English/French code-switching in later medieval charters

Abstract

The spoken use of French in later medieval England cannot be recovered, except insofar as it may be inferred from surviving documents. The use in medieval Latin charters of the French definite article (FA) determining an English Noun (EN) is here taken to be a textually preserved remnant of spoken usage. Following earlier work by Ingham (2009), the FA + EN phenomenon is studied quantitatively, showing that the FA + EN construction occurs where it would accord with code-switching constraints observed in contemporary bilingual communities. Attention is paid in particular to the appearance or otherwise of the phenomenon in contexts featuring a possessive and an adjectival modifier of the Noun, where a clear structural contrast is obtained, as predicted on the assumption that spoken code-switching lay behind the establishment of the charter text. It is further shown that FA+EN is more frequent with a monosyllabic than a polysyllabic Noun, for which a prosodic explanation is proposed, in keeping with the hypothesis that the phenomenon was originally oral. This support for the existence of spoken bilingualism from the 13th century onwards in a professional environment fits the timeframe, furthermore, for the well-known expansion in the penetration of French loan words into English. Alternative explanations that have been proposed for the FA + EN phenomenon are considered but found to be inadequate.