Francoprovençal (known locally as patois) is the glottonym used as a cover term for a highly fragmented Romance dialect-grouping. These varieties are spoken in south-eastern France, and neighbouring parts of Switzerland and Italy; diasporic communities are also reported to maintain the use of Francoprovençal in Germany, Canada, and the United States (see Nagy Reference Nagy2011). Francoprovençal enjoys varying levels of official status across these regions. In France, for example, Francoprovençal was only recognised by the Ministry for Culture and Communication in 1999 as a ‘language of France’, but it does not constitute one of the handful of regional languages protected by law that are permitted in the education system. Conversely, in the Aosta Valley (Italy), which enjoys an autonomous status, Francoprovençal is protected under Federal law, and is taught in schools (see Josserand Reference Josserand2003).
The varieties of Francoprovençal are collectively classified as ‘severely endangered’ (Salminen Reference Salminen and Moseley2007). There is no consensus on remaining speaker numbers, but between 50,000 and 60,000 are thought to remain in France, with roughly 16,000 in Switzerland, and 28,000 in Italy, where the vast majority reside in the Aosta Valley. Generally, estimates range from 120,000 to 200,000 speakers (see Martin Reference Martin1990, Reference Martin, Caubet, Chaker and Sibille2002; Tuaillon Reference Tuaillon, Guillorel and Sibille1993). Intergenerational mother-tongue transmission is no longer reported in all but a minority of cases (see Bert, Costa & Martin Reference Bert, Costa and Martin2009 in France; Nagy Reference Nagy1996 and Pannatier Reference Pannatier1999 in Switzerland and Italy).
A great deal of highly localised phonological variation is characteristic of Francoprovençal, and mutual intelligibility is reported as being problematic (see Burger Reference Burger and Valdman1979: 262, and, for an opposing view, Tuaillon Reference Tuaillon and Vermes1988: 191). Owing to the isolation of certain speech communities, mutual intelligibility is often lacking even between Francoprovençal speakers separated by only a few kilometres. For precision, the following description is, therefore, based on a single, Lyonnais variety of Francoprovençal spoken in St. Martin-en-Haut, the largest peri-urban town located in the mountainous region west of the conurbation of Lyons; this region is known locally as les monts du Lyonnais (‘the Lyonnais mountains’). The data presented below come from both conversation and word list styles, and were collected during two fieldwork visits in 2010 and 2012.
Consonants
The consonants of the Lyonnais variety spoken in St. Martin-en-Haut are provided in the following table. Allophones are omitted here and discussed in detail below.
The variety of Francoprovençal spoken in St. Martin-en-Haut has a similar consonantal inventory to that of Standard French (henceforth SF), unlike several varieties spoken east of Lyons. This is not surprising, as scholars have reported that Lyons traditionally functioned as the approximate limit of diffusion for linguistic innovations emanating from Paris (Chambon & Greub Reference Chambon and Greub2000). Some remarks are, however, necessary.
Via intermediary stages of palatalisation, Latin G + A ultimately gave rise in SF to the voiced post-alveolar fricative, while in Francoprovençal, the resulting phones differ markedly depending on the region. In many areas, /ʣ/ is a common reflex of word-initial G + A. In St. Martin-en-Haut, however, G + A maintains the reflex /ʃ/ in a small number of lexical items where Latin G remained unvoiced, e.g. CAMBAM > GAMBAM > jamba [ˈʃ
ba] ‘leg’. The voiced post-alveolar fricative is maintained word-initially in G + E/I clusters, and is also maintained word-medially, just as in SF, for C + A clusters that underwent subsequent palatalisation, e.g. MANDUCARE > mangier [ˈmĩʒi] ‘eaten’.Footnote
2
The palatalisation of Latin C + A > /ʃ/ in SF is equally a feature of Francoprovençal in les monts du Lyonnais, e.g. BUCCAM > boche [ˈbɔʃi] ‘mouth’. However, in Eastern Lyonnais, for example, the post-alveolar fricative shifts to a voiceless interdental fricative (see Tuaillon Reference Tuaillon2007 on variation in other regions).
While in SF the affricates [ʧ] and [ʤ] only occur in lexical borrowings, in les monts du Lyonnais these allophones result from the tendency to palatalise the stops /t/ and /d/ before /i/ and /e/, e.g. charcutiér [ʃaʁkyˈʧi] ‘pork butcher’, demârs [ˈʤimɔ] ‘Tuesday’.
In most varieties of Francoprovençal, /l/-palatalisation in obstruent + lateral onset clusters gives a number of differing reflexes (including [j], [ʎ] and [ɬ]), typically without a palatalising trigger (i.e. where the quality of the following vowel is not a factor in palatalisation). While certain varieties of Francoprovençal palatalise in both velar + lateral and labial + lateral clusters, in the Lyonnais variety of St. Martin-en-Haut, /l/-palatalisation to [j] occurs variably, and only with velars, e.g. clloche [ˈkjɔʃi] ‘bell’, gllar [ˈgjɔ] ‘tolling bell’.
Deletion of intervocalic liquid consonants is common in Francoprovençal, e.g. orâjo [ɔˈaʒə] ‘storm’. Moreover, the phone /ʁ/ can shift word-medially to [ð], which only exists as a result of assibilation: vouètura [waˈtyða] ‘car’, orâjo [ɔˈðaʒɔ] ‘storm’. This feature is reported in other Romance varieties, such as Jèrriais (see Jones Reference Jones2001).
Vowels
The variety of Francoprovençal spoken in St. Martin-en-Haut has an inventory of fourteen monophthongs, [i ĩ y e ɛ
a
ø ə u o ɔ
] and several diphthongs.
Monophthongs
An acoustic chart of the monophthongs for Saint-Martin-en-Haut is shown in Figure 1. This figure is based on the speech of one native male speaker. Mean F1 and F2 measurements were taken at the vowel mid point from a combination of lexical items.
Mean F1–F2 plot of monophthongs from a combination of lexical items.
Latin tonic free A is retained as /a/ in Francoprovençal, which in SF became /e/ in open syllables, and /ɛ/ in closed syllables. However, in St. Martin-en-Haut, a later development took place, whereby /a/ is typically realised as [ɔ] in tonic free syllables, e.g. NASUM > nâs [ˈnɔ] ‘nose’: this feature is unique to les monts du Lyonnais. Moreover, when Latin tonic free A is preceded by a palatal consonant, in these varieties of Francoprovençal, it is raised to [i], e.g. MANDUCARE > mangier [ˈmĩʒi]. Additionally, this lexical item illustrates the presence of nasal /ĩ/ in Francoprovençal generally, which was a feature of Old French, but which lowered to /
/ in Middle French.
Francoprovençal preserves a number of unstressed final vowels. For example, unstressed Latin atonic A is maintained as /a/, e.g. TABULAM > trâbla [ˈtʁɔbla] ‘table’, which also undergoes raising to [i] when preceded by a palatal, e.g. VACCAM > vache [ˈvaʃi] ‘cow’. A number of Lyonnais varieties have preserved Latin masculine atonic U as /ɔ/, and, moreover, it is common for this to be generalised as a masculine marker to other nouns, e.g. avogllo [aˈvygjɔ] ‘blind person’. Despite the variability in final vowels present in Francoprovençal, there is often a reduced vocalic quality in connected speech, and so schwa is also common in unstressed syllables.Footnote 3
Diphthongs
Diphthongs in St. Martin-en-Haut, as in les monts du Lyonnais generally, are formed by the glides /w/ and /j/ + a syllabic nucleus.Footnote
4
Both rising and falling diphthongs are permissible, e.g. ouè [ˈwa] ‘yes’, bouètar [bweˈtajə] ‘limp’. However, certain Latin vowels that became rising diphthongs in SF, such as Ē, Ĭ and Ĕ, typically maintain their medieval monophthongal qualities in les monts du Lyonnais (see Duraffour Reference Duraffour1932 for details). For example, Ē, Ĭ > /wa/ and Ĕ > /je/ in SF are realised in St. Martin-en-Haut as /ɛ/ and /i/, respectively, e.g. pêsson [ˈpɛs
] ‘fish’ and pi [ˈpi] ‘foot’.
Stress
Owing to the fact that Francoprovençal retains a number of Latin atonic vowels, the stress pattern can vary and can fall on either paroxytonic or oxytonic syllables (compare cela [səˈla] ‘that’ and sela [ˈsøla] ‘chair’). As with the Occitan varieties, this feature differentiates these Lyonnais varieties of Francoprovençal markedly from SF.
Recorded passage
The following reading passage comes from the 18th-century Lyonnais story Le sonneur d’Albigny (‘The Bell Ringer of Albigny’, Villefranche Reference Villefranche1891: 204), and was read by an older male speaker, native to St. Martin-en-Haut. In reciting the text, the informant produced some false starts, and these are marked in that transcription with ‘[. . .]’.
Phonetic transcription
Francoprovençal has no written standard, and most speakers in les monts du Lyonnais who do produce dialectal written texts will opt for their own individual phonetic spelling system (see Tuaillon Reference Tuaillon2004). The orthographic transcription presented below and throughout is, therefore, based on a proposed multidialectal orthography, termed Orthographe de référence B or ‘Reference Orthography B’ (ORB) (Stich, Gouvert & Favre Reference Stich, Gouvert and Favre2003). As a result, orthographic forms can be different from transcribed forms. However, while speakers are now beginning to produce texts in ORB, it should be stressed that this orthography is yet to be accepted by the majority of dialect-speaking communities (see Matthey & Meune Reference Matthey and Meune2012, Kasstan Reference Kasstan2014). As it would be impossible to transcribe recordings using every available phonetic-spelling system, ORB has been chosen here in line with Martin's (Reference Martin2006) dialect reference manual for the Lyonnais region. The speaker who provided the recording of the story was familiar with ORB, and was able to read the passage without any problems.
Orthographic transcription with free translation
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1 O fut ’na tèrribla jornâ por Liyon que cela-que du nôf octobro mile
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2 sèpt cent nonanta trèze. Assiègiêe per l’armâ de la Convèncion, ceta vela aviéve
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3 batalyê doux mês tota solèta, nan por la Royôtât, mas por la Rèpublica
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4 légâle, contra la Montagne qu’aviéve betâ dehôr la louè los Girondins et
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5 tôs los moderâs, et que govèrnâve per la tèrror. La dèfensa n’étâve ples
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6 possibla. Por empachiér los Muscadins (niom qu’ils balyêvont ux assiègiês) de
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7 recrutar des sordâts de lo vesinâjo, la Convèncion aviéve fêt ‘na rossâ
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8 de tôs los jouenos de dix-et-huét a vengt ans, et por cassar tôs liems entre-mié los
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9 Liyonês et los Forêziens que voliêvont lyors y balyér la man, el aviéve copâ
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10 per lo méten lo dèpartement de Rhône-et-Loire; el nen aviéve fât doux: Lo Rôno
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11 d’una pârt et la Lêre de l’ôtra.
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1 It was a terrible day for Lyons the ninth of October
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2 seventeen hundred and ninety three. Besieged by the Convention army, this city had
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3 fought alone for two months, not for the Monarchy, but for the lawful
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4 Republic, against The Mountain who had placed beyond the law the Girondists and
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5 all moderates, and who governed through terror. Defending the city was no longer
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6 possible. To stop the Muscadins (the name given to the besieged) from
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7 recruiting soldiers in the vicinity, the Convention ordered a draft
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8 of all young men between eighteen and twenty years old and to cut all ties between
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9 the Lyonnais, and the Foréziens who wanted to help, the Convention divided right
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10 down the middle the department of Rhône-et-Loire, forming two: the Rhône
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11 on one side and the Loire on the other.
Acknowledgements
The author thanks Amalia Arvaniti, Damien Hall, Mark Jones, Marzena Żygis, and two anonymous JIPA reviewers for their valuable input, and Stéphane Girard for his work in transcribing the story using Reference Orthography B.
