My son asked me the simplest question tonight, and I realized that all these years I thought I knew the answer, but I don’t. He asked if Jaques is John in French, and I said “No, it’s Jean.” Then he asks “Then why is Frere Jaques sung Brother John?”
Ummm… I don’t have a clue. I always thought Jean = John and Jaques = Jack. Why did it never occur to me to question this? So I try to find an online translator to tell me, but names don’t seem to translate. So I look up Frere Jaques on Wiki, and it says the literal translation is… get this… Brother James. James?!? What new hell is this? Jean, Jaques,John, Jack, James, blibbber, bluubbber, blubbbub… send me to the rubber room! Can someone tell me how these names translate between French and English?
Well, Jack is a nickname for John (JFK was called “Jack Kennedy” for example), so I suspect that although James is the literal translation of Jaques, the translator associated Jaques with the similar-sounding Jack, and shifted to the equivalent John to make the rhyme closer (John/Dong)
Jacques is from the Latin Jacobus, which is ultimately from the Hebrew Jacob. According to Wikipedia there was a late Latin variant Jacomus, which found its way into English as James. So, yes, Jacques is the French equivalent of the English James and St. James, for example, is Saint Jacques.
The English Jack is a diminutive of John. It comes from the Germanic name Jan (itself a contraction of Johann), plus the suffix -kin, which gives us Jankin, which gets further simplified to Jack. The German Johann and the French Jean both come from the Latin Ioannes, which in turn comes from the Hebrew Yohanan.
Why do people sing “Brother John”? I was never aware until today that they did. When I was a child, we sang this song only in French. I am unfamiliar with the lyric in English. Does “John” provide a rhyme or an assonance which would be lost if “James” were used?
[On seening Andy L’s post, the answer to that last question is “yes”.]
And the Jacobean era refers to the reign of King James I of England; also, the Jacobites were the supporters of King James II after he was deposed (and later of the restoration of his line).
The translator was VERY loose with the translation, so I wouldn’t assume Jacques to John was a ‘Jacques/Jack’ mistake - not only is the monk’s name changed, but so is why he’s being told to get up. In Frere Jacques, he’s being told to wake up and ring the bell. In Brother John, he’s being told to wake up because the bells are ringing.
So James and John could be two different lazy monks…so the abbot goes to rouse James and make him ring the bells, then goes to wake John because he’s not getting up for morning prayer.
Not sure where this fits in to your very informative analysis, but in the German version it’s Jakob (which I assume would also come from the Hebrew Jacob, yes?)
That’s a very literal translation. Rendering “Dormez vous” as “Sleep you” (or even “Do you sleep”) is a word-for-word substitution rather than a translation; the corresponding English that anyone would actually say is “Are you sleeping.”
I think the substitution is just because John is a more common name than James in English (though both are fairly common). I think, though, that in French Jacques might be more common than Jean.
Note that the first two lines are reversed. French version starts with Brother Jacques then asks the question, the English version asks the question, then addresses Brother John. That was likely done to maintain the rhythym and meter of the music. Similarly, John “rhymes” better with “dong” than Jack or James.
Sometimes names are more cultural concepts than words. How do you translate “John Doe,” or “Uncle Sam”? Or what about “Main Street”? The point isn’t always to find a one-to-one correspondence between languages, and this is really what you should be trying to teach your son. When he asks you that question, you can answer this: “Here we say ‘Brother John.’ In France they say ‘Frère Jacques.’”
While the name in the song might have been based on an actual person (Jacques Beaulieu), it more or less has become the stereotypical name for a monk in France. In English it’s “Brother John”–kind of how we say “Joe Six-pack,” etc.
“Monsieur Dupont” (there’s some variation in this, but that’s one I’ve come across pretty often)
“Oncle Sam”
“Rue Principale” (though if the street is really called Main, you’d see “Rue Main”)
Main Street is tricky, because we usually don’t have those - most cities in the Old World weren’t planned from the get go, so which street became the main one is more organic
However, I’d wager that even the smallest, most godforsaken hamlet in France has either a “Rue de la République”, a “Rue Charles de Gaulle” or a “Rue du 8 Mai '45”. Or all three. Those would be the street names I’d use if I were translating a text where “Main Street” has a definite thematic/symbolic value (otherwise I’d probably just leave it as Main Street for flavour).
(For reference, I went to the “Ecole de la République” school on “Charles de Gaulle Avenue” myself )
It’s certainly the default name for a person from France, but I don’t know if it’s ever used as a legal term the way “John Doe” is.
I’d say that if there are street names you’re likely to find in almost all Quebec cities, it’d be “rue Principale”, “rue Notre-Dame”, and possibly “boulevard Saint-Laurent” and “rue Jacques-Cartier” as well.
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