Part 1

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Heath’s Modern Language Series

AN OUTLINE OF THE PHONOLOGY AND MORPHOLOGY OF OLD PROVENÇAL

BY C. H. GRANDGENT PROFESSOR OF ROMANCE LANGUAGES IN HARVARD UNIVERSITY

Revised Edition

BOSTON, U. S. A. D. C. HEATH & CO., PUBLISHERS 1909

COPYRIGHT, 1905, BY D. C. HEATH & CO.

PREFACE.

This book, which is intended as a guide to students of Romance Philology, represents the result of desultory labors extending through a period of twenty years. My first introduction to the scientific pursuit of Provençal linguistics was a course given by Paul Meyer at the École des Chartes in the winter of 1884-85. Since then I have been collecting material both from my own examination of texts and from the works of those philologists who have dealt with the subject. Besides the large Grammars of the Romance Languages by Diez and by Meyer-Lübke, I have utilized H. Suchier’s _Die französische und provenzalische Sprache_ (in Gröber’s _Grundriss der romanischen Philologie_, I, 561), the _Introduzione grammaticale_ in V. Crescini’s _Manualetto provenzale_, the _Abriss der Formenlehre_ in C. Appel’s _Provenzalische Chrestomathie_, and many special treatises to which reference will be made in the appropriate places. Conscious of many imperfections in my work, I shall be grateful for corrections.

I have confined myself to the old literary language, believing that to be of the greatest importance to a student of Romance Philology or of Comparative Literature, and fearing lest an enumeration of modern forms, in addition to the ancient, might prove too bewildering. I should add that neither my own knowledge nor the material at my disposal is adequate to a satisfactory presentation of the living idioms of southern France. These dialects have, however, been investigated for the light they throw on the geographical distribution of phonetic variations; my chief source of information has been F. Mistral’s monumental _Dictionnaire provençal-français_. Catalan and Franco-Provençal have been considered only incidentally. I have not dealt with word-formation, because one of my students is preparing a treatise on that subject.

Readers desiring a brief description of Provençal literature are referred to H. Suchier and A. Birch-Hirschfeld, _Geschichte der französischen Literatur_, pp. 56-96; A. Stimming, in Gröber’s _Grundriss der romanischen Philologie_, II, ii, pp. 1-69; and A. Restori, _Letteratura provenzale_. For a more extended account of the poets they should consult _Die Poesie der Troubadours_ and the _Leben und Werke der Troubadours_ by F. Diez; and _The Troubadours at Home_ by J. H. Smith. The poetic ideals are discussed by G. Paris in _Romania_, XII, pp. 516-34; and with great fulness by L. F. Mott in _The System of Courtly Love_. The beginnings of the literature are treated by A. Jeanroy in his _Origines de la poésie lyrique en France au moyen âge_, reviewed by G. Paris in a series of important articles in the _Journal des Savants_ (November and December, 1891, and March and July, 1892) reprinted separately in 1892 under the same title as Jeanroy’s book. Contributions by A. Restori to several volumes of the _Rivista musicale italiana_ deal with Provençal music; some tunes in modern notation are to be found in J. H. Smith’s _Troubadours at Home_, and in the _Archiv für das Studium der neueren Sprachen_, CX (New Series X), 110 (E. Bohn).[1] Aside from the editions of individual poets, the best collections of verses are those of C. Appel, _Provenzalische Chrestomathie_; V. Crescini, _Manualetto provenzale_; and K. Bartsch, _Chrestomathie provençale_. Earlier and larger anthologies are M. Raynouard’s _Choix des poésies originales des troubadours_, and C. A. F. Mahn’s _Werke der Troubadours_ and _Gedichte der Troubadours_. The only dictionary of importance for the old language is the _Lexique roman_ (six volumes) of M. Raynouard, augmented by the _Supplement-Wörterbuch_ of E. Levy (now appearing in instalments). The poetic language of the present day can be studied to advantage in E. Koschwitz’s _Grammaire historique de la langue des Félibres_.

C. H. GRANDGENT.

CAMBRIDGE, MASS., NOVEMBER, 1904.

ABBREVIATIONS AND TECHNICAL TERMS.

Abl.: ablative.

Acc.: accusative.

Cl.L.: Classic Latin.

Cond.: conditional.

Cons.: consonant.

Einf.: W. Meyer-Lübke, _Einführung in das Studium der romanischen Sprachwissenschaft_, 1901.

F.: feminine.

Fr.: French.

Free (of vowels): not in position.

Fut.: future.

Gram.: W. Meyer-Lübke, _Grammaire des langues romanes_, 3 vols., 1890-1900.

Grundriss: G. Gröber, _Grundriss der romanischen Philologie_, 2 vols., 1888-1902.

Imp.: imperfect.

Imper.: imperative.

Intertonic (of vowels): following the secondary and preceding the primary accent.

Intervocalic (of consonants): standing between two vowels.

It.: Italian.

Körting: G. Körting, _Lateinisch-romanisches Wörterbuch_, 2d ed., 1901.

Lat.: Latin.

Levy: E. Levy, _Provenzalisches Supplement-Wörterbuch_, 1894-.

Ltblt.: _Literaturblatt für germanische und romanische Philologie_, monthly, Leipzig.

M.: masculine.

Nom.: nominative.

Obj.: objective (case).

Part.: participle.

Perf.: perfect.

Pers.: person.

Phon.: P. Marchot, _Petite phonétique du français prélittéraire_, 1901.

Pl.: plural.

Pr.: Provençal.

Pres.: present.

Pret.: preterit.

Raynouard: M. Raynouard, _Lexique roman_, 6 vols., 1836-44.

Rom.: _Romania_, quarterly, Paris.

Sg.: singular.

V.L.: Vulgar Latin.

Voc.: H. Schuchardt, _Vocalismus des Vulgärlateins_, 3 vols., 1866-68.

Voiced (of consonants): sonant, pronounced with vibration of the glottis.

Voiceless (of consonants): surd, pronounced without glottal vibration.

Vow.: vowel.

Zs.: _Zeitschrift für romanische Philologie_, 4 to 6 nos. a year, Halle.

SIGNS AND PHONETIC SYMBOLS.

N. B.--Phonetic characters not entered in this list are to be pronounced as in Italian. Whenever it is essential to distinguish spelling from pronunciation, _italic_ type is used for the former, Roman for the latter.

· (under a vowel): close quality.

¸ (under a vowel): open quality.

¯ (over a vowel): long quantity.

̆ (over a vowel): short quantity.

̑ (under a letter): semivowel, not syllabic.

´ (over a letter): stress.

´ (after a consonant): palatal pronunciation.

✱ (before a word): conjectural, not found.

＞ (between words or letters): derivation, the _source_ standing at the _open_ end.

+: followed by.

ạ: French _â_ in _pâte_.

ą: French _a_ in _patte_.

β: bilabial _v_, as in Spanish.

c: see k.

c´: palatal _k_, as in English _key_.

ð: English _th_ in _this_.

ẹ: French _é_ in _thé_.

ę: French _ê_ in _fête_.

g: English _g_ in _go_.

g´: palatal _g_, as in English _geese_.

h: English _h_ in _hat_.

ị: French _i_ in _si_.

į: English _ĭ_ in _pit_.

k: English _k_ in _maker_.

k´: see c´.

l´: palatal _l_, as in Italian _figlio_.

n´: palatal _n_, as in Italian _ogni_.

ŋ: English _ng_ in _sing_.

ọ: German _ō_, as in _sohn_.

ǫ: German _ŏ_, as in _sonne_.

r´: palatal _r_.

š: English _sh_ in _ship_.

þ: English _th_ in _thin_.

ụ: German _ū_, as in _gut_.

ų: German _ŭ_, as in _butter_.

ü: French _u_ in _pur_.

w: English _w_ in _woo_.

χ: German _ch_ in _ach_.

y: English _y_ in _ye_.

z: English _z_ in _crazy_.

ž: French _j_ in _jour_.

TABLE OF CONTENTS.

PAGES INTRODUCTION 1-9 PHONOLOGY 10-84 Accent 11-13 Vowels 13-36 _Quantity_ 13-14 _Accented Vowels_ 14-24 a 14-15 ẹ 15-17 ę 17-20 ị 20 ọ 20-21 ǫ 21-23 ụ 23-24 au 24 _Unaccented Vowels_ 24-36 Initial Syllable 25-27 Intertonic Syllable 27-29 Penult 29-32 Final Syllable 32-36 Consonants 37-84 Latin Consonants 37-40 Germanic Consonants 40-41 Greek Consonants 41-42 _Initial Consonants_ 42-44 Single 43-44 Groups 44 _Medial Consonants_ 45-78 Single 47-55 Groups 55-78 _Double Consonants_ 56-57 _Groups Ending in L_ 57-58 _Groups Ending in R_ 58-61 _Groups Ending in W_ 61-62 _Groups Ending in Y_ 63-69 _Groups Beginning with L, M, N, R, or S_ 69-74 _Miscellaneous Groups_ 74-78 _Final Consonants_ 78-81 Single 78-81 Groups 81 _Sporadic Change_ 81-84 Insertion 81-82 Metathesis 82-83 Dissimilation 83-84 MORPHOLOGY 85-146 Declension 85-113 _Nouns_ 85-94 First Declension 90 Second Declension 90-91 Third Declension 91-94 _Adjectives_ 95-99 Comparison 96-97 Numerals 98-99 _Pronouns and Pronominal Adjectives_ 99-113 Articles 100-101 Personal Pronouns 101-105 Possessives 105-107 Demonstratives 107-109 Interrogatives and Relatives 109-110 Indefinite Pronouns and Adjectives 110-113 Conjugation 114-146 _The Four Conjugations_ 114-115 _Fundamental Changes in Inflection_ 116-118 _Infinitive, Present Participle, and Gerund_ 118-119 _Past Participle_ 119-121 _Future and New Conditional_ 121-123 Future Endings 122-123 Conditional Endings 123 _Present_ 123-132 Double Stems 125-126 Peculiar Forms 127-130 Personal Endings 130-132 _Imperfect Indicative_ 132-133 _Preterit, Old Conditional, and Imperfect Subjunctive_ 133-146 Preterit 133-144 _Weak_ 135-138 _Strong_ 138-144 Old Conditional 144-145 Imperfect Subjunctive 145-146 INDEX 147-159

AN OUTLINE OF THE PHONOLOGY AND MORPHOLOGY OF OLD PROVENÇAL.

I. INTRODUCTION.

1. The language here studied is, in the main, that used by the poets of Southern France during the 12th and 13th centuries. The few works that we have earlier than the 12th century must, of course, be utilized for such information as they afford concerning the process of linguistic change; and lacking words or forms must occasionally be sought in writings later than the 13th. Prose literature, moreover, should not be neglected, as it greatly enlarges our vocabulary and throws much light on local divergences. The modern dialects need be cited only to determine the geographical distribution of variations.

2. The extent of the Provençal territory is sufficiently indicated by the map on p. viii. The upper black line separates Provençal on the northwest and north from French, on the northeast from Franco-Provençal; on the east are the Gallo-Italic dialects. The lower black line divides Provençal on the southwest from Basque, on the south from Spanish, on the southeast from Catalan. The boundary line between French and Provençal must be determined somewhat arbitrarily, as there is no distinct natural division; the several linguistic characteristics of each idiom do not end at the same point, and thus one language gradually shades into the other. The line shown on the map is based on the development of free accented Latin a, which remains a in Provençal, but is changed to e in French. The limits of other phonetic phenomena may be found in Suchier’s maps at the back of Vol. I of Gröber’s _Grundriss_. There may be seen also a large map showing the place of Provençal among the Romance languages. Consult, furthermore, P. Meyer in _Romania_, XXIV, 529.

3. The Spanish and Gallo-Italic frontiers are more clearly defined, and Basque is entirely distinct. Franco-Provençal and Catalan, on the other hand, are closely related to Provençal and not always easy to divide from it. Catalan, in fact, is often classed as a Provençal dialect; but it is sufficiently different to be studied separately.[2] Franco-Provençal, rated by some philologists as an independent language, has certain characteristics of Provençal and certain features of French, but more of the latter; in some respects it is at variance with both. The Gascon, or southwest, dialects of Provençal differ in many ways from any of the others and present not a few similarities to Spanish[3]; they will, however, be included in our study.

4. The Provençal domain embraces, then, the following old provinces: Provence, Languedoc, Foix, part of Béarn, Gascony, Guyenne, Limousin, most of Marche, Auvergne, the southwestern half of Lyonnais and the southern half of Dauphiné. The native speech in this region varies considerably from place to place, and the local dialects are, for convenience, roughly grouped under the names of the provinces; it should be remembered, however, that the political and the linguistic boundaries rarely coincide. For some of the principal dialect differences, see §§ 8 and 10-13.

5. The language of the poets was sometimes called _lemosí_; and, in fact, the foundation of their literary idiom is the speech of the province of Limousin and the adjacent territory on the north, west, and southwest.[4] The supremacy of this dialect group is apparently due to the fact that it was generally used for composition earlier than any of the others: popular song, in all probability, had its home in the borderland of Marche[5]; religious literature in the vulgar tongue developed in the monasteries of this region; the artistic lyric was cultivated, we know, at the court of Ventadour, and it must have found favor at others. Furthermore, many of the leading troubadours belonged by birth or residence to the Limousin district.

6. The troubadours’ verses, as we have them, seldom represent any one dialect in its purity. The poet himself was doubtless influenced both by literary tradition and by his particular local usage, as well as by considerations of rhyme and metre. Moreover, his work, before reaching us, passed through the hands of various intermediaries, who left upon it traces of their own pronunciation. It should be said, also, that the Limousin was not a single dialect, but a group of more or less divergent types of speech. For these reasons we must not expect to find in Provençal a uniform linguistic standard.

7. Neither was there a generally accepted system of orthography. When the vulgar tongue was first written, the Roman letters were used with approximately the same values that they had in Latin, as it was then pronounced. As the Provençal sounds changed, there was a conflict between the spellings first established and new notations based on contemporary speech. Furthermore, many Provençal vowels and consonants had no equivalents in Latin; for these we find a great variety of representations. The signs are very often ambiguous: for instance, _c_ before _e_ or _i_ (as in _cen_, _cinc_) generally stands in the first texts for ts, in the more recent ones for s, the pronunciation having changed; _z_ between vowels in early times usually means dz (_plazer_), but later z (_roza_); _i_ between vowels (_maiór_) indicates either y or dž (English _j_), according to the dialect; a _g_ may signify “hard” g (_gerra_), dž (“soft” _g_: _ges_), or tš (English _ch_: _mieg_). It is probable that for a couple of centuries diphthongs were oftenest written as simple vowels.

8. Some features of the mediæval pronunciation are still obscure. The close ọ was transformed, either during or soon after the literary epoch, into ụ (the sound of French _ou_); hence, when we meet in a late text such a word as _flor_, we cannot be certain whether it is to be sounded flọr or flụr. We do not know at what time Latin ū in southern France took the sound ü (French _u_): some suppose that it was during or shortly before the literary period; if this be true, the letter _u_ (as in _tu_, _mur_) may represent in some texts ụ, in others ü. In diphthongs and triphthongs whose first element is written _u_ (_cuer_, _fuolha_, _nueu_, _buou_), this letter came to be pronounced in most of the dialects like French _u_ in _huit_, while in others it retained the sound of French _ou_ in _oui_; we cannot tell exactly when or where, in ancient times, this development occurred. In the diphthongs ue, uo (_luec_, _fuoc_), opinions disagree as to which vowel originally bore the stress; subsequent changes seem to indicate that in the 12th and 13th centuries the practice varied in the different dialects. Old Provençal must have had in some words a peculiar type of r, which was sufficiently palatal in its articulation to call for an i-glide before it (_esclairar_); we do not know precisely how it was formed; in most regions it probably was assimilated to the more usual r as early as the 12th century. The š and ž (palatal s and z) apparently ranged, in the several dialects, between the sounds of French _ch_ and _j_ on the one hand, and those of German _ch_ (in _ich_) and _j_ (in _ja_) on the other; the former types were largely assimilated, doubtless by the 13th century, to s and z (_pois_, _maisó_), the latter were not (_poih_, _maió_).

9. The following table comprises the Old Provençal sounds with their usual spellings, the latter being arranged, as nearly as may be, in the order of their frequency. Diphthongs and triphthongs are included in the vowel list, compound consonants in the consonant table. For an explanation of the phonetic symbols, see p. vii. The variant pronunciations are discussed in § 8.

VOWELS.

SOUND. SPELLINGS. EXAMPLES.

ạ _a_ _pan_

ą _a_ _car_

ai _ai_, _ay_ _paire_, _cays_

au _au_ _autre_

ẹ _e_ _pena_

ę _e_ _cel_

ẹi _ei_, _ey_ _vei_, _veyre_

ęi _ei_, _ey_ _seis_, _teysser_

ẹu _eu_ _beure_

ęu _eu_ _breu_

ị _i_, _y_ _amic_, _ydola_ ię _ie_, _e_ _quier_, _velh_

ięi _iei_, _iey_, _ei_ _ieis_, _lieys_, _leit_

ięu _ieu_, _eu_ _mieu_, _deus_

ịu _iu_ _estiu_

ọ (or ụ) _o_, _u_ _corre_, _sun_

ǫ _o_ _cors_

ọi _oi_, _oy_ _conoisser_, _oyre_

ǫi _oi_, _oy_ _pois_, _poyssán_

ọu _ou_ _dous_

ǫu _ou_ _mou_

ụ: see ọ, ü

ü (or ụ?) _u_ _mut_

uę, üę _ue_, _o?_ _cuec_, _olh?_

uęi, üęi _uei_, _uey_, _oi?_ _cueissa_, _pueyssas_, _oit?_

uęu, üęu _ueu_, _ou?_ _nueu_, _bou?_

üi _ui_, _uy_ _cuit_, _duy_

uǫ, üǫ _uo_, _o_ _gruoc_, _folha_

uǫi, üǫi _uoi_, _oi_ _puoi_, _noit_

uǫu, üǫu _uou_, _ou_ _pluou_, _ou_

CONSONANTS.

SOUND. SPELLING. EXAMPLES.

b _b_, _bb_ _bel_, _abbat_

d _d_ _don_

dz _z_, _c_ _plazer_, _dicén_

dž _i_, _g_, _tg_, _gg_, _ioc_, _gen_, _paratge_, _viagge_, _ti_, _tgi_, _ih_ _coratie_, _lotgiar_, _puihar_

ð _d_ _veder_

f _f_, _ph_ _fer_, _phizica_

g _g_, _gu_ _gras_, _guan_, _guerra_

h (Gascon) _h_, _f?_ _ham_, _fe?_[6]

k _c_, _qu_, _k_, _g_ _cais_, _quar_, _quer_, _ki_, _longs_[7]

l _l_, _ll_ _leu_, _belleza_

l´ _lh_, _ill_, _ilh_, _fuelha_, _meillor_, _failha_, _ll_, _l_, _il_, _vellar_, _viel_, _voil_, _fiyl_, _yl_, _yll_, _li_ _fayllentia_, _filia_

m _m_, _mm_ _mes_, _commanda_

n _n_, _nn_ _nas_, _annat_