Charles Bruneau (1883–1969) was a French grammarian,

linguist Linguistics is the scientific study of language. The areas of linguistic analysis are syntax (rules governing the structure of sentences), semantics (meaning), Morphology (linguistics), morphology (structure of words), phonetics (speech sounds ...

and

philologist Philology () is the study of language in oral and written historical sources. It is the intersection of textual criticism, literary criticism, history, and linguistics with strong ties to etymology. Philology is also defined as the study of ...

Biography

Bruneau grew up in a village where the language of communication was Walloon, but surrounded by areas where the regional language was

Champenois Champenois (''lou champaignat'') is a Romance language among the ''langues d'oïl'' spoken by a minority of people in Champagne and Île-de-France provinces in France, as well as in a handful of towns in southern Belgium (chiefly the municipalit ...

. This prompted him, at the instigation of

Jules Gilliéron Jules Gilliéron (21 December 1854 – 26 April 1926) was a Swiss-French linguist and dialectologist Dialectology (from Greek , ''dialektos'', "talk, dialect"; and , '' -logia'') is the scientific study of dialects: subsets of languages. Though i ...

, to conduct dialectological surveys throughout the region around Givet, both in

France France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...

and

Belgium Belgium, officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. Situated in a coastal lowland region known as the Low Countries, it is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeas ...

. He was a grammar scholar (1906) and doctor of letters (1913). His research was published in four books: * ''Étude phonétique des patois d’Ardenne'' (1913), where he explained the phonetic notation system he would use. * ''La limite des dialectes wallon, champenois et lorrain en Ardenne'' (1913) where he traced the boundaries of the three regional languages in question ( Walloon , Champenois and Lorrain). * ''Enquête linguistique sur les patois d’Ardenne'', volume I (1914), where he gave the dialect forms, collected in his 93 locations, for the French words ranging from A to L (940 words, from ''abaisser'' to ''luzerne''). * ''Enquête linguistique sur les patois d’Ardenne'', volume II (1926), idem for the rest of the alphabet (764 words, from ''ma'' to ''y''). Charles Bruneau took over Ferdinand Brunot's '' l’Histoire de la langue française'' after his death, publishing volumes xii and xiii (1948-1972). He also resumed and recast ''Précis de grammaire historique de la langue française'', following which it was known as "Brunot and Bruneau". He had four children, including Anne, mother of Pascal Quignard, and Jean, an academic expert on

Gustave Flaubert Gustave Flaubert ( , ; ; 12 December 1821 – 8 May 1880) was a French novelist. He has been considered the leading exponent of literary realism in his country and abroad. According to the literary theorist Kornelije Kvas, "in Flaubert, realis ...

References

1883 births 1969 deaths Grammarians from France French philologists People from Givet 20th-century French linguists 20th-century French philologists {{France-linguist-stub