Explanation: The Franks, predecessors of the modern day French, were a Germanic peoples who invaded and colonized Roman Gaul. However, the march of history, and the allure of claiming the legacy of the Roman Empire of old, led the Franks to associate themselves gradually more with Latin than Germanic heritage.
Also, the Germans had form doing that. The whole Holy Roman Empire thing, all the statues of figures in Roman attire in their cities and such. It’s like they had an inferiority complex from their ancestors having been the barbarians harrying the Roman Empire around its fringes rather than the ones with the roads, aqueducts and indoor plumbing.
“Oops, we accidentally European civilization 😬”
tbf, the Roman Empire only needed a little help in dismantling itself.
The Roman Empire is like the French Resistance: everybody claims to have been in it.