Hostname: page-component-7c8c6479df-24hb2 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-03-19T08:35:37.477Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

French in early modern Norwich

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 December 2016

CHRISTOPHER JOBY*
Affiliation:
Hankuk University of Foreign Studies, Seoul, Republic of Korea
*
Address for correspondence: e-mail: christopherjoby@gmail.com

Abstract

Much has been written about the use of French in medieval England. However, with one or two exceptions, relatively little has been written about the language in early modern England. This article aims to provide an account of the use of French as an emigrant language in one of the leading provincial cities in early modern England, Norwich. From 1565 onwards thousands of people from the French-language area migrated to England as a result of economic necessity and religious persecution. Many of them settled in Norwich. As well as these immigrants and their descendants, there were Dutch immigrants in Norwich who spoke French as well as several well-educated individuals from the local English population such as Sir Thomas Browne. This article describes the varieties of French used in Norwich, including Picard, the emerging standard French and Law French. It then discusses how French operated in the multilingual environment of early modern Norwich under the headings of language competition, language contact, bilingualism, code switching, translation, and finally, language shift and recession. It adds not only to our understanding of French in early modern England but also to the literature on French as an emigrant language.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2016 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

This work was supported by Hankuk University of Foreign Studies Research Fund.

References

REFERENCES

Adams, J. (2003). Bilingualism and the Latin Language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Agnew, J. (ed.). (2012). The Whirlpool of Misadventures: Letters of Robert Paston, First Earl of Yarmouth 1663–1679. Norwich: Norfolk Record Society.Google Scholar
Ailes, M. and Putter, A. (2014). The French of medieval England. In: Rjéoutski, V., Argent, G. and Offord, D. (eds), European Francophonie: The Social, Political and Cultural History of an International Prestige Language. Bern: Peter Lang, pp. 5180.Google Scholar
Aslanov, C. (2013). Crusaders’ Old French. In: Arteaga, D. (ed), Research on Old French: The State of the Art. Berlin: Springer, pp. 207220.Google Scholar
Austin, J., Blume, M., and Sánchez, L. (2015). Bilingualism in the Spanish-Speaking World: Linguistic and Cognitive Perspectives. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Baker, J. (1990). Manual of Law French, 2nd edn. Aldershot: Scholar Press.Google Scholar
Boyer, A. (2003). Sir Edward Coke and the Elizabethan Age. Stanford: Stanford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Britnell, R. (2009). Uses of French Language in medieval English towns. In: Wogan-Browne, J. (ed.), Language and Culture in Medieval Britain: The French of England c. 1100–c. 1500. York: York University Press, pp. 8189.Google Scholar
Browne, T. (1964). The Works, Keynes, G. (ed.), 4 vols. London: Faber and Faber.Google Scholar
Burke, P. (1987). Introduction . In: Burke, P. and Porter, R. (eds), The Social History of Language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 120.Google Scholar
Burke, P. (2004). Languages and Communities in Early Modern Europe. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Burke, P. (2005). Towards a Social History of Early Modern Dutch. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press.Google Scholar
Burke, P. (2014). Diglossia in early modern Europe. In: Rjéoutski, V., Argent, G. and Offord, D. (eds), European Francophonie: The Social, Political and Cultural History of an International Prestige Language. Bern: Peter Lang, pp. 3350.Google Scholar
Burke, V. (2003). Contexts for women's manuscript miscellanies: The case of Elizabeth Lyttleton and Sir Thomas Browne. The Yearbook of English Studies, 33: 316328.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Corblet, J. (1851). Glossaire étymologique et comparatif du patois Picard ancien et moderne, précédé de recherches philologiques et littéraires sur ce dialecte. Paris: Dumoulin.Google Scholar
Cottret, B. (1977). The Huguenots in England: Immigration and Settlement c.1550–1700. P. and A. Stevenson (trans). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Debrie, R. (1984). Glossaire du Moyen Picard. Amiens: Université de Picardie: Centre d'Études Picardes.Google Scholar
Finch, J. S. (ed.) (1986). A Catalogue of the Libraries of Sir Thomas Browne and Dr. Edward Browne, his Son. Leiden: Brill.Google Scholar
Flutre, L.-F. (1970). Le moyen picard d'après les textes littéraires du temps (1560–1660): textes, lexique, grammaire etc. Amiens: Musée de Picardie.Google Scholar
Francard, M. (2000). Langues d'oïl en Wallonie. Brussels: Bureau européen pour les Langues moins repandues.Google Scholar
Henry, A. (1990). Esquisse d'une histoire des mots wallon et Wallonie. Mont-sur-Marchienne: Institut Jules Destrée.Google Scholar
Hessels, J. H. (ed.) (1887–97) (H 87). Ecclesiae Londino-Batavae archivum, 4 vols. Cambridge: Dutch Reformed Church.Google Scholar
Hudson, W. and Tingey, J. (1906). The Records of the City of Norwich, 2 vols. Norwich: Jarrold & Son.Google Scholar
Huguet, E. (1925). Dictionnaire de la Langue Française du Seizième Siècle. Paris: Librairie Ancienne Edouard Champion.Google Scholar
Janssen, H. Q. (1857). De Hervormde Vlugtelingen van Yperen in Engeland. In: Janssen, H. Q. and Dale, J. H. van (eds), Bijdragen tot de Oudheidkunde en Geschiedenis inzonderheid van Zeeuwsch-Vlaanderen, part II. Middelburg: J. C. & W. Altorffer, pp. 211304.Google Scholar
Joby, C. (2014a). The Multilingualism of Constantijn Huygens (1596–1687). Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press.Google Scholar
Joby, C. (2014b). Third-Person singular zero in the Norfolk dialect: a reassessment. Folia Linguistica Historica, 35: 135171.Google Scholar
Joby, C. (2015). The Dutch Language in Britain (1550–1702): A Social History of the Use of Dutch in Early Modern Britain. Leiden: Brill.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Joby, C. (2016). Third-Person singular zero in Norfolk English: an addendum. Folia Linguistica Historica, 37 (1): 3360.Google Scholar
Kellman, S. (ed.) (2003). Switching Languages: Translingual Writers Reflect on Their Craft. London: University of Nebraska Press.Google Scholar
Kibbee, D. (1991). For to Speke Frenche Trewly: The French Language in England, 1000–1600. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kibbee, D. (1996). Emigrant languages and acculturation: The case of Anglo-French. In: Nielsen, H. and Schøsler, L. (eds), The Origins and Development of Emigrant Languages. Odense: Odense University Press, pp. 120.Google Scholar
Koch, P., and Oesterreicher, W. (1985). Sprache der Nähe – Sprache der Distanz. Mündlichkeit und Schriftlichkeit im Spannungsfeld von Sprachtheorie und Sprachgeschichte. Romanistisches Jahrbuch, 36: 1543.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lambley, K. (2013). The Teaching and Cultivation of the French Language in England during Tudor and Stuart Times, 6th edn. s.l.: Emereo Classics.Google Scholar
Landert, D. and Jucker, A. (2011). Private and public in mass media communication. From letters to the editor to online commentaries. Journal of Pragmatics, 43: 14221434.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lodge, R. A. (1993). French: From Dialect to Standard. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Lusignan, S. (2012). Essai d'histoire sociolinguistique. Le français picard au Moyen Âge. Paris: Classiques Garnier.Google Scholar
McColl Millar, R. (2012). Social history and the sociology of language. In: Hernandez-Campoy, J. M. and Conde-Silvestre, J. C. (eds), The Handbook of Historical Sociolinguistics. Oxford: Blackwell, pp. 6380.Google Scholar
McKitterick, D. J. (1978). The Library of Sir Thomas Knyvett of Ashwellthorpe c.1539–1618. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Minervini, L. (2010). Le français dans l'Orient latin (XIIIe–XIVe siècles). Éléments pour la caractérisation d'une scripta du Levant. Revue de Linguistique Romane, 74: 119198.Google Scholar
Moens, W. J. C. (1888–89). The Walloons and their Church at Norwich: Their History and Registers 1565–1832, 2 parts. Lymington: The Huguenot Society.Google Scholar
Nettle, D. and Romaine, S. (2000). Vanishing Voices: The Extinction of the World's Languages. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Oakley, A. (1987). The Canterbury Walloon congregation from Elizabeth I to Laud. In: Scouloudi, I. (ed.), Huguenots in Britain and their French Background, 1550–1800. Basingstoke: Macmillan, pp. 5671.Google Scholar
Posner, R. (1997). Linguistic Change in French. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Pound, J. F. (2004). Government to 1660. In: Rawcliffe, C. and Wilson, R. (eds), Norwich since 1550. London: Hambledon and London, pp. 3562.Google Scholar
Price, G. (ed.) (2000). Languages in Britain and Ireland. Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Rickard, P. (1974). A History of the French Language. London: Hutchinson.Google Scholar
Rickwood, D. L. (1989). The Norwich Dutch and Walloon Strangers’ Book of Orders, 2 vols. MPhil Dissertation, University of East Anglia.Google Scholar
Rye, W. (ed.) (1887). The Norfolk Antiquarian Miscellany, vol. 3. Norwich: A.H. Goose & Co. Google Scholar
Schendl, H. (2012). Multilingualism, code-switching, and language contact in historical sociolinguistics. In: Hernandez-Campoy, J. M. and Conde-Silvestre, J. C. (eds), The Handbook of Historical Sociolinguistics. Oxford: Blackwell, pp. 520533.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schickler, F. de (1892). Les Eglises du Refuge en Angleterre, 3 vols. Paris: Librairie Fischbacher.Google Scholar
Sleiderink, R. (2010). From francophile to francophobe: The changing attitude of medieval Dutch authors towards French literature. In: Kleinhenz, C. and Busby, K. (eds), Medieval Multilingualism: the Francophone World and its Neighbours. Turnhout: Brepols, pp. 127143.Google Scholar
Trotter, D. (2000). Anglo-Norman. In: Price, G. (ed.), Languages in Britain and Ireland. Oxford: Blackwell, pp. 197206.Google Scholar
Trudgill, P. (2010). Investigations in Sociohistorical Linguistics: Stories of Colonisation and Contact. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Valdman, A. (ed.) (1978). Le Français Hors de France. Paris: Editions Honoré Champion.Google Scholar
Wilkins-Jones, C. (ed.) (2008). The Minutes, Donation Book and Catalogue of Norwich City Library Founded in 1608. Norwich: Norfolk Record Society.Google Scholar
Williamson, F. (2014). Social Relations and Urban Space: Norwich, 1600–1700. Woodbridge: The Boydell Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Winfield, P. H. (1925). The Chief Sources of English Legal History. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Wogan-Browne, J. (ed.) (2009), Language and Culture in Medieval Britain: The French of England c. 1100–c. 1500. York: York University Press.Google Scholar
Woods, W. (1993). Publications connected with the Dutch Church in Norwich. In: Virgoe, N. and Williamson, T. (eds), Religious Dissent in East Anglia, Historical Perspectives. Norwich: The Centre of East Anglian Studies, pp. 2936.Google Scholar
Wright, J. (1898–1905). The English Dialect Dictionary, 6 vols. London: Henry Frowde.Google Scholar
Yeager, R. F. (2009). John Gower's French and his Readers. In: Wogan-Browne, J. (ed.), Language and Culture in Medieval Britain: The French of England c. 1100–c. 1500. York: York University Press, pp. 135151.Google Scholar