language and accent question about Napoleon

[Forward Observer]

Napoleon was Corsican and of Italian noble decent, so of course his native language was Italian. His family originally came from Genoa, and I have read that he started learning French at around age 9 when attending school. I also read that he never excelled at it and spoke the language with a heavy Corsican accent.

I assume he may have also spoken other languages, and did read that he learned a little English at some poiint in his formative years.

Of course, for English speaking audiences, when he is portrayed in film and TV, if his charater is speaking English, it is always with a French accent.

If he spoke English at all, wouldn't his accent have been Corcican/Italian, which was his native tongue, and not French?

[Louis VI the Fat]

Napoléon spoke Corsu, not Italian. His family was originally from Italy, but had been living in Corsica for centuries.

Nobody spoke French at this time.
Perhaps 10%-15% percent of the population spoke French, the remainder some patois. Napoléon is exceptional for speaking French at all, for having learned it at an early age, more than for French not being his first language.


As for Napoléon not being 'real' French by virtue of distant foreign ancestry and peripheral birth: very few would qualify as Frenchman if these are the criteria, because the collection of loose territories with mutually unitelligable, or barely intelligable, languages WAS France. The Revolution came first, then the nation-state, which was created by it. Napoléon was not so much an outsider to France, as, rather, crucial for shaping a French nation. Napoléon helped make France, made it a unified nation by standardising law, education, conscription, and, above all, by spreading that most profound and prized possesion of French identity: language.


I suppose la paille au nez would've spoken English with a mixed Corsu/French accent.

[Louis VI the Fat]

What Napoléon sounded like, never mind his English, is difficult to reconstruct, except from what people wrote about his accent.

We do have, however, his personal writings. They help to establish his language. http://www.bmlisieux.com/curiosa/napoleon.htm

Here's a love letter he wrote to Joséphine:

Napoleon to Josephine, Spring 1797

To Josephine, I love you no longer; on the contrary, I detest you. you are a wretch, truly perverse, truly stupid, a real Cinderella. You never write to me at all, you do not love your husband; you know the pleasure that your letters give him yet you cannot even manage to write him half a dozen lines, dashed off in a moment!

What then do you do all day, Madame? What business is so vital that it robs you of the time to write to your faithful lover? What attachment can be stifling and pushing aside the love, the tender and constant love which you promised him? Who can this wonderful new lover be who takes up your every moment, rules your days and prevents you from devoting your attention to your husband? Beware, Josephine; one fine night the doors will be broken down and there I shall be.
In truth, I am worried, my love, to have no news from you; write me a four page letter instantly made up from those delightful words which fill my heart with emotion and joy.

I hope to hold you in my arms before long, when I shall lavish upon you a million kisses, burning as the equatorial sun.

See, this is why I adore him. What spirit! What a burning mind! What literature!


now to wait for Brenus, who abhors this terrible tyrant of a man...

[Beskar]

I love how he goes from one moment cursing her to hell, to "I shall alvish upon you a million kisses..." etc.

[Azathoth]

Napoleon to Josephine, Spring 1797

To Josephine, I love you no longer; on the contrary, I detest you. you are a wretch, truly perverse, truly stupid, a real Cinderella. You never write to me at all, you do not love your husband; you know the pleasure that your letters give him yet you cannot even manage to write him half a dozen lines, dashed off in a moment!

What then do you do all day, Madame? What business is so vital that it robs you of the time to write to your faithful lover? What attachment can be stifling and pushing aside the love, the tender and constant love which you promised him? Who can this wonderful new lover be who takes up your every moment, rules your days and prevents you from devoting your attention to your husband? Beware, Josephine; one fine night the doors will be broken down and there I shall be.
In truth, I am worried, my love, to have no news from you; write me a four page letter instantly made up from those delightful words which fill my heart with emotion and joy.

I hope to hold you in my arms before long, when I shall lavish upon you a million kisses, burning as the equatorial sun.

I'm pretty sure the outcome of such a correspondence today would be a restraining order.

[Subotan]

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[al Roumi]

Napoléon spoke Corsu, not Italian. His family was originally from Italy, but had been living in Corsica for centuries.

Nobody spoke French at this time.
Perhaps 10%-15% percent of the population spoke French, the remainder some patois. Napoléon is exceptional for speaking French at all, for having learned it at an early age, more than for French not being his first language.

As for Napoléon not being 'real' French by virtue of distant foreign ancestry and peripheral birth: very few would qualify as Frenchman if these are the criteria, because the collection of loose territories with mutually unitelligable, or barely intelligable, languages WAS France. The Revolution came first, then the nation-state, which was created by it. Napoléon was not so much an outsider to France, as, rather, crucial for shaping a French nation. Napoléon helped make France, made it a unified nation by standardising law, education, conscription, and, above all, by spreading that most profound and prized possesion of French identity: language.

From thence (or the principles of the revolution) the French sense of social equality: everyone entitled to the same and to be the same. Very different to the British sense of social equality: everyone entitled to the same right to be different.

Napoleon(e) went to a military school, which is where he learnt the Lingua Franca (ha) of France: French.

[Meneldil]

Napoleon was Corsican and of Italian noble decent, so of course his native language was Italian. His family originally came from Genoa, and I have read that he started learning French at around age 9 when attending school. I also read that he never excelled at it and spoke the language with a heavy Corsican accent.

I assume he may have also spoken other languages, and did read that he learned a little English at some poiint in his formative years.

Of course, for English speaking audiences, when he is portrayed in film and TV, if his charater is speaking English, it is always with a French accent.

If he spoke English at all, wouldn't his accent have been Corcican/Italian, which was his native tongue, and not French?

Tell a Corsican he's Italian and he'll probably blow up your house, your car, your dog and your office to avenge his honor :D

[Strike For The South]

So what did the French speak before "The Greatest Event In All Of Human History" ™ happend? German?

[Flavius Clemens]

So what did the French speak before "The Greatest Event In All Of Human History" ™ happend? German?

Lots of mututally incomprehesible dialects / languages.
See e.g. 'Langauge' in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_Modern_France

[Louis VI the Fat]

So what did the French speak before "The Greatest Event In All Of Human History" ™ happend? German?

In the periphery, non-Romanic languages like Flemish, Alsatian, Basque, Breton.

The big linguistic divide is that between the langue d'oïl in the north, and the langue d'oc in the South.

A bit simplified, the langue d'oc is the 'missing link' between Spanish, Italian and French. Almost a shame the Occitan languages have all but dissapeared. There is a huge cultural divide in France, separating the southern third from the rest. From the famous example of the rooftops, to the language, food and customs.

The langues d'oïl of the north are the basis of standard French. From theses languages, especially that of the Île-de-France, a standardised French was formed. Which only by the 19th century was understood by a majority of people, never mind their first language.

France was centralised to such an extent, that one would quickly forget that the linguistic divides of France are as complicated as that of Iberia. French languages differ as much as Portuguese from Castillian from Catalan. Even the oïl languages themselves differ as much as Danish from Swedish or Norwegian.


http://www.lexilogos.com/france_carte_dialectes.htm

[TinCow]

Napoleon was as French as Arnold Schwarzenegger is American. Both clearly originated in foreign cultures, but were so heavily integrated into their adopted culture that they actively help define it.

[Louis VI the Fat]

Napoleon was as French as Arnold Schwarzenegger is American. Both clearly originated in foreign cultures, but were so heavily integrated into their adopted culture that they actively help define it.

Schwarzenegger? I'd say Napoléon was as French as Abe Lincoln was American.

Both had distant immigrant ancestors, both were born in the periphery of their country, in territories that had only shortly before their birth been accepted as part of their country.

[TinCow]

Schwarzenegger? I'd say Napoléon was as French as Abe Lincoln was American.

Both had distant immigrant ancestors, both were born in the periphery of their country, in territories that had only shortly before their birth been accepted as part of their country.

I completely disagree. Abe Lincoln was born into the dominant culture of his country. There was absolutely nothing about Lincoln that separated him culturally from the dominant American culture. You must remember that American culture did not instantly appear in 1776, it was around for far longer than that as a splinter of British colonial culture. Lincoln's ancestors came from that old British colonial splinter culture which became the American culture. Thus, even though Lincoln grew up in a provincial backwater area, he was still raised in dominant culture from the moment of his birth.

In contrast, Napoleon was born in a provincial backwater area that did not embrace French culture in any large manner. Corsican culture at that time was more closely related to Italian than French. Napoleon's parents came from Italian and Corsican cultures, not French cultures. While Corsica became part of France prior to Napoleon's birth, it was only very shortly prior to his birth and Corsican culture was still seen as foreign in France. Napoleon spoke with a non-French accent and was often mocked by his critics during his lifetime for being an outsider and a foreigner. That is not remotely like Abraham Lincoln. If you want other analogies that are more comperable, I will propose Cicero, Stalin, and Hitler.

[Subotan]

Austria isn't the periphery of German culture. Rather, it was the nucleus of it for quite some time.

[TinCow]

Austria isn't the periphery of German culture. Rather, it was the nucleus of it for quite some time.

True, all three of those additional examples are not quite appropriate for comparison with Napoleon, because their cultures of origin were more closely related to the dominant cultures they eventually became associated with. That's why I like the Arnold analogy; a clearly foreign culture that was so significant to his upbringing that it impacts his manner of speech even to this day. At the same time, Arnold has been so fundamentally embraced by American society (and worldwide perception of American society) that he is ubiquitous as an American icon, rather than an Austrian icon. That seems very similar to Napoleon to me.

[Louis VI the Fat]

Francophobic, anachronistic, and of decidedly non-French thought.

William the Bastard was 'really' some Viking, Jeanne d'Arc was 'really' some German, Napoleon was 'really' some Italian, and all the others who won wars were not true Scotsmen...erm...true Frenchmen either.

This loose collection of territories and tribes that was formed into a nation-state in the 19th century IS France. If not, then nobody is French, save for some nobility and the Parisian upper class.

[TinCow]

This loose collection of territories and tribes that was formed into a nation-state in the 19th century IS France. If not, then nobody is French, save for some nobility and the Parisian upper class.

You cannot be serious that Corsica was an integral part of France when Napoleon was born. Prior to 1764, Corsica was not remotely connected to France. It was, and always had been, oriented towards and ruled by various Italianate and Roman peoples. The Corsicans themselves actively fought a war to maintain their independence from France, and were only defeated a few months before Napoleon was born. Corsica may be an integral part of France today, but it most certainly was nothing of the sort in August 1769. As for Napoleon himself, it is a fact that Napoleon did not learn to speak French until he was 10 years old, and he spoke with a Corsican accent for his entire life. If he qualifies as part of French culture at the moment of his birth, I qualify as a kumquat.

[Louis VI the Fat]

Are Americans who were born in the 1850's in Texas, Florida or California not American because these states were Spanish/Mexican shortly before they were born? Surely these states were, and always had been, oriented towards and ruled by various Mexicanate and Hispanic peoples?

[TinCow]

Are Americans who were born in the 1850's in Texas, Florida or California not American because these states were Spanish/Mexican shortly before they were born? Surely these states were, and always had been, oriented towards and ruled by various Mexicanate and Hispanic peoples?

It depends on the person. Many would qualify as part of American culture, but many would not. I don't think that analogy is accurate in any case, because all three of those areas were heavily colonized by American-culture immigrants prior to their entry into the Union. A better comparison is to Louisiana or Hawaii. Most people born in those states 5 years after they were taken over by the US would have been raised primarily with Creole and Hawaiin culture, which differs dramatically from the main American cultures of the time period.

To be clear, I am not talking about citizenship, I am talking about culture. Napoleon was absolutely a French citizen, but the culture he was raised with as a child was Corsican, not French. Corsican culture may be a sub-culture of France today, nearly 250 years after it was absorbed, but in 1769 Corsican culture was not related to French culture in any significant way. You might as well say that Quebecois were British or Canadian in 1763.

[Louis VI the Fat]

dang it, wanted to post a new reply but edited this one out instead.

[TinCow]

B..but, Napoléon was raised in French culture: his parents sent him to a French school, on the mainland, from the age of nine. That's how you get ahead, that's how the provincial becomes a Frenchman. Everybody has at some point in their family history made this decision, voluntarily or not. French culture is an imposed culture. Beat the patois out of the peasant by imposing the foreign language 'French' on him.

I agree with this completely. Napoleon became an integral part of French culture. In fact, I would say that Napoleon himself has influenced French culture more than French culture influenced Napoleon. That does not change the fact that French culture was not his culture of birth, which is the question the OP asked.

Citizenship precedes the nation in France. France is not a culture that formed a nation. That's the other model, so often contrasted with France, the model of Germany.

One is French, by being born in France. Regardless of your culture, etnicity or what not. This is what I meant with 'decidedly non-French thought'. If Napoléon is born in French territory, he is a Frenchmen. His story is the story of all those others. They all had to learn French at school or in the army. 'Citizens into Frenchmen' - that's the order, not the other way round.

Ironic then that Napoleon's own critics inside France during his life ridiculed him for not being born into a French culture. Times change, and France has changed a great deal since 1769. "Liberté, égalité, fraternité" was little more than an idea when Napoleon was born. During his life it changed dramatically. When Napoleon died, he was French, but that does erase the point that when Napoleon was born, he was Corsican.

Québec IS Canada. Not Anglo-Canada, no. But Canada IS this collection of French and English and native territories. To think that only whites or Anglophones are 'real' Canadians overlooks an essential element of Canada.

Certainly, except that Canada did not exist in 1763, just as the United States did not. Quebecouis culture in 1763 was a colonial sub-culture of French, just as American culture in 1776 was a colonial sub-culture of British. Quebecouis culture is part of Canadian culture now, just as Creole and Hawaiin culture are part of American culture now, but all of these are only after very long periods of absorbtion. Shortly after the territories had changed owners, there had been no opportunity for the culture to absorbed by the new owner, so it remained largely independent. Once again, you seem to be layering today's standards onto yesterday's peoples.

[Brenus]

“the others who won wars were not true Scotsmen...erm...true Frenchmen”: which precisely what it was intended.

I am not sure that the Lorrains would be happy to be Germans…

There are few (a lot) who don't accept the fact that France had conquered and won wars. The simple fact that France still exists should prove that the image they got from heavy propaganda is false, but no.
So, time-to-time, we have: ho, Napoleon was Corsican. Sorry Guillaume was William the Norman, so a Wiking. By the way Kellerman was Alsatian, and Vercingetorix a Gaul… Definitively the Franks were Germans and so was Charlemagne.

Point of History: Choiselle bought Corsica in 1740. So Napoleon, born in 15th of August 1769 was as much French than people from Lorraine, returned to France around the same time than Corsica was bought.

If not Zachary Taylor is not American, nor Pierre Gustave Toutant Beauregard (1818–93) or more recently Claire Chennault, all of them coming from Louisiana bought to France, sold by… Napoleon… in 1803.

Louis, I don’t hate Napoleon. I think he was not so good (leading a country/Empire as a Corsican Clan) but I give the man is due. He was a genius, achieved a lot and lost a lot.

[Louis VI the Fat]

Bonaparte spoke Corsu as a first language, and retained an accent throughout his life. We could've ended the thread at post one.


But there are hidden subtexts, discourses, different definitions and traditons to explore. For one, we stumble once more on different national definitions. A Japanse, when presented with an African-american, might ask for a 'real American'. Not realising that Americans do not have a racial definition of nationhood.
(To a large extent they do, as is also the case with the French republican ideas below, which are not absolute and often more theoretical too)

To an American, to non-French thought, culture makes a nation. Not so in France. French Republicanism, if not outright universal, does not consider birth or culture the essential quality of citizenship. To end just that is why France had a revolution in the first place. That everybody is a Frenchman. An equal citizen. In full possesion of every right of a citizen and of man. Regardless of birth. Regardless of religion (move over Catholics, Jews and Protestants are Frenchmen too, no matter what you say - see 'Secularism' thread in Backroom). The third estate are Frenchmen of full civil rights too. Corsica and the Vendée are Frenchmen too - whether they like it or not.The very notion that Napoléon is, and can be, a Frenchman in every and the full sense of the word is what the whole thing was about in the first place. For better or for worse, as my example of the Vendée shows.

One should not overlook this. Even if Napoléon by non-French standards barely qualifies as a Frenchman, one can not overlook this essential revolutionary and republican definition of what constitutes a Frenchman.
Should the non-French definition matter? No, because there are a thousand non-French definitions. For the English, only the upper class should've been French, not the people. For the nazi, the Jew was not a Frenchman. For the Russian and Austrian, only the nobility was. That's why we fought them all, or, rather, that's why they all fought us. France and her perfidious ideas. That's why I would've joined Napoléon. I don't care if he's a tyrant who betrayed the Revolution. He fights for the right to be free, to be a citizen and nothing but a citizen, without birth or estate or religion. He would've brought it to the entire world and Lord knows he nearly managed too!

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

When Napoleon died, he was French, but that does erase the point that when Napoleon was born, he was Corsican.

A lot of people were born but a Corsican, but a peasant, but a Jew, but a freemason. They died as free French citizens*. To live thus, if need be to die thus, that is the motto inscripted on their arms, that is why they fought the whole of Europe. If you wanted to be French, the Republic would confer French citizenship on you. It was not a matter of culture, or birth, but of ideology. Foreign radicals were elected into the National Assembly. Citizenship was conferred on American revolutionairies. They were French from that moment on. This is the universality, the revolutionary aspect of it. That is how one is a Frenchman. If you take up arms to fight to be a free French citizen, then you are a Frenchman. You have no birth. As for those who disagree and want to reduce a person to his birth, there's a Grande Armée that's willing to fight for this right against anything the entire world throws against it.

*goes to the attic, dons on grandpa's boots and rusty rifle and starts marching*


Here's the first thing our little 'Corso-Italian' saw of Italy, and Italy of him.





*Or, in the case of that delightfully ambiguous Bonaparte, would die as emperor above the citizens if he had had his way.

[Subotan]

So anyone born on French soil is automatically a Frenchman? Does that include that periphery of France and French culture, Algeria?

[TinCow]

Louis, you mostly seem to be arguing with no one. I have no intention of debating the vast majority of what you just posted. The only issue I want to emphasize is that often history needs to be viewed from the perspective of the time in which it occurred. For instance:

That everybody is a Frenchman. An equal citizen. In full possesion of every right of a citizen and of man. Regardless of birth. Regardless of religion (move over Catholics, Jews and Protestants are Frenchmen too, no matter what you say - see 'Secularism' thread in Backroom).

That certainly didn't apply to the Huguenots in the 16th century. It's all a matter of timing and of placing a person and an event in the proper context. Without context, history is meaningless data. Napoleon cannot be understood by modern standards, he must be viewed as part of the world he lived in.

[Louis VI the Fat]

Louis, you mostly seem to be arguing with no one.

Yes, but Louis, I meant Republican values, what happened after the Revolution. Among the first acts of the Revolution were the conferring of full citizen rights to Protestants and Jews.

So anyone born on French soil is automatically a Frenchman? Does that include that periphery of France and French culture, Algeria?

Fully expecting that question, I started with the example of African-Americans, where the same tension between thought and practise is felt.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civilizing_mission

[Brenus]

“That certainly didn't apply to the Huguenots in the 16th century.” They were sujet of Louis the XIV, not citizens.
The Nation concept that goes in pair with citizenship is a child of the French Revolution.

“So anyone born on French soil is automatically a French”: Yes. And all Algerians born before the Independence can still ask for French National Identity as you never loose your national identity…

[Sarmatian]

So anyone born on French soil is automatically a Frenchman? Does that include that periphery of France and French culture, Algeria?

See Zinedine Zidane.

[Louis VI the Fat]

See Zinedine Zidane.

Not a true Frenchman. Just like Obama is not American and Churchill not British.


Even more worryingly, neither are those Italians Platini and Cantona. Petit is a blond Norman, thus not French either.

Édith Piaf is an Italo-Berber. Aznavour an Armenian.

Yves Saint Laurent is a pied-noir. Jean-Paul Belmondo and Jacques Derrida are pieds-noirs too, but of foreign ancestry no less!

Sarkozy's an Ottoman-Hungarian. De Gaulle a Ch'ti, thus really Flemish. Maréchal Joffre was born in a Catalan region, thus he's Spanish.


None are French. Come to think of it, I'm going to send this thread to the Front National headquarters. Le Pen was born outside of Frenc culture, and only learned proper French when he was send to boarding school, just like Napoléon. So he's not French at all. That'll teach those nationalists.