LHistoire

L
Histoire
i i
de
de
Nol
N l

The Story of Nol,

the French word
for Christmas
Christmas

Once upon a time,

O
i
this is how you
said Christmas
in Late Latin:
Dis Ntlis Christ

It means Natal
Natal
Day (Birthday)
of Christ
Christ .
Dis Ntlis Christ

Eventually Ntlis came

to be used byy itself for
birthday, feast day, day
of commemoration
( f a saint/holy
(of
i t/h l
person) .
person)

Dis Ntlis Christ

As Latin changed
over the centuries,
things began to
happen to the word.

Ntlis

Single consonants
between two vowels
began to soften:

Ndlis

Sometimes,
S
i
when
h two
adjacent syllables had
the same vowel
vowel, one of
them would change to
another vowel:

Nodlis

In Classical Latin,
Latin vowel length
was very important, and
accented syllables were pitched
higher It must have sounded
higher.
very sing-songy! In Late Latin,
this system was replaced by a
strong stress accent:

Nodlis

Any syllable without

the stress accent was
liable to be reduced
reduced,
such as by losing a
final consonant:

Nodli

Unaccented vowels
started to be
pronounced less
distinctly especially
distinctly,
at the end of a word:

Nodle

Eventually,
word-final vowels
were nothing but an
uh sound:

Nodl

Until they
disappeared
completely:

Nodl

In France,
France consonants
between
bet
ee ttwo
o vo
vowels
es
continued to be
pronounced softer and
softer
ft ( iis lik
like th in
i
these):

Nol

Things could happen

to accented syllables
syllables,
too In France,
too.
France all
accented As
A s turned
into Es:
E s:

Noel

Finally,
Fi
ll consonants
between two vowels
were pronounced so
softly that they
p
y disappeared:
pp
completely

Noel

In Old French,
French Noel
could mean
birthday
birthday, feast day
day,
saintss day
saint
day , just like
in Late Latin.
Latin

Noel

The most important

birthday
b
t day co
commemoration
e o at o
in the church year was that
of Christ himself, so Noel
came to
t mean
Christmas .
Christmas

Noel

The word
Th
d entered
d
English by the late 14th
century as Nowel or
Nowell, meaning
Christmas.

Noel

In French it also came to

ea Christmas
C st as ca
carol.
o .
mean
English probably reborrowed the word with
th t meaning
that
i sometime
ti
before the 19th century
century.

Noel

Christmas
Christmas carol
carol is its
sense
se
se in tthee popu
popular
a so
song:
g:
The first Noel the angels
did say / Was to certain
poor shepherds
h h d iin fi
fields
ld
where they lay
lay.

Noel

The proper names Noel

Th
N l
and Noelle were
probably first given to
children who were born
y
on Christmas Day.

Noel

Old French was written

without accent marks of any
ki d Later
kind.
L
on, Noel
N l came
to be written with a dieresis
((two dots)) to show that the
two vowels belong to
diff
different
syllables.
ll bl

Nol

And that,
that
boys and girls
girls, is the
heartwarming story
of Christmas
Christmas
in French!

Nol

Heres a recap
p of 1000
years of sound change:

N li
Ntlis

Heres a recap
p of 1000
years of sound change:

Ndlis
Ndli

Heres a recap
p of 1000
years of sound change:

N dli
Nodlis

Heres a recap
p of 1000
years of sound change:

N dli
Nodlis

Heres a recap
p of 1000
years of sound change:

N dli
Nodli

Heres a recap
p of 1000
years of sound change:

N dl
Nodle

Heres a recap
p of 1000
years of sound change:

N dl
Nodl

Heres a recap
p of 1000
years of sound change:

N dl
Nodl

Heres a recap
p of 1000
years of sound change:

N l
Nol

Heres a recap
p of 1000
years of sound change:

N l
Noel

Heres a recap
p of 1000
years of sound change:

N l
Noel

Heres a recap
p of 1000
years of sound change:

N l
Noel

Heres a recap
p of 1000
years of sound change:

N l
Nol

FIN.
FIN
Merryy Christmas
& Joyeux
y
Nol
from Josh Tyra