Today, French is considered to be one of the best and most useful languages you could learn. French has a particularly long, and interesting history, which lends itself to having some rather intriguing facts about French.
If you plan to learn French in the coming future, it’s always good to do some research beforehand. Learning some quickfire facts about French is probably the best place to start!
15. Descendent of Latin
In 52 BC, Julius Ceasar led Roman legions into Gaul (modern day France). Here, they would engage the Gauls and defeat them, capturing their leader, Vercingetorix. Gaul would then become a Roman Province.
With this, Latin would become the dominant language in the region. For the aristocracy in Gaul, they spoke Classical Latin, for the plebeians of Gaul, they spoke a variant of Latin, called Vulgar Latin.
In the 5th century AD, Rome withdrew from Gaul. In their place a slew of different Germanic peoples (such as the Franks, Visigoths and the Burgundians) began to settle in Gaul.
Here, the Vulgar Latin the masses spoke and the Germanic languages spoken by the Franks, Visigoths and/or Burgundians combined to form the language that we now call French.
14. Qu’est-ce Que C’est Français?
Well… Not really. You see, the Franks, Visigoths and Burgundians all spoke slightly different languages. Each of these Germanic languages also combined with Vulgar Latin in different ways too.
This created a number of different regional languages, based on where the Franks, Visigoths and Burgundians settled. With this, the overwhelming majority of people living in those areas, spoke the local regional language.
By the time of the French Revolution in 1789, 75% of France’s population didn’t speak French. Instead, they spoke one of the regional French languages, such as Occitan, Picard and Burgundian (among others).
Over the last 100 years, this percentage has decreased, with most younger people barely being able to speak their local regional language! In its place, they’ve begun speaking French as their first and only language more and more.
13. L’Anglais?
In 1066, William the Conqueror and his Norman soldiers invaded and conquered England. Here, they brought not only their culture and food, but most importantly, their language.
By 1100, there was a clear distinction between the two languages. The Norman elite spoke French, whilst the general population spoke Anglo-Saxon. This was how people could make the distinction between the local lord and the local peasant.
In later centuries, younger sons of the Norman elite began to marry into Anglo-Saxon families. Here, the Normans would speak Anglo-Saxon, but would begin to substitute Anglo-Saxon words for their French counterparts.
Over time, many of these Norman words displaced their Anglo-Saxon counterparts. Although estimates vary, between 30 and 50% of the words in the English language are of French origin!
12. French Logic
If you’ve ever studied French, you’ll likely know that it has some rather… strange… logic to say the least. This is especially true when you take into account French numbers and French grammar…
Before the number twenty (vingt), French numbers are extremely similar to English ones. Twenty-one, however, is slightly weird, being vingt-et-un (literally “Twenty and one”). This pattern similarly repeats for all other numbers ending in “one”.
As you go further on, you’ll find that seventy is not something like septante, but actually soixante-dix (literally “Seventy-ten”). Eighty is similarly weird, being quatre-vingt (literally “Four-twenties”).
Ninety also follows this pattern, being quatre-vingt-dix (literally four-twenties-ten).
French grammar is similarly weird. Let’s say you wanted to say “A red car”, it is not une rouge voiture, instead, the adjective goes after the noun, making it une voiture rouge.
To complicate matters more, there are a handful of adjectives that don’t follow the rule I just said. These act more like the English ones, and usually pertain to size and age.
11. No “W” Words
If I were to hand you a French dictionary, and ask you to turn to the “W” section, you’d find that there are only a handful of words in it. Unless you have a pocket-sized dictionary, they rarely take up more than a page.
Of those “W” words that are in the French language, they are primarily borrowed from English. By far the two most prevalent (in everyday speech at least) are Wifi (WIFI) and WC (toilet/bathroom).
The overwhelming majority of these have come into popular use in the past 20 years. Most of these terms have been copied and pasted into French from English, and have then been entered into the French dictionary.
Looking in a French dictionary published in 1981, yields a total of six words beginning in “W”. Four of them are to do with the word “Wagon”. Another is “Walkman” (as in, Sony Walkman) and the last is of Dutch origin – Wallon (Walloon).
On top of this, there are no actual French words that have the letter “W” in them either!
10. “E” is The Most Common Letter
Looking at a piece of French writing, you’ll notice that it has a lot of vowels. In fact, there is only one word y (meaning “there” among other things) that has no vowel whatsoever.
If you look a little closer, you’ll find that the letter “E” is by far the most common letter in the entire language! Pretty much every word, longer than five letters, has at least one “E” in it!
Hilariously, a French author by the name of Georges Perec decided to bring this fact to light in 1969. Here, he published a 300-page novel which he called La Disparation, which did not have a simple letter “E”.
Assuming you want to read this (and don’t speak good enough French yet) you can read the English version. This The book was translated in the mid-1990’s, once again having the same restraints the original novel did. It’s called A Void.
9. A Favorite Among Celebrities
For as long as there have been celebrities, there have been celebrities who can speak other languages. For some, this is by birth, usually because they were born abroad or form having immigrant parents, whilst others have simply learned the language.
Regardless of the reason, French is seemingly the gold standard for celebrities, followed by German and Italian. Perhaps this is because it is so sophisticated or perhaps just because it has a certain je ne sais quoi…
Famed actors Marlon Brando, Bradley Cooper, Johnny Depp, Diane Kruger and Hugh Grant are just a few of the countless film actors to speak French. All of them have shown their fluency, in the language, both on and off the screen.
Beyond just actors, tennis player Serena Williams, singer Mick Jagger, football (soccer) manager Jose Mourinho, activist Angela Davis and politician Mitt Romney are similarly keen Francophiles!
8. Most Spoken Languages?
Starting in 1534, France would do what ever other major European power was doing: Getting an empire. This saw it discover and subsequently conquer new lands in the New World.
Over time, France would also acquire holdings in Africa, Asia and Oceania. Here, they would spread their culture, history, and most importantly, their language, to these newly-conquered lands.
Despite many of these countries having gotten their independence over the last 50 years or so, many of them still speak French.
In fact, there is a French equivalent of the Commonwealth, but it is for French-speaking countries, rather than just former French colonies.
Today, roughly 275 million people speak French all over the world, making it one of the most spoken languages on the planet. French is also the official language of 29 different countries, primarily in Europe and Asia.
7. French Speaking Cities
If you were asked to name the city where French is spoken the most, you’d probably answer “Paris”. And you’d be correct. If you were asked to name the city where French is spoken the second most, you’d be hard-pressed to guess it correctly.
You see, this city isn’t in France. It isn’t even in another famous French speaking country like Belgium, Switzerland or Canada (Quebec). It’s actually a city in Africa!
Surprisingly, it’s a city in a country that many people even realize speak French. You see, it’s not somewhere like Algiers or Tangiers in Algeria or in Morocco, it’s actually in Kinshasa, in the Democratic Republic of the Congo!
Despite a number of high profile wars over the last 30 years, the DRC has seen a population boom. This places it as the fourth largest country in Africa by population, with the majority of its residents speaking French.
This is especially true in the cities, such as the capital, Kinshasa, which has 14.5 million residents as of the time of writing.
6. The New World
By far the most famous dialect of French, known as Québécois, is spoken in Quebec, Canada. However, whilst the most famous, French is widely spoken across the rest of the new world too!
Besides just Canada, French is also spoken in the United States too. In particular, the former French territory of Louisiana still has a large Francophonic population, as do places like New York and New England.
The further down you go, you’ll still find a number of islands, formerly French colonies, that speak French. Perhaps the most famous is Haiti, but there’s also a number of smaller islands, usually a part of much larger non-Francophonic countries.
Surprisingly, France still holds territory in the New World. Among these are Martinique, Guadeloupe, Saint Barthélemy, French Guiana and Saint Martin, all of which are either departments (states) of France, or are just territories.
5. Lingua Franca
Due to the aforementioned French Empire, French spread around the world quite quickly. In Europe, French kings and noblemen married off their daughters to kings and noblemen in other European countries, spreading their language across the continent.
By the end of the 16th Century, Europe had an entire generation of nobles and kings who were half French, who regularly spoke French with their mothers and siblings.
As a result, from the 17th Century onwards, French became the lingua franca of Europe. This would see all diplomacy performed in French, even if neither of the countries involved were French speaking!
Following WWII, however, French had lost much of its power in favor of English. Regardless, French is still used as an official language of a number of organizations, including the UN, EU and the African Union among many more.
4. French Authors
Today, the French language is famous for a number of things. Among these is French literature, which is one of the richest and most diverse of any langauge I’ve ever come across!
France has produced a number of extremely famous authors, including Voltaire, Colette and Diderot among many others. Together, they have produced hundreds of masterpeices, which has been translated into hundreds of languages.
Chances are that you’ve come across a few of these books too, even if you didn’t realize it at the time! The most famous French book is probably Les Miserables, probably because it has been produced numerous times on the big screen!
Whilst Les Miserables may be the most famous, there are also L’Amant (Duras), Candide (Voltaire), L’Étranger (Camus), Le Deuxième Sexe (Beauvoir) and Le Père Goriot (Balzac) among many, many more!
3. The French Academy
In February 1635, Cardinal Richelieu, chief adviser to King Louis XIII, convinced the king to establish a council that would debate all matters of the French language as we know it.
This council was known as the Académie Française, and has been the pre-eminent authority on the French language for almost 400 years! In this 400 years, in times of revolution or war, the Académie Française has always been active!
However, historians also remember the Académie Française for one other important reason too: It was the first of its kind. Today, most major languages have some sort of council to debate their language.
Without the Académie Française, no other language would likely have their own equivalent of the Académie Française. These foreign language equivalents have essentially copied the Académie Française in its entirety!
2. French Hollywood
In English, the overwhelming majority of our movies are produced in Hollywood. The French language doesn’t have its own equivalent of Hollywood- a city built around the movie industry.
However, the French language does have something similar to the concept of Hollywood. Just north of Paris, there is a small town called Saint-Denis, an area just south of the city, La Plaine Saint-Denis, is where a number of film studios are located.
La Plaine Saint-Denis produces the vast majority of the French language films and TV shows. There is also a small area in Quebec that produces a small amount of movies and TV shows too.
Many of these movies and TV shows can be found on things like Netflix, you’ve just got to know where to look…
France also hosts the Caen Film Festival each year, which is arguably the most important film-related even of the year!
1. Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité
Besides basic French phrases such as bonjour, oui, non, au revoir and comment ça va? the most common phrase in the French language is liberté, égalité, fraternité, the national motto of France.
You see, most old French coins, those from after the Revolutions of 1848, until the introduction of the Euro in 2002, have liberté, égalité, fraternité engraved into them.
Today, liberté, égalité, fraternité can be found pretty much anywhere. It is used in front of state-owned churches, on stamps, in politics, in political marches, as well as in sports!
It’s so common in fact, that it has influenced other languages. Today, it is one of the national mottos of India, as well as being in the writing of the UN Declaration of Human Rights.
Which are your favorite facts about French? Tell me in the comments!