts. It required Latin be replaced in judgements and official acts and deeds. The local Oïl languages had always been the language spoken in justice courts. The Ordinance of Villers-Cotterêts was not intended to make French a national language, merely a chancery language for law and administration. Although there were competing literary standards among the Oïl languages in the mediæval period, the centralisation of the French kingdom and its influence even outside its formal borders sent most of the Oïl languages into comparative obscurity for several centuries. The development of literature in this new language encouraged writers to use French rather than their own

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 La ...

s. This led to the decline of vernacular literature. It was the French Revolution which imposed French on the people as the official language in all the territory. As the influence of French (and in the Channel Islands, English) spread among sectors of provincial populations, cultural movements arose to study and standardise the vernacular languages. From the 18th century and into the 20th century, societies were founded (such as the "Société liégoise de Littérature wallonne" in 1856), dictionaries (such as George Métivier's ''Dictionnaire franco-normand'' of 1870) were published, groups were formed and literary movements developed to support and promote the Oïl languages faced with competition. The Third Republic sought to modernise France and established primary education where the only language recognised was French. Regional languages were discouraged, and the use of French was seen as aspirational, accelerating their decline. This was also generally the case in areas where Oïl languages were spoken. French is now the best-known of the Oïl languages.

Literature

Besides the influence of

French literature French literature () generally speaking, is literature written in the French language, particularly by French people, French citizens; it may also refer to literature written by people living in France who speak traditional languages of Franc ...

, small-scale literature has survived in the other Oïl languages. Theatrical writing is most notable in Picard (which maintains a genre of vernacular marionette theatre), Poitevin and Saintongeais. Oral performance (story-telling) is a feature of Gallo, for example, while Norman and Walloon literature, especially from the early 19th century tend to focus on written texts and poetry (see, for example, '' Wace'' and '' Jèrriais literature''). As the vernacular Oïl languages were displaced from towns, they have generally survived to a greater extent in rural areas - hence a preponderance of literature relating to rural and peasant themes. The particular circumstances of the self-governing Channel Islands developed a lively strain of political comment, and the early industrialisation in Picardy led to survival of Picard in the mines and workshops of the regions. The mining poets of Picardy may be compared with the tradition of rhyming Weaver Poets of Ulster Scots in a comparable industrial milieu. There are some regional magazines, such as ''Ch'lanchron'' (Picard), ''Le Viquet'' (Norman), ''Les Nouvelles Chroniques du Don Balleine'

(Jèrriais), and ''El Bourdon'' (Walloon), which are published either wholly in the respective Oïl language or bilingually with French. These provide a platform for literary writing.

Status

Apart from French, an official language in many countries (see List of countries where French is an official language, list), the Oïl languages have enjoyed little status in recent times. Currently Walloon, Lorrain (under the local name of ''Gaumais''), and Champenois have the status of regional languages of

. The Norman languages of the Channel Islands enjoy a certain status under the governments of their Bailiwicks and within the regional and lesser-used language framework of the British-Irish Council. The Anglo-Norman language, a variant of Norman once the official language of England, today holds mostly a place of ceremonial honour in the United Kingdom (now referred to as '' Law French''). The French government recognises the Oïl languages as languages of France, but the Constitutional Council of France barred ratification of 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, t ...

Influence

The ''langues d'oïl'' were more or less influenced by the native languages of the conquering

Germanic tribes The Germanic peoples were tribal groups who lived in Northern Europe in Classical antiquity and the Early Middle Ages. In modern scholarship, they typically include not only the Roman-era ''Germani'' who lived in both ''Germania'' and parts ...

, notably the

Franks file:Frankish arms.JPG, Aristocratic Frankish burial items from the Merovingian dynasty The Franks ( or ; ; ) were originally a group of Germanic peoples who lived near the Rhine river, Rhine-river military border of Germania Inferior, which wa ...

. This was apparent not so much in the vocabulary (which remained overwhelmingly of Latin origin) as in the phonology and syntax; the invading Franks, Burgundians and Normans became the rulers and their accents were imposed as standard on the rest of the population. This accounts in large part for the relative distinctiveness of French compared to other Romance languages. The

English language English is a West Germanic language that developed in early medieval England and has since become a English as a lingua franca, global lingua franca. The namesake of the language is the Angles (tribe), Angles, one of the Germanic peoples th ...

was heavily influenced by contact with Norman following the

Norman Conquest The Norman Conquest (or the Conquest) was the 11th-century invasion and occupation of England by an army made up of thousands of Normans, Norman, French people, French, Flemish people, Flemish, and Bretons, Breton troops, all led by the Du ...

and much of the adopted vocabulary shows typically Norman features. Portuguese was heavily influenced by more than a millennium of perennial contact with several dialects of both Oïl and

groups, in lexicon (up to 15–20% in some estimates, at least 5000 word roots), phonology and orthography. The influence of Occitan was, nevertheless, the most marked, through the status Provençal in particular achieved in southwestern Europe around the troubadour apex in the Middle Ages, when Galician-Portuguese lyric was developed. Aside the direct influence of Provençal literature, the presence of languages from modern-day France in the Galician-Portuguese area was also strong due to the rule of the House of Burgundy, the establishment of the Orders of Cluny and Cister, the many sections of the Way of St. James pilgrimage route that come from elsewhere in Europe out of the Iberian Peninsula, and the settlement in Iberia of people from the other side of the Pyrenees, arriving during and after the

Reconquista The ''Reconquista'' (Spanish language, Spanish and Portuguese language, Portuguese for ) or the fall of al-Andalus was a series of military and cultural campaigns that European Christian Reconquista#Northern Christian realms, kingdoms waged ag ...

. The anti-Portuguese factor of Brazilian nationalism in the 19th century led to an increased use of the French language in detriment of Portuguese, as France was seen at the time as a model of civilization and progress. The learning of French has historically been important and strong among the Lusophone elites, and for a great span of time it was also the foreign language of choice among the middle class of both Portugal and Brazil, only surpassed in the globalised postmodernity by English.France in Brazil Year – the importance of cultural diplomacy
/ref> The French spoken in Belgium shows some influence from Walloon. The development of French in

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere, Northern and Western Hemisphere, Western hemispheres. North America is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South Ameri ...

was influenced by the speech of settlers originating from northwestern France, many of whom introduced features of their Oïl varieties into the French they spoke. (See also '' French language in the United States, French language in Canada'')

Languages and dialects with significant Oïl influence

*all regional languages spoken in France,

, and

Luxembourg Luxembourg, officially the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, is a landlocked country in Western Europe. It is bordered by Belgium to the west and north, Germany to the east, and France on the south. Its capital and most populous city, Luxembour ...

* Limburgish, particularly

Maastrichtian The Maastrichtian ( ) is, in the International Commission on Stratigraphy (ICS) geologic timescale, the latest age (geology), age (uppermost stage (stratigraphy), stage) of the Late Cretaceous epoch (geology), Epoch or Upper Cretaceous series (s ...

*all French-based creole languages * Anglic languages (Oïl influences on vocabulary, transmitted via the Anglo-Norman language spoken by the upper classes in England in the centuries following the

, and later from French) * Portuguese (Oïl and Occitan influences on lexicon, phonology—especially European, Macanese and Europeanized Brazilian and African dialects—, and orthography) * Franco-Italian, a mixed language of Old French and Venetian or Lombard used in literary works of northern Italy in the 13th and 14th centuries.

Footnotes

References

Bibliography

*''Paroles d'Oïl'', Défense et promotion des Langues d'Oïl, Mougon 1994, *''Les langues régionales'', Jean Sibille, 2000,

External links

Songs in oïl languages
{{DEFAULTSORT:Langues D'oil Languages of France Medieval languages