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43-951: DOBES (or DoBeS , an acronym for the German name Dokumentation bedrohter Sprachen "Documentation of Endangered Languages ") is an international organization and project. The organization seeks to archive languages since it is expected many, if not most, of the world's languages (currently about 7,000 languages) will go extinct. This organization-related article is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . German languages Pontic Steppe Caucasus East Asia Eastern Europe Northern Europe Pontic Steppe Northern/Eastern Steppe Europe South Asia Steppe Europe Caucasus India Indo-Aryans Iranians East Asia Europe East Asia Europe Indo-Aryan Iranian Indo-Aryan Iranian Others European The Germanic languages are

86-638: A branch of the Indo-European language family spoken natively by a population of about 515 million people mainly in Europe , North America , Oceania , and Southern Africa . The most widely spoken Germanic language, English , is also the world's most widely spoken language with an estimated 2 billion speakers. All Germanic languages are derived from Proto-Germanic , spoken in Iron Age Scandinavia , Iron Age Northern Germany and along

129-518: A change is quite a recent development, as well as change Cve > Cvø . Faroese is a highly variable language with many dialects actively used across the islands’ approximately 120 communities. While the dialect of Tórshavn is the most prominent due to the city's outstanding size, there is no official spoken standard variety, and little evidence that the Tórshavn dialect has developed prestige status. Faroese speech communities are tightly knit and

172-538: A common history of pre-Proto-Germanic speakers throughout the Nordic Bronze Age . From the time of their earliest attestation, the Germanic varieties are divided into three groups: West , East , and North Germanic. Their exact relation is difficult to determine from the sparse evidence of runic inscriptions. Faroese language It is one of five languages descended from Old West Norse spoken in

215-544: A hypothetical Proto-Germanic , united by subjection to the sound shifts of Grimm's law and Verner's law . These probably took place during the Pre-Roman Iron Age of Northern Europe from c.  500 BC . Proto-Germanic itself was likely spoken after c.  500 BC , and Proto-Norse from the 2nd century AD and later is still quite close to reconstructed Proto-Germanic, but other common innovations separating Germanic from Proto-Indo-European suggest

258-608: A minority language by immigrant communities in North America, South America, Central America, Mexico and Australia. A German dialect, Pennsylvania Dutch , is still used among various populations in the American state of Pennsylvania in daily life. A group of Alemannic German dialects commonly referred to as Alsatian is spoken in Alsace , part of modern France. Dutch is an official language of Aruba , Belgium, Curaçao ,

301-599: A more definitive study of the language's variation, noting distinguishing characteristics of the north–south divide such as the northern aspiration of unvoiced plosives after long vowels and the pronunciation of ⟨ó⟩ as / œ / in most of the north compared to / ɔ / in the south. The most recent and detailed classification by Hjalmar P. Petersen divides the language into four major varieties including North-Western Faroese, Central Faroese, Northern Faroese, and Southern Faroese. Additional sub-dialects of particular islands and villages have also been identified. Most of

344-626: A native language of some 11 to 13 million people, remains in use by some 1.5 million speakers in Jewish communities around the world, mainly in North America, Europe, Israel, and other regions with Jewish populations . Limburgish varieties are spoken in the Limburg and Rhineland regions, along the Dutch–Belgian–German border. In addition to being the official language in Sweden, Swedish

387-607: A separate collection of unstandardized dialects, with roughly 4.35–7.15 million native speakers and probably 6.7–10 million people who can understand it (at least 2.2 million in Germany (2016) and 2.15 million in the Netherlands (2003)); Yiddish , once used by approximately 13 million Jews in pre- World War II Europe, now with approximately 1.5 million native speakers; Scots , with 1.5 million native speakers; Limburgish varieties with roughly 1.3 million speakers along

430-499: Is a form of Old Norse spoken in medieval times in the Faroe Islands. The most crucial aspects of the development of Faroese are diphthongisation and palatalisation . There is not enough data available to establish an accurate chronology of Faroese, but a rough one may be developed through comparison to the chronologies of Old Icelandic and Old Norwegian. In the 12th/13th centuries, á and ǫ́ merged as /ɔː/ ; later on at

473-594: Is also spoken natively by the Swedish-speaking minority in Finland, which is a large part of the population along the coast of western and southern Finland. Swedish is also one of the two official languages in Finland, along with Finnish , and the only official language in Åland . Swedish is also spoken by some people in Estonia. Danish is an official language of Denmark and in its overseas territory of

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516-532: Is also the official language in the overseas territories of Norway such as Svalbard , Jan Mayen , Bouvet island , Queen Maud Land , and Peter I island . Icelandic is the official language of Iceland . Faroese is the official language of the Faroe Islands, and is also spoken by some people in Denmark. Germanic languages by share (West Germanic in yellow-red shades and North Germanic in blue shades): All Germanic languages are thought to be descended from

559-541: Is one of the 11 official languages in South Africa and is a lingua franca of Namibia. It is used in other Southern African nations, as well. Low German is a collection of very diverse dialects spoken in the northeast of the Netherlands and northern Germany. Some dialects like East Pomeranian have been imported to South America. Scots is spoken in Lowland Scotland and parts of Ulster (where

602-556: Is pronounced [ɔu] and short ⟨ó⟩ is pronounced [œ] . The Faroese alphabet consists of 29 letters derived from the Latin script : As with most other Germanic languages, Faroese has a large number of vowels, with 26 in total. Vowel distribution is similar to other North Germanic languages in that short vowels appear in closed syllables (those ending in consonant clusters or long consonants) and long vowels appearing in open syllables. Faroese shares with Icelandic and Danish

645-565: Is transmitted in the language, alongside all local newspapers. Today, Danish is considered a foreign language, although around 5% of residents on the Faroes learn it as a first language. Both Danish and English are obligatory at the primary and secondary school levels, with fluency in English becoming increasingly valued particularly among the younger generations. Films and television are frequently shown in English with Danish subtitles. In 2017,

688-750: Is unknown as some of them, especially the East Germanic languages, disappeared during or after the Migration Period . Some of the West Germanic languages also did not survive past the Migration Period, including Lombardic . As a result of World War II and subsequent mass expulsion of Germans , the German language suffered a significant loss of Sprachraum , as well as moribundity and extinction of several of its dialects. In

731-563: The Dutch – Belgian – German border; and the Frisian languages with over 500,000 native speakers in the Netherlands and Germany. The largest North Germanic languages are Swedish , Danish , and Norwegian , which are in part mutually intelligible and have a combined total of about 20 million native speakers in the Nordic countries and an additional five million second language speakers; since

774-522: The Faroe Islands , and it is a lingua franca and language of education in its other overseas territory of Greenland , where it was one of the official languages until 2009. Danish, a locally recognized minority language, is also natively spoken by the Danish minority in the German state of Schleswig-Holstein . Norwegian is the official language of Norway (both Bokmål and Nynorsk ). Norwegian

817-837: The Gospel of John in Faroese. In 1937, Faroese replaced Danish as the official school language, in 1938, as the church language, and in 1948, as the national language by the Home Rule Act of the Faroe Islands. The first complete translation of the Bible was completed in 1948. Up until the 1980s public radio broadcasts were primarily conducted in Norwegian and Danish. This helps to explain why older generations can speak Norwegian in addition to Danish and Faroese. Faroese broadcasts quickly replaced earlier programs and now all radio content

860-527: The Middle Ages ; the others include Norwegian , Icelandic , and the extinct Norn and Greenlandic Norse . Faroese and Icelandic, its closest extant relative, are not easily mutually intelligible in speech, but the written languages resemble each other quite closely, largely owing to Faroese's etymological orthography . East Germanic languages West Germanic languages Icelandic Faroese Norwegian Danish Swedish Around 900 AD,

903-581: The North Sea and Baltic coasts. The West Germanic languages include the three most widely spoken Germanic languages: English with around 360–400 million native speakers; German , with over 100 million native speakers; and Dutch , with 24 million native speakers. Other West Germanic languages include Afrikaans , an offshoot of Dutch originating from the Afrikaners of South Africa , with over 7.1 million native speakers; Low German , considered

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946-598: The [ɔu:] and [œ] found in Tórshavn and elsewhere. The northern dialect is characterized by weakened fortis consonants and a monophthongal pronunciation of ⟨á⟩ in ending syllables, i.e., / aː / . The realization of ⟨ei⟩ as [ɔi:] dominates in this region, although small parts of the central and northwestern regions use this pronunciation as well. The northwestern dialect features aspirated fortis consonants after long vowels. The ⟨i⟩ and ⟨u⟩ vowels remain unmerged in unstressed ending syllables. Long ⟨ó⟩

989-593: The consonant change known as " Grimm's law ." Early varieties of Germanic entered history when the Germanic tribes moved south from Scandinavia in the 2nd century BC to settle in the area of today's northern Germany and southern Denmark. English is an official language of Belize , Canada, Nigeria, Falkland Islands , Saint Helena , Malta , New Zealand, Ireland, South Africa, Philippines, Jamaica, Dominica , Guyana , Trinidad and Tobago , American Samoa , Palau , St. Lucia , Grenada , Barbados , St. Vincent and

1032-562: The outfield ), cf. Middle Irish áirge . Between the 9th and the 15th centuries, a distinct Faroese language evolved, although it was probably still mutually intelligible with Old West Norse , and remained similar to the Norn language of Orkney and Shetland during Norn's earlier phase. Faroese ceased to be a written language after the Danish–Norwegian Reformation of the early 16th century, with Danish replacing Faroese as

1075-409: The 21st century, German dialects are dying out as Standard German gains primacy. The common ancestor of all of the languages in this branch is called Proto-Germanic, also known as Common Germanic, which was spoken in about the middle of the 1st millennium BC in Iron Age Scandinavia . Proto-Germanic, along with all of its descendants, notably has a number of unique linguistic features, most famously

1118-886: The Faroe Islands and Iceland. As a result, the Irish language has had some influence on both Faroese and Icelandic . There is speculation about Irish language place names in the Faroes: for example, the names of Mykines , Stóra Dímun , Lítla Dímun and Argir have been hypothesized to contain Celtic roots. Other examples of early-introduced words of Celtic origin are: blak / blaðak ( buttermilk ), cf. Middle Irish bláthach ; drunnur (tail-piece of an animal), cf. Middle Irish dronn ; grúkur ( head , headhair), cf. Middle Irish gruaig ; lámur ( hand , paw ), cf. Middle Irish lámh ; tarvur ( bull ), cf. Middle Irish tarbh ; and ærgi ( pasture in

1161-975: The Grenadines , Puerto Rico, Guam , Hong Kong, Singapore, Pakistan, India, Papua New Guinea , Namibia , Vanuatu , the Solomon Islands and former British colonies in Asia, Africa and Oceania. Furthermore, it is the de facto language of the United Kingdom, the United States and Australia, as well as a recognized language in Nicaragua and Malaysia. German is a language of Austria, Belgium, Germany, Liechtenstein , Luxembourg and Switzerland; it also has regional status in Italy, Poland, Namibia and Denmark. German also continues to be spoken as

1204-500: The Icelandic grammarian and politician Jón Sigurðsson published a written standard for Modern Faroese in 1854, which still exists. They set a standard for the orthography of the language, based on its Old Norse roots and similar to that of Icelandic. The main purpose of this was for the spelling to represent the diverse dialects of Faroese in equal measure. Additionally, it had the advantages of being etymologically clear and keeping

1247-672: The Middle Ages, however, these languages have been strongly influenced by Middle Low German , a West Germanic language, and Low German words account for about 30–60% of their vocabularies according to various estimates. Other extant North Germanic languages are Faroese , Icelandic , and Elfdalian , which are more conservative languages with no significant Low German influence, more complex grammar and limited mutual intelligibility with other North Germanic languages today. The East Germanic branch included Gothic , Burgundian , and Vandalic , all of which are now extinct. The last to die off

1290-428: The Netherlands, Sint Maarten , and Suriname . The Netherlands also colonized Indonesia , but Dutch was scrapped as an official language after Indonesian independence . Today, it is only used by older or traditionally educated people. Dutch was until 1983 an official language in South Africa but evolved into and was replaced by Afrikaans , a partially mutually intelligible daughter language of Dutch. Afrikaans

1333-406: The analysis by Petersen and earlier authors is based on phonological evidence. The southern variety of Faroese is very distinct, possibly due to geographic distance exacerbated by the lack of underwater tunnels which have connected most other islands north of Sandur . The dialect of these islands is characterized by a unique form of certain personal pronouns, alongside phonological features such as

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1376-461: The beginning of the 14th century, delabialization took place: y , øy , au > /i, ɔi, ɛi/ ; í and ý merged in addition to i and y , but in the case of í and ý , it appears that labialisation took place instead as is documented by later development to /ʊi/ . Further, the language underwent a palatalisation of k , g and sk before Old Norse e , i , y , ø , au > /kʲ, ɡʲ, skʲ/ > /cᶜ̧, ɟᶨ, ɕcᶜ̧/ > /tʃʰ, tʃ, ʃ/ . Before

1419-441: The dissolution of þ ( þ > t ; þ > h in demonstrative pronouns and adverbs) appeared before the end of the 13th century. Another undated change is the merger of ǫ , ø and ǿ into /ø/ ; pre-nasal ǫ , ǫ́ > o , ó . enk , eng probably became eing , eink in the 14th century; the development of a to /ɛ/ before ng , nk appeared after the palatalisation of k , g , and sk had been completed, such

1462-478: The feature of maintaining a contrast between stops based exclusively on aspiration, not voicing. Geminated stops may be pre-aspirated in intervocalic and word-final position. Intervocalically the aspirated consonants become pre-aspirated unless followed by a closed vowel. In clusters, the preaspiration merges with a preceding nasal or apical approximant, rendering them voiceless. There are several phonological processes involved in Faroese, including: Faroese grammar

1505-530: The intervocalic voicing of non- geminate stops. The fortis consonants / p / , / t / , and / k / are aspirated following long vowels. The central dialect area centered around Suðurstreymoy features a merging of ⟨i⟩ and ⟨u⟩ in unstressed ending syllables. The fortis consonants are neither aspirated nor weakened. The island of Nólsoy is a notable transitional area due to its unique realization of long ⟨ó⟩ as [au:] and short ⟨ó⟩ as [ɔ] compared to

1548-411: The kinship with the Icelandic written language. The actual pronunciation, however, often differs considerably from the written rendering. The letter ð , for example, has no specific phoneme attached to it. Jakob Jakobsen devised a rival system of orthography, based on his wish for a phonetic spelling, but this system was never taken up by the speakers. In 1908, Scripture Gift Mission published

1591-487: The language of administration and education. The islanders continued to use the language in ballads , folktales , and everyday life. This maintained a rich spoken tradition , but for 300 years the language was not used in written form. In 1823, the Danish Bible Society published a diglot of the Gospel of Matthew , with Faroese on the left and Danish on the right. Venceslaus Ulricus Hammershaimb and

1634-474: The language spoken in the Faroes was Old Norse , which Norse settlers had brought with them during the time of the settlement of Faroe Islands ( landnám ) that began in 825. However, many of the settlers were not from Scandinavia , but descendants of Norse settlers in the Irish Sea region. In addition, women from Norse Ireland, Orkney , or Shetland often married native Scandinavian men before settling in

1677-515: The local dialect is known as Ulster Scots ). Frisian is spoken among half a million people who live on the southern fringes of the North Sea in the Netherlands and Germany. Luxembourgish is a Moselle Franconian dialect that is spoken mainly in the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg , where it is considered to be an official language. Similar varieties of Moselle Franconian are spoken in small parts of Belgium, France, and Germany. Yiddish, once

1720-551: The palatalisation é and ǽ merged as /ɛː/ and approximately in the same period epenthetic u is inserted into word-final /Cr/ and /CrC/ clusters. A massive quantity shift also operated in Middle Faroese. In the case of skerping , it took place after delabialization but before loss of post-vocalic ð and g /ɣ/ . The shift of hv /hw/ to /kw/ , the deletion of /h/ in (remaining) word-initial /h/ –sonorant clusters ( hr , hl , hn > r , l , n ), and

1763-519: The tourist board Visit Faroe Islands launched a website entitled Faroe Islands Translate. Text can be entered in thirteen languages, including English, Chinese, Russian, Japanese, French, Spanish, and Portuguese. Instead of an instant machine translation being given, the text goes to a volunteer who will provide a live video translation, or else a recorded one later. The aim of this project was to get Faroese featured on Google Translate . Old Faroese ( miðaldarføroyskt , ca. mid-14th to mid-16th centuries)

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1806-429: The use of dialectal speech is widely encouraged. The study of Faroese dialectology began hundreds of years ago, with the scholar Lucas Debes noting a north–south distinction as early as 1673. In the 18th century linguist Jens Christian Svabo made further distinctions, such as identifying the Tórshavn dialect, though his categorization lacked thorough justification. In 1891 Venceslaus Ulricus Hammershaimb would write

1849-543: Was Crimean Gothic , spoken until the late 18th century in some isolated areas of Crimea . The SIL Ethnologue lists 48 different living Germanic languages, 41 of which belong to the Western branch and six to the Northern branch; it places Riograndenser Hunsrückisch German in neither of the categories, but it is often considered a German dialect by linguists. The total number of Germanic languages throughout history

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