Page "Argot" Paragraph 3

Under the strictest definition, an argot is a proper language, with its own grammar and style.

But, such complete secret languages are rare, because the speakers usually have some public language in common, on which the argot is largely based.

Argots are mainly versions of other languages with a part of its vocabulary replaced by words unknown to the larger public.

For example, the term is used to describe systems such as verlan and louchébem, which retain French syntax and apply transformations only to individual words ( and often only to a certain subset of words, such as nouns, or semantic content words ).

Such systems are examples of argots à clef, or " coded argots.