Talk:Germanic languages/Archive 1

To Rmhermen on Burgundian see Burgundians for people. The language is very difficult, but a website from ch/Switzerland gives info in German. 'Lex Burgundionum" = Burgunderrecht= Laws of the Burgundians - one of the oldest Germanic law records, by Gundobad + 516, Laws written down are based on tribal Germanic custums. and by king Sigismund + 523/4 "Prima Constitutio". Burgundian soldiers , originally from Baltic Sea, Vistula to Rheinland , Worms area had soldiers as "hospites" in Roman service. Then came to (later)Burgundy, Swabia (Schwaben), Switzerland, Savoyen. , settled in 443 :"Sapaudia". and 457 in province Lugdunensis. Language remnants are very sparse, a Burgunder king daughter married Theoderic the Great. Some history in "Niebelungen Lied" and in later Switzerland in: "Burgundische Eidgenossenschaft" see  external Swiss link in Germanhttp://www.Snl.ch/dhs/externe/project/textes/D8028.html user:H.J.


 * Me again (boring day at work) -- the lex Burgundiorum (Burgundiarum?) is written in Latin, as are the other extant law codes

Location
All the West-Germanic languages seem to be located East of the East-Germanic languages. --AxelBoldt
 * All the East-Germanic languages do not exist any more.

Gothic is the known East-Germanic language. From the 1st century BC to the 5th century AD, they did live to the east of most other Germanic speakers, in what is now Poland, Ukraine, the Balkans and thereabouts. Later, some of them settled in Spain and Italy. (And legend has it that they may have lived in Sweden at an earlier date.)

The other possible East-Germanics are guessed from a few tiny fragments and proper names, and the fact that those tribes at one stage lived close to the Goths (in what is now Poland). Except maybe the Lombards. I don't know much about them except they later lived in northern Italy. Do scholars really think they spoke East-Germanic?


 * No, scholars don't. Langobardic was a west-germanic language of high-german stock.

Asdfgl 23:12, 25 May 2005 (UTC)

Linguistic Markers
The page includes this quote:
 * 3. The presence of two distinct types of verb conjugation: weak (regular) and strong (irregular). English has 161 strong verbs; all are of native English origin.

If I should be nitpicky, at least "take" is a strong verb with a non-native english origin, instead being a scandinavian/old norse borrowing. The scandinavian languages are also germanic, though, so maybe it's unnecessary to edit this.

--- I thought that the verb "catch - caught" had a Romance origin (capere) MaartenVidal 22:45, 8 April 2006 (UTC)


 * The wording should be amended to say "of Germanic origin" to allow take to stay. And catch/caught is from capere.  Shrive/shrove/shriven (from Latin scribere) is the other word that fits this category of exceptions.  There are so few exceptions that we can hopefully make a short yet exhaustive list which follows the sentence that states the "rule" that all English strong verbs are of Germanic origin. --Hraefen 16:42, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

Non-Indoeuropean Roots
Is the quote of up to 80% non-indoeuropean roots correct? I have seen quotes of ca 30% elsewhere. And who were the Battle Axe people??

I could not find any sources to prove 80% and Battle Axe people, so I would propose to delete this item 6 at all. -- Vassili Nikolaev

What about removing the information about German dialects? They are also in the article High German. And it does not make sense to see them in such an overview (imho) --zeno 08:50 Jan 7, 2003 (UTC)

I agree; this page is too detailed with Low German, High German, and North Germanic holding the information. I'll shorten it, tell me if it's good now. -- Toby 01:17 Feb 6, 2003 (UTC)

Low German
Regarding "Low German": On Low German, it's explained how the term is used in at least 3 senses. The table now reflects the sense adopted by Wikipedia for that article -- which I adopted (and has spread to other language wikis) on the grounds that it was a real linguistic category but had no other name. (I would move discussion there, if any.) -- Toby 01:35 Feb 6, 2003 (UTC)

Toby asks: How about "traditionally" for Yiddish/Hebrew? Sounds good! Sebastian 09:40 Feb 9, 2003 (UTC)

Great! I'm glad that that works out. -- Toby 02:09 Feb 10, 2003 (UTC)

I deleted "Burgundian", as it was an old French dialect. --zeno 00:44 Apr 15, 2003 (UTC)

Comparison of Selected Terms

Action is a bad example, as it is derived from Latin. Work (Latin: opus, Afrikaans, Dutch & German: werk) is a better word, but I don't know any other equivalents.
 * Swedish has cognates "orka"(vb. cope,manage,handle etc.) and "yrka"(vb. demand). It also has the word "Verk", although technically, it is a low german borrowing, and not a cognate. It is a more exact translation, though.
 * I might have been wrong. It seems like it is a true cognate...

I moved "Lombardic" to the upper german branch, since it definitely underwent the second germanic vowelshift according to runic inscriptions. The wrong classification as an east germanic language seems to be copy&paste error, that meanwhile has spread throughout international wikipedia version. --Zinnmann 13:20, 3 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Yiddish

 * I am fairly sure that Yiddish does belong; to call it a "pidgin" implies that during the development of Yiddish, it was a contact language that involved Hebrew speakers meeting German speakers. Hebrew was long dead as a spoken language well before the Diaspora.  Yiddish is in fact just a relatively ordinary dialect of German that developed in isolation from other German speakers, and developed a distinctive vocabulary to reflect the culture of the people who used it.  Yiddish is largely intelligible to other speakers of colloquial German.


 * Yiddish does belong. Its grammar and basic vocabulary are typically German; it has a regular sound rule in which German "au" corresponds to Yiddish "oy" (which would be written äu in German), e.g. heraus:aroys. The fact that it has borrowed lots of words from Hebrew, Slavic, and other languages doesn't make it less Germanic. -phma 18:30, 11 Mar 2004 (UTC)


 * Not sure about Angloromany, which strikes me more as a jargon, a secret Romany-derived vocabulary attached to an English base, rather than a pidgin. Smerdis of Tlön 17:01, 3 Mar 2004 (UTC)


 * While some might rightly question whether it counts as a separate language, "Ebonics" is definitely a variety of English, and therefore counts as a Germanic language, at least if English itself qualifies. For if admixture of alien vocabulary means that a language ceases to be Germanic, English also should be dropped from the list; it has far more Romance and Latin words than Yiddish has Hebrew or Slavic words.  Smerdis of Tlön 20:34, 3 Mar 2004 (UTC)


 * My friends from Berlin say that they can understand spoken Yiddish well enough to get the general idea of what's being said (if not every single word.) It ought to stay. Kwertii 23:11, 3 Mar 2004 (UTC)

More on Non-IE Roots
Quoting from the page: "The abundance of non-IE roots. There are many Germanic roots that are not found in other IE tongues. These include words for universal actions such as "bite" and "chew" and all words about ships and the sea, except "boat". These roots may have been borrowed from the so-called Battle-axe people, of which the Norse, Angles, Frisians, and Franks had been a part when they were living on the Vänern Sea. The Aesir would later come from Jutland before landing in Sweden and supplanting the language with Indo-European words."

Any references for the rather strong claim that the Norse, Angels, Frisians and Franks all were living by the Vänern lake in Sweden at some stage and can be positively identified as the battle-axe people? This may be one historical theory, but I think it can't be stated as a fact. It's notoriously difficult to connect spoken languages to pre-historical archeological findings. I propose this gets removed again. 82.73.105.231 01:27, 28 Mar 2004 (UTC)


 * While a speculative connection can be referenced in wikipedia, I don't think this belongs as this assertion on the Germanic languages page. I haven't seen this reference on other pages yet, so don't know how to evaluate those. Perhaps best would be to put a reference to any such pages from the location in this page. Anyway, I'll remove the section identifying these prehistorical people with particular language groupings. Martijn faassen 21:49, 28 Mar 2004 (UTC)


 * I've seen a lot of pages where you have contributed this particular theory. Could you cite references to consensus historical theory? I'll remove again until you do such. Martijn faassen 22:20, 28 Mar 2004 (UTC)


 * This theory in my opinion should not be part of the page on Germanic languages. Reference such a theory (as theory) if you like, but don't keep putting it back as fact in the middle of this article. Martijn faassen 22:38, 28 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Tok Pisin

 * Tok Pisin is not a pidgin any more, just like Afrikaans isn't any more. Morwen 21:58, Mar 28, 2004 (UTC)
 * It is generally agreed that Afrikaans is not a creole language and did not begin as a pidgin. Booshank 20:05, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

---

Theudish
Theudish language, as far as I know (and as Google shows) is not real; Google suggests that it is a micronation's conlang, so I have deleted its link from this page and edited its page. Anyone know more about this?

A puzzling paragraph
I can't make heads or tails of this paragraph, currently included in the article:


 * "Many of the present-day divisions between Germanic/Baltic and Celtic/Slav peoples are rooted in the imperial structure of the Roman Empire's division between West and East, as well as the subsequent division called the Great Schism, which had most Celts within the influence of Rome and Latin Catholic; while Slavs revolved around Byzantium and Greek Orthodox.  In turn, the Germanic people were under influence by the Celts and the Balts were revolving around the Slavs, as Mediterranean culture spread northwards.  This cultural osmosis and subsequent split is primarily responsible for the classification of these peoples and their languages as parallel, but otherwise, the differences aren't so great along the borders of their cultural spheres, at least.

Surely the Roman Empire and the East-West Schism have nothing to do with origin of a separate Germanic language family, because that origin came far earlier in history. Are these "divisions" supposed to be cultural as opposed to linguistic divisions? But if so, isn't this really part of European history rather than historical linguistics?

In the absence of some kind of clarification, would it perhaps be sensible to delete this paragraph? Opus33 00:05, 25 Apr 2004 (UTC)


 * This has Kenneth Alan's work written all over it. My understanding is that he is no longer actively editing, having left when other users contested his murky but suspect notions about Germanic peoples, languages, gods, and mythologies.  It can safely go.  The difference between Germanic languages, Celtic languages, and Baltic languages are profound; and at any rate not all Germanic speakers ended up in the Western half, as the history of the Crimean Goths manifests.  Smerdis of Tlön 00:28, 25 Apr 2004 (UTC)


 * Ok, I've done the deed, hoping not to put anyone into a state of rage. Thanks for your advice, Smerdis.  Opus33 00:35, 25 Apr 2004 (UTC)


 * Kenneth Alan is at it still, though he's claiming he's not editing anymore.

I've seen him add this in a minor edit: These are chiefly found in Insular Germanic and Insular Nordic tongues, while the typically Indo-European roots are found chiefly in the Continental Germanic and Continental Nordic.


 * This seems to claim that non-IE words like 'bite' and 'chew' are not typically found in continental Germanic languages. If the examples are anything to go on, this is bogus, as words with the same roots exist in continental Dutch and German. I'll remove this. Martijn faassen 21:24, 3 May 2004 (UTC)

There is nothing wrong with being a positive contributor. Why not stop being a negative detractor, Martijn Faassen?

I wrote what makes sense; those words would be BEST preserved in the maritime affected languages, rather than continental, because the metamorphosis of continental languages occurs in greater extent replacing what may appear native, NON IE ROOTS. In maritime communities, people more often attempt to preserve their unique heritage and do not take to kindly to conversion to continental ways. Case in point, the Norman Conquest brought a language to the British Isles that the people resented because not knowing it restricted the general populace's power in their own home. The Norse left Scandinavia for Faeroes, Iceland, Greenland etc. to escape encroaching Danish control in their daily lives, which meant a continental influence like language. Doing this would have the highest concentration of older terms, most of them maritime, in the isles and insular tongues. Anglo-Frisian speech would most likely have given the inspiration for much insular talk in the Low German tongues, obviously, for the degree of connection in location and time. The Hanseatic League would no doubt use many of these terms when doing business in their time, but the fact remains, the Low German background received most of it's maritime terms from the Anglo-Frisians, just as the Swedes, Goths and Danes learned theirs from the Norse. Of course there are always invented terms and slang, from any time period that has no roots, but for the most part, is what the article is referring to. No need to scream "bogus", when the facts of historical lexicography are blatantly clear. Lord Kenneð 07:12, 4 May 2004 (UTC)

You are deliberately leaving out the other part to my reference of Non IE Roots, the fact that most of these terms are about ships and the sea. It seems you wish to discredit me by distorting the facts of my behaviour. Lord Kenneð 07:16, 4 May 2004 (UTC)


 * The current edit just didn't make any sense. I am a native Dutch speaker so I know the examples ('bite', 'chew') exist in Dutch, and I also know they exist as very basic words in German. The text was definitely implying the wrong thing. This isn't helped by your history of making unsubstantiated statements and dodgy etymology. Martijn faassen 10:26, 4 May 2004 (UTC)

Perhaps I sent the wrong message by forgetting to reword it appropriately, and that, I confess is part of my editorial laziness(I have had that problem for a long time, explaining things in full composition rather than a brainstorm and rough draft-I'm getting better though), but not a sign of scholarly weakness(I am a very deep student, perhaps my studies are beyond my expression, and do not provide adequate presentation of what I know because I'm still into learning about the subject when writing about it to pay attention to what I'm showing-thinking one thing and doing another). Sorry if I presented a confusion, but this confusion is the source of what you have been using against me in my "history" here at Wikipedia. Lord Kenneð 12:58, 4 May 2004 (UTC)

No Original Research
This post concerns the following passage, recently deleted by Martijn faassen and restored by its original author, Kenneth Alan:

These are chiefly found in Insular Germanic and Insular Nordic tongues, while the typically Indo-European roots are found chiefly in the Continental Germanic and Continental Nordic.

I urge Mr. Alan to provide some citations to published work that makes this claim. The Wikipedia instructions to contributors make it very clear that we are not supposed to be presenting our own ideas/research; see No original research. If the claim can be supported by published scholarship, then it should stand, and if it is Mr. Alan's own idea (no matter what its merits), it should be deleted. Opus33 15:28, 4 May 2004 (UTC)


 * Thank you, hypocritical lawbook fascist. How many more times are Wikipedian individuals working on their projects going to be downtrodden by POV original research of geek Wikipediholic cliques who are here to spend their free time like it's a club with sects and they push people around?  A Nerd Fraternity?  Haze me all you want, it won't phase me.  Lord Kenneð 17:35, 4 May 2004 (UTC)

Fellow editors--from the above it seems clear the we've got a big problem on our hands. I hope you will join me in the task of dealing with Mr. Alan's irresponsible editing. If there is someone out there knowledgeable enough to navigate the rather complicated Wikipedia legal system, I think it would be very much worthwhile to make an effort to get Mr. Alan banned. Opus33 19:24, 4 May 2004 (UTC)

The above material got the following responses --Opus33 22:25, 4 May 2004 (UTC)


 * The Kenneth Alan fan club meets at Requests for comment/Kenneth Alan. Diderot 19:26, 4 May 2004 (UTC)


 * Thanks, Diderot, I've now copied this over. Opus33 22:25, 4 May 2004 (UTC)


 * Also, Martijn faassen replied to Kenneth Alan's remarks as follows:


 * I've told you the same on original research many times. It doesn't seem to help. What is actually going on is not that we are fascists and push you around, but that we are actually right about this and you're not playing by the rules of this community. This is why you keep stumbling upon people who question your contributions and ask for references. It's hardly a clique, as certainly I myself only know about the others due to our shared opposition to your style of editing. Martijn faassen 21:13, 4 May 2004 (UTC)


 * Yeah, I agree, it's pushing the rules that I'm whining about. Lord Kenneð Alansson 23:23, 4 May 2004 (UTC)

I'm going to attempt a rewrite of Non-Indo-European roots of Germanic languages soon, using Theo Venneman's research as a base. That will hoprefully clairify this business about root words. Diderot 13:18, 7 May 2004 (UTC)

Why was the Comparison of Selected Terms replaced? is the new one considered 'better'? Could the person putting it explain the specificly the 'Yiddish' spelling of words used in the table? why does it have both 'w' and 'v'? Yiddish has only one such sound, the transcription seems inconsistant.

The new one is better. It uses cognates or their development and avoids Latinisms and modernisms. The Yiddish may be inconsistent due to various sources from which the words were taken. I suggest if anyone knows better they regularize the transcriptions.

Why is American English listed under Commonwealth English?
Why is American English listed under Commonwealth English? Taco Deposit 16:50, Jul 6, 2004 (UTC)

Reversion
How does one revert a page? The last edit has made a hash out of the table. Cheers Io 14:37, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)
 * I found out in the meantime. Now reverted to last good version. Io 14:44, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Comparability of Terms
Some notes on the comparison of terms table: For English "Home":

- I believe the dutch "Thuis" is short for "te huis", i.e. "at house", and is not the same word linguistically as "Home".

This is correct. Just like 'thans' comes from 'van te hand = bij de hand' so does 'thuis' originate from 'te huis'. See for example Max Havelaar where 'te huis' is still used. --asmodai 15:43, 12 November 2005 (UTC)

- In Afrikaans, the word "Heim" is rarely used (it occurs in some compound words (e.g. "heimweë") and sounds archaic on its own). The word "Tuis" (like the dutch "Thuis") is used.

For comparability's sake, the dutch "Thuis" should probably be changed to a like word, or left blank. Perhaps a note should be added that some words are not generally used but are included for comparability's sake. Perhaps these can be flagged with an asterisk. --User:not signed up yet 02:56, 27 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Also in this section I do not understand why all terms in all languages are capitalized. Even Yiddish which in its native script does not have a miniscule/majascule distinction! While some of these languages may once have capitalized certain words I believe German is the only one still capitalizing all nouns. I think the table should reflect this or just get rid of all the capitals. &mdash; Hippietrail 02:54, 12 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Tree
I think the tree got a bit large and unwieldy. Maybe the English dialects should be moved to a page of their own, as was done with the German dialects. By the way, is there really a linguistic difference between "Commonwealth dialects" and "American dialects"? I am not aware of any.

I guess this shows the limitations of the tree notation. A tree works well for languages - they are not mutually intellegible, and so they evolve more or less in a tree-like shape. But a tree does not work so well for dialects which are mutually intellegible -- dialects are related to each other in a network, they mix with their neighbors all the time. Of course it's hard to draw the line between language and dialect, but maybe it would be a good idea to limit the tree on this page to the higher levels, where a tree notation actually makes sense. --Chl 16:06, 11 Sep 2004 (UTC)


 * Yes, there are differences between some Commonwealth and some American dialects (f'risntance, in Australia, the diphthong represented orthographically as AI is pronounced [æi], not [ei], and many Rs are silent, whereas most are pronounced in most American dialects, though this generalisation is inaccurate because it's based on politics, not pronunciation). However, any grouping of Englishes by 'Commonwealth' vs 'British' vs 'American' is pure nonsense, based on politics and not pronunciations (because they alliterate, y'see). Canadian English generally shares a lot more with American English than it does with Australian English. --Kesuari 06:18, 25 Nov 2004 (UTC)

page move
moved to Germanic languages for consistency with other language family articles (Italic languages, Anatolian languages etc.) dab 10:53, 15 Oct 2004 (UTC)

table many=>manche
I think "many" does not equal or match "manche". "Manche" is less.
 * I think the idea is to compare cognates. dab (&#5839;) 16:45, 27 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Wouldn't that be mannig as in manninfaltig then? Bit old fashioned?

Ken Mair 09.01.05


 * Manch does mean many or many a. Less is minder or weniger. Manch and mannig are, historically, the same word. Hedgehog 13:47, 21 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * that's right. We should replace manche (plural) with with manch (singular), I suppose (although a singular of 'many' is much rarer than the plural, of course) dab (&#5839;) 14:34, 21 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * While the similiarity of the spelling between "manche" and "many" seem to point at the same roots - as does the general meaning of a certain number of things - the actual meaning of "manche" is "some" and not "many". As a thumb rule I'd say "many" means a majority, while "manche" means a minority of things/people/etc.

the tree
I'm sorry, this is about "Germanic languages". English is one of them. Fine, why not list British English vs. American English. But the listing of every English-like lingo in America is bloating the tree. People can click on American English for higher resolution, after all. Otherwise, we'll end up with an entry for each and every American, British, German, Scandinavian, Swiss, Dutch, etc., town and district. That's clearly not what we want here. dab (&#5839;) 20:53, 25 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Strong/Weak verbs
2. The use of a dental suffix (/d/ or /t/) instead of vowel alternation (ablaut) to indicate past tense.

That's not unique at all. There are strong and weak verbs in nearly every Indo-European language, of which the strong verbs use ablaut-systems and the weak verbs don't, although the dental suffix in the past tense is not usual. I only wrote it here, because someone with more knowledge than me should correct it, if I'm wrong, but I'm quite sure, that I'm right.


 * Not really. The Germanic weak verbs were a unique development in Germanic.  The strong verbs are not: they derive directly from PIE ablaut-based verbs, and are found in other IE languages including Latin and Greek, though they are not called "strong" there - simply because conventions of description are different.  The Germanic lanugages are not the only group to have formed a "simpler" alternative ablaut-free verb paradigm, but those are separate developments which should not be thrown together.  At any rate, the text as it stands is correct.  --Doric Loon 10:21, 1 September 2005 (UTC)

Would this be useful?
I created this because I thought it might help illustrate the spread of Germanic languages. If no one has any objections, I'll put it somewhere in the article's "history" section.

Is this useful? I thought I might create a map for each major international language family, e.g. Romantic, Slavic, Afro-Asiatic, Sino-Tibetan, etc. --Bhumiya/Talk 03:46, 6 October 2005 (UTC)


 * That's a nice idea. I'm not absolutely sure, but i think, that South Africa should be marked too. At least the data from Afrikaans seems to underline that the South African majority speaks a germanic (either Afrikaans or English) language. --Zinnmann 06:35, 6 October 2005 (UTC)

I don't think you should color Quebec, but agree that South Africa should be colored. Also places like Switzerland shouldn't be wholly colored, I don't think. Perhaps you could use Image:Human Language Families Map.PNG as a source (tho I think it understates the use of English in northern and central Australia, at least). —Felix the Cassowary ( ɑe hɪː jɐ ) 06:57, 6 October 2005 (UTC)


 * How is this? It gives a better idea of the spread of Germanic languages, but I have a few concerns: For one thing, it doesn't specify the regions where Germanic languages are spoken by the majority. In South Africa, for instance, Afrikaans and English speakers, taken together, account for (I think) less than 20% of the population. Also, this map exaggerates the size of linguistic exclaves, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it should be mentioned in the key. --Bhumiya/Talk 13:37, 6 October 2005 (UTC)

I much prefer it. After all, legal institutions (like countries) are often quite different from cultural ones (like languages). Also, I don't think it matters that it doesn't specify regions where Germanic languages are spoken by the majority. They're spoken in a significant area by a significant number of native speakers, and that's the enlightening thing. Anyway, does any language have a majority of native speakers in SA? —Felix the Cassowary ( ɑe hɪː jɐ ) 14:50, 6 October 2005 (UTC)


 * Well, to me the first version looks more suitable. Cassowary's language map lists minority languages, whose speakers normaly use the surrounding "dominant" language too. Of course, there are celtic speakers in Wales, Scotland and the west of ireland. But that doesn't mean, that the major language there is a celtic one. Same thing with the Saami region in northern Norway and Australia. Regarding South Africa you're right (cf. ). Though in Switzerland German (64 %) is the most widespread language, I think it's ok to mark the area with stripes; same for Quebeck. --Zinnmann 15:21, 6 October 2005 (UTC)


 * [[Image:Germanic language zones2.PNG|thumbnail]]I agree with Cassowary that political boundaries aren't as important as cultural and linguistic boundaries, while I also agree with Zinnmann that we ought to distinguish between places like Germany, where virtually everyone within the red area speaks a Germanic language, and places like South Africa, where only a minority of them do. I suggest a modified version of the second map that shows places like South Africa, Australia, Canada, etc. as striped red.--Bhumiya/Talk 22:57, 6 October 2005 (UTC)


 * If you mark Québec as Germanic speakers, you might as well colour the whole world. Stettlerj
 * Québec is striped, not colored. This represents the fact that Québec is multilingual and that English, a Germanic language, is spoken by a sizeable number of its inhabitants. If Québec were made entirely gray, we'd also have to remove the striping from South Africa, Greenland, Alsace-Lorraine, and other places with a significant Germanic-speaking minority. --Bhumiya/Talk 00:59, 7 October 2005 (UTC)


 * I would remove the striping from (most of) Greenland. The vast majority of Greenland is uninhabited, and I think Danish is only spoken in a small region on the east. —Felix the Cassowary ( ɑe hɪː jɐ ) 01:11, 7 October 2005 (UTC)


 * This is true, but I originally never intended this map to be so precise. Notice that many enclaves and other linguo-geographical features are already simplified and exaggerated. I chose to stripe Greenland in its entirety simply to indicate that a certain (unspecified) percentage of Greenland's inhabitants speak a Germanic language. Incidentally, I think about 10% of Greenlanders speak Danish. This is the extent of my knowledge on the subject, since I don't know anything about the country's ethnic geography. --Bhumiya/Talk 01:52, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

How about this? I removed most of the striping from Greenland, since only about 12% of Greenlanders speak Danish as a first language. I left striping around the east coast and Nuuk. I can't think of any major problems with this map, so unless anyone has strong objections, I'm going to place it in the article. -Bhumiya/Talk 13:21, 7 October 2005 (UTC)
 * Looks fine to me. Nice work, thanks :-) --Zinnmann 13:44, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

Yeah, I agree. Just one thing for future reference. If you upload pictures, particularly ones without text, it's generally better to do it at the Wikimedia Commons. You can link transparently to their from any language Wikipedia. —Felix the Cassowary ( ɑe hɪː jɐ ) 13:49, 7 October 2005 (UTC)


 * 76 % of the population of the South African province of the Western Cape speak either Afrikaans or English as first language. On the other hand, 67 % of the population of the province of the Northern Cape are native speakers of Afrikaans. It appears obvious to me then that the western half of South Africa should be colored solid red, whereas the eastern half (where the majority of the population speaks Bantu languages) could be striped red. 161.24.19.82 21:03, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

Tree:Lombardic and Anglo-Frisian
I guess this must be a joke, Sandertje. I hope you have lots of very reputable sources lined up to justify putting Lombaric in Low German and East Nordic! Quite apart from the fact that a tree which has a single language on several nodes is not well-formed.

The origin of Lombardic is not exactly disputed, - everyone agrees there's no defintive answer because of the small amount of evidence. But the concensus is that it's most likely to be Upper German. The Lombardic language page has a very good account, which makes the tree on this page look utterly stupid.

As for reverting Anglo-Frisian to Insular, I can only assume you don't care that you're disagreeing with the folk who put up all the material on Frisian and Anglo-Frisian. Pfold 22:44, 31 January 2006 (UTC)

No, not a joke Pfold, but let's not forget you claim that " Dutch and German split into two different language in thw 16th century ", so I hope you gave some more thoughts to this one.

Lombardic is of disputed origin, some say it has links to Old Norse or another Nordic language, others say it's more close to upper German and even others (to which I count myself) think it's closely related to Old Saxon, and Old Saxon, my dear Pfold, is the earliest recorded form of Low German.Let me accentuate that, LOW not upper or high.

If you observe closely the genetic classification of Lombardic, it states:

It says : GERMANIC nothing more nothing less.Untill 'we' find unscrutable evidence it will not be classified under one particular group.

As for Insular Germanic vs. Anglo-Frisian it means the same, but sounds better (to me at least).

Sandertje 13:55, 1 February 2006 (UTC)


 * If Lombardic is indeed unclassified within Germanic (and I have no opinion on that, I was under the impression it was always regarded as Upper), then it should go in an extra "unclassified" slot on the top level of the tree, not separately under each node again. And as for Insular vs Anglo-Frisian, I think Anglo-Frisian is definitely the more common designation. Lukas (T. 15:19, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

Well, there are only a few possibilities where it belongs ... it's not like it's a black hole or something

Sandertje 15:54, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

Whatever the possibilities might be, the fact is that the handbooks on the history of German say Langobardic is Upper German. The following concur: Unless someone can find equal authority for a different view, that settles it for the purposes of this page, I would say. Pfold 10:37, 7 February 2006 (UTC)
 * Lexikon der Germanistischen Liguistik
 * The histories of Bach, Schweikle, Sonderegger
 * Nielsen's The Germanic Languages
 * Braune/Mitzka, Ahd. Grammatik

How can a language be Upper German at a time when the German consonant shift had not even started? Upper German implies West Germanic. Hutterer (cited on the Lombardic article) at least does not even classify as such. Lombardic is South Germanic to be sure, but this concept of "non-North non-North-Sea Germanic" is difficult to show in a tree-like list like ours. dab (&#5839;) 11:47, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

The reason for proposing Lombardic as UG is that it does show evidence of the sound shift. Pfold 12:26, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

Lombardic, is one of the least documnented germanic languages.You say it underwent the 2nd GSS others say it was related to low saxon a low Germanic language.There just isn't one answer.

Sandertje 17:11, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

we mention the sound shift on Lombardic language. That doesn't prove it is "Upper German" in any meaningful way. It is South Germanic, and it died out before the Germanic dialects had really separated into isolated languages. But maybe the tree could be arranged in a better way, showing genetic classification as well as historical era? dab (&#5839;) 17:21, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

That's good enough for me. Sandertje 17:45, 7 February 2006 (UTC)


 * OK, let's have some citations. Who else apart from Hutterer offers a non-UG classification of Lombardic? I can cite you eleven standard works than says it is UG. Pfold 13:14, 8 March 2006 (UTC)


 * this is not a matter of counting standard works. It is a matter of intelligently quoting them. Can you give us a quote of your favourite? Including a diachronic working definition of Upper German as opposed to High German? Do you agree that a classification as Upper German presupposes the existence of Central German dialects? What Central German dialects were there in the 6th century according to your references? So far, it appears that "Upper German" is just an abbreviation for "exhibits evidence of sound shift", which we had in the article all along. dab (&#5839;) 15:19, 8 March 2006 (UTC)


 * Actually, I'm not really arguing about the facts, which I don't dispute are open to several interpretations: I am arguing that this article mis-represents what is in fact a fairly large consensus, and I cite 11 sources vs Hutterer to make that point (which is underlined by the fact that these are mostly standard handbooks, not ground-breaking research articles.) My view is that this article should give only the consensus with regard to an individual dialect, with the Lombardic language article being the right place to record all the possible theories and the debate on the material, along with specific citations - this would be an obvious way to expand and improve the Lombardic article - but still no one here has cited any sources for these other views other than Hutterer.
 * Personally, I don't have a problem with assuming a CG:UG split at an early date - as soon as groups move apart their languages start to diverge. But what I'm happy with is neither here nor there - as long as I can point you to a dozen works which all state in one way or another "UG includes Bavarian, Alemannic and Langobardic" and no one can point to a similar preponderance of an opposing view. Of the works I've mentioned the only one which doesn't state this directly is Penzel ("Lautsystem u. Lautwandel) but he explicitly describes it as a consensus view (and then fails to dissent). I think it's up to you folks to show that this is not the consensus. Debating the evidence from scratch, after all, counts as original research ;-)
 * BTW, your note 1 to the table is fair enough, though I remain baffled at the stucture of the table itself!

Pfold 16:05, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Diachrony
The tree of contemporary languages should maybe separated from a presentation of historical languages, maybe something like this, with pretty colour-coded cell backgrounds,


 * [table moved to article]

now, if we add a "modern" row here, we might do without a full listing of every dialect. These duplicate content found in other articles anyway; for example, this is not the place to list each and every dialect of English, this should be done at one place, at English language. dab (&#5839;) 19:41, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

re, Sandertje, please pay attention. The point of the table is diachorony, and precisely not a detailed listing of contemporary dialects. Dutch and Afrikaans are Low Franconian dialects. Yiddish is a High Germanic dialect. Luxembourgish is a High Germanic dialect, together with Alemannic, Austro-Bavarian and what not. Just click on the links, or refer to the "contemporary" listing. dab (&#5839;) 09:52, 8 February 2006 (UTC)


 * I must say I'm partly with Sandertje on this one. Not that we should construe all this as a matter of national honour, of course ("your language is getting better treatment than mine!"), but still, if German and English each have separate entries on both their standard forms and their dialects, then why not Dutch? I'd rather say we should restrict that "modern" row to the fewest entries reasonable, including only the major languages in those branches where they exist. Thus, for instance:
 * "High German, Yiddish" - "Low German" - "Dutch, Africaans" - "Frisian" - "English, Scots" - "Danish, Swedish, Norwegian, Icelandic, Faroese"
 * This table should be for the benefit of the lay reader, for whom it may not be immediately obvious that Dutch is subsumed under "Low Franconian dialects" - but who will easily understand that English dialects fall under the same branch as English.
 * Lukas (T. 12:00, 8 February 2006 (UTC)
 * I'm sorry; I didn't even realize this was a question of national honour. Partly because of these issues, I also think it may be well to get rid of the "modern" row. That said, there will be nothing for the lay reader but to click on the link Low Franconian, or scroll down a little bit to find out what languages are comprised by the term. Note that the umbrella term corresponding to "Low Franconian" is "High Germanic" (not "High German"). This subsumes all Central and Upper German dialects. "English, Scots" could in principle be summarized as "Anglic" (again, click or scroll down for expansion, this is an overview). The only reason there are Standard German and Standard English links, but no Standard Dutch link is that we don't have an article on the latter. I just noted that Standard German is just a redirect, so if it solves our problem here, I'll remove the links to "Standard" languages altogether. Likewise, we don't have Early Modern Dutch, or else I'd have linked to it. I'll say it again, "High German, Yiddish" is redundant. If you want to echo "West Scandinavian, East Scandinavian", you could say "Central German, Upper German, Yiddish", but that would leave us without a link to High Germanic. If we take "dialect" to refer to unregulated regional continua, it does not include "Standard" languages; Germanic "Standard" languages afaik are the Scandinavian national languages, Dutch and Afrikaans, German, and English (several variants). These are all also "dialects" in the linguistic sense of course, but being regulated by some national body they would deserve separate treatment (but not necessarily in the "diachronic" discussion). dab (&#5839;) 13:54, 8 February 2006 (UTC)


 * Thanks for your answer. I think the trick is that the lay reader shouldn't need to randomly click on links or scroll around. People will be reading this with questions in mind such as "where in the family does Dutch belong?" or "where in the family does Yiddish belong?", not with questions like "let's find out what belongs to High Germanic". Giving quick access to the best-known language names has priority over giving access to the highest-level linguistic generalizations. Just my 2c. Lukas (T. 15:04, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

You pay attencion dab, I am not some kind of idiot.Of course I know that Dutch and Afrikaans and many more are Low Franconian dialects, but I don't understand why you list English and German, and not, like the others, West/East Scandanavian, Anglic dialects and high germanic dialects.Care to explain that? I'm paying attencion.

Sandertje 14:38, 8 February 2006 (UTC)


 * Oh dear; you know what, I'm here to have fun creating a nice table, not to deal with with ethno-glottic sensitivities. You have a go at it and show us what you mean, I don't get what you are saying. I am not listing "German" and "English", I am listing "High Germanic", "Low Germanic" and "English dialects". Replace "English" with "Anglic" if you must. I used to list Standard German and Standard English, as you will note above, since you are paying attention, there is no article on Standard Dutch, and for this reason I removed the other two. It's a bleeding diachronic table, I'm not out to diss anyone's idiom. dab (&#5839;) 15:25, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

What's that for a lame excuse ? You listed Swedish,Norwegian and Danish! Not standard Danish,Standard Swedish or Standard Norwegian. List them all or list none. Furthermore the Standard German article is just a redirect to the German language like all other Standard Language links.

Anything more you want to throw in as 'excuses/reasons'?

Sandertje 16:09, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

Jesus Christ, Sandertje, could you either criticize the present version, or fix it yourself, or just lean back and enjoy Wikipedia? dab (&#5839;) 19:17, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

Oh I'll criticize al right.But not right now, I'll only enjoy Wikipedia untill it's accurate.As for the diachrony, it's pretty good as it is now, but it's not yet perfect but I'll come back on that tomorrow.

Sandertje 21:37, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

(I've adjusted the diachronic, but I would like someone (I can seem to figure it out) to make the 'vandalic' box extent into the 'Old Saxon' box, for the same length as it does in the gothic box.)

Sandertje 14:10, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

You mean the "Lombardic" box, I presume. Why, and what is the rationale of your "adjustment"? The point of the Lombardic box is to place it as "South Germanic", between East and West Germanic. There is no need to differentiate High and Low German at this point (West Germanic should maybe have a single reddish-grey colour in the "Migration period" row). dab (&#5839;) 15:40, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

In view of the continuing absence of any sources (as opposed to opinions) for Lombardic as an EGmc language in this discussion, I have revised the table accordingly, and made some other adjustments for consistency. --Pfold 22:52, 6 April 2006 (UTC)


 * Well, I've see you've reverted to the former version of the table. But still you offer no sources to justify any of your opinions on these matters.


 * How come those who are so insistent that Lombardic is EGmc can't find a source to support the contention? And I defy you to find a source for the grouping of E+WGmc as South Germanic and yet Dab has the cheek to say "table was messed up on 6 April;South Germanic includes both West and East Germanic."


 * Obviously anyone is entitled to value their own opinions above the published work of scholars, but it a breach of WP policy to give unsupported opinions priority in these pages.


 * If your opinions are based on published scholarship, cite the references. If not, then you really shouldn't be reverting the edits of those who have cited sources. --Pfold 23:26, 2 May 2006 (UTC)

All 161 English strong Verbs Are Homeborn
No, not all of them. Strive-strove-striven was borrowed from French, and became strong thru analogy with thrive, drive, and so on. Bryan 82.44.212.6 22:57, 26 March 2006 (UTC)
 * And Take-took-taken is borrowed from Old Norse, (I think Strive is from Frankish, though, so it's probably true that all English strong verbs are germanic in origin, at least...) 惑乱 分からん 11:36, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

South Germanic
What is the source for using the term South Germanic to cover EGmc+WGmc? --Pfold 17:44, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

The disputed position of certain languages, mainly lombardic. Sander 17:52, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

Actually, I wasn't asking about the argument for it, I wanted someone to cite a source for it. Everyone else uses South Germanic to mean either WGmc or WGmc minus Anglo-Frisian, as far as I can see. --Pfold 18:19, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

I didn't come up with it. I believe Dab did. Sander 13:42, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

Well, I've now looked at a range of sources and have rewritten the South Germanic page accordingly. Nothing I looked at suggested even remotely that East Germanic is part of SGmc. --Pfold 20:05, 30 March 2006 (UTC)


 * Maybe East Germanic should be moved right, next to Gutnish. (Well, that is where they (Goths) claimed they came from.) -- Petri Krohn 23:45, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Diachronic box
I wonder whether the Low Franconian and Low German column maybe should be swapped, since I believe that Low Franconian actually is slightly closer to Anglo-Frisian. 惑乱 分からん 11:43, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

Vocabulary comparison
The English "give" is given to mean "geven" in Dutch, which to my opinion is wrong. It should be "geef". And it looks to me as if the translations in the other languages are translating it the same way. "give" should be changed to "to give", so at least the translation makes sense by looking at it from a theoretical viewpoint. Which on the other hand isn't the purpose of the table, but at least then it would be correct in some way. Comments would be appreciated(83.118.38.37 15:46, 12 April 2006 (UTC))
 * You mean English give could only be construed as an imperative, and if the infinitive was intended it would need to be to give? No, I'm afraid I don't agree there. The English bare form can be used perfectly well as an infinitive on its own, and it is used as such as the citation form of the verb in most modern grammatical literature. Fut.Perf. ☼ 15:54, 12 April 2006 (UTC)


 * The German translation of "dead" is "tot", not "tod". "Tod" is a noun, meaning "death", not "dead". Mbruno 02:03, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

Mainland Norse and Insular Norse
I have changed the somewhat old notations East Scandinavian and West Scandinavian into the more modern Mainland Norse and Insular Norse. The former classification is valid only for the period 700AD-1500AD (using the timeline in the article). Post 1500AD, it's clear that such a classification is rather pointless and theoretical. The modern view is mentioned in the article about Swedish ( http://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/Svenska ):


 * "Svenska är ett indoeuropeiskt språk som tillhör den nordgermanska grenen av de germanska språken. Tillsammans med danskan tillhör det den östskandinaviska undergruppen, som skiljer dessa från de västskandinaviska språken norska, färöiska och isländska. En modernare uppdelning av språken baserar sig på ömsesidig begriplighet och delar upp de nordiska språken i en fastlandsskandinavisk grupp som inkluderar danska, norska och svenska och en öskandinavisk grupp som inkluderar färöiska och isländska. Detta på grund av att norskan blivit kraftigt påverkad av i synnerhet danska under det senaste årtusendet och fjärmat sig från de övriga västskandinaviska språken."

What the article says is basically that since the originally West Norse language Norwegian has close-to converged with the East Norse language Danish, the old classification for the modern languages doesn't make any sense any more. Due to the demand for consistency, someone needs to write a proper article on Wikipedia about Mainland Norse and Insular Norse, though. ( Hunef 18:02, 9 May 2006 (UTC) )


 * I have now solved the problem in a more elegant manner by avoiding the notions of Mainland Norse, Insular Norse, East Norse and West Norse completely. I focus on particular languages instead. ( Hunef 21:03, 9 May 2006 (UTC) )

Map
I believe the western half of the Republic of South Africa should be colored "solid red" rather than the "stripped red". I say so because 55 % of the population of the Western Cape and 67 % of the population of the Northern Cape speak Afrikaans (a Germanic language) as first language. On top of that, another 20 % of the population of the Western Cape are native speakers of English. Mbruno 02:10, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

Also, although I know they're not really English-speaking countries, Nigeria, Siera Leone, Paupa New Guniea, etc., should have at leat striped read coloring.CharlesMartel 19:48, 18 June 2006 (UTC)CharlesMartel

Jamlantic
It's great that someone added the jamlantic words to the comparison... but it's a dialect. I think we shouldn't add all varieties of every language, it would simply become too long, leaving Jamlantic in then again would be unfair to all other dialects of languages.I propose to remove jamlantic. Rex Germanus Tesi samanunga is edele unde scona 16:45, 12 May 2006 (UTC)
 * Yeah, btw, is "Jamlantic" even the proper word for the dialect? 惑乱 分からん 11:40, 13 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Yes Jamtlandic is a dialect, but it is speshial as it is a Swedish dialect based on Norwegian, a Norwegian dialect in Sweden or a dialect originatin in Norwegian language and then heavily influenced by Swedish. Just pick a theory, but it isn't just another dialect. Inge 12:01, 15 May 2006 (UTC) That said, I support the removal.


 * I know what Jamtlandic is, but I asked whether "Jamlantic" was the proper word for it, which it apparently wasn't, just a misspelling. Also, your explanation seems to claim that Swedish and Norwegian was distinct at the time when this dialect developed, which I doubt. Jamtlandic is a dialect with similarities both to the Scandinavian/(former Norse) dialects in current Norwegian Trøndelag spoken west of it, and the dialects in current Norrland spoken north of it, which isn't very strange, considering its position. 惑乱 分からん 16:40, 15 May 2006 (UTC)


 * I wasn't making assumptions about your knowledge. I am sorry if it came across that way. I was just trying to make the point that Jamtlandic has some unique "qualities". But to your assumption that Jamtlandic developed at a point when Norwegian and Swedish was the same language I may disagree. The "forefathers" of Norwegian and Swedish split in the period 700-1100. I don't think Jamtlandic was developed at that point. Inge 20:29, 15 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Maybe..., but I don't know whether the boundaries between West and East Norse in Scandinavia have ever been exactly separated, and I think that there probably always have been dialect continua around. Could be argued, though, and I don't exactly know many sources to back up my statement. 惑乱 分からん 11:13, 16 May 2006 (UTC)


 * I was the guy who added the Jamtlandic words. This was mainly to have a Norse dialect represented; Frisian and Afrikaans are dialects of Dutch, Low Saxon a dialect of German and Scots a dialect of English so why not also have a non-standard dialect of Norse as well, especially since it has some very specifically northern features? It is mentioned above that Jamtlandic is on the border between Sweden and Norway, but this doesn't mean that the traditional dialect is something between Norwegian and Swedish. To a high degree it is, but it also carries a northern scandinavian component which neither Swedish nor Norwegian show. The most prominent such northern features is vowel balance and apocopation. Since Dalecarlian - also a northern scandinavian dialect - even has an official orthography and is about to be debated to become an official minority language in Sweden, I could add the words from that dialect instead. It has some very interesting phonological features as well, so it may be a good idea to add it. What do you think? I'll give a proper request further down on this talk page...
 * Jens Persson (130.242.128.85 19:03, 27 October 2006 (UTC))

Franconians
Let me say it with Marlene Dietrich:

Where are all the Franconians gone?

I remember that there are not only Low Franconian dialects (related to Dutch), but Rhine Franconian dialects spoken in Hesse, Rhineland-Palatinate and Luxembourg e. g. and Main Franconian dialects spoken in northern Bavaria. Because it is not true, Bavarian Dialects are spoken in the Nuremberg area!--Pelagus 20:14, 12 May 2006 (UTC)
 * the difference is that Low Franconian is considered "not German", while the other Franconian varieties are considered "German". The definition of "German" is by political and social consensus, not by linguistic criteria; the difference is essentially that there are newspapers printed in Low Franconian, but not in Main Franconian. dab (&#5839;) 13:53, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Other Germanic languages
From where is the information that Germanic speakers other than English and German are about 50 million? I think there'll be more than that, but that depends (mainly) on the definition of what constitutes German, if the dialects in Germany are considered as German dialects or separate languages, also there are many people that speak several different Germanic languages and dialects, so speakers often overlap. Anyway, here's info from Wikipedia's language pages:


 * 1) English 1st 380 mil, 2nd 150 mil - 1 bil (Depending on definition of fluency, I guess)
 * 2) German 1st 110 mil, 2nd 120 mil
 * 3) Alemannic German 10 mil
 * 4) Austro-Bavaraian German 12 mil
 * 5) Limburgish 1.6 mil
 * 6) Dutch 22 mil
 * 7) Afrikaans 1st 6 mil, 2nd 10 mil
 * 8) Yiddish 3 mil
 * 9) Low German 1st 3 mil, 2nd 10 mil
 * 10) West Frisian 300-700.000
 * 11) Scots 1.5 mil
 * 12) Swedish 9.3 mil
 * 13) Danish 5.5 mil
 * 14) Norwegian 4.6 mil
 * 15) Icelandic 300.000
 * 16) Faroese 60-80.000

A rough count gets around 80 mil, only including Low German gets 46, so, the number would depend on if you'd consider all High Germanic dialects as German, or not. 惑乱 分からん 17:01, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

I don't like the idea of including dialects/regional languages like low German,limburgish or all those high german varieties in a count ... I think it would make things a bit blurry, maybe it's better to add a sentence like standard language number (...) "excluding native dialects". Rex Germanus Tesi samanunga is edele unde scona 17:11, 13 May 2006 (UTC)
 * But in that case, is there any reason to add the 50 mil number, anyway? (Also, I think the wording sounds awkward.) Anyhow, that was my reasoning. 惑乱 分からん 17:36, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

As you can read on German language, all Low German and High German dialects are included in the term, just Dutch (Franconian) dialects and Frisian are not. As it is, we get numbers of about and I think it is fair to say, as a rough summary, "there are about 550 M Germanic speakers, 380 M English, 110 German, and 60 M other", or, to list the main groups, "380 English, 110 German, 30 M Dutch/Franconian, 20 M Scandinavian". There are no "native Standard German speakers", even less than "native Queen's English speakers" (there is always the queen, I guess...); German speakers just have more or less divergent dialects/Mundarten, but the standard language is an artificial norm that doesn't have actual native speakers (except for maybe the children of really fanatical thespians) dab (&#5839;) 17:54, 13 May 2006 (UTC)
 * 1) 380 M English
 * 2) 110 M German
 * 3) 30 M Franconian
 * 4) 20 M Scandinavian
 * 5) 3 M Yiddish
 * 6) 1 M Frisian
 * Well, this page doesn't mention anything about the continuum, but alright, then, I understand the reasoning. 惑乱 分からん 20:47, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

diachronic table
The North Germanic part of the table now shows disproportionate detail; the variety of North Germanic is rather less than the variety of German, and it is indefensible to show things like Gutnish or Norn, but not Austro-Bavarian / Alemannic / Saxon. I suggest we revert the table back to lower detail, there is only so much detail you can present at a glance before the 'overview' purpose is defeated. dab (&#5839;) 13:56, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Low Saxon - Low Franconian vs Low Germanic
I tend to go with Ulritz in this edit dispute. Since the article is named "Low Germanic languages", it makes sense to have a direct link, instead of a redirect. 惑乱 分からん 13:54, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Diachronic troubles
I'm afraid I fail to see Futures points. Would you care to eleborate so we can solve this matter quickly? Rex 14:12, 1 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Well, the diachronic table is basically a classificatory tree diagram, a "stammbaum" (with a bit of extra fancy formatting). Such diagrams are used by linguists to represent just this: linguistic relationships within language families. Every linguist will be aware that there are some incertainties and limitations of this way of representing relationships, but still, that's what they are used for. This one for instance represents the claim that Norwegian and Faroese are related to each other more closely than either is to Icelandic; that the three of them are related to each other more closely than to Swedish and Danish, and so on. Whether those claims are right or wrong in detail is not the issue. If this diagram is not about "representing their relation to each other linguistically", then what the hell is it doing here? Fut.Perf. ☼ 14:21, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Just an example ... did you see where Lombardic is positioned? And do you know how its classified? Also Dutch is positioned between German and Low Saxon, why? This diagraph only accurately represents the subgroups, not relation to eachother. Rex 14:40, 1 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Well, Lombardic has its own extra disclaimer underneath anyway. And the four parallel branches under "South Germanic": by way of convention, if you have a more-than-binary branching under a single node in a classification tree, the linear order of the nodes is insignificant. This simply means that the exact relation between these four branches is undefined. Which is just as well. In sum, all I can see is that this tree has been very very carefully grafted in such as way as to represent something, and so as to represent it as accurately as humanly possible under the given circumstances. Now, you still haven't answered me this: If this something isn't linguistic relationships, then what is it? Fut.Perf. ☼ 14:53, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

That wasn't the point, its positioned between Old High German and Gothic, while its also been said to have been related to Old Saxon.

As for relations, Until the South and North classification all is well, but the some languages are positioned next to eachother suggesting closest relation while others are or might be closer. Do you understand? Rex 14:58, 1 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Re-read my last. "Suggesting closest relation" is simply a misreading of how a tree diagram works. The positioning of Dutch vis-a-vis the neighbouring nodes is suggesting no such thing. Fut.Perf. ☼ 15:02, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

I don't care what is or isn't the intencion, I know how it can be perceived. Rex 15:30, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
 * Given the nature of how tree diagrams work, this is simply the best we can do. Of course you are free to move the Dutch branch to the right of the Saxon branch, if you prefer that. It makes no difference, but maybe the "perception" changes? Anyway, it's a very, very minor issue, and doesn't warrant such a wholesale disclaimer as the one you put up. Otherwise, you'd still have to explain: if "representing linguistic relationships" isn't what the table does, then what does it do? Fut.Perf. ☼ 15:36, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

That's your solution? Just move Dutch? And by doing that you remove Low Saxon further away from English. I remind you that Old English is called Anglo Saxon not Anglo Dutch. Rex 16:07, 1 September 2006 (UTC)


 * I'm not removing anything anywhere. It's a hierarchical tree, left-right adjacency as such has absolutely no meaning within it. If some readers should be unable to understand that, that's too bad for them, but there's really nothing we can do about it. Let's face it, there simply is no possible way on earth we could present family relationships in a one-dimensional space and represent every single link between them. The table as it is is as good as any, and it does exactly what such tables are supposed to do: represent linguistic relationships, as exactly as possible in such a format. It's really no different from any other language tree contained anywhere else on Wikipedia or in the linguistic literature; hence, no need for special disclaimers. Fut.Perf. ☼ 16:36, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

It is worthwhile having a note, but it should probably read something like "Horizontal adjacency does not represent quantitative linguistic difference", or words to that effect (please give better suggestions). E.g. We should explicitly point out that the only way to read the diagram is top to bottom. - FrancisTyers · 17:30, 1 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Thanks Fran. The table shows the succession of the significant historical stages of each language (vertically), and their approximate groupings in subfamilies (horizontally). Horizontal sequence within each group does not imply a measure of greater or lesser similarity.? Sounds still trivial to me, but if folks insist... Fut.Perf. ☼ 17:45, 1 September 2006 (UTC)


 * That's great, I'll make the change. We should aim for maximum clarity ;) - FrancisTyers · 18:04, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Comparative vocabularies
Sorry to diverge from discussion of the article itself, but I was wondering if anyone could tell me where I could find a comparative vocabularies table, similar to the one in the article, that features primarily "Old" languages;- Old English, Old High German, Old Norse and the like? Knyght27 12:10, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
 * Hmm, perhaps you could pose the question at Proto-Germanic language. For a start, here's some dictionaries looking useful you could look through yourself, a lot of the text included is in German, though: http://www.ling.upenn.edu/~kurisuto/germanic/aa_texts.html http://homepage.uibk.ac.at/~c30310/publikat.html 惑乱 分からん 17:11, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Earliest attestations of West Germanic
It seems not to be true that the Old Dutch fragment from the Lex Salica (early 6th cent.) is significantly earlier than other early attestations of West Germanic. The continental runic tradition goes back to c.200 AD, and our pages on the Elder Futhark and the Frisian-English Futhorc list several inscriptions that are roughly from the same time or even earlier than the Lex Salica fragment (Alemannic inscriptions from c.520, North German Saxon/Frisian from before 500, etc.). By the way, is there anything specifically Dutch (as opposed to common West Germanic) in the linguistic forms of that fragment? Fut.Perf. ☼ 12:37, 25 September 2006 (UTC)


 * That fragment simply is the oldest Dutch text (though some argue that the runic inscription of the sword of bergakker -450- are the oldest) found to this day that is considered Dutch by the experts. To my knowledge up until 450 West Germanic was fairly undivided, and I doubt (in the case of Allemanic inscriptions) that the High German consonant shift had even begun. I don't care if runic inscriptions are included, not at all, but make sure you know what language it is.
 * Rex 12:56, 25 September 2006 (UTC)


 * No, the Alemannic ones are obviously before the shift (or at least don't show effects of it in the writing). Why would it matter? The point of the passage is earliest attestations of West Germanic. If West Germanic, as a whole, is attested at a time before any notable split-up into daughter languages took place, then there's really not much point listing the individual language there at all. If, on the other hand, we were to be talking not of earliest linguistic attestations as such but of the developments of literary traditions, then the primacy would certainly go to Old English and then Old Saxon and Old High German, and not much at all in Dutch. Fut.Perf. ☼ 13:08, 25 September 2006 (UTC)


 * The Pforzen buckle is apparently considered Old High German by experts, of about the same length, and dated from the same period. Judging by corpus, "Maltho thi afrio lito" don't seem any more significant than "aigil andi aïlrun, ltahu gasokun". I think it's misleading to give old Dutch such a big significance, where the corpus actually is much smaller. 惑乱 分からん 13:13, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
 * Concur. As for the idea that Runic is representative of a stage still very close to Common Germanic, before splitup, relevant literature would be Herbert Penzl (1995): Runengermanisch. Zur Geschichte einer ›Trümmersprache‹, in: PBB 117 S. 369, if I remember correctly. (Read it years ago.) Fut.Perf. ☼ 14:14, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

The problem with the earliest examples of Dutch that they are very scarce, this does not matter for the date the language was first attested in a written form. I don't consider this some kind of contest, in which the second earliest language wins ... if runes were attested before Gothic and Dutch then by all means mention them and the languages they were written in.

As for Wakuran, who mentioned a Dutch bias, remember that my first edit was simply a move with no changing of information changing whatsoever. Why did it become a problem Wakuran? Rex 13:45, 25 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Old Dutch and Old High German are both attested in fragments from the 6th century. And as Rex says, W Gmc was likely not clearly divided prior to the 6th century anyway so that these sources show in fact emerging Old Dutch and emerging OHG (rather than being merely the earliest surviving records of existing languages). Stating that OD is attested from the 6th and OHG from the 9th century is applying two different standards, and as such just another example of Rex' familiar (althogh apparently invisible to himself) "pro Dutch / anti German" bias. dab (&#5839;) 13:46, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Where exactly did I state this? I merely state (and with me the experts) that Dutch is attested from the 6th century onwards, I didn't even touch German.Rex 13:49, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
 * true. you added Old Dutch as attested from the 6th c. to an existing statement of OHG being attested from the 9th c., back in May .  this is misleading, for the reasons given above, and it is better to correct it now than never. I was referring to your statement "To my knowledge up until 450 West Germanic was fairly undivided" above: I tend to agree with this, and from it would follow that it would we would not expect to find either distinctly OD or distinctly OHG texts in the 5th c. dab (&#5839;) 13:53, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Excuse me, but I refer to Dutch in a section that mentions Old English and Old High German as the earliest attested West Germanic languages and this somehow is anti-german? Please Dbachmann. Rex 13:59, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
 * just take it easy. the facts aren't even disputed, for chrissake. The paragraph should read something like "W Gmc diversifies into distinct dialects from about the 5th c., with early and fragmentary attestations of OD and OHG in the 6th c. and the first coherent texts in W Gmc languages appearing from the 8th or 9th c. with things like the OHG St. Gall paternoster, the Hildebrandslied, OE Beowulf and stuff". dab (&#5839;) 14:22, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

No that's the strangest here, the facts aren't disputed yet this is all I dealt here with, with facts. But somehow you manage to involve my "apparent" pro-Dutch/anti-German bias while all I did was move a referenced bit of text to a more logical position. Seriously what is your problem? Rex 14:30, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
 * your edit in question is this, which is (a) an edit away from the facts as just established here on talk and (b, why aren't we surprised) betrays a tendency to emphasize the antiquity of OD over that of OHG or OE. dab (&#5839;) 15:06, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

No Dbachmann, this is the edit in question. A simple and logical move of information is suddenly a problem. What do I care for German and English?! Rex 15:40, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
 * well, no, I take the liberty to question your other edit. The one you link merely moves around the misleading bit you had added back in May. It is fair enough to not improve the paragraph, say because you are not aware it needs improvement, but it is another thing to revert somebody else's improvement, as you do in the instance I am linking to above. dab (&#5839;) 16:00, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

What's misleading Dbachman? It's about attesting a language, not in what way. I mislead no one you're the one (among others) trying to make a fuss out of nothing. Rex 16:19, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
 * yes, note the "among others". Here are three editors trying to make sense at you. As for your question, see the discussion immediately above. Please try making a little effort, it is not all that difficult to understand the points we are making. Wakuran made an improvement. You reverted twice and then took to a rather unedifying discussion on talk. It is not the first time you show this pattern, hence people begin to show less patience with you. The fact of the matter is that nobody touched your OD bit, they just put it (correctly) into context. It is really you making a fuss about a little improvement, and people are not willing to let you get away with that even and for all your comments, you have not presented any sort of rationale for it. We can only guess at your motivations, and the only consistent indication is that it is always, always about the Dutch language with you, hence our suspicion of some irrational "Dutch bias". dab (&#5839;) 17:01, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

All I see is that when I edit a section on the first attested West languages, and I move a tiny little bit of text, Dutch suddenly needs to be kicked down a bit because suddenly the focus changes. It's like saying: "Yes, the earth has 6 bilion human inhabitants, but 2 bilion of them are black." The section was (WHEN I EDITED IT TODAY) about when the language was first attested, not when the first texts appear, and I merely reordend the information that was already there. It is you (three) who once again have to make a fuss, because Wakuran suddenly wants to change the scope, Future Perfect questions if the text is really Dutch and you agree with them just because I'm in the opposition. Rex 17:32, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
 * not quite, but you are doing a good impression of the condition I surmised you find yourself in. You made a misleading edit in May. Wakuran corrected it today. Apart from some reverts and some incoherence on talk, that's the upshot, and if you stop reverting now, everybody is happy. dab (&#5839;) 17:43, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

I made a misleading edit?! How so Dbachman? The section was about when languages were attested NOT about when long texts appear so how did I mislead people, please do tell me. Rex 17:48, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
 * sigh, we did tell you, try to pay attention. OHG is attested in coherent texts in the 9th c., and in (runic) fragments from the 6th c.; OD is attested in fragments in the 6th c. Saying "OGH is attested from the 9th c.; OD is attested from the 6th c." suggests that OD is attested earlier than OHG, while it isn't. You are counting fragments for OD but not for OHG. If you're going to count fragments, you'll have to count them for both OD and OHG. Thus your edit should have been to the effect that "both OD and OHG are attested from the 6th c."; in reality, you reverted an edit to this effect. I am being very polite by saying that your statement was merely "misleading". It is hard to believe that you should not be getting this even after the discussion we just had. dab (&#5839;) 17:55, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

I'll just repeat myself until you get it.
 * I made a misleading edit?! How so Dbachman? The section was about when languages were attested NOT about when long texts appear so how did I mislead people, please do tell me.

Rex 18:33, 25 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Sigh. One couldn't put it any more clearly than dab did above, so I won't even try. Fut.Perf. ☼ 18:45, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Dbachman assumes too much. Let me attempt to break the current record on clarity. On this image, of the edit which started this crap, we can see me moving a tiny bit of text (7 words) to a more logical position based on the information there. We can also the the context of this bit of text: "EARLY TESTIMONIES OF WEST GERMANIC LANGUAGES", so where on earth, do you, Dbachman, get the nerve from to accuse me of misleading people. Rex 19:02, 25 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Alright, this is the original edit including Old Dutch, made by Rex Germanus in May: 1, anyway, the main objection seems to be the revert on my edit, 2, which still hasn't been explained. 惑乱 分からん 21:13, 25 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Also, the text as it stands now clearly is neutral, although I personally think it sounds clumsy, someone more knowledgeable in Old English is free to come with additions, I skimmed through Wikipedia, but couldn't find any useful info. 惑乱 分からん 21:17, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
 * Rex has shown an ability for rational debate in other instances, but it really seems that as soon as the word "Dutch" comes into play, his brain somehow switches to another channel. I have explained things in almost insulting detail above, and for all the world he continues to talk around the issue. This is going nowhere, and I suppose we should just go back to editing at this point. As Wakuran says, things are accurate now, but they might need some editing for better flow. As for Anglo-Frisian, the situation is exactly parallel. We have distinctly Anglo-Frisian Futhorc inscriptions from the 5th-6th c., and coherent texts from the 8th or 9th (e.g. Dream of the Rood) dab (&#5839;) 10:37, 26 September 2006 (UTC)
 * Seems to be a common development for all West Germanic languages? Probably connected to the changes of Western Europe, as a whole? 惑乱 分からん 10:49, 26 September 2006 (UTC)
 * precisely. yes, there are scattered inscriptions from the 2nd century. Are these still Proto-Gmc? Or Common W or N Gmc? That's impossible to say, and of course even 'PGmc' would have been divided into rather disparate dialects, so that I am willing to address the earliest runic inscriptions as late PGmc, and the 4th-5th c. ones as "Proto W Gmc" and "Poto N Gmc"(is PNGmc identical to Proto-Norse?). Separation into actual "languages" is still in progress in the 5th c., and I suppose it is fair to say that our 6th c. 'fragments' show emerging OE, OD and OHG (yes, the OHG shift begins as early as that). dab (&#5839;) 13:10, 26 September 2006 (UTC)
 * Alright, but actually I was referring to the findings of more coherent texts. Could be a recent emergence of more literate societies, or something. 惑乱 分からん 13:17, 26 September 2006 (UTC)