![\"\"](\"https:\/\/nadeaubarlow.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/04\/2012-04-12-Why-Does-English-Have-Different-Names-for-Animals-and-Their-Meat-300x200.png\" "\\"Why")
<\/a>Tom writes:<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\nDear Ms. Barlow and M. Nadeau,<\/p>\n
Thank you for your efforts on the several of your books I’ve read, which have been enjoyable, particularly The Story of French<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0but also Sixty Million Frenchmen Can’t Be Wrong<\/a><\/strong>. \u00a0Being something of a linguist myself, I decided to read the Pas si Fous version<\/a><\/strong> of the latter, too. \u00a0In the course of it, I was surprised to take note of a reference as to how removed Anglophones in many cases are, compared to the French, from \u00a0awareness that meats, for example, do not in fact originate in styrofoam plates under clear plastic wrap. \u00a0I hope you will forgive that I can’t recall exactly where in the book I read this.<\/p>\n As valid as this observation may be, in my estimation, I recall that you went on to reflect that this alleged lack of perceived connection between food on the plate (or in the market) and its actual origin was reflected in the different vocabulary in English for the meat, as opposed to animal that is the source of it. \u00a0This is where I differ with you. \u00a0According to everything I’ve ever read on the subject, this feature of English, which is unique as far as I know, has nothing to do with what you suggest. \u00a0On the contrary, it has to do not with a lack of connection between Anglophones and the animals they eat, but rather with the vast social (and for a long time, linguistic) distance between the Norman aristocracy and the Anglo-Saxon peasantry between the Norman Conquest of 1066 and circa the late 14th century when, for a variety of reasons, English regained dominance in England.<\/p>\n As I have seen it explained in a number of places, the Anglophones during this period were in fact intimately familiar with the animals meats came from, for it was they, peasants on manors, who did the dirty work out in the barnyard. \u00a0And appropriately enough, they called the animals they killed by Anglo-Saxon names, as Anglophones still do. \u00a0Any separation from the animals being butchered was on the part of the Norman aristocracy, whose members called meats on the table by the same French names that Anglophones use, in evolved form, today. \u00a0So it makes good sense, as well as conveying British social history, that we have calf (from something close to German kalb<\/em>) and veau, swine (from something close to German schwein<\/em>) and pork, deer (from something close to German tier<\/em> (animal), curiously, rather than hirsch (deer)<\/em>) and venison, and so forth.<\/p>\n Henriette Walter’s excellent l’Aventure des langues en Occident: leur origine, leur histoire, leur g\u00e9ographie<\/a><\/em> <\/strong>(Paris: France Loisirs) takes note of this curious dual vocabulary as follows, quoting Sir Walter Scott’s Ivanhoe<\/a><\/em><\/strong>, in both English and French:<\/p>\n Old English, in any event, seems to have badly needed to have its vocabulary enriched by the circa 10,000 words it acquired, along with its verb tenses, from French: \u00a0to this day, virtually any word that deals with an intellectual or abstract matter is of French or Latin (often via French) origin, while modern English vocabulary from Old English and Viking sources tends to deal with relatively down-to-earth matters. \u00a0Likewise, even relatively simple things like fireplaces don’t seem to have occurred to the Anglo-Saxons; until the Normans showed up, they thought a hole in the roof worked just fine.<\/p>\n In any event, I’ve enjoyed your books, and look forward to reading more of them.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Julie answers:<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n Hello Tom,<\/p>\n How interesting! Long after finishing SMFCBW<\/a><\/strong>, I was doing some reading and research on French food and realized there was indeed more to the food vocabulary enigma that what we originally wrote. We are talking about doing a new edition of the book next year, so I\u2019ll definitely look into what Henriette Walter has written about it (she wrote the forward for the Quebec edition of The Story of French<\/a><\/strong>, by the way).<\/p>\n Thanks so much for your thoughtful comments.<\/p>\n Au plaisir,<\/p>\n