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148-613: Donaldsonville (historically French : Lafourche-des-Chitimachas ) is a city in, and the parish seat of Ascension Parish in the U.S. state of Louisiana . Located along the River Road of the west bank of the Mississippi River , it is a part of the Baton Rouge metropolitan statistical area . At the 2020 U.S. census , it had a population of 6,695. Donaldsonville's historic district has what has been described as

296-744: A French official to teachers in the department of Finistère , in western Brittany, included the following: "And remember, Gents: you were given your position in order to kill the Breton language". The prefect of Basses-Pyrénées in the French Basque Country wrote in 1846: "Our schools in the Basque Country are particularly meant to replace the Basque language with French..." Students were taught that their ancestral languages were inferior and they should be ashamed of them; this process

444-594: A PhD degree for new full-time hires. A scholarly thesis, such as a doctoral dissertation, is now regarded as the baseline qualification for a professional historian. However, some historians still gain recognition based on published (academic) works and the award of fellowships by academic bodies like the Royal Historical Society . Publication is increasingly required by smaller schools, so graduate papers become journal articles and PhD dissertations become published monographs. The graduate student experience

592-577: A Scottish historian, and the Historiographer Royal published the History of Scotland 1542 – 1603 , in 1759 and his most famous work, The history of the reign of Charles V in 1769. His scholarship was painstaking for the time and he was able to access a large number of documentary sources that had previously been unstudied. He was also one of the first historians who understood the importance of general and universally applicable ideas in

740-517: A base at Donaldsonville for their occupation of river parishes. They took over some plantations, running them as U.S. government plantations to supply the forces and produce cotton. Many escaping slaves entered the Union lines to gain freedom. General Benjamin Butler had declared them " contrabands " of war and would not return them to slaveholders. They stayed and worked with Union forces, helping build

888-465: A career that spanned much of the century, Ranke set the standards for much of later historical writing, introducing such ideas as reliance on primary sources ( empiricism ), an emphasis on narrative history and especially international politics ( aussenpolitik ). Sources had to be hard, not speculations and rationalizations. His credo was to write history the way it was. He insisted on primary sources with proven authenticity. The term Whig history

1036-431: A comprehensive academic study entitled "The World's 10 most influential languages". In the article, Weber ranked French as, after English, the second-most influential language of the world, ahead of Spanish. His criteria were the numbers of native speakers, the number of secondary speakers (especially high for French among fellow world languages), the number of countries using the language and their respective populations,

1184-555: A foreign language. Due to the rise of French in Africa, the total French-speaking population worldwide is expected to reach 700 million people in 2050. French is the fastest growing language on the continent (in terms of either official or foreign languages). French is increasingly being spoken as a native language in Francophone Africa, especially in regions like Ivory Coast , Cameroon , Gabon, Madagascar , and

1332-562: A highly influential cluster of British Marxist historians , who contributed to history from below and class structure in early capitalist society. Members included Christopher Hill , Eric Hobsbawm and E. P. Thompson . World history , as a distinct field of historical study, emerged as an independent academic field in the 1980s. It focused on the examination of history from a global perspective and looked for common patterns that emerged across all cultures. Arnold J. Toynbee 's ten-volume A Study of History , written between 1933 and 1954,

1480-452: A household in the city was $ 24,084, and the median income for a family was $ 29,408. Males had a median income of $ 31,849 versus $ 17,528 for females. The per capita income for the city was $ 12,009. About 32.8% of families and 34.8% of the population were below the poverty line , including 49.0% of those under age 18 and 22.2% of those age 65 or over. From 2014 to 2019, its median household income increased to $ 25,551 and $ 36,667 for families. At

1628-705: A period of prosperity and prominence among European nations. Richelieu established the Académie française to protect the French language. By the early 1800s, Parisian French had become the primary language of the aristocracy in France. Near the beginning of the 19th century, the French government began to pursue policies with the end goal of eradicating the many minorities and regional languages ( patois ) spoken in France. This began in 1794 with Henri Grégoire 's "Report on

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1776-450: A progressive model of British history, according to which the country threw off superstition, autocracy and confusion to create a balanced constitution and a forward-looking culture combined with the freedom of belief and expression. This model of human progress has been called the Whig interpretation of history . In his main work Histoire de France , French historian Jules Michelet coined

1924-418: A regular academic career, must entice other scholars to help him; and with the present [high] demand for college teachers, this is no easy task. An undergraduate history degree is often used as a stepping stone to graduate studies in business or law. Many historians are employed at universities and other facilities for post-secondary education. In addition, it is normal for colleges and universities to require

2072-494: A relic of the old nominal case system of Latin longer than most other Romance languages (with the notable exception of Romanian which still currently maintains a case distinction), differentiating between an oblique case and a nominative case. The phonology was characterized by heavy syllabic stress, which led to the emergence of various complicated diphthongs such as -eau which would later be leveled to monophthongs. The earliest evidence of what became Old French can be seen in

2220-683: A result of French and Belgian colonialism from the 16th century onward, French was introduced to new territories in the Americas, Africa, and Asia. French has a long history as an international language of literature and scientific standards and is a primary or second language of many international organisations including the United Nations , the European Union, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization ,

2368-469: A simple accounting of events, but strived on the contrary to pose and solve problems and, neglecting surface disturbances, to observe the long and medium-term evolution of economy, society, and civilisation. Marxist historiography developed as a school of historiography influenced by the chief tenets of Marxism , including the centrality of social class and economic constraints in determining historical outcomes. Friedrich Engels wrote The Condition of

2516-407: A small garrison of 180 Union men, commanded by Major Joseph Bullen of the 28th Maine; the forces were also made up of the 1st Louisiana Volunteers , a few Louisiana Native Guard convalescents, and some fugitive slaves. In June 1863, Confederate forces attacked Fort Butler at night. Led by General Tom Green , more than 1,000 Texas Rangers attacked the fort. Free blacks and fugitive slaves joined in

2664-547: A variant of Canadian French , is spoken in parts of New England . Missouri French was historically spoken in Missouri and Illinois (formerly known as Upper Louisiana ), but is nearly extinct today. French also survived in isolated pockets along the Gulf Coast of what was previously French Lower Louisiana , such as Mon Louis Island , Alabama and DeLisle, Mississippi (the latter only being discovered by linguists in

2812-457: A working language along with English and German ; in some institutions, French is the sole working language (e.g. at the Court of Justice of the European Union ). French is also the 16th most natively spoken language in the world, the sixth most spoken language by total number of speakers , and is among the top five most studied languages worldwide, with about 120 million learners as of 2017. As

2960-437: Is 95%, and in the French collectivity of Wallis and Futuna , it is 84%. In French Polynesia and to a lesser extent Wallis and Futuna, where oral and written knowledge of the French language has become almost universal (95% and 84% respectively), French increasingly tends to displace the native Polynesian languages as the language most spoken at home. In French Polynesia, the percentage of the population who reported that French

3108-746: Is a small city with numerous historic sites. Since 2008, the River Road African American Museum , located in the city, has been included on the Louisiana African American Heritage Trail . It also has parks, Civil War grounds, and shopping centers. The official newspaper of the city is the Donaldsonville Chief , which has been published since 1871. According to the United States Census Bureau ,

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3256-472: Is a widespread second language among the Lebanese people , and is taught in many schools along with Arabic and English. French is used on Lebanese pound banknotes, on road signs, on Lebanese license plates , and on official buildings (alongside Arabic). Today, French and English are secondary languages of Lebanon , with about 40% of the population being Francophone and 40% Anglophone. The use of English

3404-489: Is also a working language in nonprofit organisations such as the Red Cross (alongside English, German, Spanish, Portuguese, Arabic and Russian), Amnesty International (alongside 32 other languages of which English is the most used, followed by Spanish, Portuguese, German, and Italian), Médecins sans Frontières (used alongside English, Spanish, Portuguese and Arabic), and Médecins du Monde (used alongside English). Given

3552-447: Is always written with contemporary concerns and ancient historians wrote their histories in response to the needs of their times. Out of thousands of Greek and Roman historians, only the tiniest fraction's works survive and it is out of this small pool that ancient historians and ancient historiography are analyzed today. Modern historians of the ancient world have to deal with diverse types of evidence, which are debated more today than in

3700-468: Is difficult—those who finish their doctorate in the United States take on average 8 or more years; funding is scarce except at a few very rich universities. Being a teaching assistant in a course is required in some programs; in others it is a paid opportunity awarded a fraction of the students. Until the 1970s it was rare for graduate programs to teach how to teach; the assumption was that teaching

3848-652: Is enacted only in New Brunswick, where about one third of the population is Francophone. French is also an official language of all of the territories ( Northwest Territories , Nunavut , and Yukon ). Out of the three, Yukon has the most French speakers, making up just under 4% of the population. Furthermore, while French is not an official language in Ontario , the French Language Services Act ensures that provincial services are available in

3996-411: Is especially true of narrative history, which nonprofessionals have all but taken over. The gradual withering of the narrative impulse in favor of the analytical urge among professional academic historians has resulted in a virtual abdication of the oldest and most honored role of the historian, that of storyteller. Having abdicated... the professional is in a poor position to patronize amateurs who fulfill

4144-563: Is growing in the business and media environment. Out of about 900,000 students, about 500,000 are enrolled in Francophone schools, public or private, in which the teaching of mathematics and scientific subjects is provided in French. Actual usage of French varies depending on the region and social status. One-third of high school students educated in French go on to pursue higher education in English-speaking institutions. English

4292-404: Is known as Old French. The period of Old French spanned between the 8th and 14th centuries. Old French shared many characteristics with Latin. For example, Old French made use of different possible word orders just as Latin did because it had a case system that retained the difference between nominative subjects and oblique non-subjects . The period is marked by a heavy superstrate influence from

4440-567: Is located on the corner of St. Patrick Street and Marchand Drive. Mechanization of agriculture and other changes resulted in a major loss of population in Ascension Parish from 1900 to 1930, particularly from 1920 to 1930. This was the period of the Great Migration , when tens of thousands of African Americans left the rural South to go for opportunities in northern and midwestern cities. Such changes also drew off business from

4588-418: Is not seen as possible in historical practice: a historian's interest inevitably influences their judgement (what information to use and omit, how to present the information, etc.); the sources used by historians for their history all have bias, and historians are products of their culture, concepts, and beliefs. Racial and cultural biases can play major roles in national histories, which often ignore or downplay

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4736-469: Is often considered to be a useful skill by business owners in the United Kingdom; a 2014 study found that 50% of British managers considered French to be a valuable asset for their business, thus ranking French as the most sought-after foreign language there, ahead of German (49%) and Spanish (44%). MIT economist Albert Saiz calculated a 2.3% premium for those who have French as a foreign language in

4884-640: Is often seen as the goal of those who work on history, in practice there is no convergence on anything in particular. Historical scholarship is never value free since historian's writings are impacted by the frameworks of their times. Some scholars of history have observed that there are no particular standards for historical fields such as religion, art, science, democracy, and social justice as these are by their nature 'essentially contested' fields, such that they require diverse tools particular to each field beforehand in order to interpret topics from those fields. There are three commonly held reasons why avoiding bias

5032-828: Is one of the official languages of such major international and regional courts, tribunals, and dispute-settlement bodies as the African Court on Human and Peoples' Rights , the Caribbean Court of Justice , the Court of Justice for the Economic Community of West African States , the Inter-American Court of Human Rights , the International Court of Justice , the International Criminal Tribunal for

5180-478: Is poor and getting worse, with many relegated to part-time "adjunct" teaching jobs with low pay and no benefits. C. Vann Woodward (1908–1999), Sterling Professor of History at Yale University, cautioned that the academicians had themselves abdicated their role as storytellers: Professionals do well to apply the term "amateur" with caution to the historian outside their ranks. The word does have deprecatory and patronizing connotations that occasionally backfire. This

5328-639: Is taught in universities around the world, and is one of the world's most influential languages because of its wide use in the worlds of journalism, jurisprudence , education, and diplomacy. In diplomacy, French is one of the six official languages of the United Nations (and one of the UN Secretariat 's only two working languages ), one of twenty official and three procedural languages of the European Union , an official language of NATO ,

5476-434: Is the history of the arts, of commerce, of civilization – in a word, – of the human mind." He broke from the tradition of narrating diplomatic and military events, and emphasized customs, social history, and achievements in the arts and sciences. He was the first scholar to make a serious attempt to write the history of the world, eliminating theological frameworks, and emphasizing economics, culture, and political history. At

5624-553: Is the language of business and communication, with French being an element of social distinction, chosen for its emotional value. French is an official language of the Pacific Island nation of Vanuatu , where 31% of the population was estimated to speak it in 2023. In the French special collectivity of New Caledonia , 97% of the population can speak, read and write French while in French Polynesia this figure

5772-483: Is the native language of about 23% of the Swiss population, and is spoken by 50% of the population. Along with Luxembourgish and German, French is one of the three official languages of Luxembourg , where it is generally the preferred language of business as well as of the different public administrations. It is also the official language of Monaco . At a regional level, French is acknowledged as an official language in

5920-492: Is the second-most spoken language (after English) in the states of Maine and New Hampshire . In Louisiana , it is tied with Spanish for second-most spoken if Louisiana French and all creoles such as Haitian are included. French is the third most spoken language (after English and Spanish) in the states of Connecticut , Rhode Island , and New Hampshire . Louisiana is home to many distinct French dialects, collectively known as Louisiana French . New England French , essentially

6068-424: Is the sole official language in the province of Quebec , where some 80% of the population speak it as a native language and 95% are capable of conducting a conversation in it. Quebec is also home to the city of Montreal , which is the world's fourth-largest French-speaking city, by number of first language speakers. New Brunswick and Manitoba are the only officially bilingual provinces, though full bilingualism

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6216-426: Is widely accepted that "strict objectivity is epistemologically unattainable for historians". Historians rarely articulate their conception of objectivity or discuss it in detail. And like in other professions, historians rarely analyze themselves or their activity. In practice, "specific canons of historical proof are neither widely observed nor generally agreed upon" among professional historians. Though objectivity

6364-636: The Irving v Penguin Books and Lipstadt trial, the court relied on Richard Evan's witness report which mentioned "objective historian" in the same vein as the reasonable person , and reminiscent of the standard traditionally used in English law of " the man on the Clapham omnibus ". This was necessary so that there would be a legal benchmark to compare and contrast the scholarship of an objective historian against

6512-591: The Yale Law Journal , Wendie E. Schneider distils these seven points for what he meant by an objective historian: Schneider uses the concept of the "objective historian" to suggest that this could be an aid in assessing what makes a historian suitable as expert witnesses under the Daubert standard in the United States . Schneider proposed this, because, in her opinion, Irving could not have passed

6660-492: The science of biography , science of hadith and Isnad (chain of transmission). They later applied these methodologies to other historical figures in the Islamic civilization . Famous historians in this tradition include Urwah (d. 712), Wahb ibn Munabbih (d. 728), Ibn Ishaq (d. 761), al-Waqidi (745–822), Ibn Hisham (d. 834), Muhammad al-Bukhari (810–870) and Ibn Hajar (1372–1449). During

6808-640: The Age of Enlightenment , the modern development of historiography through the application of scrupulous methods began. French philosophe Voltaire (1694–1778) had an enormous influence on the art of history writing. His best-known histories are The Age of Louis XIV (1751), and Essay on the Customs and the Spirit of the Nations (1756). "My chief object," he wrote in 1739, "is not political or military history, it

6956-809: The American Civil War as part of the Union's effort to gain control of the Mississippi River. The Union sent gunboats to the town and warned that if shots were fired, the Union Navy would strike the area for six miles to the south and nine miles to the north and destroy every building on every plantation . Admiral David G. Farragut destroyed much of the former capital city and put Ascension Parish under martial law , extending that to other River parishes. Historian John D. Winters , in his The Civil War in Louisiana (1963), describes

7104-764: The Aosta Valley region of Italy where it is the first language of approximately 50% of the population, while French dialects remain spoken by minorities on the Channel Islands . It is also spoken in Andorra and is the main language after Catalan in El Pas de la Casa . The language is taught as the primary second language in the German state of Saarland , with French being taught from pre-school and over 43% of citizens being able to speak French. The majority of

7252-609: The Democratic Republic of Congo . There is not a single African French , but multiple forms that diverged through contact with various indigenous African languages . Sub-Saharan Africa is the region where the French language is most likely to expand, because of the expansion of education and rapid population growth. It is also where the language has evolved the most in recent years. Some vernacular forms of French in Africa can be difficult to understand for French speakers from other countries, but written forms of

7400-517: The Democratic Republic of the Congo . In some North African countries, though not having official status, it is also a first language among some upper classes of the population alongside indigenous languages, but only a second one among the general population. In 2015, approximately 40% of the Francophone population (including L2 and partial speakers) lived in Europe, 36% in sub-Saharan Africa and

7548-533: The European Union , French was the dominant language within all institutions until the 1990s. After several enlargements of the EU (1995, 2004), French significantly lost ground in favour of English, which is more widely spoken and taught in most EU countries. French currently remains one of the three working languages, or "procedural languages", of the EU, along with English and German. It is the second-most widely used language within EU institutions after English, but remains

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7696-559: The Francien dialect is one that not only continued but also thrived during the Middle French period (14th–17th centuries). Modern French grew out of this Francien dialect. Grammatically, during the period of Middle French, noun declensions were lost and there began to be standardized rules. Robert Estienne published the first Latin-French dictionary, which included information about phonetics, etymology, and grammar. Politically,

7844-687: The Great Reform Act of 1832 in England. Thomas Carlyle published his magnum opus, the three-volume The French Revolution: A History in 1837. The resulting work had a passion new to historical writing. Thomas Macaulay produced his most famous work of history, The History of England from the Accession of James the Second , in 1848. His writings are famous for their ringing prose and for their confident, sometimes dogmatic, emphasis on

7992-877: The International Olympic Committee , the Council of Europe , the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development , Organization of American States (alongside Spanish, Portuguese and English), the Eurovision Song Contest , one of eighteen official languages of the European Space Agency , World Trade Organization and the least used of the three official languages in the North American Free Trade Agreement countries. It

8140-678: The Middle Ages . They wrote about the history of Jesus Christ, that of the Church and that of their patrons, the dynastic history of the local rulers. In the Early Middle Ages historical writing often took the form of annals or chronicles recording events year by year, but this style tended to hamper the analysis of events and causes. An example of this type of writing is the Anglo-Saxon Chronicles , which were

8288-477: The National Register of Historic Places . After the war, Donaldsonville became the third-largest black community in the state, as more freedmen moved there to join those who had settled near Union forces for safety during the war. In 1868 the city elected the first African-American mayor in the United States, Pierre Caliste Landry , a former slave who been educated in schools on a plantation owned by

8436-626: The Oaths of Strasbourg and the Sequence of Saint Eulalia , while Old French literature began to be produced in the eleventh century, with major early works often focusing on the lives of saints (such as the Vie de Saint Alexis ), or wars and royal courts, notably including the Chanson de Roland , epic cycles focused on King Arthur and his court , as well as a cycle focused on William of Orange . It

8584-631: The Roman Empire . French evolved from Gallo-Romance , the Latin spoken in Gaul , and more specifically in Northern Gaul. Its closest relatives are the other langues d'oïl —languages historically spoken in northern France and in southern Belgium, which French ( Francien ) largely supplanted. French was also influenced by native Celtic languages of Northern Roman Gaul like Gallia Belgica and by

8732-436: The World Trade Organization , the International Olympic Committee , the General Conference on Weights and Measures , and the International Committee of the Red Cross . French is a Romance language (meaning that it is descended primarily from Vulgar Latin ) that evolved out of the Gallo-Romance dialects spoken in northern France. The language's early forms include Old French and Middle French . Due to Roman rule, Latin

8880-426: The census of 2000, there were 7,605 people, 2,656 households, and 1,946 families residing in the city. The population density was 2,986.9 inhabitants per square mile (1,153.2/km). There were 2,948 housing units at an average density of 1,157.8 per square mile (447.0/km). In 2020, the U.S. Census Bureau determined 6,695 people lived in the city, down from 7,436 in 2010. There were 3,031 households and 1,846 families in

9028-497: The provinces of Quebec, Ontario, and New Brunswick); Belgium ( Wallonia and the Brussels-Capital Region ); western Switzerland (specifically the cantons forming the Romandy region); parts of Luxembourg; parts of the United States (the states of Louisiana, Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont); Monaco; the Aosta Valley region of Italy; and various communities elsewhere. French is estimated to have about 310 million speakers, of which about 80 million are native speakers. According to

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9176-427: The ( Germanic ) Frankish language of the post-Roman Frankish invaders. Today, owing to the French colonial empire , there are numerous French-based creole languages , most notably Haitian Creole . A French-speaking person or nation may be referred to as Francophone in both English and French. French is an official language in 27 countries , as well as one of the most geographically widespread languages in

9324-416: The 16th century BCE, and it includes many treatises on specific subjects and individual biographies of prominent people and also explores the lives and deeds of commoners, both contemporary and those of previous eras. Christian historiography began early, perhaps as early as Luke-Acts , which is the primary source for the Apostolic Age . Writing history was popular among Christian monks and clergy in

9472-455: The 1990s) but these varieties are severely endangered or presumed extinct. French is one of two official languages in Haiti alongside Haitian Creole . It is the principal language of education, administration, business, and public signage and is spoken by all educated Haitians. It is also used for ceremonial events such as weddings, graduations, and church masses. The vast majority of the population speaks Haitian Creole as their first language;

9620-403: The 19th century due to innovations in the field. Ancient historians were very different from modern historians in terms of goals, documentation, sources, and methods. For instance, chronological systems were not widely used, their sources were often absorbed (traceability of such sources usually disappeared), and the goal of an ancient work was often to create political or military paradigms. It

9768-416: The 2021 American Community Survey , the median income was $ 20,052, while families had a median income of $ 26,061, down from the 2000 census. French language French ( français [fʁɑ̃sɛ] or langue française [lɑ̃ɡ fʁɑ̃sɛːz] ) is a Romance language of the Indo-European family . Like all other Romance languages, it descended from the Vulgar Latin of

9916-488: The 20th century historians incorporated social science dimensions like politics, economy, and culture in their historiography, including postmodernism. Since the 1980s there has been a special interest in the memories and commemoration of past events. History by its nature is prone to continuous debate, and historians tend to be divided. There is no past that is commonly agreed upon, since there are competing histories (e.g., of elites, non-elites, men, women, races, etc.). It

10064-474: The 20th century, when it was replaced by English as the United States became the dominant global power following the Second World War . Stanley Meisler of the Los Angeles Times said that the fact that the Treaty of Versailles was written in English as well as French was the "first diplomatic blow" against the language. During the Grand Siècle (17th century), France, under the rule of powerful leaders such as Cardinal Richelieu and Louis XIV , enjoyed

10212-475: The Bringier family. After the war, he had advanced to become an attorney and state politician, serving in both houses of the legislature. He also became a Methodist Episcopal minister. Donaldsonville is the home of one of the oldest synagogue buildings still standing in the United States. The wooden structure was built in 1872 by Congregation Bikur Cholim, which disbanded in the 1940s. It is now used as an Ace Hardware store. The Jewish Cemetery dates to 1800s and

10360-510: The Canadian capital, is also effectively bilingual, as it has a large population of federal government workers, who are required to offer services in both French and English, and is just across the river from the Quebecois city of Gatineau . According to the United States Census Bureau (2011), French is the fourth most spoken language in the United States after English, Spanish, and Chinese, when all forms of French are considered together and all dialects of Chinese are similarly combined. French

10508-614: The Caribbean that are collectively referred to as the French West Indies , namely Guadeloupe , Saint Barthélemy , Saint Martin , and Martinique . French is the official language of both French Guiana on the South American continent, and of Saint Pierre and Miquelon , an archipelago off the coast of Newfoundland in North America. French was the official language of the colony of French Indochina , comprising modern-day Vietnam , Laos , and Cambodia . It continues to be an administrative language in Laos and Cambodia, although its influence has waned in recent decades. In colonial Vietnam,

10656-538: The Empire, this local elite had been slowly abandoning Gaulish entirely, but the rural and lower class populations remained Gaulish speakers who could sometimes also speak Latin or Greek. The final language shift from Gaulish to Vulgar Latin among rural and lower class populations occurred later, when both they and the incoming Frankish ruler/military class adopted the Gallo-Roman Vulgar Latin speech of

10804-484: The Germanic Frankish language , which non-exhaustively included the use in upper-class speech and higher registers of V2 word order , a large percentage of the vocabulary (now at around 15% of modern French vocabulary ) including the impersonal singular pronoun on (a calque of Germanic man ), and the name of the language itself. Up until its later stages, Old French , alongside Old Occitan , maintained

10952-772: The Greek tradition . While early Roman works were still written in Greek, the Origines , composed by the Roman statesman Cato the Elder (234–149 BCE), was written in Latin, in a conscious effort to counteract Greek cultural influence. Strabo (63 BCE – c.  24   CE ) was an important exponent of the Greco-Roman tradition of combining geography with history, presenting a descriptive history of peoples and places known to his era. Livy (59 BCE – 17 CE) records

11100-643: The Indian Ocean, 15% in North Africa and the Middle East, 8% in the Americas, and 1% in Asia and Oceania. French is the second most widely spoken mother tongue in the European Union . Of Europeans who speak other languages natively, approximately one-fifth are able to speak French as a second language. French is the second most taught foreign language in the EU. All institutions of the EU use French as

11248-533: The Mediterranean region. The earliest known critical historical works were The Histories , composed by Herodotus of Halicarnassus (484 – c. 425  BCE ) who later became known as the "father of history" ( Cicero ). Herodotus attempted to distinguish between more and less reliable accounts and personally conducted research by travelling extensively, giving written accounts of various Mediterranean cultures. Although Herodotus' overall emphasis lay on

11396-451: The OIF, approximately 321 million people worldwide are "able to speak the language" as of 2022, without specifying the criteria for this estimation or whom it encompasses. In Francophone Africa, it is spoken mainly as a second language. However it has also become a native language in a number of urban areas, especially in regions like Ivory Coast , Cameroon , Gabon, Madagascar , and

11544-818: The Working Class in England in 1844 , which was salient in creating the socialist impetus in British politics from then on, e.g. the Fabian Society . R. H. Tawney 's The Agrarian Problem in the Sixteenth Century (1912) and Religion and the Rise of Capitalism (1926), reflected his ethical concerns and preoccupations in economic history . A circle of historians inside the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB) formed in 1946 and became

11692-740: The [Confederate] Rangers from firing on Federal boats. These attacks did no real good and brought only crude reprisals against the innocent and helped to keep the Negroes stirred up. A citizen complained that the Rangers were useless and lawless, unable or unwilling to protect Confederate property. The citizen added that the Confederate people "could not fare worse were we surrounded by a band of Lincoln 's mercenary hirelings. Our homes are entered and pillaged of everything that they [Rangers] see fit to appropriate to themselves." Union forces established

11840-581: The actions and characters of men, he also attributed an important role to divinity in the determination of historical events. Thucydides largely eliminated divine causality in his account of the war between Athens and Sparta, establishing a rationalistic element that set a precedent for subsequent Western historical writings. He was also the first to distinguish between cause and immediate origins of an event, while his successor Xenophon ( c.  431 – 355 BCE) introduced autobiographical elements and character studies in his Anabasis . The Romans adopted

11988-403: The area. Landowner and planter William Donaldson in 1806 commissioned the architect and planner, Barthelemy Lafon , to plan a new town at this site. It was renamed Donaldsonville after him. Donaldsonville was designated as the Louisiana capital (1829–1831), as the result of conflict between the increasing number of Anglo-Americans , who deemed New Orleans "too noisy" and wanted to move

12136-463: The area. They named the site Lafourche-des-Chitimachas, after the regional indigenous people and the local bayou, which they gave the same name. They developed agriculture in the parish, mainly as sugar cane plantations worked by African slave labor . Acadians , expelled by the British from Acadia in 1755, began to settle in the area from 1756 to 1785, where they developed small subsistence farms. Spanish Isleños also settled here. In 1772 when

12284-417: The capital closer to their centers of population farther north in the state, and French Creoles , who wanted to keep the capital in a historically-French area. As a result of the wealth planters gained from sugar and cotton commodity crops , they built fine mansions and other buildings in town during the antebellum years . In the summer of 1862, Donaldsonville was bombarded by Union forces during

12432-542: The city at the 2020 census . In 2000, the racial and ethnic makeup of the city was 29.82% White , 69.13% Black or African American, 0.12% Native American , 0.12% Asian , 0.37% from other races , and 0.45% from two or more races. Hispanic and Latino Americans of any race were 1.10% of the population. By 2020, the racial and ethnic makeup was 18.04% non-Hispanic white , 77.31% African American, 0.01% Native American, 0.19% Asian, 2.03% from two or more races, and 2.4% Hispanic or Latino of any race. In 2000, median income for

12580-468: The city has a total area of 2.5 square miles (6.5 km), all land. Coming upriver on the Mississippi, Donaldsonville is the point of the first expanse of land beyond the narrow natural levee. The city sits approximately 25 feet above sea level. Donaldsonville is located where Bayou Lafourche , a distributary of the Mississippi River, formerly branched off until the entrance was dammed in 1905. At

12728-411: The common people, rather than the leaders and institutions of the country. Another important French historian of the period was Hippolyte Taine . He was the chief theoretical influence of French naturalism , a major proponent of sociological positivism and one of the first practitioners of historicist criticism. Literary historicism as a critical movement has been said to originate with him. One of

12876-543: The concept of historical materialism into the study of world-historical development. In his conception, the economic conditions and dominant modes of production determined the structure of society at that point. Previous historians had focused on the cyclical events of the rise and decline of rulers and nations. Process of nationalization of history , as part of national revivals in the 19th century, resulted with separation of "one's own" history from common universal history by such way of perceiving, understanding and treating

13024-632: The construction of significant infrastructure in Donaldsonville (including about 12 miles of paving, and the still-extant sewerage system). Today the Donaldsonville Historic District has what is described as the "finest collection of buildings from the pre-Civil War to 1933 period" of rivertowns above New Orleans. It is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. In the 21st century, Donaldsonville

13172-506: The country near French-speaking Quebec, however, it is the foreign language more commonly taught. Vowel phonemes in French Historian In the 19th century scholars used to study ancient Greek and Roman historians to see how generally reliable they were. In recent decades, however, scholars have focused more on the constructions, genres, and meanings that ancient historians sought to convey to their audiences. History

13320-420: The cultural context of the times. An important part of the contribution of many modern historians is the verification or dismissal of earlier historical accounts through reviewing newly discovered sources and recent scholarship or through parallel disciplines like archaeology . Understanding the past appears to be a universal human need, and the telling of history has emerged independently in civilizations around

13468-519: The demographic prospects of the French-speaking nations of Africa, researcher Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry wrote in 2014 that French "could be the language of the future". However, some African countries such as Algeria intermittently attempted to eradicate the use of French, and as of 2024 it was removed as an official language in Mali and Burkina Faso . Significant as a judicial language, French

13616-448: The economic power of the countries using the language, the number of major areas in which the language is used, and the linguistic prestige associated with the mastery of the language (Weber highlighted that French in particular enjoys considerable linguistic prestige). In a 2008 reassessment of his article, Weber concluded that his findings were still correct since "the situation among the top ten remains unchanged." Knowledge of French

13764-594: The elites primarily spoke French, while many servants who worked in French households spoke a French pidgin known as " Tây Bồi " (now extinct). After French rule ended, South Vietnam continued to use French in administration, education, and trade. However, since the Fall of Saigon and the opening of a unified Vietnam's economy, French has gradually been effectively displaced as the first foreign language of choice by English in Vietnam. Nevertheless, it continues to be taught as

13912-399: The finest collection of buildings from the antebellum era to 1933, of any of the Louisiana river towns above New Orleans . Union forces attacked the city, occupying it and several of the river parishes beginning in 1862. Fort Butler was built on the west bank of the Mississippi River. The fort was successfully defended on June 28, 1863, against a Confederate attack. This battle was one of

14060-468: The first "modern historian". The book sold impressively, earning its author a total of about £9000. Biographer Leslie Stephen wrote that thereafter, "His fame was as rapid as it has been lasting." The tumultuous events surrounding the French Revolution inspired much of the historiography and analysis of the early 19th century. Interest in the 1688 Glorious Revolution was also rekindled by

14208-516: The first government authority to adopt Modern French as official was the Aosta Valley in 1536, while the Ordinance of Villers-Cotterêts (1539) named French the language of law in the Kingdom of France . During the 17th century, French replaced Latin as the most important language of diplomacy and international relations ( lingua franca ). It retained this role until approximately the middle of

14356-422: The first occasions when free blacks and fugitive slaves fought as soldiers on behalf of the Union. The fort is listed on the National Register of Historic Places . After the war, in 1868 Donaldsonville residents elected as mayor Pierre Caliste Landry , an attorney and Methodist minister; he was the first African American to be elected as mayor in the United States. The French were the first Europeans to colonize

14504-416: The focus of historical research in France during the 20th century by stressing long-term social history, rather than political or diplomatic themes. The school emphasized the use of quantification and the paying of special attention to geography. An eminent member of this school, Georges Duby , described his approach to history as one that relegated the sensational to the sidelines and was reluctant to give

14652-915: The former Yugoslavia , International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda , the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea the International Criminal Court and the World Trade Organization Appellate Body . It is the sole internal working language of the Court of Justice of the European Union , and makes with English the European Court of Human Rights 's two working languages. In 1997, George Weber published, in Language Today ,

14800-829: The gender of the corresponding word in Gaulish. The estimated number of French words that can be attributed to Gaulish is placed at 154 by the Petit Robert , which is often viewed as representing standardized French, while if non-standard dialects are included, the number increases to 240. Known Gaulish loans are skewed toward certain semantic fields, such as plant life ( chêne , bille , etc.), animals ( mouton , cheval , etc.), nature ( boue , etc.), domestic activities (ex. berceau ), farming and rural units of measure ( arpent , lieue , borne , boisseau ), weapons, and products traded regionally rather than further afield. This semantic distribution has been attributed to peasants being

14948-871: The historian uses the "objective historian" standards, they are a "conscientious historian". It was Irving's failure as an "objective historian" not his right-wing views that caused him to lose his libel case, as a "conscientious historian" would not have "deliberately misrepresented and manipulated historical evidence" to support his political views. The process of historical analysis involves investigation and analysis of competing ideas, facts, and purported facts to create coherent narratives that explain "what happened" and "why or how it happened". Modern historical analysis usually draws upon other social sciences, including economics , sociology , politics , psychology , anthropology , philosophy , and linguistics . While ancient writers do not normally share modern historical practices, their work remains valuable for its insights within

15096-490: The history of institutional change, particularly the development of constitutional government. William Stubbs 's Constitutional History of England (3 vols., 1874–78) was an important influence on this developing field. The work traced the development of the English constitution from the Teutonic invasions of Britain until 1485, and marked a distinct step in the advance of English historical learning. Karl Marx introduced

15244-539: The illegitimate methods employed by David Irving , as before the Irving v Penguin Books and Lipstadt trial, there was no legal precedent for what constituted an objective historian. Justice Gray leant heavily on the research of one of the expert witnesses, Richard J. Evans , who compared illegitimate distortion of the historical record practiced by Holocaust deniers with established historical methodologies. By summarizing Gray's judgment, in an article published in

15392-454: The language are very closely related to those of the rest of the French-speaking world. French is the second most commonly spoken language in Canada and one of two federal official languages alongside English. As of the 2021 Canadian census , it was the native language of 7.7 million people (21% of the population) and the second language of 2.9 million (8% of the population). French

15540-479: The language, although it has now given way to Tamil and English. A former French mandate , Lebanon designates Arabic as the sole official language, while a special law regulates cases when French can be publicly used. Article 11 of Lebanon's Constitution states that "Arabic is the official national language. A law determines the cases in which the French language is to be used". The French language in Lebanon

15688-612: The language. The Act applies to areas of the province where there are significant Francophone communities, namely Eastern Ontario and Northern Ontario . Elsewhere, sizable French-speaking minorities are found in southern Manitoba, Nova Scotia , Prince Edward Island and the Port au Port Peninsula in Newfoundland and Labrador, where the unique Newfoundland French dialect was historically spoken. Smaller pockets of French speakers exist in all other provinces. The Ontarian city of Ottawa ,

15836-479: The last to hold onto Gaulish. The beginning of French in Gaul was greatly influenced by Germanic invasions into the country. These invasions had the greatest impact on the northern part of the country and on the language there. A language divide began to grow across the country. The population in the north spoke langue d'oïl while the population in the south spoke langue d'oc . Langue d'oïl grew into what

15984-542: The late 20th century: historical editing. Edmund Morgan reports on its emergence in the United States: It required, to begin with, large sums of money. But money has proved easier to recruit than talent. Historians who undertake these large editorial projects must leave the main channel of academic life. They do not teach; they do not write their own books; they do not enjoy long vacations for rumination, reflection, and research on whatever topic interests them at

16132-567: The major progenitors of the history of culture and art , was the Swiss historian Jacob Burckhardt Burckhardt's best-known work is The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy (1860). According to John Lukacs , he was the first master of cultural history, which seeks to describe the spirit and the forms of expression of a particular age, a particular people, or a particular place. By the mid-19th century, scholars were beginning to analyse

16280-441: The moment. Instead they must live in unremitting daily pursuit of an individual whose company, whatever his genius, may ultimately begin to pall. Anyone who has edited historical manuscripts knows that it requires as much physical and intellectual labor to prepare a text for publication as it does to write a book of one's own. Indeed, the new editorial projects are far too large for one man. The editor-in-chief, having decided to forego

16428-420: The necessity and means to annihilate the patois and to universalize the use of the French language". When public education was made compulsory , only French was taught and the use of any other ( patois ) language was punished. The goals of the public school system were made especially clear to the French-speaking teachers sent to teach students in regions such as Occitania and Brittany . Instructions given by

16576-671: The official chronicle of the State of Lu covering the period from 722 to 481 BCE, is among the earliest surviving Chinese historical texts arranged on annalistic principles. Sima Qian (around 100 BCE) was the first in China to lay the groundwork for professional historical writing. His written work was the Shiji ( Records of the Grand Historian ), a monumental lifelong achievement in literature. Its scope extends as far back as

16724-534: The other main foreign language in the Vietnamese educational system and is regarded as a cultural language. All three countries are full members of La Francophonie (OIF). French was the official language of French India , consisting of the geographically separate enclaves referred to as Puducherry . It continued to be an official language of the territory even after its cession to India in 1956 until 1965. A small number of older locals still retain knowledge of

16872-522: The parish seat. Ascension Parish lost more than 16% of its population in that decade. In the Great Depression , the area struggled economically. Historian Sidney A. Marchand , who was also an attorney, was elected as mayor of the city and state legislator during that period. He served as a state Senator and contemporary of Governor Huey Long . During the mayoral administrations of Sidney A. Marchand and his son Sidney Marchand, Jr., they directed

17020-469: The past that constructed history as history of a nation. A new discipline, sociology , emerged in the late 19th century and analyzed and compared these perspectives on a larger scale. The modern academic study of history and methods of historiography were pioneered in 19th-century German universities. Leopold von Ranke was a pivotal influence in this regard, and is considered as the founder of modern source-based history . Specifically, he implemented

17168-435: The past, the sensibility which studies the past 'for the sake of the past', which delights in the concrete and the complex, which 'goes out to meet the past', which searches for 'unlikenesses between past and present'." Butterfield's formulation received much attention, and the kind of historical writing he argued against in generalised terms is no longer academically respectable. The French Annales School radically changed

17316-471: The preferred language of certain institutions or administrations such as the Court of Justice of the European Union , where it is the sole internal working language, or the Directorate-General for Agriculture . Since 2016, Brexit has rekindled discussions on whether or not French should again hold greater role within the institutions of the European Union. A leading world language , French

17464-471: The rest largely speak French as a first language. As a French Creole language , Haitian Creole draws the large majority of its vocabulary from French, with influences from West African languages, as well as several European languages. It is closely related to Louisiana Creole and the creole from the Lesser Antilles . French is the sole official language of all the overseas territories of France in

17612-569: The rise of Rome from city-state to empire . His speculation about what would have happened if Alexander the Great had marched against Rome represents the first known instance of alternate history . In Chinese historiography , the Classic of History is one of the Five Classics of Chinese classic texts and one of the earliest narratives of China. The Spring and Autumn Annals ,

17760-405: The rise of constitutional government , personal freedoms , and scientific progress . The term has been also applied widely in historical disciplines outside of British history (the history of science , for example) to criticize any teleological (or goal-directed), hero-based, and transhistorical narrative. Butterfield's antidote to Whig history was "...to evoke a certain sensibility towards

17908-478: The roles on other groups. Gender biases as well. Moral or worldview evaluations by historians are also seen partly inevitable, causing complications for historians and their historical writings. One way to deal with this is for historians to state their biases explicitly for their readers. In the modern era, newspapers (which have a bias of their own) impacts historical accounts made by historians. Misplaced Pages also contributes to difficulties for historians. During

18056-688: The same time, philosopher David Hume was having a similar impact on history in Great Britain . In 1754, he published the History of England , a six-volume work that extended from the Invasion of Julius Caesar to the Revolution in 1688. Hume adopted a similar scope to Voltaire in his history; as well as the history of Kings, Parliaments, and armies, he examined the history of culture, including literature and science, as well. William Robertson ,

18204-518: The scene: The irate naval commander, Admiral Farragut, ordered the bombardment of Donaldsonville as soon as it could be evacuated. All of the citizens of Donaldsonville . . . "left their homes and went to the bayou . . . a detachment of Yankees went to shore with fire torches in hand." The hotels, warehouses, dwellings, and some of the most valuable buildings of the town were destroyed, Plantations . . . were bombarded and set afire. . . . A citizens' committee met and decided to ask Governor Moore to keep

18352-448: The seminar teaching method in his classroom and focused on archival research and analysis of historical documents. Beginning with his first book in 1824, the History of the Latin and Teutonic Peoples from 1494 to 1514 , Ranke used an unusually wide variety of sources for a historian of the age, including "memoirs, diaries, personal and formal missives, government documents, diplomatic dispatches and first-hand accounts of eye-witnesses". Over

18500-515: The shaping of historical events. The apex of Enlightenment history was reached with Edward Gibbon 's, monumental six-volume work, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire , published on 17 February 1776. Because of its relative objectivity and heavy use of primary sources , at the time its methodology became a model for later historians. This has led to Gibbon being called

18648-424: The standard Daubert tests unless a court was given "a great deal of assistance from historians". Schneider proposes that by testing a historian against the criteria of the "objective historian" then, even if a historian holds specific political views (and she gives an example of a well-qualified historian's testimony that was disregarded by a United States court because he was a member of a feminist group), providing

18796-400: The star-shaped Fort Butler in the town. A work of earth and wood, it was 381 feet long on the side by the Mississippi River, the other was protected by Bayou Lafourche , and the land sides by a deep moat. A stockade surrounded the fort, which contained a high and thick earth parapet. There was further security from a strong log. The fort was built to accommodate 600 men, but in 1863 there were

18944-415: The successful defense of the fort, in one of the first times they fought as soldiers on behalf of the Union. The New York Tribune wrote; "When action took place the negroes were stimulated to daring deeds." Historian Don Frazier, wrote; "Not only did black hands build this citadel of freedom, they defended it to the death." The Union kept control of the fort and ultimately won the war. It has been listed on

19092-525: The term Renaissance (meaning "Re-birth" in French language ), as a period in Europe's cultural history that represented a break from the Middle Ages, creating a modern understanding of humanity and its place in the world. The nineteen-volume work covered French history from Charlemagne to the outbreak of the Revolution . Michelet was one of the first historians to shift the emphasis of history to

19240-614: The territory was under Spanish rule, the militia constructed La Iglesia de la Ascensión de Nuestro Señor Jesucristo de Lafourche de los Chetimaches (the Ascension of Our Lord Catholic Church of Lafourche of the Chitimaches) to serve the area. The region returned later to French control for a time. This area was included in the Louisiana Purchase in 1803 and became part of the United States. Americans began to move into

19388-466: The total number of French speakers will reach approximately 500 million in 2025 and 650 million by 2050, largely due to rapid population growth in sub-Saharan Africa . OIF estimates 700 million French speakers by 2050, 80% of whom will be in Africa. In a study published in March 2014 by Forbes , the investment bank Natixis said that French could become the world's most spoken language by 2050. In

19536-754: The two official languages—along with Dutch —of the Brussels-Capital Region , where it is spoken by the majority of the population (approx. 80%), often as their primary language. French is one of the four official languages of Switzerland, along with German, Italian, and Romansh , and is spoken in the western part of Switzerland, called Romandy , of which Geneva is the largest city. The language divisions in Switzerland do not coincide with political subdivisions, and some cantons have bilingual status: for example, cities such as Biel/Bienne and cantons such as Valais , Fribourg and Bern . French

19684-568: The urban intellectual elite. The Gaulish language likely survived into the sixth century in France despite considerable Romanization . Coexisting with Latin, Gaulish helped shape the Vulgar Latin dialects that developed into French contributing loanwords and calques (including oui , the word for "yes"), sound changes shaped by Gaulish influence, and influences in conjugation and word order. Recent computational studies suggest that early gender shifts may have been motivated by

19832-485: The use of French in official government publications, public education except in specific cases, and legal contracts; advertisements must bear a translation of foreign words. In Belgium, French is an official language at the federal level along with Dutch and German. At the regional level, French is the sole official language of Wallonia (excluding a part of the East Cantons , which are German-speaking ) and one of

19980-640: The work of several different writers: it was started during the reign of Alfred the Great in the late ninth century, but one copy was still being updated in 1154. Muslim historical writings first began to develop in the seventh century, with the reconstruction of the Prophet Muhammad 's life in the centuries following his death. With numerous conflicting narratives regarding Muhammad and his companions from various sources, scholars had to verify which sources were more reliable. To evaluate these sources, they developed various methodologies, such as

20128-536: The workplace. In 2011, Bloomberg Businessweek ranked French the third most useful language for business, after English and Standard Mandarin Chinese . In English-speaking Canada, the United Kingdom, and Ireland, French is the first foreign language taught and in number of pupils is far ahead of other languages. In the United States, French is the second-most commonly taught foreign language in schools and universities, although well behind Spanish. In some areas of

20276-402: The world's French-speaking population lives in Africa. According to a 2023 estimate from the Organisation internationale de la Francophonie , an estimated 167 million African people spread across 35 countries and territories can speak French as either a first or a second language . This number does not include the people living in non-Francophone African countries who have learned French as

20424-503: The world, with about 50 countries and territories having it as a de jure or de facto official, administrative, or cultural language. Most of these countries are members of the Organisation internationale de la Francophonie (OIF), the community of 54 member states which share the official use or teaching of French. It is spoken as a first language (in descending order of the number of speakers) in France; Canada (especially in

20572-403: The world. What constitutes history is a philosophical question (see philosophy of history ). The earliest chronologies date back to Mesopotamia and ancient Egypt , though no historical writers in these early civilizations were known by name. Systematic historical thought emerged in ancient Greece , a development that became an important influence on the writing of history elsewhere around

20720-674: Was an important influence on this developing field. He took a comparative topical approach to independent civilizations and demonstrated that they displayed striking parallels in their origin, growth, and decay. William H. McNeill wrote The Rise of the West (1965) to improve upon Toynbee by showing how the separate civilizations of Eurasia interacted from the very beginning of their history, borrowing critical skills from one another, and thus precipitating still further change as adjustment between traditional old and borrowed new knowledge and practice became necessary. A new advanced specialty opened in

20868-507: Was coined by Herbert Butterfield in his short book The Whig Interpretation of History in 1931, (a reference to the British Whigs , advocates of the power of Parliament ) to refer to the approach to historiography that presents the past as an inevitable progression towards ever greater liberty and enlightenment , culminating in modern forms of liberal democracy and constitutional monarchy . In general, Whig historians emphasized

21016-819: Was during the period of the Crusades in which French became so dominant in the Mediterranean Sea that became a lingua franca ("Frankish language"), and because of increased contact with the Arabs during the Crusades who referred to them as Franj , numerous Arabic loanwords entered French, such as amiral (admiral), alcool (alcohol), coton (cotton) and sirop (syrop), as well as scientific terms such as algébre (algebra), alchimie (alchemy) and zéro (zero). Within Old French many dialects emerged but

21164-490: Was easy and that learning how to do research was the main mission. A critical experience for graduate students is having a mentor who will provide psychological, social, intellectual and professional support, while directing scholarship and providing an introduction to the profession. Professional historians typically work in colleges and universities, archival centers, government agencies, museums, and as freelance writers and consultants. The job market for new PhDs in history

21312-463: Was gradually adopted by the inhabitants of Gaul. As the language was learned by the common people, it developed a distinct local character, with grammatical differences from Latin as spoken elsewhere, some of which is attested in graffiti. This local variety evolved into the Gallo-Romance tongues, which include French and its closest relatives, such as Arpitan . The evolution of Latin in Gaul

21460-652: Was known in the Occitan-speaking region as Vergonha . Spoken by 19.71% of the European Union's population, French is the third most widely spoken language in the EU, after English and German and the second-most-widely taught language after English. Under the Constitution of France , French has been the official language of the Republic since 1992, although the Ordinance of Villers-Cotterêts made it mandatory for legal documents in 1539. France mandates

21608-475: Was only after the emergence of Christianity that philosophies of history grew in prominence due to the destiny of man from the Christian account. Epics such as Homer 's works were used by historians and considered history even by Thucydides . In the 19th-century historical studies became professionalized at universities and research centers along with a belief that history was a type of science. However, in

21756-542: Was shaped by its coexistence for over half a millennium beside the native Celtic Gaulish language , which did not go extinct until the late sixth century, long after the fall of the Western Roman Empire . The population remained 90% indigenous in origin; the Romanizing class were the local native elite (not Roman settlers), whose children learned Latin in Roman schools. At the time of the collapse of

21904-570: Was the language they use the most at home rose from 67% at the 2007 census to 74% at the 2017 census. In Wallis and Futuna, the percentage of the population who reported that French was the language they use the most at home rose from 10% at the 2008 census to 13% at the 2018 census. According to a demographic projection led by the Université Laval and the Réseau Démographie de l'Agence universitaire de la Francophonie ,

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