Talk:Germanic languages/Archive 3

deleting orphan: Terminological comparison between Germanic languages
I'm adding the info here, in case anyone wants to make use of it. Since no-one ever bothered to link to it, I assume there isn't much need for a separate article. If anyone here wants to restore it, please do so, and link appropriately from this or other articles. kwami (talk) 00:56, 5 December 2009 (UTC)


 * Contents of redirected page Terminological comparison between Germanic languages, edited mainly by with additions by  and others.

This page offers a comparison between those words belonging to some languages of the Germanic branch (English, German, Dutch, Norwegian and Danish), words of common origin, that still maintain the same meaning. The list only considers English words having a German equivalent with the same Proto-Germanic stem, or English words hailing from Old Norse language; those latter are CAPITALIZED.

The goal of this work is to show the words' phonetic evolution of the Germanic languages, because in every line is reported the original Proto-Germanic term, if it is known.

The words in (brackets) are equivalents without the same Proto-Germanic stem; if the box is empty, no equivalent has been found; if there are three dots in the box, the English word has more than an equivalent but no one shares the stem.

Main source: Oxford English Dictionary, ed. 1964

re "Diachronic": Gutnish
It's true that Gutnish is now "practically a dialect of Swedish" but the same applies to Low German and Scots - and these languages are not declared for "extinct". Shouldn't therefore the entry concerning Gutnish be corrected? Thanks. Freigut (talk) 16:33, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
 * I don't think Low German is a mere dialect either of (high) German or Dutch. Scots is more unclear, depending on the variety discussed. It seems the claim is Gutnish was largely replaced by Swedish. 惑乱 分からん * \)/ (\ (&lt; \) (2 /) /)/ * (talk) 09:03, 8 May 2008 (UTC)
 * That being said, Gutnish still is spoken today (with differences from Swedish)so it is not 'extinct' that is why the German Diachronic should be changed Bennyj600 (talk) 16:35, 14 May 2009 (UTC)
 * Sadly Gutnish is in decline and will probably be dead within three generations, but calling it extinct would be premature. BodvarBjarki (talk) 20:47, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

New diagram: check language names / ethnonyms?
Hello!

I translated File:Einteilung der Germanen nach Maurer.de.svg from German to English File:Einteilung der Germanen nach Maurer.en.svg – as far as I could. It illustrates the subdivion of the Germanic languages and peoples according to de:Friedrich Maurer.

Would someone like to check if the names of peoples and languages are correct? Especially my translation of "Germanen" (Latin "Germani", i.e. members of a Germanic people). According to the English wiktionary, it is "Germans", too...

The other translations (English and Latin ones) are taken from the English wikipedia, and I think that they are correct. Thanks in advance. -- MaEr (talk) 08:39, 29 August 2010 (UTC)

French influence in Swedish?
I have noticed when looking in Swedish that there are some French(Romansche) based words like 'Historie', Have these words been adopted from French into Swedish or are they of a Germanic origin?80.192.246.56 (talk) 17:45, 21 January 2008 (UTC)Falcon-Eagle200780.192.246.56 (talk) 17:45, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Well, that one (historie) is certainly borrowed into Swedish from Romance (probably direct from Latin historia rather than from French histoire). But French also has a lot of Germanic loan words, so other similarities you see may be native Swedish words that are cognate to Frankish words that French has borrowed. Or the Swedish words and the French words may both be borrowed, since Swedish has a lot of loanwords from Low German. Your question can only be answered on a word-by-word basis, but this page isn't the place for it. —Angr If you've written a quality article... 18:00, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
 * In the 18th century (I think), there were many loanwords adopted directly from French, by the Swedish aristocracy. Curiously, by comparing these to the English equivalents, in English they have often retained the spelling, but changed pronunciation, while in Swedish, the pronunciation is largely retained, but the spelling is changed, one example is English "raid", Swedish "räd". (Granted, it's just one example.) Also, Norman, a dialect of French had a notable impact from Old Norse, the predecessor of Swedish. Finally, in some cases, the words could be indirectly borrowed from French, via Low or High German, as well.惑乱 分からん * \)/ (\ (&lt; \) (2 /) /)/ * (talk) 16:50, 10 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Sweden had a long phase of francophilia, where many loanwords were adopted - most have been purged from the language but some remain. BodvarBjarki (talk) 20:43, 13 May 2010 (UTC)
 * The correct Swedish word for "history" is actually "historia" which I guess has been borrowed directly from Latin or via Low German. There are however many French loan words in Swedish. Some common examples include: apropå (fr: à propos), ingenjör (fr: ingénieur), garderob (fr: garde-robe), portmonnä (fr: porte-monnaie), löjtnant (fr: lieutenant), glass (fr: glace), fåtölj (fr: fauteuil), garanti (fr: garantie) and many more. Aaker (talk) 22:12, 29 August 2010 (UTC)

Yiddish
Yiddish is a Germanic language derived from Middle High German and closely related to modern German, and it is spoken by 3 million people. I was surprised to see it missing from this page, other than in a footnote. I would follow WP:SOFIXIT, but I fear I'd make a mess of including it as I'm not that familiar with linguistics. Fences and windows (talk) 22:41, 29 March 2009 (UTC)


 * I agree. Yiddish should definitely be included in the mainspace of the article, as well as the chart of cognates, etc. JesseRafe (talk) 03:15, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

Diachronic
Norwegian is placed as a descendant of the Old East Norse, therefore, the Old West Norse should be moved one space to accommodate the Old Norwegian. Also, Old Gutnish should be occupying both the Early Middle ages and the Middle ages spaces. Mmasalleras (talk) 13:07, 28 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Modern Norwegian is 'east Norse' in the same way that English is Romance, brought on by foreign influence. The difference though is that the differences between Danish and Norwegian are small, so Danish influence didn't affect Norwegian in a very serious manner. I think it's best to say that modern Norwegian descends from both Old Norwegian and Old Danish to some degree. CodeCat (talk) 18:44, 28 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Just as English was heavily influenced by Latin and Norman, but it isn't Romance, Norwegian isn't an East Scandinavian language nor descends(mainly) from Old East Norse, as the table incorrectly shows. Also, [Early] Old Gutnish doesn't descend from Old East Norse, they were contemporary and already showing clear differences by the 10th c., something that the table isn't displaying. Mmasalleras (talk) 02:13, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

Genetic tree of West Germanic
The internal grouping of the West Germanic languages is still unresolved (see e.g. Ringe's recent book "From Proto-Indo-European to Proto-Germanic"), but the tree as (formerly) given, which splits Anglo-Frisian against Old High German/Old Saxon/Old Low Franconian is certainly wrong. The proper division is almost certainly between OHG and all the other languages (Ringe's "Northern West Germanic" grouping). The basic reason for this is that the Northern West Germanic languages share a number of innovations that are not present in OHG:


 * 1) The so-called "Einheitsplural" (unified plural ending of verbs in -ath)
 * 2) The development of Class III weak verbs into a relic class consisting of four verbs (*sagjan, *hugjan, *habjan, *libjan)
 * 3) The split of the Class II weak verb ending -ō- into -ō-/-ōja-
 * 4) Possibly, the plural ending -as of a-stem nouns
 * 5) Possibly, the so-called Ingvaeonic nasal spirant law

The second item -- the development of Class III weak verbs -- seems particularly important as it is such a specific change and because the developments in northern WG vs. OHG were radically different. According to Ringe, Class III was actually two different classes in Proto-Germanic: (1) a stative class with endings -ja/-ai in the present and no linking vowel in the past; (2) a "factitive" class with endings -ā/-ai in the present and a linking vowel -a in the past. It's likely that both of these classes persisted down through Proto-West-Germanic. Essentially what happened is:


 * 1) The northern languages moved all factitive verbs, and all stative verbs other than the four previously mentioned, into Class II (or occasionally Class I?). The remaining four verbs keep the original stative endings.
 * 2) OHG unified the factitive and stative verbs and generalized the -ai ending (which later developed to -ẽ) as the only ending for all forms of both present and past.

Benwing (talk) 02:01, 23 June 2010 (UTC)


 * The linguistic evidence is not the issue here. The question is: what is the predominant view in the literature? - that is what the article should reflect. I am not convinced (and a single reference to Ringe won't do it) that the traditional view is less widely supported than the one you cite. Everyone can see some problems with the traditional view (in that sense, everyone agrees it's "certainly wrong", though I think that is a misleading way to put it, since all prehistoric linguistic groupings are by definition based on problematic and incomplete evidence), but that doesn't mean there's a greater consensus for NWGmc or that NWGmc is "certainly right" or even "certainly a better hypothesis". Even if those of us who contribute to this article agreed it was "certainly right" (and I agree there are interesting arguments in favour of it) I don't see that the literature has yet come round to that view. You'd need at several more authorities to make it even arguable that this is a widespread view amongst linguists, let alone the consensus.


 * Having said that, though, I agree that the diachronic table as it stands is unsatisfactory: the top row for West Gmc doesn't remotely represent the literature either. Hardly any linguists use the term South Germanic; you don't have proto-languages with only a single descendant - and who uses "Proto-Saxon" anyway?; how can two Frankish dialects be grouped separately at this level when their main difference (the sound shift) didn't occur till later?; Low Franconian is closer to English than to Central Franconian? I could go on. You won't find a grouping remotely like this in any of the standard works on the grouping of the Gmc languages - this is effectively OR. I suggest someone source the groupings from a reliable standard work and cite it as a source. The disclaimer that the groupings are controversial simply doesn't excuse the muddle presented here. As for the position of Lombardic in the row below, it breaks the rules of tree diagrams and is completely contrary to the consensus view in the literature that Lombardic is West Germanic - OR again. --Pfold (talk) 18:17, 23 June 2010 (UTC)


 * Are you sure that the "consensus" groups Old Saxon and OHG against Anglo-Frisian? I seriously doubt that.  I've seen the "northwest germanic" grouping mentioned in plenty of places.  You also have to consider that some of the older sources are confused about the fact that shared retentions don't count for anything when looking at groupings.  If anything, we should present a "consensus" that inserts no groupings at all between West Germanic and Anglo-Frisian.  As for Proto-Saxon etc., I agree these are more or less neologisms, although there's in fact nothing wrong with "Proto-X" referring to a single language (e.g. "Proto-Norse"; Kortlandt speaks of "Proto-Irish" in ).  As it stands, these are simply place-fillers for earlier stages of the languages in question, to avoid creating a clade where none exists. Benwing (talk) 23:05, 23 June 2010 (UTC)


 * BTW When I wrote the above comments I hadn't looked much at OLF and it does look like it doesn't belong with Old Saxon and Anglo-Frisian, e.g. it doesn't have characteristics 1, 4 or 5 given above. This would lead to a potential "Ingvaeonic" grouping of Anglo-Frisian and Old Saxon.  However I'm not sure whether this is supported in the literature.  As for "South Germanic", this was in the last version of the chart and I agree it doesn't belong.  The question is, what do you call e.g. the stage of OHG in 400 AD?  It's not clear that terms like "OHG" are generally thought to extend that far back.  With OE, I've seen terms like "Primitive English" and "Proto-Anglo-Saxon" to refer to pre-OE of 400 AD or so. Benwing (talk) 23:16, 23 June 2010 (UTC)


 * OK, I went ahead and changed the tree so that Old Saxon and Anglo-Frisian are grouped in an Ingvaeonic node, and used the term "Primitive X" to describe the pre-written stages of OHG, Old Saxon and OLF/Old Frankish. Benwing (talk) 03:42, 24 June 2010 (UTC)

Possible solution
Low Franconian and Low Saxon are two separate groups. The language of the Hanseatic League was Low German and this included the Low Franconian and Low Saxon varieties. Historically, there were no two separate languages, but there was a so-called dialect continuum.

Making a difference between High German and the Low German (including Dutch) is already questionable in both ways, but separating the Low German in two different categories (Dutch and Low German) is simply incorrect.

In this table you will find English and Frisian on the one side, and German and Dutch on the other side. The so-called Low Saxon or Low German varieties should be somewhere between the Dutch and German language. I propose you merge Low Franconian and Low Saxon, otherwise you need at least three new linguistic groups for Frisian as well. Kind regards --Kening Aldgilles (talk) 00:41, 25 December 2011 (UTC)


 * Low Franconian takes an intermediate position between these two. It doesn't take part in innovations 1, 3 and 4, only partly in 5 and completely in 2. It also has the diphthongisation of WG ē and ō to ie and uo, as does Old High German, but it shares the monophthongisation of WG ai and au to ē and ō with Old Saxon (and if monophthongisation in general is concerned, with Old Frisian as well). It also seems to have the shift io > ia, at least judging from the form thiadi, which unifies it with Old Frisian against Old Saxon and Old High German which both retain io (thioda, diota). It also shares the loss of intervocalic -h- with Old Frisian and Old English, which is retained in Old Saxon and Old High German. Another feature it shares with Old Frisian and Old English is the weakening of unstressed i to e, which appears intermittently in Old Low Franconian texts. On the other hand, it loses initial h- before consonants, like Old High German.
 * So it seems that there is no real specific feature of Low Franconian that sets it out as a unique branch, but it also seems strange to use any connection to Central Franconian as evidence against a distinct identity. The Franks were not a unified people, they were a union of many smaller groups, so there is no reason why those groups could not have had different dialects. There are very few sound changes that are completely unique to Low Franconian, but the early appearance of final devoicing and the change -hs- > -ss- may speak for an emerging identity as a distinct dialect, as does the relative lack of distinction between the strong and weak declensions (including the complete merger of feminine o-stems and on-stems). I think the most sensible thing to say is that Low Franconian is a transition dialect, which takes a central position among Old Saxon, Old Frisian and Old High German and shares certain features with all three without being grouped distinctly with any one. CodeCat (talk) 10:44, 25 December 2011 (UTC)


 * Thank you for your examples.
 * At least for Frisian speaking people who also have knowledge of Dutch/German, both languages seem to be pretty much the same. The language of the Hanseatic League was Low German/Dutch, spoken in a dialect continuum. It sounds the same, looks the same, and has a common history and maybe therefor should be treated as one group.
 * Different from English and Frisian, the Low German varieties later took over the Nasal developments. The examples given give a good impression. Kind regards --Kening Aldgilles (talk) 19:33, 28 December 2011 (UTC)

Hello Kening. I've been out of the country for 5 weeks and just got back. Can you explain more clearly what your concerns are with the current layout and what you want it to look like instead? However, before proposing anything I'd suggest you look somewhat more into the actual linguistic reasons why the Germanic languages are grouped as they are. You are arguing primarily on surface similarities of various words in the modern languages, which is not a valid way of grouping languages historically and suggests you don't have a background in historical linguistics. Benwing (talk) 00:25, 18 January 2012 (UTC)

Madagascar
Madagascar shouldn't be coloured on the map because English is no longer official there (and actually not very known). Aaker (talk) 21:06, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

Characteristics & Standardisation
Surely the standardised dialects aren't the best yardstick for taxonomy? This paragraph is also very bad at getting across what it actually means. If you are familiar with comparative linguistics, a few readings gets you there, but I fear it'll read like gibberish to someone new to the subject. 92.40.253.86 (talk) 11:05, 29 December 2012 (UTC)

dialect
If one understands dialect to mean variant forms of one language used in a a more or less circumscribable area, Franconian (and others) is as much a dialect of German as Yorkshire is a dialect of English. The only Lowland Scots that I have ever read was used by Mary Queen of Scots in her letters. It is so similar to English that it is quite easy to read. It is much easier to read than, say, Beowulf or even Wulfstan's Sermon to the English (11th cent.). I find it difficult think of it as anything other than a language with the same history of development, so a dialect of English. Pamour (talk) 13:16, 7 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Linguists generally don't distinguish between dialects and languages. After all, consider your first sentence. "Variant forms of one language". What is one language? That in itself isn't well defined, especially in the face of a dialect continuum like the one that exists in mainland West Germanic. Dutch on one end and Alemannic or Bavarian on the other are not mutually intelligible, but there is no clear-cut border between them; rather there are gradual changes as you travel from one area to the other, and in each area, the most intelligible dialects are those closer to that area, while those further away are harder to understand. So linguists normally consider the difference between dialect and language to be a matter of perspective and often use the two terms interchangeably (for example, they call the Germanic languages a dialect of Indo-European). A more neutral term that is also used is "language variety", which implies that everything is just a kind of language in its own right rather than a dialect of something. CodeCat (talk) 17:00, 7 December 2012 (UTC)

I'd suggest the Lowland Scots of Burns would tax you a bit more, as a Glaswegian (a dialect largely fairly light on Scots vocab)I can't make head nor tail of it.

And I agree with CodeCat, that in linguistics a dialect is merely a variation that is/has been at point on a continuum. If you really want to push it, you can measure mutual intelligibility... but often it seems that arguments around "language" versus "dialect" are emotionally-driven political identity arguments rather than scientific ones. 92.40.253.86 (talk) 11:11, 29 December 2012 (UTC)

Classification of English
One new study reports that English could/should be classified as North Germanic. http://www.apollon.uio.no/english/articles/2012/4-english-scandinavian.html Inge (talk) 13:09, 2 December 2012 (UTC)
 * That would ignore all the West Germanic features, which all the North Germanic languages lack. However, it's not terribly surprising that there are some similarities, considering that Old English arose from the Germanic dialects of Denmark. CodeCat (talk) 13:52, 2 December 2012 (UTC)


 * The claim is definitively debunked on Language Log --Pfold (talk) 12:20, 5 December 2012 (UTC)

I'm no expert in this field, but as a Scot it doesn't required you to be an expert to know that Scots English dialects display a huge amount of Norse vocabulary- and a few grammatical features. At what point people want to start drawing lines isn't clear to me, but the considerable Scandinavian history & influence in/on Scotland is undeniable. 92.40.253.86 (talk) 11:17, 29 December 2012 (UTC)

That figure
According to this diagram, Fife is a multilingual area while Lewis isn't. As anyone who has even visited these places could tell you, let alone lived in them, this is grossly inaccurate. Lewis is an English-speaking island, with a significant number of Gaelic speakers. Fife speaks English and is monolingual. Similarly, any attempts to claim that Lothian and Borders, in 2013, speak "Scots" is misguided. The language is much closer to English than it is to the Scots of 70 years back, when it was genuinely a distinct and distinctive dialect (if not a separate language). Given these offensively gross errors, I'm exceedingly loathe to trust anything plotted on this chart at all. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.90.184.135 (talk) 21:53, 11 April 2013 (UTC)

Why is such a crappy, questionable product such as Ethnologue.com being used?
Why is such a backdoor application such as http://www.ethnologue.com used as a reference. Many of their contentions about language are primitive at best. It just a shoddy product and yet it is cited as if it has some authority and as if it is viable research which it is clearly not. It is the intellectual equivalent of using already soiled toilet paper in a bathroom environment... Is its use on Wikipedia the result of someone furthering their business interest in this less than standard product? Stevenmitchell (talk) 02:08, 28 February 2013 (UTC)


 * I'd hesitate before ascribing commercial interests. It's far more likely it's the sloppy lack of research - and, indeed, education - that is at the root of it. Someone edits a Wikipedia page with their belief and when eventually challenged to find a "notable source" they go to Ethnologue.com and state that it's outside of Wikipedia and "trustworthy" and then camp until everyone else gives up in disgust.

Welcome to Wikipedia!88.90.184.135 (talk) 21:55, 11 April 2013 (UTC)

Examples of verb second order for English
Added 'Pop Goes the Weasel' and 'Able was I ere I saw Elba' as further examples. I've never heard the two examples that were previously the only ones cited, but I am sure the two I added are better known. Furthermore, both are already referenced within Wikipedia. Meaning of Fife (talk) 23:34, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

August 2014 what about Flemish
I don't see any mention of Flemish/Vlaams in the Article. Is there an assumption that Nederlands is a common language between the Dutch and the Belgians? Even between the Flemish provinces there are variations in dialectic words and between Dutch and Flemish even the basic alphabet has phonic differences e.g. "g" takes on a different sounding. The diminutive in Dutch is an "icke" whereas in Vlaams more likely "tje" Also the influence of the Monarchy/Aristocracy also sees a lot of borrowed French words adapted into Flemish e.g. a small present would be cadeautje but in Dutch geschenk 74.103.167.2 (talk) 15:30, 1 May 2014 (UTC) CED (Not scientific input - just a Celt raising a few questions) Both examples are actually reversed. Also, besides the obvious pronunciation and day-to-day seperateness of 2 nations, both everyday languages are relatively similar and mutually intelligible. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 94.213.38.233 (talk) 00:20, 13 August 2014 (UTC)

South Germanic languages
Why there is no such way for South Germanic languages?
 * If you look at South Germanic, you will see why. --Pfold (talk) 21:47, 25 November 2014 (UTC)

Diachronic Table
I think the diachronic table needs to be replaced by something explicitly based on a published source. As it stands the table is in breach of WP:OR and WP:SYNTH. There are problems which cannot be fixed simply by editorial tweaking: I don't see how the job can be done in a table - I think we need to source a suitable diagram, or, if we can't find a copyright-free diagram that represents current thinking, create a new diagram based on a single published source. Something like the one on p. 49 of Keller's The German Language, say. --Pfold (talk) 11:32, 2 February 2015 (UTC)
 * The idea that the periodisation of all the dialects can be aligned within a single grid of period divisions - the divisions used are often in conflict with the articles on the individual languages
 * The use of terms which are never used in the literature, such as Early New Central German, Primitive Saxon.

Bad organization and missing information
The article needs serious rewriting. I'm a fan of historical linguistics or philology, but there's way too much historical information and it's sprinkled through every section in the article, without regard for whether it's actually helpful. We need more information on the phonology, morphology, and syntax of modern Germanic languages.

For instance, the Phonology section should discuss the phonemic inventories and phonological features of modern Germanic languages, like and. The sound changes that happened between Proto-Germanic and the old Germanic languages belong in another section, because they don't really help a reader understand how modern English, Dutch, Standard German, Norwegian, Danish, and Icelandic are different. The real differences between the modern Germanic languages have to do with presence or absence of phonemes (the dorsal fricative and semivowel, postalveolars, affricates, front rounded vowels) and different phonological features (pitch accent, vowel length, diphthongs, different features of fortis and lenis obstruents, greater or lesser vowel reduction). More on these things is needed.

The Characteristics section is also confusing. We need to distinguish between features that happen to be important for classifying the Germanic languages as a separate branch of the Indo-European family, and features that are actually rare or unique to the Germanic languages as compared with other languages around the world. The Germanic consonant shift isn't a unique feature, because it results in the same voiced and voiceless stops and fricatives that are found in other language families around the world. Similarly, large vowel inventories are found in other language families, and so is vowel reduction and a present-past contrast. Probably some features listed are typologically distinctive, but I'm not sure which.

I may work on fixing these problems, but help would be appreciated. — Eru·tuon 06:58, 28 March 2015 (UTC)

The linguistic contact of the Viking settlers of the Danelaw with the Anglo-Saxons left traces in the English language
There were never a vikingish language:

In Bósa saga ok Herrauðs is to read:
 * Herraud's best friend was Bósi, the younger son of a former viking named Thvari or Bryn-Thvari by Brynhild, a former shieldmaiden and a daughter of King Agnar of Nóatún. 
 * Bósi was a rough boy who was eventually outlawed for maiming some other folk in a ball-game. Herraud, discontented, gained permission from his father, over Sjód's objections, be allowed to set off on a Viking expedition with five ships

There is, however, no such thing as a former Norseman, mentioned in the sources. Dan Koehl (talk) 22:49, 9 May 2015 (UTC)

Egil Skallagrimsson saga: ''Björn var farmaður mikill, var stundum í víking, en stundum í kaupferðum; Björn var hinn gervilegasti maður. (english: Björn was a great traveller; sometimes as viking, sometimes as tradesman.''

So, a Norseman could be a viking for some time, and he could be a tradesman (or a baker, or a shepherd) for some time. But not all tradesmen, bakers, shepherds and vikings were Norseman.

Norseman spoke norse, but norse vikings did not speak vikingish, and norse shepherds did not speak shepherdish or bakerish.

Norsemen had norse culture, but there was no norse viking, baker or shepherd culture.

I think its important to remind people today about the term Norsemen, an accepted term by historians and archelogists, referring to people from the north, present Scandinavia. This term does not have any certain time limit, the Norsemen were norse in years, 400, 500, 657, 749, 803, 950, 1066 and 1100. Norsemen is a true ethnical group, for some reason neglected on Wikipedia. Whenever the word viking is mentioned, it can correctly be replaced by the term Norsemen in 95% of the cases. Norsemen are described in other Wikipedia languages, and since the english Wikipedia should be written from a global point of view, the term Norse and Norsemen should not be treated different.

The first documented use of the word viking is made by Orosius, written in latin, and translated into old english. There is to read about Alexander the Great´s father, Philip II of Macedonia: Philippus vero post longam obsidionem, ut pecuniam quam obsidendo exhauserat, praedando repararet, piraticam adgressus est. translated into: ac he scipa gegaderade, and i vicingas wurdon. In this time the word pirat was not used in the english language, the latin piraticam was directly translated to vicingus.

Interestingly enough, theres stories in the sagas, describing arabic piates, and they were in the sagas referred to, as vikings. = Vikings could be arabs practising piracy, and vikings could be macedonian kings practising piracy, but peaceful norse farmers, and their wifes, were never, ever, described as vikings before 1900.

For over 1 000 years, viking was nothing else than an old-english translation of the latin word pirate.

A macedonian king will never, ever, become scandinavian. An arabic pirat will never become scandinavian.

But a norseman was scandinavian, and the present scandinavians are descendants of Norsemen, according to historians and archelogists.

The sentence  The linguistic contact of the Viking settlers of the Danelaw with the Anglo-Saxons left traces in the English language reflects a very poor knowledge in what viking actually means. As well as poor knowledge in the term Norsemen.

'Viking is a controversial term, Norsemen is not. For some reason, some people absolutely wants to call my ancestors vikings, which is historically incorrect and besides, unpolite. The Scandinavians as a an ethnic group, is more or less the same as Norsemen, Theres no problem whatsoever to use the correct term.

Dan Koehl (talk) 23:19, 9 May 2015 (UTC)


 * I think this is an issue regarding the difference in usage between the terms in English and in modern Scandinavian languages. Sorry if you don't like that usage but we must follow the English language version here. Mutt Lunker (talk) 23:35, 9 May 2015 (UTC)


 * Sorry, but we must follow the global point of view, with whatever language. We don't know how Koreans, Kenyans, or Tasmanians interprete the word viking, but for sure the word Norsemen is the correct term for the ethnical group of Scandinavian people. Dan Koehl (talk) 23:59, 9 May 2015 (UTC)


 * If by "the global view" you mean a usage which is divergent from that of the English language, no that is fundamentally not correct. Mutt Lunker (talk) 00:10, 10 May 2015 (UTC)

Limburgish
Never heard of anyone recognizing it as a separate language on the same level and comparable to German, Swedish or English. Its a dialect of Dutch.Ernio48 (talk) 19:13, 18 August 2016 (UTC)
 * Or Dutch is a dialect of Limburgish. It's unlinguistic to call a language a dialect of another. Linguists only recognise speech varieties. CodeCat (talk) 19:42, 18 August 2016 (UTC)

Quebec shouldn't be colored in the map
Quebec official language is French, so shouldn't be colored on the map as a germanic language territory.


 * Per the legend, the map is by country, not by further subdivisions, and "where a Germanic language is the first language of the majority of the population", which it is in Canada. Mutt Lunker (talk) 13:44, 17 September 2015 (UTC)


 * A world map is too large for a good illustration. Agree also with "Quebec", today's countries in the entire world provide poor educational understanding. Boeing720 (talk) 23:36, 20 May 2017 (UTC)

Interesting table, expanded
Just for possible use or interest Boeing720 (talk) 23:59, 20 May 2017 (UTC)

750 BC until 1 AD map
From this map, one gets the impression that central Europe was populated from the North. I strongly doubt this. I do however know that Finnish-Ugrian languages came from the East, split up in Russia and became the Magyars and Finnish which at least explains why Finnish, Estonian and Hungarian are related. In any case, was Scandinavia Populated from south to north. (With a possible excepton of the Sami peole, who came from the East, I think). Boeing720 (talk) 23:32, 20 May 2017 (UTC)
 * The map regards Germanic tribes, not humanity as a whole. Mutt Lunker (talk) 00:06, 21 May 2017 (UTC)

Hellenistic languages - only Greek exist
User:Pfold Under the Indo-European languages exists fife subgroups
 * 1) Germanic languages
 * 2) Slavonic & Baltic languages
 * 3) Latin-based "Romance"  (Italic are a smaller part of Romance language, which i smaller than Germanic languages. However all Romance lang. are larger !
 * 4) Indo-Iranian
 * 5) Hellenic languages - of which only modern Greek still is spoken.

All five groups are equally related to the Indo-European base. (All Indo-European languages have the same classes of words (although some are discussed ''as words of classes or not, like atricles and numbers)
 * nouns, pronouns (personal nouns) their describing adjectives (sometimes are articles also included, and exist in all Indo-European languages.)
 * verbs, their describibg adverbs
 * prepositions (are not included in languages like Hungarian, Finnish and Estonian)
 * numbers (whether of class of its own or not differs, but both "five" and "fifth" can be translated directly to any other Indo-European language.
 * conjuctions (words like "and", "or")
 * interjections ("Yes !", "Ouch !")

This applies also to the Greek language. (The alphabet used has nothing to do with linguistic relations). About the lead-sentence which mentions all sub-branches of the Indo-European languages - either it has to mention all five, or only state "Germanic languages is one of five Indo-European branches" - or something in line with that. Boeing720 (talk) 00:35, 21 May 2017 (UTC)

Reply also to another user. (IF using Italic, then is Germanic larger; if using Romance, then they are larger than Germanic. The sentence listed all sub-branches from the largest to the smallest. Forgot Hellenistic languages - iow. Greek language, and made a blur of the sorting order by gathered speakers. Boeing720 (talk) 00:50, 21 May 2017 (UTC)
 * There are more than five branches of Indo-European. Read up on it before making a show. CodeCat (talk) 11:56, 21 May 2017 (UTC)
 * User:CodeCat Directly below Indo-Eurpean ? In any case was my contribution an improvement, if you are correct. Bu I do not count sub-branches of sub-branches like Scandinavian languages or Iberian languages. I added the one I knew about. I'm talking abot the lead. Please also see my proposal here below. Boeing720 (talk) 13:38, 21 May 2017 (UTC)
 * There is obviously more but all of those are like Greek "stand-alone", and are smaller than Greek, I think. Also Albanian and Celtic appear to like Greek be "stand-alone" languages directly under the Indo-European main tree. And in the east several others. Armenian is the only one I've heared about. Boeing720 (talk) 22:20, 21 May 2017 (UTC)
 * What do you mean by "stand-alone"? If you mean that they are not a sub-branch, then the answer is "it depends". The interrelatedness of various branches is still an ongoing debate, and only Balto-Slavic and Indo-Iranian have widespread support. Italo-Celtic is supported by some but is still relatively unaccepted. Greek has also been connected to other branches, especially Armenian. CodeCat (talk) 22:30, 21 May 2017 (UTC)

But in Europe there are three major sub-branches today, Italic cannot be used about "native speakers today"
 * What gives you that idea? More people speak Italic languages today than do Germanic. CodeCat (talk) 22:30, 21 May 2017 (UTC)