Penetration of French-origin lexis in Middle English occupational domains

Abstract

Abstract This study reassesses whether the contact influence of French on Middle English should continue to be conceptualised essentially as high-status prestige borrowing. French-origin items were found to constitute an average of 27% of the specific lexis of six occupational domains collected in the Bilingual Thesaurus of Mediaeval English Occupations ( Sylvester, Marcus & Ingham 2017 ), such as trade, building and farming. Corresponding figures for Scandinavian and Dutch loans were far lower. For French to have permeated the lexis of these domains so extensively, speakers of French must have interacted significantly with English users in such occupations. Contact with French evidently exerted influence not only on the language of social elite pursuits, but also on that of the technology relating to everyday occupations.

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