What a success, Wow!
just for MY fun:
Today french, spite its complicated orthographic system, specially for vowels, is exemplar for its lack of true diphtongs, except pseudo-diphtongs resulting of vowel-consonnant groups giving vowels/semi-vowels (sometimes foreign words), or sometimes previously true opening diphtongs resulting into semi-vowels/vowels groups (I don’t add the nasalized group concerning only the opening diphtongs):
/aj/ [FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]canaille / ‘Thaï’ / ‘cobaye’ [/FONT]– /Aj/ [FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]rail / paille – [/FONT]/Ej/ [FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]paye / treille – [/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]/[/FONT]j/ [FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]‘boy’ – [/FONT]/ij/ [FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]bille – [/FONT]/j/ [FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]treuil / cueille – [/FONT]/uj/ rouille[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif][/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]– [/FONT]
/ja/ [FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]paria / scia – /je/ [FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]pied / scié / scier –[/FONT] /jE/ [FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]biais / sciait / [/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]miel – [/FONT]/jo/ [FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]radio / chiot / signaux – [/FONT]/jO/[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif] pieu / cieux – [/FONT]/ju/ [FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]‘Sioux’ – [/FONT]/wa/ [FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]toi / soie – [/FONT]/wA/ [FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]roi / bois – [/FONT]/we/ [FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]roué / fouée – [/FONT]/wE/ [FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]rouet / fouet / douaire / souhait / [/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]- [/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]& : today the opposition between [/FONT]/a/ [FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]and [/FONT]/A/[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif] is fading out even when backed by etymology[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif] - [/FONT][/FONT]
[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]W[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]hen two vowels are in contact in today French, they keep their individuality and are for the most in two different syllabes : for the most for[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]e[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]ign or rather loan words, or words wh[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]e[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]re an ancient ‘h’ disappeared :[/FONT][/FONT]
[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]cahot – néon[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]--[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif] – cahute – paysan [/FONT]/pE,izA0/ [FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]sometimes in [/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]regions[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif] : [/FONT]/pEjzA0/ [FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]– [/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]‘Mohican’ – ‘[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]béotien’ - ‘néophyte’ – ‘maïs’ …[/FONT][/FONT]
[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]But the most if not the totality of the monophtongs of today French spelled with 2 or 3 signs are ancient diphtongs or triphtongs ; and a lot of Oïl dialects have kept these vowels or vowels/semi-vowels groups ; someones are true multi-vowels groups spite not [FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]all of them [/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]of latine origin but rather of romance origin under Celtic and Germanic influences, others were born thanks to vocalization of previous implosive ‘l’ (it occurred in English, Dutch, Breton…*) ; the western Oïl dialects by instance were until recently (before they faded out for the most) very found of these sounds [/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]groups,[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif] true phonems or not :[/FONT][/FONT]
‘[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]Gallo’ or ‘Gallais’ (« french », in fact old Angevine of Eastern Brittany) could pronounce, according to words and places :[/FONT]
[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]boire (beire) /’ae//’aE//’Ee//’EI//we/ – haie /’ae//’aE//’Ee//’EI/ also /a//A/ – peur (pour) / cou /’«O//’O//U/ also /u/ – beau / veau /’jaU//jo./ – eau /’jaU//jo.//’EU/ also /Ev/[/FONT]
– [FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]côte /o/ also /o/ –[/FONT]
[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]As we can see the diphtongaison is not always tied to an ancient diphtong or to a group vowel/L (all French dialects had previously a diphtong for this last etymon part). A lot of them are secondary diphtongaisons.[/FONT]
[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]Poitevin (very local): spontaneous diphtongaisons without etymologic background : linked to the stress accent of phrase more than of word :[/FONT]
[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]mouchoir /mu’Sae/ [FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]>> [/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]mouchoir-de-[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]nez[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif] [/FONT]/mu’Sa d ‘nae/[/FONT]
[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]gros[/FONT] /gry/ [FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]>> [/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]gros père [/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]/gro ‘[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]paer[/FONT][FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]/[/FONT][/FONT]
[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]* : ‘au’ : haut (alt-), coq = jau (gall-), vau (vall-)[/FONT]
‘[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]eau’ : beau (bell-), sceau (sigell-), oiseau (aucell-/avicell-), veau (vitell-)[/FONT]
‘[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]ou’ << ‘ol(l)-’ : cou/col, fou/folle, mou/molle + doux/douce (dulc-), pouce (pulic-), pou, [/FONT]
[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]# pour, tour, poupée, roux, caillou, pourceau, pouvoir… (no -OL in etymons).[/FONT]
[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]Except concerning the recent spontaneous unstable diphtongs or triphtongs of Poitevin, the Northern Oîl « parlers » had conserved all kinds of primary spontaneous diphtongs based on long E :[/FONT]
[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]the chain of sounds was, simplified and according to places : éé : > èé > aé > aï (+ aa) > oï > oé > oa (+ ôô) > wa : the /wa/ stage is appeared in rather Northern (Picard) and Northeastern (Champenois) before to reach Paris. During a long time the French gentry in Paris and elsewhere pronounced /we/ what is seen today by profane people as a sign of « rurality » ! Concerning etymologic sounds, a lot of places in France kept until rather recently some non-standard pronounciations for au, eau : ‘aw’, ‘yaw’, ‘yo’ :[/FONT]
[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]look at French : Le veau a été trouvé en haut de la côte avec une plaie au cou.[/FONT]
[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]Standard : /l ‘vo a e’te tru’ve A ‘o d la ‘ko.t avEk yn ‘plE o ‘ku/[/FONT]
[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]qqpart West : /’l’vjaU a ‘te tr’w A ‘haU dla ‘kUt avk yn ‘plae o ‘kO/ [/FONT]
[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]It’s true fats speach tends to partly reduce the diphtong « aperture ».[/FONT]
[FONT=Liberation Serif, serif]All these dialectal habits applied to French has been left since a long time now and can be heard only when some people speak or trie to speak ancient dialects, « patois » as say Fench folks. But the very drastic monophtongaison of standerd French seems a (unconscient?) tentative to reduce difficulties for people coming from very different langages areas. The process of « discolouring » of French speach in big towns[/FONT]
