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Q&A

Comments on Modern English words originating in Norman

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Modern English words originating in Norman

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Where should I learn about words that came into Modern English most likely from Norman?

Please example some words which most likely came to Modern English only from Norman (i.e. words which are likely not to arrive from Common Brittonic and/or Anglo-Saxon German).

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Post Feedback (1 comment)
Certain suffixes indicate a likely French origin, including -tion, -ence, -ance, -ic, and -ian. Howev... (1 comment)
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If you rephrase this question to ask about "the influence of Norman French on English", you will discover a myriad of searchable sources and references, and the book Contact: The Interaction of Closely Related Linguistic Varieties and the History of English (2016 Edinburgh University Press).

The linguistic influence comes from the societal change: the French-speaking invaders established their government and conducted their affairs in Norman French. People who had to deal with their new lords learned their language; then vocabulary diffused through the rest of the society. When the Normans had a concept that Middle English did not, the French word became dominant: parliament, joust, mustard. In other cases it became fashionable to use a French term to distinguish oneself from the masses, and both words remain with similar meanings: cow/beef, sheep/mutton, pig/pork are especially obvious. Seek a social change to explain a linguistic change and you will generally be successful.

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Cow versus beef (1 comment)
Cow versus beef
Jirka Hanika‭ wrote almost 3 years ago

The last example is especially eloquent. That cow/sheep/pig are parallel but not quite synonymous with beef/mutton/pork. You use the Germanic word if you feed it, you use the Norman word if you eat it.

Having a different word for a "cow", for "(horned) cattle", and for beef, isn't at all unusual even in many other languages. But the particular way how these words settled in English reflects particular post-invasion circumstances.