The usage of a specific name for Béarnese lies in the history of Béarn, a viscounty that became a sovereign principality under Gaston Fébus.

The standardised orthography defined by the administrative and judicial acts was adopted outside the limits of Béarn, not only in a part of Gascony, but also in some Basque territories.

The number of speakers of Béarnais is difficult to estimate; a 2008 survey suggests that 8 to 15% of the population speaks Béarnese, depending on the definition chosen.

Arnaud de Salette is considered to be the first writer to claim a writing in rima bernesa in his translation of the Genevan Psalter, composed between 1568 and 1571 and published in 1583 in Orthez.

During the sociolinguistic survey commissioned by the Conseil départemental des Pyrénées-Atlantiques in 2018, the people of Béarn were asked about the name they gave to their regional language.

The expression "Béarnese language" was used as early as Arnaud de Salette in the 16th century, "la lengoa bernesa", and this use is not based on a scientific observation, but on an identity approach, in a context of rising Béarn nationalism.

It is widely used in the normativization attempts to reach a standard Gascon and is the most likely dialect to succeed, due to the stronger cultural identity and output of this area.

[citation needed] A 1982 survey of the inhabitants of Béarn indicated that 51% of the population can speak Béarnese, 70% understood it, and 85% were in favor of preserving the language.

However, other authorities consider them to be distinct languages, including Jean Lafitte, publisher of Ligam-DiGam, a linguistic and lexicography review of Gascon.

[3] A detailed sociolinguistic study presenting the current status of the language (practice and different locutors' perceptions) has been made in 2004 by B. Moreux (see Sources): the majority of native speakers have learned it orally, and tend to be older.

On the other hand, the proponents for its maintenance and revival are classified into three groups: Béarnists, Gasconists and Occitanists, terms which summarize the regional focus they give respectively to their language(s) of interest: Béarn, Gascony or Occitania.

Used from the middle of the 13th century to replace Latin in this former Basque-speaking region, Béarnese remained the institutional language of the sovereign principality of Bearn from 1347 to 1620.

Several Béarn communes have installed bilingual signs at the entrance to their commune, such as Bordes, Etsaut, Artix, Lacq or Billère.Concerning literature and poems, the first important book was a Béarnese translation of the Psalms of David by Arnaud de Salette, at the end of the 16th century, contemporary with the Gascon (Armagnac dialect) translation of these Psalms by Pey de Garros.

Both translations were ordered by Jeanne d'Albret, queen of Navarre and mother of Henry IV of France, to be used at Protestant churches.

During the 17th century, the Béarnese writer Jean-Henri Fondeville (among others) composed plays such as La Pastorala deu Paisan and also his anti-Calvinist Eglògas.

Noticeable representatives of modern béarnese literature include poets Roger Lapassade, and novelists Eric Gonzalès, Serge Javaloyès, and Albert Peyroutet.