English and French: A millennium of common history

Before the Norman Conquest, English was a pure Germanic language imported by Angles, Saxons and Jutes invaders. It was slowly replacing Celtic idioms during the fifth century in a country formerly occupied by the Romans during four centuries. French was born during the Roman occupation by slowly mixing Latin words into the Gaulish, a Celtic-based language that was spoken in Gaul before the Romans and the Franks invaded. When William of Normandy was crowned King of England in 1066, French became the language of the English court, administration and nobility for three centuries. When Joan of Arc kicked the English out of France in 1430 during the Hundred Years’war, French started to be less and less spoken in England. But at that time, the English language was much like the French. Then each language started maturing following separated paths. In order to help English to become a noble and scientific language, English people started to import a lot of Latin words that are still used as it*, as opposed to French where most Latin words underwent a transformation. Starting from the eighteenth century, French attracted a lot of English words. As a result, some words even made a return trip from French to English and back to French like flirt, originally conter fleurette in Middle Age French and now also used in French.

* Examples: genius, vacuum, millennium, alumni, census, acumen, emporium, fiat, impetus, omen, magnum opus, per capita, per diem, per annum, appendix, asylum, data, delirium, dilemma, enigma, formula, museum, pauper, vertigo, versus, …