Breton language, Celtic language spoken in Brittany in France. It was introduced in the 5th–6th century by immigrants from southwestern Britain and first appears in glosses to Latin manuscripts of the 8th–10th century. The modern language has traditionally been divided into four dialects; efforts to establish orthographic standards were long hindered by the separate development of the written form of each. The estimated number of speakers fell from 1,200,000 in the 1920s to 500,000 at the turn of the 21st century, when a unified spelling system and expanded language instruction encouraged Breton’s wider use.
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