Middle French ( French : moyen français ) is a historical division of the French language that covers the period from the mid-14th to the early 17th centuries. It is a period of transition during which:
80-534: It is the first version of French that is largely intelligible to Modern French, contrary to Old French . The most important change found in Middle French is the complete disappearance of the noun declension system, which had been underway for centuries. There was no longer a distinction between nominative and oblique forms of nouns , and plurals became indicated by simply an s . The transformations necessitated an increased reliance on word order in
160-668: A Master of Requests . Between 1545 and 1547 François Rabelais lived in Metz , then a free imperial city and a republic, to escape the condemnation by the University of Paris . In 1547, he became curate of Saint-Christophe-du-Jambet in Maine and of Meudon near Paris. With support from members of the prominent du Bellay family , Rabelais had received approval from King Francis I to continue to publish his collection on 19 September 1545 for six years. However, on 31 December 1546,
240-570: A Roman Catholic , Rabelais was a humanist , and favoured classical Antiquity over the "barbarous" Middle Ages, believing in the need for reform to return science and arts to their classical blossoming, and theology and the Church to their original Evangelical form as expressed in the Gospels. In particular, he was critical of monasticism . Rabelais criticised what he considered to be inauthentic Christian positions by both Catholics and Protestants, and
320-399: A Greek manuscript from the printer. Gryphius published Rabelais' translations and annotations of Hippocrates , Galen and Giovanni Manardo . In 1537 he returned to Montpellier to pay the fees to obtain his licence to practice medicine (April 3) and obtained his doctorate the following month (May 22). Upon his return to Lyon in the summer, he gave an anatomy lesson at Lyon's Hôtel-Dieu using
400-488: A fat Swiss guy on a cannon. In the Prologue to Gargantua the narrator addresses the: "Most illustrious drinkers, and you the most precious pox-ridden—for to you and you alone are my writings dedicated ..." before turning to Plato's Banquet . An unprecedented syphilis epidemic had raged through Europe for over 30 years when the book was published, even the king of France was reputed to have been infected. Etion
480-584: A fellow Franciscan, and corresponded with Guillaume Budé , who observed that he was already competent in law. Following Erasmus ' commentary on the original Greek version of the Gospel of Luke , the Sorbonne banned the study of Greek in 1523, believing that it encouraged "personal interpretation" of the New Testament. As a result, both Lamy and Rabelais had their Greek books confiscated. Frustrated by
560-415: A list of the most notable works of French literature, noting with surprise and indignation that Rabelais was placed behind Charles de Gaulle 's war memoirs, and was denied the "aura of a founding figure! Yet in the eyes of nearly every great novelist of our time he is, along with Cervantes , the founder of an entire art, the art of the novel". In the satirical musical The Music Man by Meredith Willson ,
640-531: A manuscript containing eleven chapters and ending mid-sentence in Lyon on his way to Rome to work as Cardinal du Bellay's personal physician in 1548. According to Jean Plattard, this publication served two purposes: first, it brought Rabelais some much-needed money; and second, it allowed him to respond to those who considered his work blasphemous. While the prologue denounced slanderers, the following chapters did not raise any polemical issues. Already it contained some of
720-463: A misogynist or a feminist based on different episodes in his works. An article by Edwin M. Duvall in Études rabelaisiennes 18 (1985) sparked a debate on the prologue of Gargantua in the pages of the Revue d’histoire littéraire de la France as to whether Rabelais intentionally hid higher meanings in his work, to be discovered through erudition and philology, or if instead the polyvalence of symbols
800-507: A rejection of the sacred truths themselves. Timothy Hampton writes that "to a degree unequaled by the case of any other writer from the European Renaissance, the reception of Rabelais's work has involved dispute, critical disagreement, and ... scholarly wrangling ..." In particular, as pointed out by Bruno Braunrot, the traditional view of Rabelais as a humanist has been challenged by early post-structuralist analyses denying
880-607: A single prestige variety in Modern Standard Arabic . In contrast, there is often significant intelligibility between different North Germanic languages . However, because there are various standard forms of the North Germanic languages, they are classified as separate languages. A dialect continuum or dialect chain is a series of language varieties spoken across some geographical area such that neighboring varieties are mutually intelligible, but
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#1732790418463960-422: A single consistent ideological message of his text, and to some extent earlier by Marxist critiques such as Mikhail Bakhtin with his emphasis on the subversive folk roots of Rabelais' humour in medieval " carnival " culture. At present, however, "whatever controversy still surrounds Rabelais studies can be found above all in the application of feminist theories to Rabelais criticism", as he is alternately considered
1040-404: A whole it exercises a baneful influence. Acknowledging both the sordid side of the work and its protean nature, Jean de La Bruyère in 1688 saw beyond that its sublimity: His book is an enigma, it is whatever you want to say, it is inexplicable, it is a chimera ….. a monstrous assembling of refined and ingenious morality and foul corruption. Either it is bad, sinking far below the worst, to have
1120-412: Is an abstract one: whether Panurge should marry or not. Torn between the desire for a wife and the fear of being cuckolded, Panurge engages in divinatory methods, like dream interpretation and bibliomancy . He consults authorities vested with revealed knowledge, like the sibyl of Panzoust or the mute Nazdecabre, profane acquaintances, like the theologian Hippothadée or the philosopher Trouillogan, and even
1200-464: Is considered a Christian humanist . He was critical of medieval scholasticism, lampooning the abuses of powerful princes and popes, opposing them with Greco-Roman learning and popular culture. Rabelais is widely known for the first two volumes relating the childhoods of the giants Gargantua and Pantagruel written in the style of bildungsroman ; his later works—the Third Book (which prefigures
1280-442: Is the case between Afrikaans and Dutch . It is generally easier for Dutch speakers to understand Afrikaans than for Afrikaans speakers to understand Dutch. (See Afrikaans § Mutual intelligibility with Dutch ). In a dialect continuum , neighboring varieties are mutually intelligible, but differences mount with distance, so that more widely separated varieties may not be mutually intelligible. Intelligibility can be partial, as
1360-436: Is the case with Azerbaijani and Turkish , or significant, as is the case with Bulgarian and Macedonian . However, sign languages , such as American and British Sign Language , usually do not exhibit mutual intelligibility with each other. Asymmetric intelligibility refers to two languages that are considered partially mutually intelligible, but for various reasons, one group of speakers has more difficulty understanding
1440-591: The Book of Tobit whose canonical status was being debated at the Council of Trent —led Rabelais to dedicate the book to her before she wrote the Heptameron . In contrast to the two preceding chronicles, the dialogue between the characters is much more developed than the plot elements in the third book. In particular, the central question of the book, which Panurge and Pantagruel consider from multiple points of view,
1520-469: The Kingdom of France : in the south of France, Occitan languages dominated; in east-central France, Franco-Provençal languages were predominant; and in the north of France, Oïl languages other than Francien continued to be spoken. The fascination with classical texts led to numerous borrowings from Latin and Greek . Numerous neologisms based on Latin roots were introduced, and some scholars modified
1600-591: The Tiers Livre joined the Sorbonne's list of banned books. After the king's death in 1547, the academic élite frowned upon Rabelais, and the Paris Parlement suspended the sale of The Fourth Book, published in 1552, despite Henry II having accorded him the royal privilege. This suspension proved ineffective, for the time being, as the king reiterated his support for the book. Rabelais resigned from
1680-463: The University of Poitiers and then to the University of Montpellier to study medicine. In 1532 he moved to Lyon , one of the intellectual centres of the Renaissance, and began working as a doctor at the hospital Hôtel-Dieu de Lyon . During his time in Lyon, he edited Latin works for the printer Sebastian Gryphius , and wrote a famous admiring letter to Erasmus to accompany the transmission of
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#17327904184631760-568: The grotesque , and for his larger-than-life characters. Both ecclesiastical and anticlerical , Christian and a freethinker , a doctor and a bon vivant , the multiple facets of his personality sometimes seem contradictory. Caught up in the religious and political turmoil of the Reformation , Rabelais treated the great questions of his time in his novels. Assessments of his life and work have evolved over time depending on dominant paradigms of thought. Rabelais admired Erasmus and like him
1840-630: The varieties of Chinese , and parts of the Romance , Germanic and Slavic families in Europe. Terms used in older literature include dialect area ( Leonard Bloomfield ) and L-complex ( Charles F. Hockett ). Northern Germanic languages spoken in Scandinavia form a dialect continuum where the two furthermost dialects have almost no mutual intelligibility. As such, spoken Danish and Swedish normally have low mutual intelligibility, but Swedes in
1920-463: The veracity of obviously fantastical elements of the story. The full version appeared in 1552, after Rabelais received a royal privilege on 6 Aug 1550 for the exclusive right to publish his work in French, Tuscan , Greek, and Latin. This, he accomplished with the help of the young Cardinal of Châtillon ( Odet de Coligny )—who would later convert to Protestantism and be excommunicated. Rabelais thanks
2000-576: The Öresund region (including Malmö and Helsingborg ), across the strait from the Danish capital Copenhagen , understand Danish somewhat better, largely due to the proximity of the region to Danish-speaking areas. While Norway was under Danish rule , the Bokmål written standard of Norwegian developed from Dano-Norwegian , a koiné language that evolved among the urban elite in Norwegian cities during
2080-614: The Americas ( cacao , hamac , maïs ). The influence of the Anglo-Norman language on English had left words of French and Norman origin in England. Some words of Romance origin now found their way back into French as doublets through war and trade. Also, the meaning and usage of many words from Old French transformed. Spelling and punctuation were extremely variable. The introduction of printing in 1470 highlighted
2160-524: The Cardinal for his help in the prefatory letter signed 28 January 1552 and, for the first time in the Pantagruel series, titled the prologue in his own name rather than using a pseudonym. The French Renaissance was a time of linguistic contact and debate. The first book of French, rather than Latin, grammar was published in 1530, followed nine years later by the language's first dictionary. Spelling
2240-476: The Divine Bottle, in the subsequent episode, Pantagruel is content simply listening to the thawing words as they rain down on the boat, whereas Jeanneret observes that his companions focus instead on their colourful appearance while they are still frozen, hurrying to gather as many up as they can and offering to sell those they have collected. The pilot describes the words as evidence of a great battle, and
2320-590: The French Language ) (1549) by the poet Joachim du Bellay , which maintained that French, like the Tuscan of Petrarch and Dante Alighieri , was a worthy language for literary expression and promulgated a program of linguistic production and purification, including the imitation of Latin genres. Mutual intelligibility In linguistics , mutual intelligibility is a relationship between different but related language varieties in which speakers of
2400-682: The Hôtel Dieu de Lyon on 13 February 1535 after receiving his salary, disappearing until August 1535 as a result of the tumultuous Affair of the Placards , which led Francis I to issue an edict forbidding all printing in France. Only the influence of the du Bellays allowed the printing presses to run again. In May, Jean du Bellay was named cardinal, and still with a diplomatic mission for Francis I, had Rabelais join him in Rome. During this time, Rabelais
2480-458: The Lyon fairs in the early 1530s. In the first chapter of the earliest book, Pantagruel's lineage is listed back 60 generations to a giant named Chalbroth. The narrator dismisses the skeptics of the time—who would have thought a giant far too large for Noah's Ark —stating that Hurtaly (the giant reigning during the flood and a great fan of soup) simply rode the Ark like a kid on a rocking horse, or like
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2560-535: The abbot in commendam of the Saint-Maur Abbey , Rabelais arranged to be assigned there, knowing that the monks were to become secular clergy the following year. In 1540, Rabelais lived for a short time in Turin as part of the household of du Bellay's brother, Guillaume . It was at this time that his two children were legitimized by Paul III, the same year that his third child (Théodule) died in Lyon at
2640-399: The age of two. Rabelais also spent some time lying low, under periodic threat of being condemned of heresy depending upon the health of his various protectors. In 1543, both Gargantua and Pantagruel were condemned by the Sorbonne , then a theological college. Only the protection of du Bellay saved Rabelais after the condemnation of his novel by the Sorbonne. In June 1543 Rabelais became
2720-622: The ban, Rabelais petitioned Pope Clement VII (1523–1534) and obtained an indult with the help of Bishop Geoffroy d'Estissac [ fr ] , and was able to leave the Franciscans for the Benedictine Order at Maillezais . At the Saint-Pierre-de-Maillezais abbey, he worked as a secretary to the bishop—a well-read prelate appointed by Francis I —and enjoyed his protection. Around 1527 he left
2800-458: The best-known episodes, including the storm at sea and Panurge's sheep. It was framed as an erratic odyssey, inspired in part by the Argonauts and the news of Jacques Cartier 's voyage to Canada, and in part by the imaginary voyage described by Lucian in A True Story , which provided Rabelais not only with several anecdotes, but also with a first-person narrator who regularly insisted on
2880-478: The bowels which Swift so malignantly hated. His was the true amor fati : he accepted reality in its entirety, accepted with gratitude and delight this amazingly improbable world." George Orwell was not an admirer of Rabelais. Writing in 1940, he called him "an exceptionally perverse, morbid writer, a case for psychoanalysis ". Milan Kundera , in a 2007 article in The New Yorker , commented on
2960-618: The charm of the rabble. Or it is good, rising as far as exquisite and excellent, to be perhaps the most delicious of dishes. In his 1759–1767 novel Tristram Shandy , Laurence Sterne quotes extensively from Rabelais. Alfred Jarry performed, from memory, hymns of Rabelais at Symbolist Rachilde 's Tuesday salons , and worked for years on an unfinished libretto for an opera by Claude Terrasse based on Pantagruel. Anatole France gave lectures on Rabelais in Argentina. John Cowper Powys , D. B. Wyndham-Lewis , and Lucien Febvre (one of
3040-422: The context of the communication. Classifications may also shift for reasons external to the languages themselves. As an example, in the case of a linear dialect continuum , the central varieties may become extinct , leaving only the varieties at both ends. Consequently, these end varieties may be reclassified as two languages, even though no significant linguistic change has occurred within the two extremes during
3120-578: The continued unification of French, the suppression of certain forms, and the prescription of rules, leading to Classical French. Middle French is the language found in the writings of Charles, Duke of Orléans , François Villon , Clément Marot , François Rabelais , Michel de Montaigne , Pierre de Ronsard , and the poets of La Pléiade . The affirmation and glorification of French finds its greatest manifestation in La Défense et illustration de la langue française ( The Defense and Illustration of
3200-467: The corpse of a hanged man, which Etienne Dolet described in his Carmina . It was through his work and scholarship in the field of medicine that Rabelais gained European fame. In 1532, under the pseudonym Alcofribas Nasier (an anagram of François Rabelais), he published his first book, Pantagruel King of the Dipsodes , the first of his Gargantua series , primarily to supplement his income at
3280-613: The curacy in January 1553 and died in Paris later that year. Gargantua and Pantagruel relates the adventures of Gargantua and his son Pantagruel. The tales are adventurous and erudite, festive and gross, ecumenical, and rarely—if ever—solemn for long. The first book, chronologically, was Pantagruel: King of the Dipsodes and the Gargantua mentioned in the Prologue refers not to Rabelais' own work but to storybooks that were being sold at
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3360-484: The danger of the Decretals." The Catholic Encyclopedia of 1911 declared that Rabelais was ... a revolutionary who attacked all the past, Scholasticism, the monks; his religion is scarcely more than that of a spiritually minded pagan. Less bold in political matters, he cared little for liberty; his ideal was a tyrant who loves peace. [...] His vocabulary is rich and picturesque, but licentious and filthy.[.....] As
3440-499: The dialects themselves, with the standard Shtokavian dialect , and with other languages. For example, Torlakian, which is considered a subdialect of Serbian Old Shtokavian , has significant mutual intelligibility with Macedonian and Bulgarian . Rabelais François Rabelais ( UK : / ˈ r æ b ə l eɪ / RAB -ə-lay , US : / ˌ r æ b ə ˈ l eɪ / - LAY ; French: [fʁɑ̃swa ʁablɛ] ; born between 1483 and 1494; died 1553)
3520-518: The differences accumulate over distance so that widely separated varieties may not be. This is a typical occurrence with widely spread languages and language families around the world, when these languages did not spread recently. Some prominent examples include the Indo-Aryan languages across large parts of India , varieties of Arabic across north Africa and southwest Asia, the Turkic languages ,
3600-406: The different varieties can readily understand each other without prior familiarity or special effort. Mutual intelligibility is sometimes used to distinguish languages from dialects , although sociolinguistic factors are often also used. Intelligibility between varieties can be asymmetric; that is, speakers of one variety may be able to better understand another than vice versa. An example of this
3680-401: The extinction of the central varieties. Furthermore, political and social conventions often override considerations of mutual intelligibility. For example, the varieties of Chinese are often considered a single language, even though there is usually no mutual intelligibility between geographically separated varieties. This is similarly the case among the varieties of Arabic , which also share
3760-497: The first edition and by Henri II for the 1552 edition, The Third Book was condemned by the Sorbonne, like the previous tomes. In it, Rabelais revisited discussions he had had while working as a secretary to Geoffroy d'Estissac earlier in Fontenay–le–Comte, where la querelle des femmes had been a lively subject of debate. More recent exchanges with Marguerite de Navarre —possibly about the question of clandestine marriage and
3840-648: The founders of the French historical school Annales ), all wrote books about him. James Joyce included an allusion to "Master Francois somebody" in his 1922 novel Ulysses . Mikhail Bakhtin , a Russian philosopher and critic, derived his concepts of the carnivalesque and grotesque body from the world of Rabelais. He points to the historical loss of communal spirit after the Medieval period and speaks of carnival laughter as an "expression of social consciousness". Aldous Huxley admired Rabelais' work. Writing in 1929, he praised Rabelais, stating "Rabelais loved
3920-453: The hospital. The idea of basing an allegory on the lives of giants came to Rabelais from the folklore legend of les Grandes chroniques du grand et énorme géant Gargantua , which were sold by colporteurs and at the fairs of Lyon [ fr ] as popular literature in the form of inexpensive pamphlets. The first edition of an almanac parodying the astrological predictions of the time called Pantagrueline prognostications appeared for
4000-415: The jester Triboulet . It is likely that several of the characters refer to real people: Abel Lefranc argues that Hippothadée was Jacques Lefèvre d'Étaples , Rondibilis was the doctor Guillaume Rondelet , the esoteric Her Trippa corresponds to Cornelius Agrippa . One of the comic features of the story is the contradictory interpretations Pantagruel and Panurge get embroiled in, the first of which being
4080-801: The later years of the union. Additionally, Norwegian assimilated a considerable amount of Danish vocabulary as well as traditional Danish expressions. As a consequence, spoken mutual intelligibility is not reciprocal. Because of the difficulty of imposing boundaries on a continuum, various counts of the Romance languages are given. For example, in The Linguasphere register of the world's languages and speech communities , David Dalby lists 23 languages based on mutual intelligibility: The non-standard vernacular dialects of Serbo-Croatian ( Kajkavian , Chakavian and Torlakian ) diverge more significantly from all four normative varieties of Serbo-Croatian. Their mutual intelligibility varies greatly between
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#17327904184634160-414: The members are defined positively, the text becomes more inviting: Honour, praise, distraction Herein lies subtraction in the tuning up of joy. To healthy bodies so employed Do pass on this reaction: Honour, praise, distraction The Thélèmites in the abbey live according to a single rule: DO WHAT YOU WANT Published in 1546 under his own name with the privilège granted by Francis I for
4240-428: The monastery without authorization, becoming an apostate until Pope Paul III absolved him of this crime, which carried with it the risk of severe sanctions, in 1536. Until this time, church law forbade him to work as a doctor or surgeon. J. Lesellier surmises that it was during the time he spent in Paris from 1528 to 1530 that two of his three children (François and Junie) were born. After Paris, Rabelais went to
4320-478: The narrator even wants to preserve some of the finest insults in oil. Jeanneret observes that Pantagruel considers the exchange of words to be an act of love rather than a commercial exchange, argues that their artificial preservation is superfluous, and "insinuates that books are petrified tombs, where the signs threaten to stop moving and, left to the devices of lazy readers, get shriveled down into simplistic meanings[,]" implying that "[a]ll writing carries within it
4400-475: The need for reform in spelling . One proposed reform came from Jacques Peletier du Mans , who developed a phonetic spelling system and introduced new typographic signs (1550), but his attempt at spelling reform was not followed. The period saw the publication of the first French grammars and of the French-Latin dictionary of Robert Estienne (1539). At the beginning of the 17th century, French would see
4480-660: The next word. The French wars in Italy and the presence of Italians in the French court brought the French into contact with Italian humanism . Many words dealing with the military ( alarme , cavalier , espion , infanterie , camp , canon , soldat ) and artistic (especially architectural: arcade , architrave , balcon , corridor ; also literary: sonnet ) practices were borrowed from Italian. Those tendencies would continue through Classical French . There were also some borrowings from Spanish ( casque ) and German ( reître ) and from
4560-607: The non-hard-of-hearing people of the United Kingdom and the United States share the same spoken language. The grammar of sign languages does not usually resemble that of the spoken languages used in the same geographical area. To illustrate, in terms of syntax , ASL shares more in common with spoken Japanese than with English . Almost all linguists use mutual intelligibility as the primary linguistic criterion for determining whether two speech varieties represent
4640-447: The novel Gargantua permanently added more than 800 words to the French language. Most scholars today agree that Rabelais wrote from a perspective of Christian humanism . This has not always been the case. Abel Lefranc , in his 1922 introduction to Pantagruel , depicted Rabelais as a militant anti-Christian atheist. On the contrary, M. A. Screech , like Lucien Febvre before him, describes Rabelais as an Erasmian . While formally
4720-749: The other language than the other way around. For example, if one language is related to another but has simplified its grammar , the speakers of the original language may understand the simplified language, but not vice versa. To illustrate, Dutch speakers tend to find it easier to understand Afrikaans as a result of Afrikaans's simplified grammar. Sign languages are not universal and usually not mutually intelligible, although there are also similarities among different sign languages. Sign languages are independent of spoken languages and follow their own linguistic development. For example, British Sign Language and American Sign Language (ASL) are quite different linguistically and mutually unintelligible, even though
4800-526: The paradoxical encomium of debts in chapter III. The Third Book , deeply indebted to In Praise of Folly , contains the first-known attestation of the word paradoxe in French. The more reflective tone shows the characters' evolution from the earlier tomes. Here Panurge is not as crafty as Pantagruel and is stubborn in his will to turn every sign to his advantage, refusing to listen to advice he had himself sought out. For example, when Her Trippa reads dark omens in his future marriage, Panurge accuses him of
4880-465: The philosophical novel) and the Fourth Book are considerably more erudite in tone. His literary legacy is such that the word Rabelaisian designates something that is "marked by gross robust humor, extravagance of caricature, or bold naturalism". According to a tradition dating back to Roger de Gaignières (1642–1715), François Rabelais was the son of seneschal and lawyer Antoine Rabelais and
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#17327904184634960-578: The praise of Pantagruelion, which combines properties of linen and hemp—a plant used in the 16th century for both the hangman's rope and medicinal purposes, being copiously loaded onto the ships. As a naturalist inspired by Pliny the Elder and Charles Estienne , the narrator intercedes in the story, first describing the plant in great detail, then waxing lyrical on its various qualities. Rabelais began work on The Fourth Book while still in Metz. He dropped off
5040-496: The same blind self-love ( philautie ) from which he seems to suffer. His erudition is more often put to work for pedantry than let to settle into wisdom. By contrast, Pantagruel's speech gains in weightiness by the third book, the exuberance of the young giant having faded. At the end of the Third Book , the protagonists decide to set sail in search of a discussion with the Oracle of the Divine Bottle. The last chapters are focused on
5120-476: The same or different languages. A primary challenge to this position is that speakers of closely related languages can often communicate with each other effectively if they choose to do so. In the case of transparently cognate languages recognized as distinct such as Spanish and Italian, mutual intelligibility is in principle and in practice not binary (simply yes or no), but occurs in varying degrees, subject to numerous variables specific to individual speakers in
5200-568: The second novel, Gargantua , M. Alcofribas narrates the Abbey of Thélème, built by the giant Gargantua. It differs markedly from the monastic norm, since it is open to both monks and nuns and has a swimming pool, maid service, and no clocks in sight. Only the good-looking are permitted to enter. The inscription at the gate first specifies who is not welcome: hypocrites, bigots, the pox-ridden, Goths, Magoths, straw-chewing law clerks, usurious grinches, old or officious judges, and burners of heretics. When
5280-534: The sentence, which becomes more or less the syntax of Modern but with a continued reliance on the verb in the second position of a sentence, or " verb-second structure ", until the 16th century. Among the elites, Latin was still the language of education, administration, and bureaucracy. That changed in 1539, with the Ordinance of Villers-Cotterêts , in which Francis I made French the sole language for legal acts. Regional differences were still extreme throughout
5360-424: The spelling of French words to bring them into conformity with their Latin roots, sometimes erroneously. That often produced a radical difference between a word's spelling and pronunciation. Nevertheless, Middle French spelling was overall fairly close to the pronunciation; unlike Modern French, word-final consonants were still pronounced though they were optionally lost when they preceded another consonant that started
5440-710: The study of grammar, rhetoric, and dialectic before moving on to the quadrivium , which dealt with arithmetic, geometry, music, and astronomy. In 1623, Jacques Bruneau de Tartifume wrote that Rabelais began his life as a novice of the Franciscan Order of Cordeliers , at the Convent of the Cordeliers, near Angers ; however there is no direct evidence to support this theory. By 1520, he was at Fontenay-le-Comte in Poitou where he became friends with Pierre Lamy,
5520-460: The theologians but brought them popular success and the admiration of later critics for their focus on the body. This first book, critical of the existing monastic and educational system, contains the first known occurrence in French of the words encyclopédie , caballe , progrès, and utopie , among others. The book became popular, along with its 1534 prequel , which dealt with the life and exploits of Pantagruel's father Gargantua, and which
5600-421: The year 1533 from the press of Rabelais' publisher François Juste. It contained the name "Maître Alcofribas" in its full title. The popular almanacs continued irregularly until the final 1542 edition, which was prepared for the "perpetual year". From 1537, they were printed at the end of Juste's editions of Pantagruel . Pantagruelism is an "eat, drink and be merry" philosophy, which led his books into disfavor with
5680-553: Was a French writer who has been called the first great French prose author. A humanist of the French Renaissance and Greek scholar , he attracted opposition from both Protestant theologian John Calvin and from the hierarchy of the Catholic Church . Though in his day he was best known as a physician, scholar, diplomat, and Catholic priest , later he became better known as a satirist for his depictions of
5760-541: Was a poetic device meant to resist the reductive gloss . Michel Jeanneret [ fr ] suggests that Panurge's description (in the Papimane Island episode in The Fourth Book ) of the ill-effects of the pages of decretals being used as toilet paper, targets, cones, and masks on whatever they touch was due to their misuse as material objects. As the merry crew sail on from the island towards
5840-466: Was a prolific reader, who wrote a great deal about bodies and all they excrete or ingest. His fictional works are filled with multilingual, often sexual, puns, absurd creatures, bawdy songs and lists. Words and metaphors from Rabelais abound in modern French and some words have found their way into English, through Thomas Urquhart 's unfinished 1693 translation, completed and considerably augmented by Peter Anthony Motteux by 1708. According to Radio-Canada,
5920-404: Was also working for Geoffroy d'Estissac's interests and maintained a correspondence with him through diplomatic channels (under royal seal as far as Poitiers). Three letters from Rabelais have survived. On 17 January 1536, Paul III issued a papal brief authorizing Rabelais to join a Benedictine monastery and practice medicine, as long as he refrained from surgery. Jean du Bellay having been named
6000-601: Was attacked and portrayed as a threat to religion or even an atheist by both. For example, "at the request of Catholic theologians, all four Pantagrueline chronicles were censured by either the Sorbonne , Parlement, or both". On the opposite end of the spectrum, John Calvin saw Rabelais as a representative of the numerous moderate evangelical humanists who, while "critical of contemporary Catholic institutions, doctrines, and conduct", did not go far enough; in addition, Calvin considered Rabelais' apparent mocking tone to be especially dangerous, since it could be easily misinterpreted as
6080-462: Was born at the estate of La Devinière in Seuilly (near Chinon ), Touraine in modern-day Indre-et-Loire , where a Rabelais museum can be found today. The exact dates of his birth (c. 1483–1494) and death (1553) are unknown, but most scholars accept his likely birthdate as being 1483. His education was likely typical of the late medieval period: beginning with the trivium syllabus that included
6160-443: Was far less codified. Rabelais, as an educated reader of the day, preferred etymological spelling—preserving clues to the lineage of words—to more phonetic spellings which wash those traces away. Rabelais' use of Latin, Greek, regional and dialectal terms, creative calquing , gloss , neologism and mis-translation was the fruit of the printing press having been invented less than a hundred years earlier. A doctor by trade, Rabelais
6240-559: Was more infused with the politics of the day and overtly favorable to the monarchy than the preceding volume had been. The 1534 re-edition of Pantagruel contains many orthographic, grammatical, and typographical innovations, in particular the use of diacritics (accents, apostrophes, and diaereses ), which was then new in French. Mireille Huchon ascribes this innovation in part to the influence of Dante 's De vulgari eloquentia on French letters. No clear evidence establishes when Jean du Bellay and Rabelais met. Nevertheless, when du Bellay
6320-463: Was sent to Rome in January 1534 to convince Pope Clément VII not to excommunicate Henry VIII , he was accompanied by Rabelais, who worked as his secretary and personal physician until his return in April. During his stay, Rabelais found the city fascinating and decided to bring out a new edition of Bartolomeo Marliani 's Topographia antiqua Romae with Sebastien Gryphe in Lyon. Rabelais quietly left
6400-410: Was the first giant in Pantagruel's list of ancestors to suffer from the disease. Although most chapters are humorous, wildly fantastic and frequently absurd, a few relatively serious passages have become famous for expressing humanistic ideals of the time. In particular, the chapters on Gargantua's boyhood and Gargantua's paternal letter to Pantagruel present a quite detailed vision of education. In
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