And when the letters are removed, French still lets you know there was a letter at some point by putting a little hat on top of the preceding letter. It makes learning it even funnier.
Forêt and forest. Arrêt and arrest. Hôpital and hospital.
As a native French speaker this may be the laziest part to me. We still say someone was hoSpitalisé, in a hôpital. People can be défeneStrés through fenêtres. Someone can be arrêté through arreStation.
Lots of hidden pains and treasures. When I was a kid I thought learning all this shit was pointless. We should just reform everything and spell like we speak. But then I also learned to appreciate the evolution of the language, and why it’s aisle and isle in English.
I’m curious where the ‘s’ was dropped first, in speech or writing? Written French is quite prescriptive with phonetics so I would guess it dropped from spoken language first?
(And each little ‘hat’ is just a ‘tip of the hat’ to the lost letter? (Ok, I’ll see myself out lol))
And when the letters are removed, French still lets you know there was a letter at some point by putting a little hat on top of the preceding letter. It makes learning it even funnier.
Forêt and forest. Arrêt and arrest. Hôpital and hospital.
As a native French speaker this may be the laziest part to me. We still say someone was hoSpitalisé, in a hôpital. People can be défeneStrés through fenêtres. Someone can be arrêté through arreStation.
Lots of hidden pains and treasures. When I was a kid I thought learning all this shit was pointless. We should just reform everything and spell like we speak. But then I also learned to appreciate the evolution of the language, and why it’s aisle and isle in English.
I’m curious where the ‘s’ was dropped first, in speech or writing? Written French is quite prescriptive with phonetics so I would guess it dropped from spoken language first? (And each little ‘hat’ is just a ‘tip of the hat’ to the lost letter? (Ok, I’ll see myself out lol))