French in Different Languages: the French language in 98 languages
French is français to its speakers, Französisch in German, francuski in Croatian and Polish, γαλλικά (galliká) in Greek and 法語 (fǎyǔ) in Chinese. The two tables give the word in 98 languages and many scripts.
Franks and Gauls: where the names of French come from
Most languages name French with the stem of France, a name that comes from Latin Francia, “land of the Franks”.2 That line runs through français, Frans, fransk, francuski, французский (francuzskij) and the Arabic الفرنسية (al-faransīyâ). Sounds shift on the way: Finnish ranska drops the initial f, Lithuanian prancūzų and Estonian prantsuse turn it into p, and Tagalog Pranses does the same.
A smaller group uses a different stem, gall-: Breton says galleg, Latin gallice, and Greek γαλλικά (galliká). Welsh, Scottish Gaelic and Irish return to the first line with Ffrangeg, Fraingis and Fraincis. The ISO 639 codes are fr, fra and the bibliographic fre.1
French in different languages written in the Latin alphabet
59 rows. Where two or more languages share the spelling they share a row; German adds its long-s form Franzöſiſch.
| Language · ISO 639 code | Name of French | Romanisation |
|---|---|---|
| English · eng | French | |
| Afrikaans, Dutch · afr, nld | Frans | |
| Catalan, Walloon · cat, wln | francès | |
| Danish, Norwegian · dan, nor | fransk | |
| Galician, Spanish · glg, spa | francés | |
| Croatian, Polish · hrv, pol | francuski | |
| Interlingua, Italian · ina, ita | francese | |
| Icelandic, Swedish · isl, swe | franska | |
| Azerbaijani (Latin) · aze | fransızca | |
| Bosnian (Latin) · bos | francuski | |
| Breton · bre | galleg | |
| Czech · ces | francouzština | |
| Welsh · cym | Ffrangeg | |
| German · deu | Französisch / Franzöſiſch | |
| Esperanto · epo | franca | |
| Estonian · est | prantsuse | |
| Basque · eus | frantsesera | |
| Faroese · fao | franskt | |
| Finnish · fin | ranska | |
| French · fra | français | |
| West Frisian · fry | Frânsk | |
| Scottish Gaelic · gla | Fraingis | |
| Irish · gle | Fraincis | |
| Guarani · grn | hyãsiañe’ẽ | |
| Hungarian · hun | francia | |
| Indonesian · ind | bahasa Perancis | |
| Latin · lat | gallice | |
| Latvian · lav | franču | |
| Lithuanian · lit | prancūzų | |
| Malagasy · mlg | frantsay | |
| Maltese · mlt | Franċiż | |
| Moldovan (Latin) · mol | franceză | |
| Malay (Latin) · msa | bahasa Perancis | |
| Portuguese · por | francês | |
| Romansh · roh | franzos | |
| Romanian · ron | franceză | |
| Slovak · slk | francúzština | |
| Slovio (Latin), constructed · no ISO code | Francio | |
| Slovene · slv | francoščina | |
| Somali · som | faransiis | |
| Albanian · sqi | frëngjishte | |
| Swahili · swa | kifaransa | |
| Tagalog · tgl | Pranses | |
| Turkmen (Latin) · tuk | frantsuzça | |
| Turkish · tur | Fransızca | |
| Uzbek (Latin) · uzb | fransuzcha | |
| Vietnamese · vie | tiếng Pháp | |
| Volapük · vol | Fransänapük | |
| Xhosa · xho | isi-French | |
| Zulu · zul | isiFrench | |
| Belarusian (Latin) · bel | francuzskaja / francuskaja | |
| Kazakh (Latin) · kaz | francwzşa | |
| Kyrgyz (Latin) · kir | frantsuzça | |
| Serbian (Latin) · srp | francuski | |
| Tajik (Latin) · tgk | faronsavī / fransuzī | |
| South Azerbaijani (Latin) · azb | fransızca | |
| Sorani Kurdish (Latin) · ckb | feransî | |
| Persian (Latin) · fas | farânsavi | |
| Uyghur (Latin) · uig | fransuzche |
French in Cyrillic, Arabic, Hebrew, Indic, Tibetan and East Asian scripts
52 rows, most with a romanisation. The Arabic-script and Hebrew-script entries run right to left.
| Language · ISO 639 code | Name of French | Romanisation |
|---|---|---|
| Azerbaijani (Cyrillic) · aze | франсызҹа | |
| Bosnian (Cyrillic) · bos | француски | |
| Moldovan (Cyrillic) · mol | франчезэ | |
| Malay (Arabic script) · msa | بهاس ڤرانچيس | |
| Slovio (Cyrillic), constructed · no ISO code | Францио | |
| Turkmen (Cyrillic) · tuk | французча | |
| Uzbek (Cyrillic) · uzb | французча | |
| Uzbek (Arabic script) · uzb | فرەنسۇزچە | |
| Belarusian (Cyrillic) · bel | французская, француская | |
| Bulgarian · bul | френски | frenski |
| Kazakh (Cyrillic) · kaz | французша | |
| Kazakh (Arabic script) · kaz | فرانتسۋزشا | |
| Kyrgyz (Cyrillic) · kir | французча | |
| Kyrgyz (Arabic script) · kir | فرانتسۇزچا | |
| Macedonian · mkd | француски | francuski |
| Mongolian · mon | франц | franc |
| Ossetian · oss | францусаг | francusag |
| Russian · rus | французский | francuzskij |
| Serbian (Cyrillic) · srp | француски | |
| Tajik (Cyrillic) · tgk | фаронсавӣ, франсузӣ | |
| Tajik (Arabic script) · tgk | فرانسوی, فرنسوزی | |
| Ukrainian · ukr | французька | francuz'ka |
| Arabic · ara | الفرنسية | al-faransīyâ |
| South Azerbaijani (Arabic script) · azb | فرانسیزجا | |
| Sorani Kurdish (Arabic script) · ckb | فەرانسی | |
| Persian (Arabic script) · fas | فرانسوی | |
| Dari · prs | فرانسوی, فرانسیسی | frānsavī, frānsīsī |
| Pashto · pus | فرانسوي, فرانسيسي | frānsawī, frānsīsī |
| Sindhi · snd | فرينچ | frēnč |
| Uyghur (Arabic script) · uig | فرانسۇزچە | |
| Uyghur (Cyrillic) · uig | франсузчә | |
| Urdu · urd | فرانسیسی | frānsīsī |
| Hebrew · heb | צרפתית | t͡sarəfatīt |
| Yiddish · yid | פֿראַנצײזיש | frant͡seyziš |
| Amharic, Tigrinya · amh, tir | ፈረንሳይኛ | färänsayəñña |
| Greek · ell | γαλλικά | galliká |
| Armenian · hye | ֆրանսերեն | franseren |
| Georgian · kat | ფრანგული | ṗranguli |
| Hindi · hin | फ़्रांसीसी, फ़्रांसिसी | frāṃsīsī, frāṃsisī |
| Marathi · mar | फ़्रेंच | freṃč |
| Nepali · nep | फ्रांसिसी | pʰrāṃsisī |
| Gujarati · guj | ફ્રેન્ચ | pʰrenč |
| Kannada · kan | ಫ್ರೆಂಚ್ | pʰreṃč |
| Malayalam · mal | ഫ്രഞ്ച് | pʰrañč |
| Tamil · tam | பிரெஞ்சு | pireñcu |
| Chinese · zho | 法語/法语, 法文 | fǎyǔ, fǎwén |
| Japanese · jpn | フランス語 | furansugo |
| Korean · kor | 프랑스어 | peurangseueo |
| Tibetan · bod | ཕ་རན་སིའི་སྐད། | pʰa.ran.sī.skad |
| Dzongkha · dzo | ཕེ་རེནཆེ། | pʰe.renčʰe |
| Thai · tha | ภาษาฝรั่งเศส | pʰāsā frầṅsēt |
| Lao · lao | ພາສາຝຣັ່ງ | pʰāsā flầṅ |
How the word is built
Turkic languages add a suffix to the country name: Fransızca in Turkish, fransuzcha in Uzbek, французша in Kazakh. Bantu languages put a class prefix in front, so Swahili has kifaransa and Zulu isiFrench. Thai and Lao open with the word for language, ภาษา and ພາສາ, followed in Thai by ฝรั่งเศส (frầṅsēt). In South Asia several languages take the English word French: Marathi फ़्रेंच, Gujarati ફ્રેન્ચ, Kannada ಫ್ರೆಂಚ್, Malayalam ഫ്രഞ്ച്.
Questions about the name of French
Why is French called galleg in Breton?
Breton uses the stem gall-, like Latin gallice and Greek galliká; most other languages build the word on the stem of France, Latin Francia.
What are the ISO 639 codes of French?
fr (ISO 639-1), fra and fre (ISO 639-2, terminology and bibliographic), fra (ISO 639-3).
How is French written in Tibetan and Dzongkha?
Tibetan ཕ་རན་སིའི་སྐད། (pʰa.ran.sī.skad), Dzongkha ཕེ་རེནཆེ། (pʰe.renčʰe).