Langue d’Oc and Langue d’Oil: The old French languages

The word “langue” in French means “tongue” or “language”. Historically, the area that is now known as France had so many different languages and dialects, that it was broken down into two parts: Langue d’Oc and Langue d’Oil.

Dating back to the Gallo-Roman era, both are Romance languages and the predecessor to the French language. However, the differences in the Langue d’Oc vs Langue d’Oil languages were classified based on the response to the prominent word “yes”.

Langue d’oïl

Langue d’oïl designates the ancient northern Gallo-Romance languages where the word for “yes” was “oïl.”  Today, this “yes” translates to “oui” in French, and the current dominant French language is a descendant of Langue d’oïl.

It was the advance of the French Kings based in Paris slowly conquering and absorbing the regions of the south through marriage and alliances that made the French language we hear today so dominant.

In addition, in 1539 French King François I banned the use of most of these regional languages and insisted on a new language he called “françoys” be used for all official purposes. This is also the version of French that was initially imposed on all overseas colonies like Quebec.

Langue d’Oc

In the southern part of France, the word “Oc” was the southern word for “yes“, hence the name “Langue d’oc“. The language Occitan is a descendent of these “Langues d’oc”, and can still be heard in the South of France, in cities like Toulouse, etc.

The region of Languedoc in the southern portion of France gets its name from this local language. King François I was mostly successful in wiping out Occitan and other regional languages, but some pockets of resistance remain.

Occitan is the forefather or dialects such as Gascon, Languedoc, Provençal, Auvergne, Limousin, Vivaro-Alpin. All of these dialects are deeply endangered.

In order to maintain some semblance of the language, the metro in the city of Toulouse is officially bilingual in French and version of Occitan.