I. The Occitan Language
Our language is mainly spoken in France where it is not officialized in spite of a huge number of claims from its speakers. It is also spoken in Italy (Las Valadas) and Spain (Val d'Aran), where it has an official status. The word Occitan, already in use more than 700 years ago, comes from "òc" (mainly pron. [ò]) which means "yes" in our language. Currently it is difficult to know its exact number of speakers but it's worth noting that Occitan was THE European language in the Middle Ages (remember the Trobadors). Nowadays, lots of people try to protect the original language of Occitània but the harm's already done: like other languages of the french State, Occitan is very endangered. I hope this modest page (my modest contribution to a Country I love) will bring its small brick to the wall of survival of polida lenga nòstra. Never forget before learning our language that, despite what claims France to make a fool of us, Occitan is not a dialect or a patois of French; it is a true language with its own rules; a language written and sung much before French (French is nothing more than le patois du roi (the king's dialect) itself…)
Why should someone learn Occitan?
The first masterpieces of the european litterature come mainly from the Trobadors. Knowing their language can help the reading of these texts and the penetration of their culture. Nowadays Occitan is spoken, above all in France, by speakers who are often ashamed of speaking their own language because of french educational system. If you know France you have certainly noticed that speakers from the South speak French with an "accent". This accent is caused by the Occitan substratum. If you come to them and show Occitan is not a contagious disease, it will help our language to recover its rights in its Country. Moreover, because of its roots, Occitan can be an excellent bridge to those who want to learn easily, Catalan, Italian, French or Portuguese. Some claim (and justly!) that it is easier to shade one's thoughts in Occitan than in any other european language: Occitan has more than 160,000 words (French: about 40,000).
Where is Occitan spoken? Which dialects*?
Occitan is spoken in the South of the french State (Miègjorn de la França = French Midi). We now call this linguistic area Occitània. Occitània has 13 million inhabitants and its surface area is 190,000 km2.
Occitan's closest language is obviously Catalan. Lots of linguists even consider that Occitan and Catalan are the same language. Occitan is closer to Catalan, Spanish, Portuguese and Italian than French.
*The word 'dialect' means here 'linguistic variant of a language'. It has not the racist meaning used in France, where 'dialect' means Untersprache (=everything which is not French...) Provençal is a dialect of Occitan the same way US English or Cockney are dialects of standard English.
The main dialects are:
- Southern Occitan: Gascon, Languedocian, Provençal
- Northern Occitan: Limousin dialect, Auvergne dialect, Alpine Provençal
It is already essential to point out the fact that there is no dominant dialect. Each dialect is Occitan and the intercomprehension between each dialect is good (even with Catalan). The dialect we will learn here is Languedocian. This dialect is the most conservative among Occitan dialects and is thus the best bridge to the other dialects. See in Chapter VI examples of texts in different dialects.
To see the main characteristics of each Occitan dialect click here.
Que vòstra volontat nos ajude a salvar nòstres mots…
II. The pronunciation of Languedocian:
To present the basic pronunciation of the Lengadòc's Occitan I will make comparisons with the closest latin languages: Spanish, Catalan and French. I'll also try to give an English approximate pronunciation, when it's possible...
Vowels:
| Letter | Pronunciation |
|---|---|
| A (beginning or in a word); À | French, Spanish papa ~English butter |
| A (end of a word); Á; Ò | Fr and Catalan port Eng John |
| E, É | Fr marché, Spa de |
| È | Fr après, Cat fet, Ger Mädchen, Eng get |
| O, Ó | Fr Toulouse, German Mutter, Eng fool |
| I, Í | Fr souris, Eng kill |
| U, Ú | Fr Lune, Ger für |
Consonants:
| Letter | Pronunciation | Letter | Pronunciation |
|---|---|---|---|
| B,V (beg. of a word) | Spa botella, vino Eng beer |
R (beginning of a word); RR | Spa ratón, tierra, It terra |
| B, V (in a word) | Spa hubo, uva | R (in a word) | Spa pero, It però |
| C (in front of a,o,u); QU | Eng kill | R (end of a word) | Isn't pronounced |
| C (in front of e,i); Ç; S; SC; SS | Spa salir Eng salt |
T | Fr tante, Eng tell |
| D | Spa dedo Eng daddy |
X | Eng exam |
| F | Fra fils Eng film |
Z | Fr zéro, Eng zoo |
| G (in front a,o,u); GU (in front e,i) | Spa garganta Eng get |
LH | Spa botella, Cat lluna, Italian famiglia, Eng Million |
| G (in front of e,i), J | Eng John | NH | Spa niño, Eng Kenya |
| G (end of a word); TG; TJ; CH | Spa mucho, Cat freig, Eng church | TZ | Ger zuviel, Hebrew kibbuts |
| L | Fr lune, Eng link | GN | It anno |
| M | Eng mother | ||
| N; M (end of a word); MP | Fr nez, Eng nose | ||
| P | Fr papa, Eng put |
The Occitan Alphabet
The tonic stress in Occitan
- Words which end by a vowel, an s or an n (only in conjugation): stress on the last but one syllable
- Words which end by a consonant (but s) or a diphthong: stress on the last syllable
- The exceptions wear a written accent on the stressed syllable.
Examples:
La mecanica; destriar; cuélher; cantan; penós; gaton
Just type on your keyboard ALT, keep pressed this key and type the following numbers. When you release the ALT key the letter will appear.
| 0225 á | 0233 é | 0237 í | 0243 ó | 0250 ú | 0231 ç |
| 0224 à | 0232 è | 0242 ò | |||
| 0193 Á | 0201 É | 0205 Í | 0211 Ó | 0218 Ú | 0199 Ç |
| 0192 À | 0200 È | 0210 Ò |
Some distinctive features of each Occitan dialects
Lengadocian:
It is the most conservative dialect and that's the reason why it became the root of standard normalized Occitan. Like in Spanish and Catalan, V is pronounced B. Vida is pronounced [bido].
In Southern Lengadocian final -CH becomes -IT. Hence fach (done) becomes fait.
Eastern Lengadocian is really close to Provençal.
Provençal:
It became differentiated from Lengadocian in the XVI Century only. This may explain why in nowadays English the word Provençal is used instead of Occitan to name our language.
Provençal is a famous dialect thanks to the fabulous work of Provençal poets such as Frederic Mistral. Mistral (Nobel Prize in Litterature) wrote an incredible number of masterpieces in his own dialect (the Southern Rhone dialect), by means of a special spelling (gràfia mistralenca). This spelling is not that far from standardized Occitan and is the one used to write places' names in Provence (Aix-en-Provence is written Ais-de-Provença in normalized Occitan and Ais-de-Prouvènço in Mistralian).
V is pronounced V. Vida is pronounced [vido] or [vid].
Final -L and -LH become -U. Provençal becomes Provençau [Proovenssaw]; cèl (sky) is cèu.
R is not rolled; it is mainly pronounced the French (Parisian) way.
Final consonants are not pronounced. Parlar (to speak), parlat (spoken) are pronounced [parlà].
Numerous nasalization: pan (bread) is [pã].
Open o (ò) often diphthongizes in [wò], everywhere but in the Rhone region. Bòn (good) is pronounced [bwòn].
1st person of singular in present tense is -e in the Rhone region, -i in maritime Provençal and -o in alpine Provençal.
Gascon:
Like Castilian Spanish, Gascon was under the influence of the Basque language which explains the majority of its oddities.
Initial F- becomes H. Thus, filha (girl) becomes hilha [hilyo]. Compare with Spanish hija!
Final Latin -LL becomes -TH (pronounced -t', -tch,...). Latin aucell(u) -> ausèth.
Intervocalic Latin -LL- becomes -R. Bella -> bèra.
As in Provençal, final -L becomes -U.
Intervocalic -N- disappears. Una (one) becomes ua.
Initial R- often becomes ARR-. Riu (river) becomes arriu. Compare with Spanish rio/arroyo!
QU- and GU- are pronounced [kw] and [gw].
V is pronounced B.
Common metathesis of -R-. Languedocian cambra (room) becomes cramba.
Oddities in conjugation: enunciative particles added to the verb: que (assertion), e (interrogation), be (exclamation). Preterit is done in -èc and -oc (instead of -èt).
Northern Occitan (Auvernhat, Lemosin, Provençal Aupin):
The characteristics of Northern dialects is the transformation of -CA into -CHA and -GA into -JA. Example: cantar (to sing) becomes chantar; galina (hen) becomes jalina.
Most of final consonants are not pronounced.
V is pronounced V.
As in Provençal, final -L becomes -U.
Common aphaeresis (disapppearance of initial vowel): aquò -> 'quò; una -> 'na, etc.