The French connection — I

FOR centuries, the French and the English have been borrowing words from each other, complaining about it all the time. During the Renaissance, when a vast influx of words; French and others, entered the English language, purists like Edmund Spenser condemned foreign borrowings loudly, giving rise to the ‘inkhorn controversy’ (mentioned earlier in this column). And French writers, notably Rene Etiemble, form a forum condemning what they feel is Franglais and not French. The Reader’s Digest (1983) takes the realistic perspective: "If all the words of French origin were to be subtracted from English, we would be nearly tonque-tied". Wallace Stevens, the poet, goes a step further: "English and French constitute a single language." English is a hybrid language growing from a multitude of borrowings from many sources and thus achieving a vast vocabulary along with a unique richness of connotation.

Before the Norman invasion of 1066, there had been minimal borrowing of words between the two countries. With William the conqueror came a new ruling elite of Frenchmen. And almost overnight, French became the official language of England. The next few Norman Kings did not even bother to learn English. Along with the king came waves of French immigrants who brought numerous French words with them related to occupation. Butcher comes from the French bouchier meaning buck slaughterer; bouc being male deer. Mason is derived from the French macon meaning maker. Carpenter comes from carpentier meaning wagon maker.

For about 150 years after the Norman conquest, England was a kind of linguistic battlefield. French was the language of politics, Church, law scholarship, literature, science, the arts and some trades. Yet, the English language remained staunchly resistant to foreign influence. During these year, it absorbed hardly one thousand words into its permanent vocabulary. Strained relations between the two countries did not allow much relaxed interaction between language users.

Tap-root

Many Hindi words take origin from French words. This happens when French words are borrowed by English and Hindi adapts the borrowed word. One such word is copy that denotes so many things in English. In Hindi, a caapi is a notebook. The word comes from the French copie which is derived from the Latin Copia meaning aplenty. The copy or notebook has plenty of pages, making the derivation obvious.

— Deepti Gupta

This feature was published on February 27, 1999