Introduction to the BFM

The Base de Français Médiéval database (or BFM), founded in 1989, currently comprises 126 complete Old and Middle French texts. Thanks to its volume (approx. 3 550 000 words) and the diversity of the texts included, this database is unique in France for this period of the history of French. It has been used by a research community of approximately one hundred scholars, teachers, and students worldwide.

The texts included in the BFM cover a considerable geographic area and an extensive chronological breadth, with texts from the 9^th century (including the first known French text, the Serments de Strasbourg) to the end of the 15^th century. Both verse and prose texts are represented, as well as different genres and domains (e.g., fiction, history, hagiography, law, the sciences...).

The BFM is accessible via the web portal based on the TXM platform.

Many of the BFM texts can be downloaded upon request under a CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 License. Some restrictions apply to texts under copyright.

All the the BFM are XML-tagged following the recommendations of the TEI.

Access to the database : BFM is accessible free of charge for individual scholars, faculty and students. You need to accept the the terms qnd conditions of use of the database by filling out a web form : click on "S’inscrire" button on the BFM Portal welcome page (in French). Access to the BFM corpus will be granted immediately upon the confirmation of your email address.