When I eat chicken, I call it chicken. Chicken wing; chicken drumsticks etc.
When I eat lamb, I call it lamb. Lamb shank; lamb cutlets.
So why do I not eat pig or cow? I eat pork or beef. Is there a reason for that?
My understanding is that the difference in terms goes back to the Norman invasion, which is when a ton of French-based terms for things were carried over.
The peasants referred to everything as the name of the animal but the French nobles referred to it as porc, boeuf, etc. This is also where we got the words for venison, mutton, veal, poultry, and also apparently pheasant
@whenigrowup356 Yup. And then you have the New World animals where we use the name of the animal for both the animal and the meat, like buffalo.
I guess the reason why it is “chicken” and not “poulet” or something, is because chicken was allready the poor man’s meat back than?
From what I can work out, yep it seems that way. Pork and beef were too expensive for the peasants so they just referred to them as the animals they were raising, but chickens were actually on their menu so we ended up keeping the animal words for it. We still got the word for pullet (young hen) though.
I just read a theory that poisson, french for fish, didn’t come over because it sounded too much like poison, but who knows if that’s true lol.
My country had not been invaded by the Normans and we speak completely different language, yet we don’t call it pig or cow either.
If you don’t mind my asking, which language is yours?
It’s an interesting question to ponder which different languages ended up with distinction words for the meat vs the living animal, and maybe what that says about the culture.
The distinction is not a feature of French, from what I understand, and English ending up with this distinction seems to have been entirely accidental.
My country also has not been invaded by the Normans but we call pig a pig and cow a cow.
Because of the Norman invasion. 1066 and all that. (edit: specifically, after a time the peasants spoke English and looked after the animals, the nobility spoke french and named the food, so we got the English words for the animals and the French words for most of the farm animals were used for the food made from them)
Interesting but doesn’t quite answer the question.
Boeuf is the French word for beef, not cow. So the question is still why do we call it roast boeuf instead of roast vache?
To be more confusing, cow is the term for the female of the species, in this case cattle, but female whales are also called cows.
Does vache mean cow or does vache mean cattle?
The French eating it called it beef, the English raising it called it cow. The french didn’t call it roast cow because they were eating it as food, thus beef.
The above poster explained your question already.
Quand je mange du poulet, je l’appelle poulet. Aile de poulet; pilons de poulet etc.
Quand je mange de l’agneau, je l’appelle agneau. Jarret d’agneau; côtelettes d’agneau.
Alors pourquoi est-ce que je ne mange pas de cochon ou de vache ? Je mange du porc ou du boeuf.
Quelle est la raison de ceci?
If it involves food or the culinary arts, then chances are good France and the French language is involved.
Chicken has Its own “Norman” word, which is “poultry”.
True. I think someone else pointed this out as well. But I don’t eat a poultry drumstick. The English language is a funny thing!
We do in Denmark.
The english words are different because…
The farmers would call it by its english name. And the king and other fancy people would use the french.
Pig becomes porc
For example.
Eventually this meant that when the animal was alive youd call it by the english name. And when it was butchered you used the french name.
Or so i read once.
