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The Italian influence on France since the Middle Ages has been vast and underappreciated. I speak French and I like learning the etymology of words with a good
by Mediterraneo10 6y ago
The Italian influence on France since the Middle Ages has been vast and underappreciated. I speak French and I like learning the etymology of words with a good dictionary, and I am astounded at how many ordinary French terms are actually borrowings from Italian.
- simion314 6y agoI am curious how you check to be sure the words are not just from ancient latin?
- Mediterraneo10 6y agoBecause Italian shows different reflexes of Vulgar Latin phonemes then French does. So if a word is present in French with a phonetic outcome different from most words of Latin origin in French, then you can tell it is a later borrowing. Also sometimes you can trace the slow spread of an Italian word first to the medieval Occitan dialects spoken in southern France, and then only later into French spoken further north.
- simion314 6y agoThanks.
- jeromenerf 6y agoWell appreciated in fact, for over 2000 years. You know ... Rome.
- Mediterraneo10 6y agoMy post wasn't referring to the impact of the Roman Empire in terms of originally bringing Latin to France which, of course, everyone knows about. Rather, I was referring to the later wave of Italian > French borrowings post AD 1000 when Latin had long since diverged into the different Romance languages, and Italian was considered a prestige language in certain contexts.
- kergonath 6y agoItaly was the cool culture (or rather, the cool cultures) to emulate during the Renaissance; some borrowing is not that strange. A lot of artists and intellectuals felt they needed to travel Italy at that time and until the romantics in the 19th century, so they were lots of contacts besides the Italian wars. Purely out of curiosity, which words surprised you the most? AFAIK etymology for a lot of them are quite murky, but off the top of my head, “quarantaine” is a nice one. Even though they prefer “quatorzaine” these days...
- axlee 6y ago> Purely out of curiosity, which words surprised you the most? Bank (banque) is a fun one. It comes from the Lombard money lenders who used benches as makeshift tables. That's also why the root of the word is germanic despite coming from Italy.
- kergonath 6y agoI didn’t know that. Nice one!
- ashtonkem 6y agoThe word “bankrupt” comes from the process of ritually breaking said benches of a merchant who couldn’t make due on their debts.
- smogcutter 6y agoThat’s especially a fun one because it’s true even though it sounds totally apocryphal.