Note V. p. . Notices of Language in the Tenth Century

The notices of language which we come across in our authors are often highly curious. The Romance languages are now just beginning to be felt to be really languages, and not mere vulgar dialects of Latin. We get perhaps our first glimpse of this feeling in Nithard’s description (iii. 5) of the famous oath of Strassburg in 842. The two languages, the parents of modern High-Dutch and modern French, are distinguished as “lingua Teudisca” and “lingua Romana.” Charles the Bald himself spoke Lingua Romana; Pertz, Legg. i. 472. “Romana,” Romance, is the usual description of the new language, as distinguished from the classical “Latina,” though we have seen (see p. ) at least one instance where “Latinus sermo” means the popular Romance. In the course of the next century the language became nationalized, and in Richer (iv. 100) it appears as “lingua Gallica,” which becomes its usual later name. I leave to professed philologers to fix the exact relation of the “lingua Romana” of Nithard to French and to Provençal respectively. For my purpose it is enough that it is Romance, as distinguished both from Latin and from Teutonic.

We also in the course of the narratives of Flodoard and Richer come across several curious passages where the Romance and Teutonic languages are opposed to each other. Thus Charles the Simple has a conference at Worms with Henry of Saxony (“Heinricus Transrhenensis”), when (Richer, i. 20) “Germanorum Gallorumque juvenes, linguarum idiomate offensi, ut eorum mos est, cum multa animositate maledictis sese lacessire cœperunt.” In 948 Lewis and Otto attend a synod, where letters are read in Latin, and are translated “propter reges juxta Teutiscam linguam.” (Flod. in an.; Pertz, iii. 396.) Lewis therefore spoke German no less than Otto. Otto however (see Widukind, ii. 36) could speak French on occasion (“Romana lingua Slavanicaque loqui scit”), which makes the employment of German still more important. In 981 Hugh Capet and Otto the Second met. Otto spoke Latin, and a Bishop translated his speech to Hugh. (Richer, iii. 85.) Hugh therefore did not understand German, and the Romance which he spoke had departed so far from Latin that Latin needed an interpreter. In 996 certain Gaulish and German Bishops meet (Richer, iv. 100), and the Bishop of Verdun is chosen to speak “eo quod linguam Gallicam norat.” The Lotharingian prelate could doubtless speak both languages. These passages seem enough to make out the view which I have everywhere maintained, that throughout the tenth century the Carolingian Kings at Laon were a strictly German dynasty, speaking German as their mother-tongue, while the Dukes and Kings of Paris were already French.

Sir Francis Palgrave’s assertion (i. 72) that “the German Ritterschaft of Otho the Great raised the war-cry in French” is an evident misconception of the passage in Widukind (ii. 17) on which it seems to be grounded. The historian is clearly speaking of the Lotharingian borderers who spoke both languages. His words are simply, “Ex nostris etiam fuere, qui Gallica lingua ex parte loqui sciebant, qui clamore in altum Gallice levato, exhortati sunt adversarios ad fugam.”

Of the speed with which French displaced Danish as the language of Normandy, I have said something in p. . For the retention of the ancient speech at Bayeux, after it had been forgotten at Rouen, our chief authority is Dudo, 112 D; “Quoniam quidem Rotomagensis civitas Romana potius quam Dacisca utitur eloquentia, et Baiocacensis fruitur frequentius Dacisca lingua quam Romana; volo igitur ut ad Baiocacensia deferatur quantocius mœnia, et ibi volo ut sit, Botho, sub tua custodia, et enutriatur et educetur cum magna diligentia, fervens loquacitate Dacisca, tamque discens tenaci memoria, ut queat sermocinari profusius olim contra Dacigenas.” (“Contra sermocinari,” in Dudo’s language, is simply to converse with.) So Benoît, 11520;

“Si à Roem le faz garder
E norir, gaires longement
Il ne saura parlier neient
Daneis, kar nul l’i parole.
Si voil qu’il seit a tele escole
Ou l’en le sache endoctriner
Que as Daneis sache parler.
Ci ne sevent riens fors romanz;
Mais à Baiues en a tanz
Qui ne sevent si Daneis non:
E pur ceo, sire quens Boton,
Voil que vos l’aiez ensemble od vos.”

Wace (Roman de Rou, 2502) says only

“Richart sout en Daneiz, en Normant parler.”

Here “Normant” can mean nothing but French, but it is less clear what he means by it in v. 2377, where we read,

“Cosne sout en Thioiz et en Normant parler.”

Wace probably meant French, but he seems to have misunderstood a passage of Dudo (99, 100) which contains a curious notice of the use of the Danish language, the force of which Dudo himself seems hardly to have understood. William is at a conference with Henry of Germany (really with Otto). Certain Lotharingians and Saxons talk to their own chief Cono; William, by his knowledge of Danish, understands them (“per Daciscam linguam quæ dicebant subsannantes, intelligendo subaudit”). The Saxon Duke Hermann afterwards speaks to William in Danish, and being asked how the Saxons came to understand that language, explains the fact by the constant incursions of the Northmen. Duke Hermann might very well understand Danish, and might speak Danish to William; but the Saxons and Lotharingians would not speak Danish to Cono. What the story seems to point to is that the Low-Dutch of Saxony and Lower Lorraine was so far intelligible to one who understood Danish that he could guess at the general meaning of what was said.

But the most remarkable notice of language at all is to be found in the Tours Chronicle in Duchesne, Rer. Franc. Scriptt. iii. 360, which records the homage of Rolf to Charles (see p. ), and the traditional origin of the name Bigot as applied to the Normans. When Rolf is called on to kiss the King’s feet, “lingua Anglica respondit, Ne se bigoth, quod interpretatur, non per Deum, rex vero et sui illum deridentes, et sermonem ejus corrupte referentes, illum vocaverunt Bigoth. Unde Normanni adhuc Bigothi dicuntur” (see Wace, 9907, et seqq.). Here we read that this famous refusal of Rolf to abase himself was made in a language which by Frankish hearers was looked upon as English. That Rolf spoke English in any strict sense is most unlikely; the tongue in which he answered was doubtless his native Danish. Nor is it enough to say, with Sir F. Palgrave (i. 700), that any Teutonic speech was loosely called English by the French; for Rolf was speaking in the presence of a prince whose native speech was undoubtedly Teutonic. But Charles the Frank spoke High-Dutch; Rolf the Dane spoke a language which, in a wide sense of the words, might be called Low-Dutch. England was the most famous and most familiar country of the Low-Dutch speech, and the Scandinavian talk of Rolf was by his Frankish hearers accordingly set down as English.