AH CHALLENGE: Anglais language.

[robertp6165]

How could we, with a POD no earlier than 1066, have Norman French supplant the old Anglo-Saxon as the mother tongue of the general populace of England (although not necessarily of Wales, Scotland, or Ireland), without a fusion language developing as happened in OTL (basically Anglo-Saxon completely dies out without any significant survival in modern language), and end up with a modern language called "Anglais" which is a decendant of Norman French, but not mutually intelligible to speakers of modern OTL French?

 

[Theodoric]

A mass influx of French peasants would help achieve that. Even though the Normans were comparatively succesful in Romancising the English language, there simply weren't enough of them.

 

[Thande]

If Hereward the Wake had raised an unsuccessful southern rebellion that led to a Harrying of the South, there would be a lot less English people left alive speaking English.

Otherwise, as Theodoric said, the best bet is that the Normans bring over more colonists from Normandy and other parts of France. Also perhaps the Normans are defeated in Sicily etc. and the remnants of those Normans come over to England?

 

[rcduggan]

Up until the 1300s French was spoken as the administrative language in England, I think. Maybe if the initial Conquest was a lot more brutal (an extended Harrying of the North or something) that left a larger part of the country depopulated, and more Normans settled, it would lead to French supplanting English in the country.

 

[robertp6165]

A mass influx of French peasants would help achieve that. Even though the Normans were comparatively succesful in Romancising the English language, there simply weren't enough of them.

If Hereward the Wake had raised an unsuccessful southern rebellion that led to a Harrying of the South, there would be a lot less English people left alive speaking English.

Otherwise, as Theodoric said, the best bet is that the Normans bring over more colonists from Normandy and other parts of France. Also perhaps the Normans are defeated in Sicily etc. and the remnants of those Normans come over to England?

Up until the 1300s French was spoken as the administrative language in England, I think. Maybe if the initial Conquest was a lot more brutal (an extended Harrying of the North or something) that left a larger part of the country depopulated, and more Normans settled, it would lead to French supplanting English in the country.

Those are all good ideas for meeting Part One of the Challenge...keep the old Anglo Saxon tongue from contributing significantly to the hypothetical Anglais language. Now, for Part Two...how do we end up with a modern Anglais language which is not mutually intelligible to speakers of modern French?

 

[Tyr]

Those are all good ideas for meeting Part One of the Challenge...keep the old Anglo Saxon tongue from contributing significantly to the hypothetical Anglais language. Now, for Part Two...how do we end up with a modern Anglais language which is not mutually intelligible to speakers of modern French?

Norman was already a bit weird vis-a-vis Parisian.
Maybe have France develop into a more Occitanian centred country so it is closer to Spanish and Italian?
Then maybe move a lot of Irish or Welsh into England too so they can bring some celtic weirdness?

 

[RPW@Cy]

and end up with a modern language called "Anglais" which is a decendant of Norman French, but not mutually intelligible to speakers of modern OTL French?

Is this a loophole? Because it doesn't sound like you're requiring it to be unintellegible to the modern ATL French. If so, then do as Leej says and have France go through a more southerly unification so that the ATL "French" is actually more like Occitan. Then even if "Anglais" remains fairly close to ATL French (just what would Norman Occitan even sound like?) it would be completely unintelligible to an OTL French speaker.

Alternatively, as an adjunct to the large scale ethnic cleansing that seems to be the consensus as to what is required to suppress English, have some Norman scholars (ideally around the time they lose their French possessions) decide that to avoid assimilating they need to purify themselves in time honoured fashion. So their Viking roots are re-emphasised, the language is purged of as much Romance as possible and lots of cod Norse terms are invented to fill the gap (nothing an Icelander would easily recognise, remember we're talking blood and soil nationalists here, not linguistic scholars), and what Romance is left is consciously archaised to sound more Latin - the Romans were a proper warrior race too, after all. This is a failure of course, but enough of it is fashionable for long enough for a lot of the invented Norse terms to hang around, and quite a bit of the Romance in the language gets a Norse/Latin inflection. I shudder to think what the resulting mess will sound like, but it won't sound much like French....

 

[robertp6165]

Is this a loophole? Because it doesn't sound like you're requiring it to be unintellegible to the modern ATL French.

No, we are assuming that the ATL modern French is the same as OTL modern French.

 

[robertp6165]

Norman was already a bit weird vis-a-vis Parisian. Maybe have France develop into a more Occitanian centred country so it is closer to Spanish and Italian?

It would be preferred to have modern ATL French remain the same as the modern OTL French, but have Anglais diverge from it.

Then maybe move a lot of Irish or Welsh into England too so they can bring some celtic weirdness?

That could definitely be a major contributing factor. The original POD stated that Anglais need only be the language of England, not Scotland, Wales, or Ireland. So if we assume, somehow, that Welsh and Gaelic (both Scottish and Irish) remain strong in their native lands, and that Anglais does not come to dominate for some reason, that could mean there are a lot of loan words and diffusion along the borders.

Another factor that might contribute to such an outcome would be an earlier and more complete political severance between England and France, which leads the Normans in England to think of themselves as "Anglais" rather than "Norman." They then consciously make an effort to differentiate themselves...and their language...from that of the "Old Country." This would be similar to what happened in Norway, for example, in OTL, IIRC. Norwegians spoke Danish up until the mid to late 19th century, when a conscious nationalist movement basically created enough divergences for a new language to emerge...the Norwegian language. If something like that could occur in such a short time, Anglais, given a much longer period to diverge from French, could end up quite different.

So what PODs could create these factors...

1) Stronger survival and prospering of Welsh and Gaelic, and less influence of English/Anglais over them?

2) Earlier severing of political relations and cultural bonds between England and France, and a nationalist move to
differentiate Anglais from French?

 

[VT45]

I agree with bringing over more Francophones amlost immediately after William the Conquerer is crowned (my mother's family apparently came over from Normandy at that time).

I'm wondering what this version of English would look like.

 

[Thande]

I agree with bringing over more Francophones amlost immediately after William the Conquerer is crowned (my mother's family apparently came over from Normandy at that time).

I'm wondering what this version of English would look like.

Probably quite a lot like Channel Islands Norman (I believe they have their own Wikipedia now ) - Norman with some English vocab and influences.

 

[VT45]

Probably quite a lot like Channel Islands Norman (I believe they have their own Wikipedia now ) - Norman with some English vocab and influences.

Ah. Linky?

 

[Thande]

Ah. Linky?

http://nrm.wikipedia.org/wiki/Page_dé_garde

Note there are 3 parallel 'pedias here - the second and third ones are the Channel Islands ones, the top one is Norman of Normandy (less English influence).

 

[robertp6165]

I agree with bringing over more Francophones amlost immediately after William the Conquerer is crowned (my mother's family apparently came over from Normandy at that time).

As stated above in an earlier post, this would meet the qualifications of the first part of the POD...to prevent the Anglo Saxon language from contributing significantly to Anglais...but not the second part...which is to have speakers of Anglais and French be unintelligible to each other by the 21st century.

 

[Thande]

As stated above in an earlier post, this would meet the qualifications of the first part of the POD...to prevent the Anglo Saxon language from contributing significantly to Anglais...but not the second part...which is to have speakers of Anglais and French be unintelligible to each other by the 21st century.

I don't think Jersey French is very intelligible with Parisian French in OTL - certainly not in written form. (See my wiki link).

 

[robertp6165]

So here's what we have so far...

1) A much larger segment of the population of England is killed or forced into exile following the Norman conquest, perhaps as the result of Norman reprisals after a successful southern revolt of Anglo-Saxons lead by Hereward the Wake.

2) Following this, the Norman Kings bring in a lot of French peasants to work the land. They also make active efforts to destroy English culture and discourage use of the English language. The remaining Anglo-Saxons are absorbed by the Francophone population and disappear as a separate group.

3) Some political event occurs in the 1100s to sever the political and cultural connections between England and Normandy for good. The Norman Kings and nobility of England gradually become more nationalistic and make active efforts to encourage differentiation between Anglais and French. Monks and other learned people in England begin introducing variations in the spelling of the language, which eventually translate into differences in the way it is spoken.

4) The Kingdom of England, for whatever reason (perhaps a side effect of killing or exiling such a large segment of its population following the Norman conquest, perhaps?) is less powerful in the ATL. As a result Wales, Scotland, and Ireland all remain independent, with their own languages. Cross-border population filtration cause some exchange of words between the languages which did not occur in OTL, which causes Anglais to diverge from French even more.

4) The process of divergence accelerates when printing comes on the scene, and the first dictionaries and grammars of Anglais are printed. Now the "language nationalists" in England can actively control the development of the language by controlling the content of the dictionaries, spelling, and grammar textbooks. By the 20th century, Anglais has diverged so far from mainstream French that it has become unintelligible to French-speakers, and it is a fully-fledged separate language.

 

[mishery]

Gaelic was a relative latecomer to Scotland and never penetrated that far south.