West Germanic languages

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(Redirected from West Germanic language)

{{Infobox Language family 

|name=West Germanic
|region=Originally between the Rhine, Alps, Elbe, and North Sea; today worldwide
|familycolor=Indo-European
|fam1=Indo-European
|fam2=Germanic
|child1=Anglo-Frisian
|child2=Low Germanic
|child3=High Germanic

}} West Germanic is the largest branch of the Germanic family of languages, including such languages as German, English and Dutch.

The other families of Germanic are North Germanic and East Germanic.

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History

From the time of their earliest attestation, the Germanic dialects are divided into three groups, West, East and North Germanic. Their exact relation is difficult to determine from the sparse evidence of runic inscriptions, and they remained mutually intelligible throughout the Migration period, so that some individual dialects are difficult to classify. The Western group would have formed as a dialect of Proto-Germanic in the late Jastorf culture (ca. 1st century BC).

During the Middle Ages, the West Germanic languages were separated by the insular development of Middle English on one hand, and by the second Germanic sound shift on the continent on the other.

The linguistic contact of the Viking settlers of the Danelaw with the Anglo-Saxons left traces in the English language, and is suspected to have facilitated the collapse of the Old English inflexional system that marked the onset of the Middle English period 12th century.

The High Germanic sound shift resulted in the division between the Low Germanic languages and the High Germanic languages. By Early modern times, the span had extended into considerable differences, ranging from Highest Alemannic in the South (the Walliser dialect being the southernmost surviving German dialect) to Northern Low Saxon in the North. Although both extremes are considered German, they are not mutually intelligible. The southern dialects have completed the second sound shift, but remained closer to the Middle German vowel system, while the northern dialects remained unaffected by the consonant shift, but simplified the vowel system.

Of modern German dialects the north German 'Plattdeutsch' (Low German) is the one that most resembles modern English. The district of 'Angeln' (or Anglia), from which the name "English" derives, is in the extreme north of Germany between the Danish border and the Baltic coast. Saxony lies further to the south. The Anglo-Saxons were a combination of a number of peoples from northern Germany and the Jutland Peninsula.

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Family tree

Note that divisions between subfamilies of Germanic are rarely precisely defined; most form dialect continua, with adjacent dialects being mutually intelligible and more separated ones not.

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See also

ca:Llengües germàniques occidentals cs:Západogermánské jazyky de:Westgermanische Sprachen el:Δυτική Γερμανική fr:Langues germaniques occidentales fy:Westgermaanske talen hr:Zapadnogermanski jezici id:Bahasa Jermanik Barat nds:Westgermaansche Spraken nl:West-Germaanse talen nn:Vestgermanske språk pl:Języki zachodniogermańskie sk:Západogermánske jazyky zh:西日耳曼语支

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