92-700: Saint-Nazaire ( French: [sɛ̃ nazɛːʁ] ; Breton : Sant-Nazer/Señ Neñseir ; Gallo : Saint-Nazère/Saint-Nazaer ) is a commune in the Loire-Atlantique department in western France, in traditional Brittany . The town has a major harbour on the right bank of the Loire estuary , near the Atlantic Ocean. The town is at the south of the second-largest swamp in France, called "la Brière ". Given its location, Saint-Nazaire has
184-560: A Brittonic language community that once extended from Great Britain to Armorica (present-day Brittany) and had even established a toehold in Galicia (in present-day Spain). Old Breton is attested from the 9th century. It was the language of the upper classes until the 12th century, after which it became the language of commoners in Lower Brittany. The nobility, followed by the bourgeoisie , adopted French . The written language of
276-432: A college for boys), Sainte-Therese (historically a college for girls). The high schools educate 6,000 pupils into 11 lycées, with the mainstream education and technical school Aristide Briand having some 2,500 pupils, one of the largest lycée of France; an experimental lycée, public lycée managed jointly by the teachers and the pupils; the private lycée of Saint-Louis mainstream education; the hotel private lycée Sainte-Anne;
368-519: A constant target of Allied air forces, in the face of determined Luftwaffe fighter opposition to raids by United States Army Air Forces Eighth Air Force bombers. On 3 January 1943 Colonel Curtis LeMay led 85 Boeing B-17 Flying Fortresses of the 1st Bombardment Wing against the U-boat pens at Saint-Nazaire, on the Eighth Air Force's sixth raid against the facility. LeMay also introduced
460-548: A dispute between the town's brothel owners backed by the mayor, versus the US Army forces. With the dispute escalating, Prime Minister Georges Clemenceau sent a memo to General John Pershing offering a compromise: American medical authorities would control designated brothels operated solely for American soldiers. Pershing passed the proposal to Raymond Fosdick , who on giving it to Secretary of War Newton D. Baker promptly responded: "For God's sake, Raymond, don't show this to
552-540: A fairly large body of literature for a minority language. In 1977, Diwan schools were founded to teach Breton by immersion . Since their establishment, Diwan schools have provided fully immersive primary school and partially immersive secondary school instruction in Breton for thousands of students across Brittany. This has directly contributed to the growing numbers of school-age speakers of Breton. The Asterix comic series has been translated into Breton. According to
644-512: A large town in the second half of the 19th century, thanks to the construction of railways and the growth of the seaport. Saint-Nazaire progressively replaced upstream Nantes as the main haven on the Loire estuary. As a major submarine base for the Kriegsmarine , Saint-Nazaire was subject to a successful British raid in 1942 and was heavily bombed by the Allies until 1945. Being one of
736-543: A long tradition of fishing and shipbuilding . The Chantiers de l'Atlantique , one of the largest shipyards in the world, constructed notable ocean liners such as SS Normandie , SS France , RMS Queen Mary 2 and the cruise ship MS Symphony of the Seas , the largest passenger ship in the world until 2022. Saint-Nazaire was a small village until the Industrial Revolution but became
828-534: A mainly local (Brière), of Lower Brittany (of Morbihan in the Finistère-south), and minor representation from most other areas of France. From this point forward the population of Saint-Nazaire experienced exponential growth, which was reflected in its nickname of "Little Breton California", or " Liverpool of the West". In 1802, a road was built to develop the port, which extended by 1835 to a breakwater with
920-461: A national culture. Teachers humiliated students for using their regional languages, and such practices prevailed until the late 1960s. In the early 21st century, due to the political centralization of France, the influence of the media, and the increasing mobility of people, only about 200,000 people are active speakers of Breton, a dramatic decline from more than 1 million in 1950. The majority of today's speakers are more than 60 years old, and Breton
1012-526: A navigational lighthouse at its end. The development included new basins for ships to unload to barges that carried goods further up the river. This development moved the town into the area of the city which is now called the district of "Little Morocco". This development made the town the base for the passenger steamships of the Nantes–Saint-Nazaire line, as well as making the town the alternative port for ships which could not access Nantes . In 1856,
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#17327724715181104-477: A schwa sound occurs as a result of vowel neutralization in post-tonic position, among different dialects. All vowels can also be nasalized , which is noted by appending an 'n' letter after the base vowel, or by adding a combining tilde above the vowel (most commonly and easily done for a and o due to the Portuguese letters ), or more commonly by non-ambiguously appending an ⟨ñ⟩ letter after
1196-412: Is -où , with its variant -ioù ; most nouns that use this marker are inanimates but collectives of both inanimate and animate nouns always use it as well. Most animate nouns, including trees, take a plural in -ed . However, in some dialects the use of this affix has become rare. Various masculine nouns including occupations as well as the word Saoz ("Englishman", plural Saozon ) take
1288-662: Is a Southwestern Brittonic language of the Celtic language group spoken in Brittany , part of modern-day France. It is the only Celtic language still widely in use on the European mainland, albeit as a member of the insular branch instead of the continental grouping. Breton was brought from Great Britain to Armorica (the ancient name for the coastal region that includes the Brittany peninsula) by migrating Britons during
1380-402: Is applied for animate referents. Metals, time divisions (except for eur "hour", noz "night" and sizhun "week") and mountains tend to be masculine, while rivers, cities and countries tend to be feminine. However, gender assignment to certain words often varies between dialects. Number in Breton is primarily based on an opposition between singular and plural. However, the system
1472-406: Is full of complexities in how this distinction is realized. Although modern Breton has lost its ancestral dual number marker, relics of its use are preserved in various nouns pertaining to body parts, including the words for eyes, ears, cheeks, legs, armpits, arms, hands, knees, thighs, and wings. This is seen in a prefix (formed in daou , di or div ) that is etymologically derived from
1564-830: Is however relatively variable from one year to the next. The sunshine is 1,892 hours a year. Saint-Nazaire receives mainly southwestern sector winds related to the Atlantic depressions and northeastern sector winds when the weather is more stable. The annual average wind of 4.5 m / s and there are 60 days per year of strong wind. The primary schools of Saint-Nazaire (Carnot, Jean-Jaurès, Lamartine, Jules Ferry, Ferdinand Bush, Boncourt, etc.) educate nearly 8,000 pupils in 30 school complexes. The junior schools have nearly 7,000 pupils in 12 colleges: public colleges Albert Vinçon; Pierre Norange; Manon Roland; Jean de Neyman; Jean Moulin, accommodate around 1,350 pupils each. Private colleges include: Saint-Louis (1,000 pupils, boarding school; historically
1656-520: Is more in line with that of France as a whole. The major industries are: Saint Nazaire hosts the first French offshore wind farm with 80 wind turbines that will produce enough power to cover consumptions of around 700,000 people. Breton language Breton ( / ˈ b r ɛ t ə n / , BRET -ən , French: [bʁətɔ̃] ; endonym : brezhoneg [bʁeˈzɔ̃ːnɛk] or [bɾəhɔ̃ˈnek] in Morbihan )
1748-422: Is not used, while keleier has become the regular plural, 'different news items'. Meanwhile, certain nouns can form doubly marked plurals with lexicalized meanings – bugel "child" is pluralized once into bugale "children" and then pluralized a second time to make bugaleoù "groups of children". The diminutive suffix -ig also has the somewhat unusual property of triggering double marking of
1840-609: Is now classified as an endangered language . At the beginning of the 20th century, half of the population of Lower Brittany knew only Breton; the other half were bilingual. By 1950, there were only 100,000 monolingual Bretons, and this rapid decline has continued, with likely no monolingual speakers left today. A statistical survey in 1997 found around 300,000 speakers in Lower Brittany, of whom about 190,000 were aged 60 or older. Few 15- to 19-year-olds spoke Breton. In 1993, parents were finally legally allowed to give their children Breton names. In 1925, Professor Roparz Hemon founded
1932-589: Is pluralized to pesked , singulativized to peskedenn , referring to a single fish out of a school of fish, and this singulative of the plural can then be pluralized again to make peskedennoù "fishes". On top of this, the formation of plurals is complicated by two different pluralizing functions. The "default" plural formation is contrasted with another formation which is said to "emphasize variety or diversity" – thus two semantically different plurals can be formed out of park : parkoù "parks" and parkeier "various different parks". Ball reports that
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#17327724715182024-546: Is the only living Celtic language that is not recognized by a national government as an official or regional language. The first Breton dictionary, the Catholicon , was also the first French dictionary. Edited by Jehan Lagadec in 1464, it was a trilingual work containing Breton, French and Latin. Today bilingual dictionaries have been published for Breton and languages including English, Dutch, German, Spanish and Welsh. A monolingual dictionary, Geriadur Brezhoneg an Here
2116-405: Is used to form singulars out of collective nouns , for which the morphologically less complex form is the plural. Thus, the singulative of the collective logod "mice" is logod enn "mouse". However, Breton goes beyond Welsh in the complications of this system. Collectives can be pluralized to make forms which are different in meaning from the normal collective-- pesk "fish" (singular)
2208-498: The Ya d'ar brezhoneg campaign, to encourage enterprises, organisations and communes to promote the use of Breton, for example by installing bilingual signage or translating their websites into Breton. In the late 20th century, the French government considered incorporating the independent Breton-language immersion schools (called Diwan ) into the state education system. This action
2300-520: The Area bombing directive . To minimize civilian casualties during air attacks, the Allies devised a plan to force an evacuation of the town. For three days in 1943, British Royal Air Force and American aircraft dropped scores of leaflets warning the population of a planned fire-bombing raid. At the end of the third day, the raid came and burned the entire city to the ground. Casualties were light as most of
2392-621: The Atlantic pockets , Saint-Nazaire was one of the last territories in Europe to be liberated from German occupation, on 11 May 1945. The town was one of the most damaged in France during World War II . Archaeologists believe that Saint-Nazaire is built upon the remnants of Corbilo , an Armorican Gaulish city populated by the Namnetes tribe, which (according to the Greek navigator Pytheas )
2484-506: The Clyde -built cruise liner, later converted to troopship, RMS Lancastria , which was attacked and sunk by German Junkers Ju 88 bombers, mainly from Kampfgeschwader 30 , taking with her around 4,000 victims. This is the worst disaster in British maritime history and the worst loss of life for British forces in the whole of World War II. Winston Churchill banned all news coverage of
2576-572: The Duchy of Brittany was Latin , switching to French in the 15th century. There exists a limited tradition of Breton literature . Some philosophical and scientific terms in Modern Breton come from Old Breton. The recognized stages of the Breton language are: Old Breton – c. 800 to c. 1100 , Middle Breton – c. 1100 to c. 1650 , Modern Breton – c. 1650 to present. The French monarchy
2668-607: The Early Middle Ages , making it an Insular Celtic language . Breton is most closely related to Cornish , another Southwestern Brittonic language. Welsh and the extinct Cumbric , both Western Brittonic languages , are more distantly related, and the Goidelic languages ( Irish , Manx , Scottish Gaelic ) have a slight connection due to both of their origins being from Insular Celtic. Having declined from more than one million speakers around 1950 to about 200,000 in
2760-727: The Pont de Saint-Nazaire , which crosses the Loire. Paris is then accessed via the A10/A11 in Nantes. Valves, Lorient, Quimper and Brest are accessed via the N165. A project to review a second crossing of the Loire between Nantes and Saint Nazaire is being considered, planned to be constructed and operational by 2025. Saint-Nazaire railway station is served by both the TGV and regional trains and buses of
2852-527: The TER Pays de la Loire . TGV (high speed train) connection to Paris, Lyon , Marseille , Lille , and Strasbourg , with trains to Paris via the LGV Atlantique taking just over 2 hours. TER Pays de la Loire provides links to Nantes , Angers , Le Mans , La Roche sur Yon , and other regional cities and towns. Saint-Nazaire airport is located 5 km (3 mi) south-east of Saint-Nazaire, in
Saint-Nazaire - Misplaced Pages Continue
2944-533: The Viscountcy of Saint-Nazaire . Like the whole of Brittany, Saint-Nazaire formed part of the Duchy of Brittany until 1532, when it was annexed by France. In 1756, a fort was built on the order of the governor of Brittany to protect the town, which by then had 600 inhabitants. Until the French Revolution , Saint-Nazaire belonged to the province of Brittany. At the beginning of the 19th century,
3036-459: The combat box defensive formation, echeloning three-plane elements within a squadron , and squadrons within a group, to concentrate defensive firepower against fighter opposition. Only 76 aircraft found and hit the target, and during the mission seven bombers were shot down and 47 damaged. As a result of the raid, on 14 January 1943 under directive (S.46239/?? A.C.A.S. Ops), the Allies implemented incendiary bomb tactics against U-boat pens, under
3128-527: The commune of Montoir-de-Bretagne . It has an annual capacity of approximately 150,000 passengers, and is the operational and maintenance base for Eagle Aviation France . International travel is via Nantes Atlantique Airport , the biggest airport in western France, linking with several French and European cities as well as Montreal in Canada (seasonally) and some cities in North Africa. A new airport
3220-431: The county of Léon ), tregerieg ( trégorrois , of Trégor ), kerneveg ( cornouaillais , of Cornouaille ), and gwenedeg ( vannetais , of Vannes ). Guérandais was spoken up to the beginning of the 20th century in the region of Guérande and Batz-sur-Mer . There are no clear boundaries between the dialects because they form a dialect continuum , varying only slightly from one village to
3312-584: The sinking of Bismarck , the need for the Allies to take the Joubert dry dock out of operation was increased. On 28 March 1942, a force of 611 British Commandos and the Royal Navy launched the St Nazaire Raid against the shipyards of Saint-Nazaire, codenamed Operation Chariot . An obsolete American-built destroyer HMS Campbeltown was used as a ram-ship loaded with explosives. It and
3404-495: The "Fusillade de Fourmies". In 1900, the commune of Pornichet was created by separating from the larger commune of Saint-Nazaire. During World War I , the city became an important debarkment port of Allied troops, particularly in the latter stages for the United States Army . When they entered the war in 1917, they developed the town and port infrastructure, by adding additional drinking water storage ponds for
3496-498: The Breton-language review Gwalarn . During its 19-year run, Gwalarn tried to raise the language to the level of a great international language. Its publication encouraged the creation of original literature in all genres, and proposed Breton translations of internationally recognized foreign works. In 1946, Al Liamm replaced Gwalarn . Other Breton-language periodicals have been published, which established
3588-538: The Commandos succeeded in destroying the gates and machinery of the Joubert drydock, preventing its further use by the Germans during the war. Of the 600+ navy and commando personnel, 220 returned, half were wounded. Five Victoria Crosses and 69 other decorations were awarded. The Joubert dry dock was not brought back into operation until 1948. The U-boat threat to supply convoys across the Atlantic made Saint-Nazaire
3680-412: The French law known as Toubon , it is illegal for commercial signage to be in Breton alone. Signs must be bilingual or French only. Since commercial signage usually has limited physical space, most businesses have signs only in French. Ofis Publik ar Brezhoneg , the Breton language agency, was set up in 1999 by the Brittany region to promote and develop the daily use of Breton. It helped to create
3772-539: The Germans could no longer conduct major submarine operations from the bases without a supply line, the SHAEF commander, U.S. General Dwight D. Eisenhower decided to simply bypass these ports, and the Allied armies focused their resources on the invasion of Germany. Saint-Nazaire and the other two German "pockets" remained under German control until after the last day of the war in Europe, 8 May 1945. The town of St. Nazaire
Saint-Nazaire - Misplaced Pages Continue
3864-579: The Guérande peninsula. The eastern part of the town is on the alluvial terrain between the Brière and the Loire estuary. The western part, more extensive, corresponds to the extension of the hillside of Guérande: the relief is hilly and of higher altitude, where one finds a granite and metamorphic base. Geologically, Saint-Nazaire is located in the Armorican massif. In close proximity to the Atlantic Ocean,
3956-477: The Roman Church sheltered the remains of the martyr Nazarius in a local basilica. According to legend, the Breton chief Waroch II sent an emissary to seize these relics. The plot was foiled when the emissary fractured his skull upon the lintel of the church door. Waroch, interpreting this as a miracle, was deterred and the village thenceforth took the name of Sanctus Nazarius de Sinuario. After this point,
4048-500: The Saint-Nazaire casino went bankrupt and was resold to the town of Nantes: the site was redeveloped in 1935 as the first home of the current Saint-Louis school. As a result of the national general strike of June 1936, to ensure completion of the nationally prestigious project SS Normandie , the government nationalised the various private shipyards into one state-owned entity, the 1861-founded Chantiers de l'Atlantique . After
4140-506: The U-boat pens. Tours of the submarine are available to the public. After the construction of SS France in 1961, the last Compagnie Générale Transatlantique liner and the subsequent closure of the Suez Canal , Chantiers de l'Atlantique began building large oil tankers, including Batillus , Bellamya , Pierre Guillaumat and Prairial . A new dry dock (Basin C) was planned for
4232-510: The University of Rennes 2 has a Breton language department offering courses in the language along with a master's degree in Breton and Celtic Studies. Vowels in Breton may be short or long . All unstressed vowels are short; stressed vowels can be short or long (vowel lengths are not noted in usual orthographies as they are implicit in the phonology of particular dialects, and not all dialects pronounce stressed vowels as long). An emergence of
4324-495: The bar in Saint-Nazaire. In September he became, in spite of his youth, secretary to the municipal commission temporarily appointed to carry on the town's business. He organized the National Defense at Saint-Nazaire, and marched out with his contingent, though they saw no active service due to lack of ammunition (their private store having been commandeered by the state). In 1873, he moved to the bar of Rennes , following
4416-479: The base vowel (this depends on the orthographic variant). Diphthongs are /ai, ei, ou/ . Breton nouns are marked for gender and number. While Breton gender is fairly typical of gender systems across western Europe (with the exception of Basque and modern English), Breton number markers demonstrate rarer behaviors. Breton has two genders: masculine ( gourel ) and feminine ( gwregel ), having largely lost its historic neuter ( nepreizh ) as has also occurred in
4508-535: The changes associated with -er / -ier are less predictable. Various nouns instead form their plural merely with ablaut : a or o in the stem being changed to e : askell "wing" → eskell "wings"; dant "tooth" → dent "teeth"; kordenn "rope" → kerdenn "ropes". John V, Duke of Brittany Too Many Requests If you report this error to the Wikimedia System Administrators, please include
4600-489: The civilians had heeded the warning and fled to the safety of the countryside but after that point, except for the self-contained U-boat base, Saint-Nazaire remained abandoned until the end of the war. After D-day and the liberation of most of France in 1944, German troops in Saint-Nazaire's submarine base refused to surrender, and they holed up (as did their counterparts in the La Rochelle and Lorient bases). Since
4692-531: The climate of Saint-Nazaire is, as with the rest of the Loire-Atlantique, of temperate oceanic type, with Cfb designation in Köppen climate classification . This climate is very much influenced by the Loire estuary. The winters are mild, and summer is warm. Snowfall is rare, but rain is frequent (116 days a year with precipitation) but not very intense, the annual rainfall being 789 mm. Precipitation
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#17327724715184784-1156: The comic, the Gaulish village where Asterix lives is in the Armorica peninsula , which is now Brittany. Some other popular comics have also been translated into Breton, including The Adventures of Tintin , Spirou , Titeuf , Hägar the Horrible , Peanuts and Yakari . Some original media are created in Breton. The sitcom, Ken Tuch , is in Breton. Radio Kerne , broadcasting from Finistère , has exclusively Breton programming. Some movies ( Lancelot du Lac , Shakespeare in Love , Marion du Faouet , Sezneg ) and TV series ( Columbo , Perry Mason ) have also been translated and broadcast in Breton. Poets, singers, linguists, and writers who have written in Breton, including Yann-Ber Kallocʼh , Roparz Hemon , Añjela Duval , Xavier de Langlais , Pêr-Jakez Helias , Youenn Gwernig , Glenmor , Vefa de Saint-Pierre and Alan Stivell are now known internationally. Today, Breton
4876-880: The consideration of the Breton language in Microsoft products. In October 2014, Facebook added Breton as one of its 121 languages after three years of talks between the Ofis and Facebook. France has twice chosen to enter the Eurovision Song Contest with songs in Breton; once in 1996 in Oslo with " Diwanit bugale " by Dan Ar Braz and the fifty piece band Héritage des Celtes , and most recently in 2022 in Turin with " Fulenn " by Alvan Morvan Rosius and vocal trio Ahez . These are two of five times France has chosen songs in one of its minority languages for
4968-505: The construction of major shipbuilding facilities, including those of Chantier Scott , which launched the first French metal-hulled ships. In 1868, Saint-Nazaire became a sub-prefecture of the town of Savenay . A second dock basin was created at Penhoët in 1881, to allow the handling of larger ships, but a lock gate built to access it cut the town in two, thus creating Old Saint-Nazaire and an artificial island called "Little Morocco". In early 1870, Nantes-born Pierre Waldeck-Rousseau joined
5060-540: The construction of tankers over 1,000,000 tonnes but this fell through with the reopening of the Suez Canal. RMS Queen Mary 2 was constructed at Chantiers de l'Atlantique in 2003. The town of Saint-Nazaire is located on the north bank of the Loire estuary (its territory includes the tip of Chémoulin which marks the end of the estuary), 50 km west of Nantes. It is near the marshes of Brière, an important regional natural park with many animal and plant species,
5152-568: The contest, the others being in 1992 (bilingual French and Antillean Creole ), 1993 (bilingual French and Corsican ), and 2011 (Corsican). Breton is spoken mainly in Lower Brittany, but also in a more dispersed way in Upper Brittany (where it is spoken alongside Gallo and French), and in areas around the world that have Breton emigrants. The four traditional dialects of Breton correspond to medieval bishoprics rather than to linguistic divisions. They are leoneg ( léonard , of
5244-461: The disaster on learning of it and it remains largely forgotten by history. A Lancastria memorial is located near the U-boat pens in Saint-Nazaire. The ball turret gunner of an American B-17F bomber fell 20,000 ft (6,100 m) onto the glass roof of the train station, even though his parachute had been destroyed by German flak while still in his plane. The US airman, Alan Magee , survived
5336-557: The district of Paimbœuf was merged with the district of Saint-Nazaire, thus reinforcing the influence of the city on the south bank of the Loire River. Although having built SS Paris , between 1913 and 1921, and SS Île de France between 1925 and 1926, as a result of the 1930s Great Depression the French government commissioned a series of state programs to aid national economic activity. The state-owned shipping company Compagnie Générale Transatlantique commissioned
5428-526: The establishment of the Third Republic in 1871. On 30 March 1894, a strike occurred at the forging mills of Trignac in opposition to a reduction of the work force. What had seemed a small dispute escalated after a shooting in Fourmies , resulting in the town getting its national nickname of "Red City". Socialists flocked to the town in defense of the striking workers, joining in the declaration of
5520-433: The existence of a small fleet of fisheries and fishing vessels. Saint-Nazaire suffered heavily from the downsizing of shipbuilding activity in western Europe in the 1960s and 1970s, after the completion of the national passenger liner, SS France . For a long time in the 1980s, Saint-Nazaire remained an economically depressed area with unemployment rates above 20%. Today, the local economy is more diversified and its situation
5612-540: The fall. A German military surgeon was able to save his nearly severed arm. The airman credited his survival to a prayer to God as he recovered consciousness during his fall. Following the surrender of France to German forces later in June 1940, the port immediately became a base of operations for the Kriegsmarine and was as such the target of Allied operations. A heavily fortified U-boat Saint-Nazaire submarine base
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#17327724715185704-676: The first decade of the 21st century, Breton is classified as "severely endangered" by the UNESCO Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger . However, the number of children attending bilingual classes rose 33% between 2006 and 2012 to 14,709. Breton is spoken in Lower Brittany ( Breton : Breizh-Izel ), roughly to the west of a line linking Plouha (west of Saint-Brieuc ) and La Roche-Bernard (east of Vannes ). It comes from
5796-471: The first wet dock was dug in "Halluard City", making it possible for ships to moor and turn. This led to the construction of the town's first railway connection. In 1857, the Chemin de Fer de Paris à Orléans (railroad company of Orléans ) connected Saint-Nazaire to Nantes. In 1862, the first transatlantic telegraph lines were installed from France to South America, coming ashore at Saint-Nazaire. 1862 also saw
5888-577: The growing numbers of school-age speakers of Breton. The schools have also gained fame from their high level of results in school exams, including those on French language and literature. Breton-language schools do not receive funding from the national government, though the Brittany Region may fund them. Another teaching method is a bilingual approach by Div Yezh ("Two Languages") in the State schools, created in 1979. Dihun ("Awakening")
5980-681: The growth of the movement. In 2007, some 4,500 to 5,000 adults followed an evening or correspondence one Breton-language course. The transmission of Breton in 1999 was estimated to be 3 percent. In addition to bilingual education (including Breton-medium education) the region has introduced the Breton language in primary education, mainly in the department of Finistère. These "initiation" sessions are generally one to three hours per week, and consist of songs and games. Schools in secondary education ( collèges and lycées ) offer some courses in Breton. In 2010, nearly 5,000 students in Brittany were reported to be taking this option. Additionally,
6072-541: The heritage of France ). The European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages , which obliges signatory states to recognize minority and regional languages, was signed by France in 1999 but has not been ratified. On 27 October 2015, the Senate rejected a draft constitutional law ratifying the charter. Regional and departmental authorities use Breton to a very limited extent. Some bilingual signage has also been installed, such as street name signs in Breton towns. Under
6164-582: The history of Saint-Nazaire, like much of Europe during the Dark Ages, is not well documented. Battles occurred, such as in 1380 when Jehan d'Ust defended the city in the name of John V, Duke of Brittany (known in France as Jean IV) against the Castilian fleet during the Hundred Years' War . After this time, Saint-Nazaire became the seat of a parish extending from Penhoët to Pornichet , part of
6256-472: The invasion of Poland by Nazi Germany 's Wehrmacht army at the start of World War II , the combined forces of the French Army and the British Expeditionary Force failed to hold the oncoming onslaught. As part of Operation Aerial , Saint-Nazaire, like Dunkirk , became an evacuation point to England for the British, with those embarking including the writer John Renshaw Starr . On 17 June 1940 an estimated 9,000 British Army soldiers were embarked aboard
6348-450: The latter pluralizer is used only for inanimate nouns. Certain formations have been lexicalized to have meanings other than that which might be predicted solely from the morphology: dour "water" pluralized forms dourioù which means not "waters" but instead "rivers", while doureier now has come to mean "running waters after a storm". Certain forms have lost the singular from their paradigm: keloù means "news" and * kel
6440-436: The mythical ancestor of the Bretons, travelled to Saint-Nazaire to set foot upon the new homeland of his people. Historical accounts note that at the end of the Roman Empire , some Britons colonized the Loire estuary and later the peninsula containing Guérande . The farthest extent of the Breton language in the Loire region is Donges , to the east of Saint-Nazaire. According to the late-6th-century writer Gregory of Tours ,
6532-519: The next. Gwenedeg , however, requires a little study to be intelligible with most of the other dialects. French is the sole official language of France . Supporters of Breton and other minority languages continue to argue for their recognition, and for their place in education, public schools, and public life. In July 2008, the legislature amended the French Constitution , adding article 75-1: les langues régionales appartiennent au patrimoine de la France (the regional languages belong to
6624-457: The other Celtic languages as well as across the Romance languages. Certain suffixes ( -ach/-aj, -(a)dur, -er, -lecʼh, -our, -ti, -va ) are masculine, while others ( -enti, -er, -ez, -ezh, -ezon, -i , -eg , -ell , and the singulative -enn ) are feminine. The suffix -eg can be masculine or feminine. There are certain non-determinant factors that influence gender assignment. Biological sex
6716-519: The peasant masses under-informed. In 1794, Bertrand Barère submitted his "report on the patois " to the Committee of Public Safety in which he said that "federalism and superstition speak Breton". Since the 19th century, under the Third , Fourth and now Fifth Republics , the French government has attempted to stamp out minority languages—including Breton—in state schools, in an effort to build
6808-478: The plural: bugelig means "little child", but the doubly pluralized bug ale ig où means "little children"; bag boat has a singular diminutive bagig and a simple plural bagoù , thus its diminutive plural is the doubly pluralized bag où ig où . As seen elsewhere in many Celtic languages, the formation of the plural can be hard to predict, being determined by a mix of semantic, morphological and lexical factors. The most common plural marker
6900-482: The port consisted only of one simple harbour. As the town was so far inland, its main economy was not based on commercial fishing but on its strategic location as the lowest possible navigation point for large ships and on supplying pilots for navigation further up the Loire. In 1800, the parish of Saint-Nazaire had 3,216 inhabitants. The modern Saint-Nazaire was created by the administration of Napoleon III . The population of 3,216 in 1800 shows its battered history, with
6992-410: The prefixation of the number two. The dual is no longer productive, and has merely been lexicalized in these cases rather than remaining a part of Breton grammar. The (etymologically) already dual words for eyes ( daoulagad ) and ears ( divskouarn ) can be pluralized "again" to form daoulagad où and diskouarn où . Like other Brythonic languages, Breton has a singulative suffix that
7084-619: The president or he'll stop the war." Only after the signing of the Armistice in November 1918, when the United States Army could no longer plead military necessity as grounds for curtailing leave, did venereal disease rates among United States Army troops rise quickly. The post-war period brought about a period of economic depression for the shipbuilders, who consequently diversified into building seaplanes from 1922. In 1926
7176-621: The private of mainstream education and technological college Our-Lady-in Espérance. The Cité Scolaire of Saint-Nazaire is one of largest of France, with nearly 4,000 high-school pupils. The University of Saint-Nazaire is a college of the University of Nantes , the second largest university in France with approximately 35,000 students, including nearly 5,000 on the university campus of Saint-Nazaire. The Route nationale N165 /N161 ( E60 route ) connects Saint-Nazaire to Nantes and Rennes via
7268-528: The roof is an exhibition about Saint-Nazaire. The huge Joubert drydock built for SS Normandie was the only port on the Atlantic capable of servicing the German battleships Bismarck and Tirpitz . This made the port strategically important to both the Axis Powers and the Allies during World War II. After Operation Rheinübung on 18–27 May 1941, which resulted in the sinking of HMS Hood and
7360-466: The second largest wetland in France after the Camargue. According to INSEE , Saint-Nazaire is the commune-center of an urban unit (commonly: agglomeration) which counted 186,760 inhabitants in 2018, gathering 17 communes of the Loire estuary. This unit is the urban center of the urban area of Saint-Nazaire (24 communes), which had 213,675 inhabitants in 2018 and extending over Brière and almost all of
7452-527: The ship builders of Saint-Nazaire to construct a new large passenger ship, which as a result between 1928 and 1934 created the Albert Caquot –engineered the Louis Joubert dry dock – at 1,200 m × 60 m (3,940 ft × 200 ft), the largest of its kind in the world at the time – necessary to be able to accommodate the construction of SS Normandie . In 1932,
7544-512: The suffix -ien , with a range of variants including -on , -ion , -an and -ian . The rare pluralizing suffixes -er / -ier and -i are used for a few nouns. When they are appended, they also trigger a change in the vowel of the root: -i triggers a vowel harmony effect whereby some or all preceding vowels are changed to i ( kenderv "cousin" → kindirvi "cousins"; bran "crow" → brini "crows"; klujur "partridge" → klujiri "partridges");
7636-554: The town's water treatment plants, and a refrigeration terminal to the docks for shipment and storage of meat and dairy products to supply their troops. However, the presence of legal brothels ( Maisons Tolérée ) resulted in a diplomatic incident. As a result of strict reformist public health concerns at home, the American Expeditionary Force placed the Maisons Tolérée off limits, resulting in
7728-570: The use of the Spilhennig to let speakers identify each other. The office also started an Internationalization and localization policy asking Google , Firefox and SPIP to develop their interfaces in Breton. In 2004, the Breton Misplaced Pages started, which counts more than 85,000 articles as of August 2024. In March 2007, the Ofis ar Brezhoneg signed a tripartite agreement with Regional Council of Brittany and Microsoft for
7820-804: Was blocked by the French Constitutional Council based on the 1994 amendment to the Constitution that establishes French as the language of the republic. Therefore, no other language may be used as a language of instruction in state schools. The Toubon Law implemented the amendment, asserting that French is the language of public education. The Diwan schools were founded in Brittany in 1977 to teach Breton by immersion . Since their establishment, Diwan schools have provided fully immersive primary school and partially immersive secondary school instruction in Breton for thousands of students across Brittany. This has directly contributed to
7912-399: Was built by Organisation Todt shortly after occupation, with a 9 m-thick (30 ft) concrete ceiling capable of withstanding almost any bomb in use at the time. The base provided a home during the war to many of the best-known U-boat staff, including: The base stands today as its extremely sturdy construction makes demolition uneconomical. The base is now used by cafes, a bar and on
8004-701: Was created in 1990 for bilingual education in the Catholic schools. In 2018, 18,337 pupils (about 2% of all students in Brittany) attended Diwan , Div Yezh and Dihun schools, and their number has increased yearly. This was short of the goal of Jean-Yves Le Drian (president of the Regional Council ), who aimed to have 20,000 students in bilingual schools by 2010, and of "their recognition" for "their place in education, public schools, and public life"; nevertheless he describes being encouraged by
8096-467: Was not concerned with the minority languages of France , spoken by the lower classes, and required the use of French for government business as part of its policy of national unity. During the French Revolution , the government introduced policies favouring French over the regional languages, which it pejoratively referred to as patois . The revolutionaries assumed that reactionary and monarchist forces preferred regional languages to try to keep
8188-438: Was planned that was to be situated 30 km (19 mi) to the north-west of Nantes in the commune of Notre-Dame-des-Landes . Called Aéroport du Grand Ouest , it was officially cancelled in 2018. The economy of the city is founded on the activity of the port, including export of manufactured goods but also on the services, being given sizeable size of the city. Commercial fishing has almost completely disappeared in spite of
8280-489: Was published in 1995. The first edition contained about 10,000 words, and the second edition of 2001 contains 20,000 words. In the early 21st century, the Ofis Publik ar Brezhoneg ("Public Office for the Breton language") began a campaign to encourage daily use of Breton in the region by both businesses and local communes. Efforts include installing bilingual signs and posters for regional events, as well as encouraging
8372-568: Was rebuilt in the late 1940s and 1950s in a minimalist functional style. One of the last of these buildings to be completed was the Hôtel de Ville which was completed in February 1960. The submarine base was used by the French Navy from 1945 to 1948. It then came under the control of various chemical companies and shipbuilders. As of 2016, the French diesel submarine Espadon is moored within
8464-533: Was the second-largest Gaulish city, after Massilia (now Marseille ). Archeology suggests that the area has been inhabited since at least the Neolithic period, as evidenced by the presence of monuments like the tumulus of Dissignac , the dolmen located in the centre of the present-day city, and ancient bronzes found in the vicinity. According to the 15th-century chronicler Alain Bouchart , Brutus of Troy ,
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