Francophone pedants, prepare to weep

[gurnemanz]

A few musical items which will presumably need adjusting (or not)

Chant de la Fête de Pâques - Berlioz, Damnation of Faust
Toute mon âme est là - Werther, Massenet
La flûte enchantée - Ravel
Miroirs brûlants - Poulenc
Après un rêve - Fauré
Concert Champêtre - Poulenc

[teamsaint]

Same here - and ya boo to all those who knew their oignons!

I was going to say that,b ut couldn't spell Ognon.

Not a linguist in younger days, Beefy?

Edit: actually, now i think about it, I might ask for a re mark.

[Nick Armstrong]

A few musical items which will presumably need adjusting (or not)

Chant de la Fête de Pâques - Berlioz, Damnation of Faust
Toute mon âme est là - Werther, Massenet
La flûte enchantée - Ravel
Miroirs brûlants - Poulenc
Après un rêve - Fauré
Concert Champêtre - Poulenc

Yes all those circonflexes will be optional, as far as I can see.

[french frank]

Won't ripe be confused with wall?

Yes, that's why it keeps its hat. The "eg" was just an example of accents immediately conveying origin. Connaître will become connaitre, hiding that hint of discarded s (cognoscere).

I was at a conference of French medievalists in Paris, and one of the German contributors suddenly threw a past subjunctive into his lecture. As someone commented afterwards: A room full of scholars all mentally visualising the ^

[I always said wa-gnons until a friend whispered to me …]

[ahinton]

Won't ripe be confused with wall?

Or blackberry liqueur?

[Nick Armstrong]

Or blackberry liqueur?

Or indeed, a blackberry tout court....

Good point - because "a ripe blackberry" is "une mûre mûre" ... or so it is murmured in fruity French circles.

.

"Il est sûr que j'adore tes mûres mûres" murmura-t-il, sur le mur, rue Réaumur"



I need some coffee.

[vinteuil]

... a few more details from le Monde :

http://www.lemonde.fr/les-decodeurs/article/2016/02/04/non-l-accent-circonflexe-ne-va-pas-disparaitre_4859439_4355770.html

In particular -

"Ajoutons que l’Académie précisait déjà dans son document de 1990 :

« Les personnes qui ont déjà la maîtrise de l’orthographe ancienne pourront, naturellement, ne pas suivre cette nouvelle norme. »

Jeudi matin, le cabinet de Najat Vallaud-Belkacem confirmait que « ces règles sont une référence mais ne sauraient être imposées, les deux orthographes sont donc justes. » "

[vinteuil]

A few musical items which will presumably need adjusting (or not)

Chant de la Fête de Pâques - Berlioz, Damnation of Faust
Toute mon âme est là - Werther, Massenet
La flûte enchantée - Ravel
Miroirs brûlants - Poulenc
Après un rêve - Fauré
Concert Champêtre - Poulenc

Yes all those circonflexes will be optional, as far as I can see.

.... NO! - it's only the i and the u that might lose their hats

[Anna]

Yes, that's why it keeps its hat. The "eg" was just an example of accents immediately conveying origin. Connaître will become connaitre, hiding that hint of discarded s (cognoscere).

Thank you frenchie - I never knew that was what gave birth to the circumflex!! So, do any other accents convey missing letters?

[Nick Armstrong]

.... NO! - it's only the i and the u that might lose their hats

Ah indeed. Presumably because other hats actually affect pronunciation e.g. lengthening the 'â' as opposed to 'a'. Whereas 'flûte' and 'flute' sound the same....

[french frank]

Thank you frenchie - I never knew that was what gave birth to the circumflex!! So, do any other accents convey missing letters?

Quite often with missing 's'. Latin words that began with an s+consononant, like stadium, seem to have been difficult for some early peoples to pronounce, so they separated them to something that sounded like es-tadiu, which became es-tage which became étage. But in the middle of a word they adopted the circumflex: bestia > bête. Grave accents a bit different - I'd have to think about that (forgotten me student notes!). Studium > étude and so on …

[Nick Armstrong]

Thank you frenchie - I never knew that was what gave birth to the circumflex!! S

Yes and you can often see the 's's still knocking around in English... e.g. hôtel / hostel, hôpital / hospital, château / castle &c. &c.

[vinteuil]

Grave accents a bit different - …

... sometimes a missing t : frater - frère , mater - mère etc.

[ahinton]

Or indeed, a blackberry tout court....

Good point - because "a ripe blackberry" is "une mûre mûre" ... or so it is murmured in fruity French circles.

!!!

A friend is engaged to a girl from Toulouse by the name of Murielle but I don't think that she was ever circonflexed...

[Mary Chambers]

I suppose the next generation will have become used to it … But disappointing for etymologists who appreciate what the circumflex represented e.g. maturu(s) > meür > mûr; muru(s) > mur

You speak for me, ff. I have known about the reason for the circumflex since I was an infant, because both my parents were bilingual (French/English) and obsessed with etymology.

I hate to see linguistic history erased.