spelling
Spelling is a set of conventions for written language regarding how graphemes should correspond to the sounds of spoken language. Spelling is one of the elements of orthography, and highly standardized spelling is a prescriptive element.
Spelli ...
and
punctuation
Punctuation marks are marks indicating how a piece of writing, written text should be read (silently or aloud) and, consequently, understood. The oldest known examples of punctuation marks were found in the Mesha Stele from the 9th century BC, c ...
of the
French language
French ( or ) is a Romance languages, Romance language of the Indo-European languages, Indo-European family. Like all other Romance languages, it descended from the Vulgar Latin of the Roman Empire. French evolved from Northern Old Gallo-R ...
. It is based on a combination of
phonemic
A phoneme () is any set of similar speech sounds that are perceptually regarded by the speakers of a language as a single basic sound—a smallest possible phonetic unit—that helps distinguish one word from another. All languages con ...
and historical principles. The spelling of words is largely based on the pronunciation of
Old French
Old French (, , ; ) was the language spoken in most of the northern half of France approximately between the late 8th first French dictionary by the
, there were attempts to reform French orthography.
This has resulted in a complicated relationship between spelling and sound, especially for vowels; a multitude of
silent letter
In an alphabetic writing system, a silent letter is a letter that, in a particular word, does not correspond to any sound in the word's pronunciation. In linguistics, a silent letter is often symbolised with a null sign , which resembles the ...
s; and many
homophone
A homophone () is a word that is pronounced the same as another word but differs in meaning or in spelling. The two words may be spelled the same, for example ''rose'' (flower) and ''rose'' (past tense of "rise"), or spelled differently, a ...
s, e.g. ''/////'' (all pronounced ) and ''//'' (all pronounced ). This is conspicuous in verbs: ' (you speak), ' (I speak / one speaks) and ' (they speak) all sound like . Later attempts to respell some words in accordance with their
Latin
Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...
etymologies further increased the number of silent letters (e.g., ' vs. older ' – compare English "tense", which reflects the original spelling – and ' vs. older ').
Nevertheless, the rules governing French orthography allow for a reasonable degree of accuracy when pronouncing unfamiliar French words from their written forms. The reverse operation, producing written forms from pronunciation, is much more ambiguous. The French alphabet uses a number of
diacritic
A diacritic (also diacritical mark, diacritical point, diacritical sign, or accent) is a glyph added to a letter or to a basic glyph. The term derives from the Ancient Greek (, "distinguishing"), from (, "to distinguish"). The word ''diacrit ...
s, including the
circumflex
The circumflex () is a diacritic in the Latin and Greek scripts that is also used in the written forms of many languages and in various romanization and transcription schemes. It received its English name from "bent around"a translation of ...
grave
A grave is a location where a cadaver, dead body (typically that of a human, although sometimes that of an animal) is burial, buried or interred after a funeral. Graves are usually located in special areas set aside for the purpose of buria ...
accents, as well as
ligature Ligature may refer to:
Language
* Ligature (writing), a combination of two or more letters into a single symbol (typography and calligraphy)
* Ligature (grammar), a morpheme that links two words
Medicine
* Ligature (medicine), a piece of suture us ...
s. A system of braille has been developed for people who are visually impaired.
Alphabet
The French alphabet is based on the 26 letters of the
Latin alphabet
The Latin alphabet, also known as the Roman alphabet, is the collection of letters originally used by the Ancient Rome, ancient Romans to write the Latin language. Largely unaltered except several letters splitting—i.e. from , and from â ...
, uppercase and lowercase, with five
diacritic
A diacritic (also diacritical mark, diacritical point, diacritical sign, or accent) is a glyph added to a letter or to a basic glyph. The term derives from the Ancient Greek (, "distinguishing"), from (, "to distinguish"). The word ''diacrit ...
loanword
A loanword (also a loan word, loan-word) is a word at least partly assimilated from one language (the donor language) into another language (the recipient or target language), through the process of borrowing. Borrowing is a metaphorical term t ...
s and regional words. is usually written ; is usually written anywhere but before , before , and sometimes at the ends of words. However, is common in the metric prefix kilo- (originally from Greek ''khilia'' "a thousand"), e.g. , , , .
Diacritics
The
diacritic
A diacritic (also diacritical mark, diacritical point, diacritical sign, or accent) is a glyph added to a letter or to a basic glyph. The term derives from the Ancient Greek (, "distinguishing"), from (, "to distinguish"). The word ''diacrit ...
s used in French orthography are the
acute accent
The acute accent (), ,
is a diacritic used in many modern written languages with alphabets based on the Latin alphabet, Latin, Cyrillic script, Cyrillic, and Greek alphabet, Greek scripts. For the most commonly encountered uses of the accen ...
(; ), the
grave accent
The grave accent () ( or ) is a diacritical mark used to varying degrees in French, Dutch, Portuguese, Italian, Catalan and many other Western European languages as well as for a few unusual uses in English. It is also used in other ...
(; ), the
circumflex
The circumflex () is a diacritic in the Latin and Greek scripts that is also used in the written forms of many languages and in various romanization and transcription schemes. It received its English name from "bent around"a translation of ...
cedilla
A cedilla ( ; from Spanish language, Spanish ', "small ''ceda''", i.e. small "z"), or cedille (from French , ), is a hook or tail () added under certain letters (as a diacritic, diacritical mark) to indicate that their pronunciation is modif ...
(; ). Diacritics have no effect on the primary alphabetical order.
* An acute accent over represents . An in modern French is often used where a combination of and a consonant, usually , would have been used formerly, e.g. < .
* A grave accent over or is primarily used to distinguish homophones: ("to") vs. ("has"); ("or") vs. ("where"; note that is only used in this word). A grave accent over indicates in positions where a plain would be pronounced (schwa). Many verb conjugations contain regular alternations between and ; for example, the accent mark in the present tense verb distinguishes the vowel's pronunciation from the schwa in the infinitive, .
* A circumflex over indicates , respectively, but the distinction between vs. is being lost in Parisian French, merging them as . In Belgian French, is pronounced . Most often, it indicates the historical deletion of an adjacent letter (usually or a vowel): < , < , < , < (in medieval manuscripts many letters were often written as diacritical marks, e.g. the circumflex for and the tilde for ). It has also come to be used to distinguish homophones, e.g. ("of the") vs. (past participle of "to have to do something (pertaining to an act)"); however is in fact written thus because of a dropped : ''deu'' (see
). Since the 1990 orthographic changes, the circumflex on and can be dropped unless it distinguishes homophones, e.g. becomes but (sure) does not change to avoid ambiguity with the word (on).
* A diaeresis over indicates a hiatus between the accented vowel and the vowel preceding it, e.g. , . The diaeresis may also indicate a glide/diphthong, as in .
**The combination is pronounced in the regular way if followed by ( . An exception to this is ).
**The combination is either pronounced (, ) or (); it represents if it precedes ( ).
**A diaeresis on only occurs in some proper names and in modern editions of old French texts, e.g. (commune in Marne, now ), (alley in the
18th arrondissement of Paris
The 18th arrondissement of Paris (''XVIIIe arrondissement'') is one of the 20 Arrondissements of Paris, arrondissements, or administrative districts, of Paris, the capital city of France. In spoken French, this arrondissement is referred to as '' ...
), (family name and hotel on the Boulevard Raspail, Paris), ? (near Joigny), ? (name of Flemish origin spelt where cursive looked like to French clerks), (commune between Paris and
Orly
Orly () is a commune in the southern suburbs of Paris, ÃŽle-de-France. It is located from the center of Paris.
The name of Orly came from Latin ''Aureliacum'', "the villa of Aurelius".
Orly Airport partially lies on the territory of the c ...
Moÿ-de-l'Aisne
Moÿ-de-l'Aisne () is a commune in the Aisne department in Hauts-de-France in northern France.
Demographics
See also
*Communes of the Aisne department
The following is a list of the 796 communes in the French department of Aisne.
...
(commune in
Aisne
Aisne ( , ; ; ) is a French departments of France, department in the Hauts-de-France region of northern France. It is named after the river Aisne (river), Aisne. In 2020, it had a population of 529,374.
Geography
The department borders No ...
and a family name), and (an insurance company in eastern France).
**The diaeresis on appears in the Biblical proper names ?, (with for as in words of Latin origin such as , or chemical element names such as ), , , and , as well as French names such as Haüy . Nevertheless, since the 1990 orthographic changes, the diaeresis in words containing (such as or ) can be moved onto the : , , and by analogy may be used in verbs such as . Without a diaeresis, the would be silent (or a schwa in accents which retain one): .
**In addition, words of German origin retain their umlaut () if applicable but often use French pronunciation, such as (, trademark of a pressure washer).
* A
cedilla
A cedilla ( ; from Spanish language, Spanish ', "small ''ceda''", i.e. small "z"), or cedille (from French , ), is a hook or tail () added under certain letters (as a diacritic, diacritical mark) to indicate that their pronunciation is modif ...
under indicates that it is pronounced rather than . Thus "I throw" (with for before ), "I was throwing" ( would represent before without the cedilla). The cedilla is only used before , e.g. . A cedilla is not used before , since they already mark the as , e.g. , , .
A
tilde
The tilde (, also ) is a grapheme or with a number of uses. The name of the character came into English from Spanish , which in turn came from the Latin , meaning 'title' or 'superscription'. Its primary use is as a diacritic (accent) in ...
() above is occasionally used in French for words and names of Spanish origin that have been incorporated into the language (e.g., , ). Like the other diacritics, the tilde has no impact on the primary alphabetical order.
Diacritics are often omitted on capital letters, mainly for technical reasons (not present on
AZERTY
AZERTY ( ) is a specific layout for the characters of the Latin alphabet on typewriter keys and computer keyboards. The layout takes its name from the first six letters to appear on the first row of alphabetical keys; that is, ( ). Like oth ...
reject this usage and confirm that "in French, the accent has full orthographic value", except for acronyms but not for abbreviations (e.g., , , but ). Nevertheless, diacritics are often ignored in word games, including
crossword
A crossword (or crossword puzzle) is a word game consisting of a grid of black and white squares, into which solvers enter words or phrases ("entries") crossing each other horizontally ("across") and vertically ("down") according to a set of cl ...
s,
Scrabble
''Scrabble'' is a word game in which two to four players score points by placing tiles, each bearing a single letter, onto a Board game, game board divided into a 15×15 grid of squares. The tiles must form words that, in crossword fashion, re ...
, and .
Ligatures
The
ligature Ligature may refer to:
Language
* Ligature (writing), a combination of two or more letters into a single symbol (typography and calligraphy)
* Ligature (grammar), a morpheme that links two words
Medicine
* Ligature (medicine), a piece of suture us ...
s and are part of French orthography. For
collation
Collation is the assembly of written information into a standard order. Many systems of collation are based on numerical order or alphabetical order, or extensions and combinations thereof. Collation is a fundamental element of most office fi ...
, these ligatures are treated like the sequences and respectively.
Æ
(, or ) is rare, appearing only in some words of Latin and Greek origin like , , , (as named ''dog’s parsley''). It generally represents the vowel , like .
The sequence appears in loanwords where both sounds are heard, as in and .
Å’
(, or ) is a mandatory contraction of in certain words. Some of these are native French words, with the pronunciation or , e.g. "choir" , "heart" , "moods (related to moral)" , "knot" , "sister" , "egg" , "work (of art)" , "vow" . It usually appears in the combination ; "eye" is an exception. Many of these words were originally written with the digraph ; the in the ligature represents a sometimes artificial attempt to imitate the Latin spelling: > Old French / > Modern French .
is also used in words of Greek origin, as the Latin rendering of the Greek diphthong , e.g. "
coelacanth
Coelacanths ( ) are an ancient group of lobe-finned fish (Sarcopterygii) in the class Actinistia. As sarcopterygians, they are more closely related to lungfish and tetrapods (the terrestrial vertebrates including living amphibians, reptiles, bi ...
". These words used to be pronounced with , but in recent years a spelling pronunciation with has taken hold, e.g. or , or etc. The pronunciation with is often seen to be more correct.
When is found after , the can be pronounced in some cases (), or in others ().
is not used when both letters contribute different sounds. For example, when is part of a prefix (), or when is part of a suffix (), or in the word and its derivatives.
Digraphs and trigraphs
French digraphs and trigraphs have both historical and phonological origins. In the first case, it is a vestige of the spelling in the word's original language (usually Latin or Greek) maintained in modern French, e.g. the use of in , in , or in . In the second case, a digraph is due to an archaic pronunciation, such as , , , , and , or is merely a convenient way to expand the twenty-six-letter alphabet to cover all relevant phonemes, as in , , , , , and . Some cases are a mixture of these or are used for purely pragmatic reasons, such as for in ('he ate'), where the serves to indicate a "soft" inherent in the verb's root, similar to the significance of a cedilla to .
Spelling to sound correspondences
Some exceptions apply to the rules governing the pronunciation of word-final consonants. See
Liaison (French)
In French, liaison () is the pronunciation of a linking consonant between two words in an appropriate phonetic and syntactic context. For example, the word () is pronounced , the word () is pronounced , but the combination is pronounce ...
for details.
Consonants
Vowels
Vowels and consonants
: These combinations are pronounced after , all but the last of which are pronounced normally and are not influenced by the . For example, in , is pronounced ; in , is pronounced . , however, which only occurs in such combinations after and , is pronounced as opposed to , e.g. , , , etc. These combinations are never pronounced after , except -- (), e.g. , , where the vowel + + sequence is pronounced normally, although as usual, the pronunciation of after and is somewhat unpredictable: , , but , etc.
Words from Greek
The spelling of French words of Greek origin is complicated by a number of digraphs which originated in the
Latin
Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...
transcriptions. The digraphs normally represent , respectively, in Greek loanwords; and the ligatures and in Greek loanwords represent the same vowel as (). Further, many words in the
international scientific vocabulary
International scientific vocabulary (ISV) comprises scientific and specialized words whose language of origin may or may not be certain, but which are in current use in several modern languages (that is, translingually, whether in naturalized, lo ...
were constructed in French from Greek roots and have kept their digraphs (e.g. , ).
History
The
Oaths of Strasbourg
The Oaths of Strasbourg were a military pact made on 14 February 842 by Charles the Bald and Louis the German against their older brother Lothair I, the designated heir of Louis the Pious, the successor of Charlemagne. One year later the Treaty ...
from 842 is the earliest text written in the early form of French called Romance or Gallo-Romance.
Roman
The Celtic
Gaulish language
Gaulish is an extinct Celtic language spoken in parts of Continental Europe before and during the period of the Roman Empire. In the narrow sense, Gaulish was the language of the Celts of Gaul (now France, Luxembourg, Belgium, most of Switzerl ...
of the inhabitants of
Gaul
Gaul () was a region of Western Europe first clearly described by the Roman people, Romans, encompassing present-day France, Belgium, Luxembourg, and parts of Switzerland, the Netherlands, Germany, and Northern Italy. It covered an area of . Ac ...
disappeared progressively over the course of Roman rule as the Latin language began to replace it.
Vulgar Latin
Vulgar Latin, also known as Colloquial, Popular, Spoken or Vernacular Latin, is the range of non-formal Register (sociolinguistics), registers of Latin spoken from the Crisis of the Roman Republic, Late Roman Republic onward. ''Vulgar Latin'' a ...
, a generally lower register of
Classical Latin
Classical Latin is the form of Literary Latin recognized as a Literary language, literary standard language, standard by writers of the late Roman Republic and early Roman Empire. It formed parallel to Vulgar Latin around 75 BC out of Old Latin ...
spoken by the Roman soldiers, merchants and even by patricians in quotidian speech, was adopted by the natives and evolved slowly, taking the forms of different spoken Roman vernaculars according to the region of the empire.
Eventually the different forms of Vulgar Latin in what is now France evolved into three branches in the Gallo-Romance language sub-family, the north of the
Loire
The Loire ( , , ; ; ; ; ) is the longest river in France and the 171st longest in the world. With a length of , it drains , more than a fifth of France's land, while its average discharge is only half that of the Rhône.
It rises in the so ...
, the in the south, and the
Franco-Provençal language
Franco-Provençal (also Francoprovençal, Patois or Arpitan) is a Gallo-Romance language that originated and is spoken in eastern France, western Switzerland, and northwestern Italy.
Franco-Provençal has several distinct dialects and is s ...
Romance languages
The Romance languages, also known as the Latin or Neo-Latin languages, are the languages that are Language family, directly descended from Vulgar Latin. They are the only extant subgroup of the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-E ...
(English).
Old French
In the 9th century, the Romance vernaculars were already quite far from Latin. For example, to understand the
Bible
The Bible is a collection of religious texts that are central to Christianity and Judaism, and esteemed in other Abrahamic religions such as Islam. The Bible is an anthology (a compilation of texts of a variety of forms) originally writt ...
, written in Latin, footnotes were necessary. The languages found in the
manuscript
A manuscript (abbreviated MS for singular and MSS for plural) was, traditionally, any document written by hand or typewritten, as opposed to mechanically printed or reproduced in some indirect or automated way. More recently, the term has ...
s dating from the 9th century to the 13th century form what is known as
Old French
Old French (, , ; ) was the language spoken in most of the northern half of France approximately between the late 8th [2-4; we might wonder whether there's a point at which it's appropriate to talk of the beginnings of French, that is, when it wa ...
(). With consolidation of royal power, beginning in the 13th century, the vernacular, the variety then in usage in the ÃŽle-de-France (region around Paris), took, little by little, over the other languages and evolved toward Classic French. These languages continued to evolve until Middle French () emerged, in the 14th century to the 16th century.
Middle French
During the
Middle French
Middle French () is a historical division of the French language that covers the period from the mid-14th to the early 17th centuries. It is a period of transition during which:
* the French language became clearly distinguished from the other co ...
period (–1600), modern spelling practices were largely established. This happened especially during the 16th century, under the influence of printers. The overall trend was towards continuity with Old French spelling, although some changes were made under the influence of changed pronunciation habits; for example, the Old French distinction between the diphthongs and was eliminated in favor of consistent , as both diphthongs had come to be pronounced or (depending on the surrounding sounds). However, many other distinctions that had become equally superfluous were maintained, e.g. between and soft or between and . It is likely that etymology was the guiding factor here: the distinctions and reflect corresponding distinctions in the spelling of the underlying Latin words, whereas no such distinction exists in the case of .
This period also saw the development of some explicitly etymological spellings, e.g. ("time"), ("twenty") and ("weight") (note that in many cases, the etymologizing was sloppy or occasionally completely incorrect; reflects Latin , with the in the wrong place, and actually comes from Latin , with no at all; the spelling is due to an incorrect derivation from Latin ). The trend towards etymologizing sometimes produced absurd (and generally rejected) spellings such as for normal ("to know"), which attempted to combine Latin ("to be wise", the correct origin of ) with ("to know").
vowel length
In linguistics, vowel length is the perceived or actual length (phonetics), duration of a vowel sound when pronounced. Vowels perceived as shorter are often called short vowels and those perceived as longer called long vowels.
On one hand, many ...
. During the
Middle French
Middle French () is a historical division of the French language that covers the period from the mid-14th to the early 17th centuries. It is a period of transition during which:
* the French language became clearly distinguished from the other co ...
period, a distinction developed between long and short vowels, with long vowels largely stemming from a lost before a consonant, as in (cf. Spanish ), but sometimes from the coalescence of similar vowels, as in from earlier (early
Old French
Old French (, , ; ) was the language spoken in most of the northern half of France approximately between the late 8th [2-4; we might wonder whether there's a point at which it's appropriate to talk of the beginnings of French, that is, when it wa ...
<
Vulgar Latin
Vulgar Latin, also known as Colloquial, Popular, Spoken or Vernacular Latin, is the range of non-formal Register (sociolinguistics), registers of Latin spoken from the Crisis of the Roman Republic, Late Roman Republic onward. ''Vulgar Latin'' a ...
, cf. Spanish < ). Prior to this, such words continued to be spelled historically (e.g. and ). Ironically, by the time this convention was adopted in the 19th century, the former distinction between short and long vowels had largely disappeared in all but the most conservative pronunciations, with vowels automatically pronounced long or short depending on the phonological context (see
French phonology
French phonology is the sound system of French language, French. This article discusses mainly the phonology of all the varieties of Standard French. Notable phonological features include the uvular r present in some accents, nasal vowels, and ...
).
*Use of in place of where pronounced rather than . The most significant effect of this was to change the spelling of all imperfect verbs (formerly spelled -, -, - rather than -, -, -), as well as the name of the language, from to .
exclamation mark
The exclamation mark (also known as exclamation point in American English) is a punctuation mark usually used after an interjection or exclamation to indicate strong feelings or to show wikt:emphasis, emphasis. The exclamation mark often marks ...
,
question mark
The question mark (also known as interrogation point, query, or eroteme in journalism) is a punctuation, punctuation mark that indicates a question or interrogative clause or phrase in many languages.
History
The history of the question mark is ...
,
semicolon
The semicolon (or semi-colon) is a symbol commonly used as orthographic punctuation. In the English language, a semicolon is most commonly used to link (in a single sentence) two independent clauses that are closely related in thought, such as ...
, colon, percentage mark, currency symbols, hash, and guillemet all require a thin space between the punctuation mark and the material it adjoins. Outside of France and Belgium, this rule is often ignored. Computer software may aid or hinder the application of this rule, depending on the degree of localisation, as it is marked differently from most other Western punctuation.
Elision (French)
In French language, French, elision () is the suppression of a final unstressed vowel (usually ) immediately before another word beginning with a vowel or a silent letter#French, silent . The term also refers to the orthographic convention by which ...
*
French phonology
French phonology is the sound system of French language, French. This article discusses mainly the phonology of all the varieties of Standard French. Notable phonological features include the uvular r present in some accents, nasal vowels, and ...
*
French braille
French Braille is the original braille alphabet, and the basis of :Innovative braille scripts, almost :French-ordered braille scripts, all others. The collation, alphabetic order of French has become the basis of the international braille conven ...
*
French manual alphabet
The French manual alphabet is an alphabet used for French Sign Language (LSF), both to distinguish LSF words and to sign French language, French words in LSF.
The alphabet has the following letters:
Image:LSF LettreA.jpg, alt=A fist with thumb ...
Orthography
An orthography is a set of convention (norm), conventions for writing a language, including norms of spelling, punctuation, Word#Word boundaries, word boundaries, capitalization, hyphenation, and Emphasis (typography), emphasis.
Most national ...