Frankish language in France

non-exhaustive

Badonviller Badenweiler
Besancon Bisanz
Dunkerque Dünkirchen
Longwy Longuich
Montbéliard archaic: Mömpelgard
Mulhouse Mülhausen im Elsaß
Nancy archaic: Nanzig
Nice Nizza
Strasbourg Straßburg im Elsaß
Thionville Diedenhofen
Wisembach Weißenbach

Alsace & Moselle not included. if included would be much lengthier

toponymy generally doesn't say much more then speaking about what language spoke the previous people that live in a place.

It doesn't say much about the cultural herency of the modern people, and even less about their genetic lineage. For exemple when you know that most places names in USA are Amerindian names - there is no link (or very few) with the modern culture and people.

In most of France city names generally have been passing from language to language, following the linguistic changes of the area. So it is generally difficult to say that one name has its origin in only one language.

On exemple, Nice (seen above)

Nikaia (Greek) - Nicaea (latin) - Nissa (Nissart) - Nice (French)

Niza has a very beautiful name.

"toponymy generally doesn't say much more then speaking about what language spoke the previous people that live in a place.

It doesn't say much about the cultural herency of the modern people, and even less about their genetic lineage. For exemple when you know that most places names in USA are Amerindian names - there is no link (or very few) with the modern culture and people."

Exactly. Larger towns generally retain their ancient names even if their citizens switch to another language. For instance, London, Lincoln, York and so many others still have a Celtic-Romance name (same for Köln, Augsburg, Konstanz or Bregenz in Germany / Austria).

On the other hand, small villages and hamlets are more likely to be new creations. In France, all small place names in '-ville', 'villers', '-court' appeared at the Frankish age and were coined with a Germanic name first. They are typical for new settlements founded in the dark age in previously forest areas.

As a matter of fact Germanic toponyms are very common in France North to the Granville-Geneva line, they are very rare in Southern France and Northern Italy.

"On the other hand, small villages and hamlets are more likely to be new creations. In France, all small place names in '-ville', 'villers', '-court' appeared at the Frankish age and were coined with a Germanic name first. They are typical for new settlements founded in the dark age in previously forest areas.

As a matter of fact Germanic toponyms are very common in France North to the Granville-Geneva line, they are very rare in Southern France and Northern Italy. "

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We have to add French the many place names ending with "-ange" and "-enge". They are also of Germanic origin and correspond with places ending with "-ingen" in Germany.

Let it be understood ounce and for ever.
Although, French is MOSTLY 77% Gallo Roman in origin in terms of most of its lexicon, grammatical structures and so forth, let us not forget that the Franks who spoke Old Frankish, the forefather tongue of modern Dutch and Flemish influenced greatly the French language by introducing many military words into French.
The words like Guerre, Gardien, Garantie are Teutonic based words similar to English War, Warden, Warranty. The doublet Guarentee/ Warranty stem from Old Frankish Warentjo.
The Spanish word Guerra is from Gothic Werra, related to French Guerre, English War, all from Frankish Werra.
But the Frankish influence was Much stronger in French than the Gothic influence in Spanish. Spanish has 3% Gothic influence whereas the French language has an astonishing 20% influence and so forth.
Colors like bleu, brun, gris, blanc are all Frankish and related to blue, brown, grey, blank/white. The French word Canif is from Frankish Knif, related to a Cutting Knife in English and the building word Echafaudage is similar to the word scaffolding, hance from Skaffolding in Frankish.
The Frankish impact in Northern Gaul was much greater than the Goths in Southern Gaul or Spain.
It is the truth that 20% of the French lexicon, mostly dealing with Warfare comes from Ancient Old Low Frankish, related to Dutch.
Bleu = Blue (English) = Blao (Frankish), Blau (German), Bla (Danish)...
And the Scandinavian influence was greater in Normandy than the Norse influence in European Russia.
The words Turbot, Homard, Bateau are all Scandinavian Danish from the Vikings who founded Normandy in 911 AD.
But the Norse Danish influence was gigantic in England as the pronouns like They, Them, Their, There are all Danish Viking in origin as well as common verbs like, to bend, to blend, to crawl, to creep, to get, to give, to heal, to leave, to live, to raise, to run, to strive, to talk, to thrive...
English TO TAKE is from Old Norse TAKA, hance Danish TAGE.
Danish Viking influence was over 20% in the English language but a small 2% in Franch but it added to the huge 20% Frankish influence in French.
French is by far the most Teutonic of the Romance based languages.

<<French is by far the most Teutonic of the Romance based languages. >>

French is the most Teutonic of the Major Romance languages.
Walloon is more Teutonic than French.

Walloon is a dialect of French.

French is the least Latin of the Romance tongues.

<<Walloon is a dialect of French. >>

I would call Walloon a seperate, albeit closely related, language

In Lorraine (Lothringen), a lot of place names are of Germanic origin, like
Forbach, Folkling, Rosbruck, Théding, Freistroff, Dalstein, Holving, Hombourg-Haut, Neudorf, Brettnach, Oberdorff, Denting, Freyming-Merlebach, Tenteling, and many more.
They are right on the border to Germania, though ;-)

Lorraine-Lothringen was a part of German Empire.

<< Walloon is a dialect of French. >>
I would call Walloon a seperate, albeit closely related, language >>
-- Just like every Oïl language: Picard, Lorrain, Champenois, Normand, Bourguignon, Tourangeau, Gallo etc.

<<Walloon is more Teutonic than French.>>
-- This is debatable. Walloon hosts more Germanic substantives than French but its grammar is eerily similar to Italian or Spanish, with lots of intricate uses for conditional and subjunctive moods, double-composed tenses, and simple past has remained alive in casual speech.

To put it short, Walloon is more Latin, more Germanic and even more Celtic than French, but definitely less "Francian".

Nice is not in northern France. If you like Alsatian-like languages, listen to Regional French TV.

<< French is MOSTLY 77% Gallo Roman >>

-- Ces histoires de % me font toujours rire!

. Dans un texte traitant de construction navale traditionnelle, il y aura un haut % de vocabulaire normanno-scandinave.

. Un traité sur la musique baroque vénitienne, ses instruments et sa notation sera envahi de termes italiens.

. On peut aussi écrire "Dans ce kriegspiel, un blockhaus ferme le thalweg du hinterland"...

Et dans tout les cas ce sera toujours 100 % du français.

"Frankish"dialects in Lorraine-Lothringen are Moselle Franconian (Moselfraenkisch) and Palatian(Pfaelzisch) Franconian dialects of German language,also spoken in Germany , Luxembourg and Belgium ( Moselle Franconian).