- Breton:
- Brezhoneg
- Related Topics:
- Breton literature
- Brythonic languages
Breton language
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What is the Breton language?
Breton is one of six living Celtic languages, along with Cornish, Welsh, Irish, Scottish Gaelic, and Manx. It is spoken in Brittany, northwestern France, and was brought to Armorica (now Brittany) by migrants from southwestern Britain in the 5th and 6th centuries.
Breton shares a basic vocabulary with Welsh and Cornish. All Celtic languages use initial consonantic variation to denote gender grammatically.
A language-recovery movement in Brittany in the late 20th century has benefited Breton culturally and socially. An estimated 500,000 people could understand and speak it at the beginning of the 21st century.
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Where is the Breton language spoken?
The Breton language is spoken in Brittany, a region in northwestern France encompassing the départements of Ille-et-Vilaine, Morbihan, Côtes-d’Armor, and Finistère. It was brought to Armorica, now Brittany, by migrants from southwestern Britain in the 5th and 6th centuries. Until recently, Breton was common in Cornouaille, Léon, Tréguier, and Vannes, within Côtes-du-Nord, Finistère, and Morbihan.
At the turn of the 21st century, an estimated 500,000 people could understand and speak Breton. Public opinion in Brittany strongly favored the language, leading to the development of Breton-language schools and bilingual education.
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To which language family does Breton belong?
Breton belongs to the Celtic languages, a branch of the Indo-European language family. Specifically, it is one of the six extant Celtic languages, along with Cornish, Welsh, Irish, Scottish Gaelic, and Manx.
Breton was brought to Armorica (now Brittany in northwestern France) by migrants from southwestern Britain in the 5th and 6th centuries. It is closely related to Welsh and Cornish, sharing a basic vocabulary. The Celtic languages fall into two divisions: Insular Celtic and Continental Celtic. The Brythonic languages (Welsh, Cornish, and Breton) are sometimes referred to as P-Celtic.
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How is the Breton language different from French?
Breton, a Celtic language spoken in Brittany, France, differs significantly from French. Here's how:
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Origins Breton was brought to Armorica (now Brittany) by migrants from southwestern Britain in the 5th and 6th centuries. French is a Romance language that later became dominant in the region's towns.
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Vocabulary Breton shares basic vocabulary with Welsh and Cornish. Divergence between Breton and Cornish is largely because of English loanwords in Cornish and French loanwords in Breton.
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Grammar Breton shares with all other Celtic languages the grammatical use of initial consonantic variation, mainly to denote gender.
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Dialects Breton has four main dialects: Kerne, Leon, Treger, and Gwened. Only Gwened differs significantly from the others because of a shift in stress accent and vowel aperture, potentially caused by close contact with French.
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What is the current status of the Breton language?
The Breton language, one of six extant Celtic languages, is spoken in Brittany, France. A language-recovery movement emerged in the late 20th century, which has benefited Breton culturally and socially.
At the turn of the 21st century, an estimated 500,000 people could understand and speak Breton. Public opinion in Brittany strongly favored the language, and a Breton-language school system began to develop at that time. Supporters of the language were optimistic that it was being built into a modern, up-to-date, urban language. By the close of the 20th century, Breton literature had become largely urban in theme and language.
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What efforts are being made to preserve and revive Breton?
Breton, a Celtic language spoken in Brittany, has benefited from a late 20th-century language-recovery movement. At the turn of the 21st century, around 500,000 people could understand and speak Breton, with strong public support in Brittany.
Efforts to preserve and revive Breton include the development of a Breton-language school system and the emergence of bilingual education in state-run and Roman Catholic primary schools. Adult education in Breton has also expanded. A unified spelling system has been developed, and the language is used in media such as radio, television, and film. Despite these efforts, the survival of Breton remains uncertain due to factors such as French official policy and limited economic opportunities in Brittany.
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Breton language, one of the six extant Celtic languages (the others being Cornish, Welsh, Irish, Scottish Gaelic, and Manx). Breton is spoken in Brittany in northwestern France. It shares with Welsh and Cornish an identical basic vocabulary and with all other Celtic languages the grammatical use of initial consonantic variation, which is used mainly to denote gender. Breton benefited culturally and socially from a language-recovery movement that emerged in Brittany in the late 20th century.
Breton was introduced into Armorica (western Gaul; now Brittany) in the 5th and 6th centuries by migrants from southwestern Britain. It became firmly established in the western part of the Armorican peninsula, while in the eastern part a Romance language, Gallo-Romance, took hold. French later became the language of the region’s towns.
Old Breton, in use up to the 11th century, is known through glosses, words, and names recorded in documents. Middle Breton appears in the Catholicon, a Breton-Latin-French dictionary published in 1499 and attributed to Jean Lagadeuc. A number of texts that date from the 15th through 17th centuries use Late Middle Breton, mostly in the form of elaborate poetry that exhibits a prosody akin to that of medieval Welsh poetry. Late Middle Breton was also used in prayer books, catechisms, and various works for religious education.
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The publication of Julien Maunoir’s dictionary in 1659 is accepted as marking, with its new spelling, the emergence of written Modern Breton. The dictionary had little significance for spoken Breton, however. Religious publications, which were nearer everyday speech, later flourished in the four Breton-speaking bishoprics of Brittany. The standards for written Breton developed separately in each, and the differences that subsequently emerged contributed to the theory that there existed four Breton dialects, each named for those bishoprics: Kerne, Leon, Treger, and Gwened (in French, Cornouaille, Léon, Tréguier, and Vannes, respectively). In fact, only Gwened differs significantly from the others, through a shift in stress accent and vowel aperture. Much energy was devoted during the 18th and 19th centuries to establishing a single written norm for Breton, especially after Jean-François Le Gonidec published a grammar (1807). He also published a Breton dictionary in 1821. But an unrelenting eradication policy implemented from the mid-19th century and into the 20th wrought havoc on Breton. No language census was ever taken. In 1928, after carrying out a survey, the scholar Roparz Hemon put at 1.2 million the number of people using Breton as their daily means of communication.
At the turn of the 21st century an estimated 500,000 people could understand and speak the language, and public opinion in Brittany strongly favoured the language. A Breton-language school system began to develop at that time, and bilingual education emerged in state-run and Roman Catholic primary schools. Adult education in Breton also expanded. Supporters of the language were optimistic that it was being built into a modern, up-to-date, urban language: a unified spelling system had been developed, and the language was used on private and state-funded radio and television networks as well as in films.