The ENTIRE History of the French Language in 11 Minutes

In 1863, the French government counted how many of its own citizens spoke French. One in four did not. Subscribe for more hidden history — new video every week. The results were quietly filed away. Not an accent problem — seven and a half million people who could not hold a conversation with a man from Paris. Breton in the west. Basque in the southwest, a language related to nothing else on Earth. Alsatian along the Rhine. And across the entire south, Occitan: a full language with its own medieval poets, spoken by millions as their only tongue. Sixty years later it was almost gone. No deportations. No massacre. No language banned by name. One of the fastest cultural conversions in European history — and the last stage of it was carried out by the parents themselves, deliberately, out of love. This is the story of three machines — the school, the railway and the army — and of a small wooden block on a string that turned children into informers against their own friends. Sources and further reading in the comments. #history #france #linguistics #bretonnia #occitan #documentary