indeterminate zone, in which one dialect probably shaded off by easy
gradations into the other.

Within the region thus described as Provencal, several separate dialects
existed, as at the present day. Apart from the Franco-Provencal on the
north-east, which we have excluded, there was Gascon in the south-west
and the modern _departements_ of the Basses and Hautes Pyrenees;
Catalonian, the dialect of Roussillon, which was brought into Spain in
the seventh century and still survives in Catalonia, Valencia and the
Balearic Islands. The rest of the country may be subdivided by a line to
the north of which _c_ before _a_ becomes _ch_ as in French, cant_a_re
producing chant_a_r, while southwards we find _c(k)_ remaining. The
Southern dialects are those of Languedoc and Provence; north of the line
were the Limousin and Auvergne dialects. At the present day these
dialects have diverged very widely. In the early middle ages the
difference between them was by no means so great. Moreover, a literary [4]
language grew up by degrees, owing to the wide circulation of poems and
the necessity of using a dialect which could be universally
intelligible. It was the Limousin dialect which became, so to speak, the
backbone of this literary language, now generally known as Provencal,
just as the Tuscan became predominant for literary purposes among the
Italian dialects. It was in Limousin that the earliest troubadour lyrics
known to us were composed, and this district with the adjacent Poitou
and Saintonge may therefore be reasonably regarded as the birthplace of
Provencal lyric poetry.

Hence the term "Provencal" is not entirely appropriate to describe the
literary language of the troubadours, as it may also be restricted to
denote the dialects spoken in the "Provincia". This difficulty was felt
at an early date. The first troubadours spoke of their language as
_roman_ or _lingua romana,_ a term equally applicable to any other
romance language. _Lemosin_ was also used, which was too restricted a
term, and was also appropriated by the Catalonians to denote their own
dialect. A third term in use was the _lingua d'oc,_ which has the
authority of Dante [2] and was used by some of the later troubadours;
however, the term "Provencal" has been generally accepted, and must
henceforward be understood to denote the literary language common to the [5]
south of France and not the dialect of Provence properly so-called.

For obvious reasons S