Auregnais

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Auregnais
Aoeur'gnaeux, Aurignais
aoeur'gny, auregny
Native to
rememberers)[citation needed]
Early forms
Language codes
ISO 639-3
GlottologNone
Linguasphere51-AAA-hcg
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Auregnais (French pronunciation: [ɔʁɲɛ]), Aoeur'gnaeux, or Aurignais was the Norman dialect of the Channel Island of Alderney (French: Aurigny, Auregnais: aoeur'gny or auregny). It was closely related to the Guernésiais (Guernsey), Jèrriais (Jersey), and Sercquiais (Sark) dialects of the neighbouring islands, as well as continental Norman on the European mainland.

The dialect became extinct in the 20th century. Only a few examples of Auregnais survived, mostly in place names in Alderney, and one audio recording is known to exist.

History

The last known native speaker of Auregnais died around 1960.

rememberer died in the early 2020s.[citation needed
]

One reason for the extinction of the language was movement of the population. In particular, the influx of labourers from the United Kingdom employed by the British government in the construction of the abortive harbour project and other fortifications (during the reign of Queen Victoria), as well as the stationing of a sizable British garrison among the small population, served to relegate Auregnais to a lesser status for communication. The evacuation of nearly all indigenous Auregnais to the British mainland during World War II (the island was occupied by the Wehrmacht) was thought to be a major factor in the final loss of the spoken language.[6]

Another reason for the language's demise was official neglect, especially in the education sector, where it was not taught at all. This led to a situation in which, as was noted by the Guernsey newspaper Le Bailliage in 1880, children had ceased to speak the language among themselves – partly due to teachers discouraging its use in favour of standard

Metropolitan French
and greatly from the vernacular Norman.

Surnames and place names

Traces of the language still exist in many, if not most, local

placenames. Many of these have been gallicised, but some notable examples include Ortac (Or'tac), Burhou (with the -hou suffix) and the first element of the name "Braye Harbour
".

One or two words linger on in the local English, e.g. vraic (seaweed fertiliser – a word common throughout the Channel Islands), and the pronunciation of certain local surnames, e.g. Dupont and Simon as [dipõ] and [symõ] rather than the standard Parisian pronunciation.

Les Casquets

Unusually, for such a small dialect, Auregnais used to have an exclave or "colony" of speakers on Les Casquets for a number of years. Algernon Charles Swinburne based his poem "Les Casquets" on the Houguez family who actually lived on the islands for 18 years. The Houguez family came from Alderney, and the evidence points to its members being Auregnais speakers; in fact, the daughter married a man from Alderney. During this time, they were isolated and would have had few visitors, but would have spoken Auregnais most of the time.

References

  1. ^ a b Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin; Bank, Sebastian (24 May 2022). "Glottolog 4.8 - Oil". Glottolog. Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology. Archived from the original on 11 November 2023. Retrieved 11 November 2023.
  2. ^
    Linguasphere Register via hortensj-garden.org. Linguasphere Observatory. Archived
    from the original on 8 October 2022. Retrieved 7 October 2022 – via hortensj-gardens.org.
  3. The Toronto Star
    . Retrieved 30 September 2015. The last native speaker of Alderney French, a Norman dialect spoken in the Channel Islands, died around 1960.
  4. . Retrieved 7 December 2015.
  5. ^ Reilly, Lucas (6 November 2018). "How the World's Only Feudal Lord Outclassed the Nazis to Save Her People". Mental Floss. Retrieved 7 November 2023.

Sources

External links