French / Brezoneg

BRETON ICHTYONYMY
Linguistic atlas of Brittany’s marine fauna

Alan-Gwenog Berr’s thesis (Alain Le Berre by his official name, CNRS researcher), Ichthyonymie bretonne, defended at the University of Western Brittany (UBO), was published in 1973. This unique piece of work includes a near-to-comprehensive listing of fish names from the coasts of Lower Brittany (129 survey points). It is high-level scientific work in terms of systematics and linguistics.

The author passed away one week prior to the thesis defence, which was thus posthumous and presented before a thesis committee of linguists and biologists. Alan-Gwenog Berr’s project was to compile a linguistic atlas based on his data: he was unable to see it through due to the circumstances.

This web site presents the linguistic atlas compiled on the basis of his work, by a team of CRBC and IUEM researchers from 2004 to 2008. Given the current advantages provided by the IT sector, this scientific project required digital entry of Alan-Gwenog Berr’s data, their integration into a structured database and their mapping using software specifically developed for this purpose. Original drawings and factsheets describing each of the 430 species involved complement the maps produced.

This project was carried out with the support of Université de Bretagne Occidentale and Brittany’s Regional Council, within the framework of a regional-scale research project (PRIR).

Foreword Acknowledgement
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