Randy Maison, age 14, of Baton Rouge, La., for his question:
WHEN DID THE FRENCH LANGUAGE ORIGINATE?
French is one of the Romance languages. It developed from Latin when Julius Caesar conquered Gaul, or France, in the 50s B.C.
The Gauls gradually adopted the language of the Roman soldiers, but tended to change the vocabulary on the basis of the way the words sounded.
The new French language that developed actually kept only a few of the old Gaulish words. Only about 360 Gaulish words are part of the modern language.
When the Franks invaded Gaul during the A.D. 400s, they gave their name to the country and also contributed about 1,000 words to the language. Then the Norsemen occupied northern France in the 800s and also added 909 of their words. Some additional words also came from Greek.
As the language developed, the grammar changed also. And by the 700s, popular Latin had evolved so completely into the language that few persons could read Latin without the aid of a dictionary.
By the 900s, two distinct dialects of Old French were spoken in the north and south. But the dialect of the language spoken in the area around Paris became the accepted tongue throughout France.
The Renaissance added learned Greek and Latin words to the French vocabulary. and contacts with the Spaniards and Italians in the 1500s brought still additional words.
By the 1700s, writers and scholars standardized the structure of the French language. Today, French is considered one of the clearest and most precise of all languages.
Today, more than 80 million people speak French as their mother tongue, and millions of others use it as a second language.
French is the official language of France, of course, but it is also an official language in Belgium, Canada, Haiti, Luxembourg, Switzerland and the United Nations.
Experts consider French to be a beautiful and harmonious language. It has served for hundreds of years as the language of diplomats. Its clear style. and regular syntax, or arrangement of words, make it ideal for legal, diplomatic and business use.
About half of the words in the English language come from French. English began to absorb French words after the Norman conquest of England in 1066.
Thousands of French terms have been adopted, in whole or in part, into English.
Pronunciation of French is often difficult for English speaking people. The French rarely pronounce final consonants except for the letters C, F, L and R. Nasal sounds occur in syllables ending in N or M. And the French R, pronounced with the uvula at the back of the soft palate, sounds throatier than the English R.