Amédée-François Frézier Amédée-François Frézier Amédée-François Frézier (1682 – October 26, 1773) was a French military engineer, mathematician, spy, and explorer who is best remembered for bringing back five specimens of "Fragaria chiloensis", the beach strawberry, from an assignment in South America, thus introducing this New World fruit to the Old. As described by G.M. Darrow, Frézier's ancient surname was derived from "fraise", the French word for strawberry. A story relates the surname is derived from the fact that Julius de Berry, a citizen of Anvers (i.e. Antwerp), was knighted by Charles the Simple in 916 for a timely gift of ripe strawberries.
Quebec French is spoken all over the southern part of St. Lawrence valley, including Montreal and Trois-Rivières, as well as the Western area going from Gatineau to as far as Rouyn-Noranda. Basic distinctions include the pronunciation of unstressed "ai", as opposed to stressed "è" of the Metropolitan French. For example, the word "fraise" would be most likely pronounced as , instead of . Some extreme speakers would even pronounce . The Western-Central dialects can be further divided into Central and Western. In Montreal, there are more long vowels than in Quebec City (for example, the word "arrête" is pronounced ). Relatively archaic