Editing Bocage (section)

==Etymology==
[[File:Bocage country at Cotentin Peninsula.jpg|thumb|upright=1.35|Bocage country on the [[Cotentin Peninsula]], Lower Normandy]]
[[File:Bocagenormandy.jpg|thumb|upright=1.35|Location of bocage in the context of [[Operation Overlord]]]]

''Bocage'' is a [[Norman language|Norman]] word that comes from the Old Norman ''boscage'' (Anglo-Norman {{lang|xno|boscage}}, Old French {{lang|fro|boschage}}), from the Old French root ''bosc'' ("wood") > Modern French {{lang|fr|bois}} ("wood") cf. Medieval Latin {{lang|la-x-medieval|boscus}} (first mentioned in 704 AD).<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.cnrtl.fr/etymologie/bocage|title=BOCAGE : Etymologie de BOCAGE}}</ref> The [[Norman toponymy|Norman place names]] retain it as ''Bosc-'', ''-bosc'', ''Bosc-'', pronounced traditionally {{IPA|fr|bɔk|}} or {{IPA|[bo]}}. The [[suffix]] ''-age'' means "a general thing". The ''boscage'' form was used in English for "growing trees or shrubs; a thicket, grove; woody undergrowth"<ref>"boscage | boskage, n.". OED Online. March 2021. Oxford University Press. https://www.oed.com/view/Entry/21733 (accessed March 02, 2021)</ref> and to refer to decorative design imitating branches and foliage or leafy decoration such as is found on eighteenth-century porcelain; since early twentieth century this usually called "bocage".<ref>"bocage, n.". OED Online. March 2021. Oxford University Press. https://www.oed.com/view/Entry/20858?redirectedFrom=bocage (accessed March 02, 2021).</ref> Similar words occur in Scandinavian (cf. Swedish {{lang|sv|buskage}}; Danish {{lang|da|buskads}}) and other Germanic languages (cf. Dutch {{lang|nl|bos}}, {{lang|nl|boshaag}}); the original root is thought to be the Proto-Germanic ''*bŏsk-''. The ''boscage'' form seems to have developed its meaning under the influence of eighteenth-century [[romanticism]].

The 1934 ''Nouveau Petit Larousse'' defined ''bocage'' as "a ''bosquet'', a little wood, an agreeably shady wood" and a ''bosquet'' as "a little wood, a clump of trees". By 2006, the ''Petit Larousse'' definition had become "(Norman word) Region where the fields and meadows are enclosed by earth banks carrying hedges or rows of trees and where the habitation is generally [[Dispersed settlement|dispersed]] in farms and hamlets."