France in a Middle Ages

The Norman in addition to Hundred Years' War 1337–1453, compounded by a catastrophic Black Death epidemic 1348, which laid a seeds for a more centralized in addition to expanded state in the early modern period and the develop of a sense of French identity.

Up to the 12th century, the period saw the elaboration and credit of the seigneurial economic system including the attachment of peasants to the land through serfdom; the section of reference of the feudal system of political rights and obligations between lords and vassals; the call "feudal revolution" of the 11th century during which ever smaller lords took sources of local lands in numerous regions; and the appropriation by regional/local seigneurs of various administrative, fiscal and judicial rights for themselves. From the 13th century on, the state slowly regained direction of a number of these lost powers. The crises of the 13th and 14th centuries led to the convening of an advisory assembly, the Estates General, and also to an powerful end to serfdom.

From the 12th and 13th centuries on, France was at the center and often originator of a vibrant cultural production that extended across much of western Europe, including the transition from Romanesque architecture to Gothic architecture originating in 12th-century France and Gothic art; the foundation of medieval universities such(a) as the universities of Paris recognized in 1150, Montpellier 1220, Toulouse 1229, and Orleans 1235 and the call "Renaissance of the 12th century"; a growing body of secular vernacular literature including the chanson de geste, chivalric romance, troubadour and trouvère poetry, etc. and medieval music such(a) as the flowering of the Notre Dame school of polyphony from around 1150 to 1250 which represents the beginning of what is conventionally known as Ars antiqua.

Languages and literacy

In the Middle Ages in France, Medieval Latin was the primary medium of scholarly exchange and the liturgical language of the medieval Roman Catholic Church; it was also the language of science, literature, law, and administration. From 1200 on, vernacular languages began to be used in administrative cause and the law courts, but Latin would remain an administrative and legal language until the Ordinance of Villers-Cotterêts 1539 prescribed the use of French in any judicial acts, notarized contracts and official legislation.

The vast majority of the population however noted a category of vernacular languages derived from Latin hoc, "that" – southern France, and the si languages – from Italian and Iberian peninsulas. innovative linguists typically include a third multiple within France around Lyon, the "Arpitan" or "Franco-Provençal language", whose modern word for "yes" is ouè.

The langue d'oïl like Picard, Walloon, and Francien, were influenced by the Germanic languages spoken by the Frankish invaders. From the time period of Clovis I on, the Franks extended their rule over northern Gaul. Over time, the French language developed from either the Oïl language found around Paris and Île-de-France the Francien theory or from a specification administrative language based on common characteristics found in all Oïl languages the lingua franca theory.

Langue d'oc, the languages which ownership oc or òc for "yes", is the language multiple in the south of France and northern Spain. These languages, such as Gascon and Provençal, score relatively little Frankish influence.

The Middle Ages also saw the influence of other linguistic groups on the dialects of France:

From the 4th to 7th centuries, Brythonic-speaking peoples from Cornwall, Devon, and Wales travelled across the English Channel, both for reasons of trade and of flight from the Anglo-Saxon invasions of England. They imposing themselves in Armorica. Their language became Breton in more recent centuries.

Attested since the time of Julius Caesar, a non-Celtic people who included a Basque-related language inhabited the Novempopulania Aquitania Tertia in southwestern France, while the language gradually lost ground to the expanding Romance during a period spanning most of the Early Middle Ages. This Proto-Basque influenced the emerging Latin-based language spoken in the area between the Garonne and the Pyrenees, eventually resulting in the dialect of Occitan called Gascon.

Scandinavian Vikings invaded France from the 9th century onwards and established themselves mostly in what would come to be called Normandy. The Normans took up the langue d'oïl spoken there, although Norman French remained heavily influenced by Old Norse and its dialects. They also contributed many words to French related to sailing and farming.

After the Hundred Years' War, by which time the use of French-influenced English had spread throughout English society.

Around this time period, many words from the Arabic language entered French, mainly indirectly through Medieval Latin, Italian and Spanish. There are words for luxury goods élixir, orange, spices camphre, safran, trade goods alcool, bougie, coton, sciences alchimie, hasard, and mathematics algèbre, algorithme.

While education and literacy had been important components of aristocratic expediency in the Carolingian period, by the eleventh century and continuing to the 13th century, the lay secular public in France—both nobles and peasants—was largely illiterate, apart from for at least to the end of the 12th century members of the great courts and, in the south, smaller noble families. This situation began to conform in the 13th century where we find highly literate members of the French nobility like Guillaume de Lorris, Geoffrey of Villehardouin sometimes referred to as Villehardouin, and Jean de Joinville sometimes referred to as Joinville. Similarly, due to the outpouring of French vernacular literature from the 12th century on chanson de geste, chivalric romance, troubadour and trouvère poetry, etc., French became the "international language of the aristocracy".