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bataille des haies

English translation: hedge row battle

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GLOSSARY ENTRY (DERIVED FROM QUESTION BELOW)

French term or phrase:	bataille des haies
English translation:	hedge row battle
Entered by:	verslanglais

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16:55 Nov 24, 2011

French to English translations [PRO]
Social Sciences - History / specific battle of WWII

French term or phrase: bataille des haies

"Des épisodes clés se sont déroulés dans la Manche et ont marqué les mémoires, comme la bataille des haies et la percée d’Avranches. Là, en juillet 1944, l’opération Cobra allait permettre de progresser rapidement..."

It is important for me to distinguish between Operation Cobra, which is clearly described on the English version of Wikipedia; "la percée d'Avranches", which I have translated "the Avranches breakthrough"; and this battle, for which I cannot find the English equivalent. In the French version of Wikipedia I see that it took place from the 13 of June to the 24 of July 1944. http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bataille_des_Haies

All I need now is the English equivalent, and I'm sure you WWII history buffs have got the answer!

Thanks in advance, and happy Thanksgiving to those who have taken a day off!

verslanglais KudoZ activity Questions: 51 (none open) (1 closed without grading) Answers: 119
Local time: 18:10

hedge row battle

Explanation:
ca paie de regarder le History channel

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Note added at 10 mins (2011-11-24 17:05:25 GMT)
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ou hedgerow

Selected response from:

jmleger
Local time: 11:10

Grading comment

As always in this business, I learn something every day - for example the use of 'bocage' as an English word - but I finally went with this first answer, as it seems the most straightforward for readers. I appreciate everyone's efforts towards solving the puzzle!
4 KudoZ points were awarded for this answer

Summary of answers provided

4 +5

hedge row battle

jmleger

battle of the bocage

xxxBourth

Summary of reference entries provided

NB:

kashew

Answers

8 mins confidence:

peer agreement (net): +5

hedge row battle

jmleger
Local time: 11:10
Native speaker of:

French
PRO pts in category: 4

Grading comment

Notes to answerer

Asker: Merci ! Je vois "battle(s) of the hedgerows" un peu partout sur Google. Continuez donc à regarder History Channel ! ;-)

14 hrs confidence:

battle of the bocage

Explanation:
Ah ha! It's not just in French that bocage is used (see my comment of a minute ago under Discussion).

Google reveals:
"battle of the hedgerows" + Normandy - 24,700 ghits
"battle of the bocage" + Normandy - 270,000 ghits, i.e. 11 times more.

However it looks as if "hedgerows" is thrown in in close association with this name, in explanatory fashion.

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Note added at 14 hrs (2011-11-25 07:47:53 GMT)
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This is not related solely to the battle of Villers-Bocage.

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Note added at 15 hrs (2011-11-25 08:19:43 GMT)
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I've just observed that some sites claim that the Battle of the Bocage IS the Battle of Villers-Bocage. However, if you add "-villers" to the " "battle of the bocage" + Normandy " search string, you still get 254,000 ghits.

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Note added at 16 hrs (2011-11-25 09:36:31 GMT)
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@Asker. It seems to me the numbers speak for themselves. Of 270,000 ghits for "battle of the bocage", 16,000 actually include the word "Villers", presumably fewer still state that the battle of Villers-Bocage and the battle of the bocage are one and the same.
At 11 times the numbers, it seems to me that "battle of the bocage" is what anyone with an interest in war history might expect to find.

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Note added at 19 hrs (2011-11-25 12:53:03 GMT)
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The reason why you found no mention of the Battle of Villers-Bocage on the Bataille des Haies site is that, as you have discovered, the village of Villers-Bocage is in a different part of the country.
That is not to say that the Battle of the Bocage, or, if you will, the Battle of the Hedgerows, is the same thing as the Battle of Villers-Bocage. "Bocage" simply refers to the system of hedges, dikes and ditches used on farms in this part of the country, and can be found in many place names.

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Note added at 21 hrs (2011-11-25 14:24:05 GMT)
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On this BATAILLE DES HAIES site you will find a map, in English, showing "the BOCAGE country", with the French caption Carte des opérationsdu bocage normand :
http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bataille_des_Haies

On the Discussion page for the above site, one person (not me!) says " Il me semble que le titre le plus approprié devrait être BATAILLE DU BOCAGE. Le titre actuel me semble une traduction littérale de "hedgerow""
http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discussion:Bataille_des_Haies

While suggesting that the Battle of the Bocage is NOT the same as the Battle of Villers-Bocage, it also suggests that "Battle of the Hedgerows" is the prevailing term in English.

[Note the similarity here with tennis. centuries ago, while playing jeu de paume, a player would shout "Tenez! as he served. When the game was taken up in England, the English used the French expressions, much as also occurs in fencing. While jeu de paume declined in France, it gradually became "tennis" in England, the name being the English pronunciation of "Tenez. When the French took up the game again, they found nothing better to call it than "tennis", little realizing it was a deformation of French and that the game should really be called jeu de paume in French. Quite apart from anything else, this would have avoided them the embarrassment of inventing silly words like tennisman.
In a similar vein, there are caverns beneath the city of Amiens from which Commonwealth troops launched an attack behind the German lines in WWI. While the troops were massing in these caverns, signs pointing to the "Latrines" were painted on the walls. In WWII the caverns were used by the civilian population as bomb shelters, and they painted "WC" over the "latrines" signs.]

www.dday-overlord.com/guerre_haies.htm - Translate this page
La GUERRE DES HAIES, également connue sous le nom de "BATAILLE DU BOCAGE", ...

beaucoudray.free.fr/guerre.htm - Translate this page
Ce fut la terrible BATAILLE DU BOCAGE normand. La " BATAILLE DES HAIES " pendant plus d'un mois a précédé la prise de la ville de Saint-Lô

www.forcesdz.com/t2689p300-la-2eme-guerre-m... - Translate this page
9 oct. 2010 – La GUERRE DES HAIES, également connue sous le nom de "BATAILLE DU BOCAGE", a débuté dès le

After the battle of the beaches came what historians now commonly call the "HEDGEROWS WAR" in reference to the nature of the land. The hedgerows, ALSO KNOWN AS THE "BATTLE OF THE BOCAGE", began the day after D-Day and was over at the end of August 1944, when allied troops eventually released the biggest part of the current Basse-Normandie region
http://www.dday-overlord.com/eng/bocage_war.htm

Interestingly, this site refers to "hedgerows WAR" but "BATTLE of the Bocage".

Other sites too make this distinction:
hedgebritannia.wordpress.com/2011/06/21/the-battle-of-the-bocage/
21 Jun 2011 – This conflict became known as the “HEDGEROWS WAR” or the “BATTLE OF THE BOCAGE” ( the French name for hedgerow). The ancient hedgerows were ...

3lyk-n-filad.att.sch.gr/Comenius/no.../Barack%20Obama_Frames.ht...
After the battle of the beaches, came the BATTLE OF THE “BOCAGE”” the HEDGEROWS” WAR: for several weeks, Normandy was the scene of fierce and bloody

As observed above, French too uses both "bataille des haies" and "guerre des haies", parallelled by "bataille du bocage " and "guerre du bocage".

I believe this Facebook page appearing to say that the "Battle of the Bocage" and the "Battle of Villers-Bocage" are the same thing is erroneous.
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Battle-of-the-Bocage/129659913...
And it appears the person or people who created this page realized and corrected their mistake but neglected to delete the erroneous site:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Battle-of-the-Bocage/129659913...

xxxBourth
Local time: 18:10
Native speaker of:

English
PRO pts in category: 154

Notes to answerer

Asker: Thank you for your help, Bourth, but I am afraid that this might cause some undue confusion, as it seems to on the net.

Asker: I wonder if it is really the same battle; or even if this term is really referring to one specific battle, or rather all the skirmishes that took place throughout the countryside for those two weeks? There is no mention of Vlilliers-Bocage on the French Wiki page: http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bataille_des_Haies

Asker: I just found another clue that hints at the fact that these are two seperate events: 'La Bataille des Haies' happened in La Manche, which corresponds with my context; whereas the 'La Bataille de Villers-Bocage' - which I do believe is the French term for 'Battle of the Bocage' (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Bocage) - took place in Calvados. So thank you for your detective work, but La Manche has it, I'm afraid. ;-)

Reference comments

1 hr

Reference: NB:

Reference information:
The Battle of Villers-Bocage took place during the Second World War on 13 June 1944, one week after the Allies landed in Normandy to begin the liberation.

kashew
France
Native speaker of:

English
PRO pts in category: 20

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English translation: hedge row battle

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English translation: hedge row battle

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