The Meuse or Maas is a major European river , rising in France and flowing through Belgium and the Netherlands before draining into the North Sea from the Rhine–Meuse–Scheldt delta . It has a total length of 925 km (575 miles).
56-457: Ehrhardt is Old High German for "Ehre" = honour and "hard" = strong . It may refer to: Old High German Old High German ( OHG ; German : Althochdeutsch (Ahdt., Ahd.) ) is the earliest stage of the German language , conventionally identified as the period from around 500/750 to 1050. Rather than representing a single supra-regional form of German, Old High German encompasses
112-565: A connection between the Maas and the Merwede at the town of Woudrichem . From that moment on, the current Afgedamde Maas was the main branch of the lower Meuse. The former main branch eventually silted up and is today called the Oude Maasje . In the late 19th century and early 20th century the connection between the Maas and Rhine was closed off and the Maas was given a new, artificial mouth –
168-618: A distinction between a pre-literary period and the start of a continuous tradition of written texts around the middle of the 8th century. Differing approaches are taken, too, to the position of Langobardic . Langobardic is an Elbe Germanic and thus Upper German dialect, and it shows early evidence for the Second Sound Shift. For this reason, some scholars treat Langobardic as part of Old High German, but with no surviving texts — just individual words and names in Latin texts — and
224-749: A key objective of the Battle of France , the Battle of Sedan and also for the last major German WWII counter-offensive on the Western Front , the Battle of the Bulge in December 1944 and January 1945. The Meuse is represented in the documentary The River People released in 2012 by Xavier Istasse. In July 2021, the Meuse basin was one of the many regions in Europe to experience catastrophic flooding during
280-549: A major communication route the River Meuse is the origin of Mosan art , principally (Wallonia and France). The first landscape painted in the Renaissance was the landscape of Meuse by Joachim Patinir . He was likely the uncle of Henri Blès , who is sometimes defined as a Mosan landscape painter active during the second third of the 16th century (i.e. second generation of landscape painters). The main tributaries of
336-534: Is given in four Old High German dialects below. Because these are translations of a liturgical text, they are best not regarded as examples of idiomatic language, but they do show dialect variation very clearly. Meuse From 1301, the upper Meuse roughly marked the western border of the Holy Roman Empire with the Kingdom of France , after Count Henry III of Bar had to receive the western part of
392-471: Is in Modern German). The following is a sample conjugation of a strong verb, nëman "to take". Any description of OHG syntax faces a fundamental problem: texts translated from or based on a Latin original will be syntactically influenced by their source, while the verse works may show patterns that are determined by the needs of rhyme and metre, or that represent literary archaisms. Nonetheless,
448-631: Is joined by the Sambre . Beyond Namur the Meuse winds eastwards and passes Liège before turning north. The river then forms part of the Belgian-Dutch border, except that at Maastricht the border lies further to the west. In the Netherlands it continues northwards through Venlo closely along the border to Germany, then turns towards the west, where it runs parallel to the Waal and forms part of
504-543: Is navigable over a substantial part of its total length: In the Netherlands and Belgium, the river is part of the major inland navigation infrastructure, connecting the Rotterdam-Amsterdam-Antwerp port areas to the industrial areas upstream: 's-Hertogenbosch, Venlo, Maastricht, Liège, Namur. Between Maastricht and Maasbracht , an unnavigable section of the Meuse is bypassed by the 36 km (22.4 mi) Juliana Canal . South of Namur, further upstream,
560-578: Is the sole survivor of what must have been a vast oral tradition. Other important works are the Evangelienbuch ( Gospel harmony ) of Otfrid von Weissenburg , the Ludwigslied and the 9th century Georgslied . The boundary to Early Middle High German (from c. 1050 ) is not clear-cut. An example of Early Middle High German literature is the Annolied . The Lord's Prayer
616-675: The 2021 European floods . The name Meuse is derived from the French name of the river, derived from its Latin name, Mosa , which ultimately derives from the Celtic or Proto-Celtic name * Mosā . This probably derives from the same root as English " maze ", referring to the river's twists and turns. The Dutch name Maas descends from Middle Dutch Mase , which comes from the presumed but unattested Old Dutch form * Masa , from Proto-Germanic * Masō . Modern Dutch and German Maas and Limburgish Maos preserve this Germanic form. Despite
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#1732786908855672-660: The Abrogans , a Latin–Old High German glossary variously dated between 750 and 780, probably from Reichenau . The 8th century Merseburg Incantations are the only remnant of pre-Christian German literature. The earliest texts not dependent on Latin originals would seem to be the Hildebrandslied and the Wessobrunn Prayer , both recorded in manuscripts of the early 9th century, though the texts are assumed to derive from earlier copies. The Bavarian Muspilli
728-716: The Afgedamde Maas ) so that little water from the Meuse entered the old Maas courses or the Rhine distributaries. The resulting separation of the rivers Rhine and Meuse is considered to be the greatest achievement in Dutch hydraulic engineering before the completion of the Zuiderzee Works and Delta Works . In 1970 the Haringvlietdam has been finished. Since then the reunited Rhine and Meuse waters have reached
784-500: The Bergse Maas . The resulting separation of the rivers Rhine and Maas reduced the risk of flooding and was considered to be the greatest achievement in Dutch hydraulic engineering before the completion of the Zuiderzee Works and Delta Works . The former main branch was, after the dam at its southern inlet was completed in 1904, renamed Afgedamde Maas and no longer receives water from the Maas. The Meuse and its crossings were
840-706: The Carolingian Renaissance in the 9th. The dedication to the preservation of Old High German epic poetry among the scholars of the Carolingian Renaissance was significantly greater than could be suspected from the meagre survivals we have today (less than 200 lines in total between the Hildebrandslied and the Muspilli ). Einhard tells how Charlemagne himself ordered that the epic lays should be collected for posterity. It
896-601: The County of Bar ( Barrois mouvant ) as a French fief from the hands of King Philip IV . In 1408, a Burgundian army led by John the Fearless went to the aid of John III against the citizens of Liège, who were in open revolt. After the battle , which saw the men from Liège defeated, John ordered the drowning in the Meuse of burghers and noblemen in Liège whose loyalties he suspected. The border remained relatively stable until
952-591: The Latinate literary culture of Christianity . The earliest instances, which date to the latter half of the 8th century, are glosses —notes added to margins or between lines that provide translation of the (Latin) text or other aid to the reader. Old High German is generally dated from around 750 to around 1050. The start of this period sees the beginning of the OHG written tradition, at first with only glosses, but with substantial translations and original compositions by
1008-548: The Middle High German forms of words, particularly with respect to the consonants. Old High German had six phonemic short vowels and five phonemic long vowels. Both occurred in stressed and unstressed syllables. In addition, there were six diphthongs. Notes: By the mid 11th century the many different vowels found in unstressed syllables had almost all been reduced to ⟨e⟩ / ə / . Examples: (The New High German forms of these words are broadly
1064-622: The Romance language of the native population , so that Langobardic had died out by the end of the OHG period. At the beginning of the period, no Germanic language was spoken east of a line from Kieler Förde to the rivers Elbe and Saale , earlier Germanic speakers in the Northern part of the area having been displaced by the Slavs . This area did not become German-speaking until the German eastward expansion ("Ostkolonisation", "Ostsiedlung") of
1120-407: The synthetic inflectional system inherited from its ancestral Germanic forms. The eventual disruption of these patterns, which led to the more analytic grammar, are generally considered to mark the transition to Middle High German . Surviving Old High German texts were all composed in monastic scriptoria , so the overwhelming majority of them are religious in nature or, when secular, belong to
1176-458: The 9th century. However, the fact that the defining feature of Old High German, the Second Sound Shift, may have started as early as the 6th century and is complete by 750, means that some take the 6th century to be the start of the period. Alternatively, terms such as Voralthochdeutsch ("pre-OHG") or vorliterarisches Althochdeutsch ("pre-literary OHG") are sometimes used for the period before 750. Regardless of terminology, all recognize
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#17327869088551232-720: The Biblical texts were translated from Greek, not Latin) raise the possibility that it was an independent development. Germanic also had no future tense, but again OHG created periphrastic forms, using an auxiliary verb skulan (Modern German sollen ) and the infinitive, or werden and the present participle: Thu scalt beran einan alawaltenden (Otfrid's Evangelienbuch I, 5,23) "You shall bear an almighty one" Inti nu uuirdist thu suigenti' (Tatian 2,9) "And now you will start to fall silent" Latin: Et ecce eris tacens (Luke 1:20) The present tense continued to be used alongside these new forms to indicate future time (as it still
1288-468: The Late OHG changes that affected Middle High German : Germanic had a simple two-tense system, with forms for a present and preterite . These were inherited by Old High German, but in addition OHG developed three periphrastic tenses : the perfect , pluperfect and future . The periphrastic past tenses were formed by combining the present or preterite of an auxiliary verb ( wësan , habēn ) with
1344-461: The Meuse are listed below in downstream-upstream order, with the town where the tributary meets the river: The mean annual discharge rate of the Meuse has been relatively stable over the last few thousand years. One recent study estimates that average flow has increased by about 10% since 2000 BC. The hydrological distribution of the Meuse changed during the later Middle Ages, when a major flood forced it to shift its main course northwards towards
1400-494: The Meuse has the responsibility of the implementation of the treaty. The costs of this Commission are met by all these countries, in proportion of their own territory in the basin of the Meuse: Netherlands 30%, Wallonia 30%, France 15%, Germany 14.5%, Flanders 5%, Brussels 4.5%, Kingdom of Belgium 0.5%, and Luxembourg 0.5%. The map of the basin area of Meuse was joined to the text of the treaty. As for culture, as
1456-503: The Meuse split near Heusden into two main distributaries, one flowing north to join the Merwede and one flowing direct to the sea. The branch of the Meuse leading direct to the sea eventually silted up (and now forms the Oude Maasje stream), but in 1904 the canalised Bergse Maas was dug to take over the functions of the silted-up branch. At the same time the branch leading to the Merwede was dammed at Heusden (and has since been known as
1512-664: The Netherlands, and Belgium. Also participating in the agreement were the Belgian regional governments of Flanders , Wallonia , and Brussels (which is not in the basin of the Meuse but pumps running water into the Meuse). Most of the basin area (approximately 36,000 km ) is in Wallonia (12,000 km ), followed by France (9,000 km ), the Netherlands (8,000 km ), Germany (2,000 km ), Flanders (2,000 km ) and Luxembourg (a few km ). An International Commission on
1568-474: The North Sea either at this site or, during times of lower discharges of the Rhine, at Hook of Holland . A 2008 study notes that the difference between summer and winter flow volumes has increased significantly in the last 100–200 years. It points out that the frequency of serious floods ( i.e. flows > 1000% of normal) has increased markedly. They predict that winter flooding of the Meuse may become
1624-692: The OHG Isidor or Notker show a similar awareness. The charts show the vowel and consonant systems of the East Franconian dialect in the 9th century. This is the dialect of the monastery of Fulda , and specifically of the Old High German Tatian . Dictionaries and grammars of OHG often use the spellings of the Tatian as a substitute for genuine standardised spellings, and these have the advantage of being recognizably close to
1680-424: The almighty father"). By the end of the OHG period, however, use of a subject pronoun has become obligatory, while the definite article has developed from the original demonstrative pronoun ( der, diu, daz ) and the numeral ein ("one") has come into use as an indefinite article. These developments are generally seen as mechanisms to compensate for the loss of morphological distinctions which resulted from
1736-522: The annexation of the Three Bishoprics Metz, Toul and Verdun by King Henry II in 1552 and the occupation of the Duchy of Lorraine by the forces of King Louis XIII in 1633. Its lower Belgian ( Walloon ) portion, part of the sillon industriel , was the first fully industrialized area in continental Europe. The Afgedamde Maas was created in the late Middle Ages, when a major flood made
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1792-494: The basic word order rules are broadly those of Modern Standard German . Two differences from the modern language are the possibility of omitting a subject pronoun and lack of definite and indefinite articles . Both features are exemplified in the start of the 8th century Alemannic creed from St Gall : kilaubu in got vater almahticun (Modern German, Ich glaube an Gott den allmächtigen Vater ; English "I believe in God
1848-713: The early 12th century, though there was some attempt at conquest and missionary work under the Ottonians . The Alemannic polity was conquered by Clovis I in 496, and in the last twenty years of the 8th century Charlemagne subdued the Saxons, the Frisians, the Bavarians, and the Lombards, bringing all continental Germanic-speaking peoples under Frankish rule. While this led to some degree of Frankish linguistic influence ,
1904-555: The end of the Old High German period, Notker Labeo was among the greatest stylists in the language, and developed a systematic orthography. Old High German marked the culmination of a shift away from runic writing of the pre-OHG period to Latin alphabet . This shift led to considerable variations in spelling conventions, as individual scribes and scriptoria had to develop their own transliteration of sounds not native to Latin script . Otfrid von Weissenburg , in one of
1960-548: The entire system of noun and adjective declensions . There is also a hundred-year "dearth of continuous texts" after the death of Notker Labeo in 1022. The mid-11th century is widely accepted as marking the transition to Middle High German . Old High German encompasses the dialects that had undergone the Second Sound Shift during the 6th century—namely all of the Upper and Central German dialects. The Franks in
2016-570: The extensive Rhine–Meuse–Scheldt delta , together with the Scheldt to its south and the Rhine to the north. The river has been divided near Heusden into the Afgedamde Maas on the right and the Bergse Maas on the left. The Bergse Maas continues under the name of Amer , which is part of De Biesbosch . The Afgedamde Maas joins the Waal, the main stem of the Rhine at Woudrichem , and then flows under
2072-480: The language of both the administration and the Church was Latin, and this unification did not therefore lead to any development of a supra-regional variety of Frankish nor a standardized Old High German; the individual dialects retained their identity. There was no standard or supra-regional variety of Old High German—every text is written in a particular dialect, or in some cases a mixture of dialects. Broadly speaking,
2128-594: The language of the Carolingian court or that it is attested in the Ludwigslied , whose presence in a French manuscript suggests bilingualism , are controversial. Old High German literacy is a product of the monasteries, notably at St. Gallen , Reichenau Island and Fulda . Its origins lie in the establishment of the German church by Saint Boniface in the mid-8th century, and it was further encouraged during
2184-418: The main dialect divisions of Old High German seem to have been similar to those of later periods—they are based on established territorial groupings and the effects of the Second Sound Shift, which have remained influential until the present day. But because the direct evidence for Old High German consists solely of manuscripts produced in a few major ecclesiastical centres, there is no isogloss information of
2240-472: The majority of Old High German texts are religious in nature and show strong influence of ecclesiastical Latin on the vocabulary. In fact, most surviving prose texts are translations of Latin originals. Even secular works such as the Hildebrandslied are often preserved only because they were written on spare sheets in religious codices . The earliest Old High German text is generally taken to be
2296-672: The name of Boven Merwede to Hardinxveld-Giessendam , where it splits into Nieuwe Merwede and Beneden Merwede . Near Lage Zwaluwe , the Nieuwe Merwede joins the Amer, forming the Hollands Diep , which splits into Grevelingen and Haringvliet , before finally flowing into the North Sea. The Meuse is crossed by railway bridges between the following stations (on the left and right banks respectively): There are also numerous road bridges and around 32 ferry crossings. The Meuse
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2352-487: The numerous West Germanic dialects that had undergone the set of consonantal changes called the Second Sound Shift . At the start of this period, dialect areas reflected the territories of largely independent tribal kingdoms, but by 788 the conquests of Charlemagne had brought all OHG dialect areas into a single polity . The period also saw the development of a stable linguistic border between German and Gallo-Romance , later French . Old High German largely preserved
2408-498: The past participle. Initially the past participle retained its original function as an adjective and showed case and gender endings - for intransitive verbs the nominative, for transitive verbs the accusative. For example: After thie thö argangana warun ahtu taga ( Tatian , 7,1) "When eight days had passed", literally "After that then gone-by were eight days" Latin: Et postquam consummati sunt dies octo (Luke 2:21) phīgboum habeta sum giflanzotan (Tatian 102,2) "There
2464-420: The prefaces to his Evangelienbuch , offers comments on and examples of some of the issues which arise in adapting the Latin alphabet for German: " ...sic etiam in multis dictis scriptio est propter litterarum aut congeriem aut incognitam sonoritatem difficilis. " ("...so also, in many expressions, spelling is difficult because of the piling up of letters or their unfamiliar sound.") The careful orthographies of
2520-539: The river Merwede . From then on several stretches of the original Merwede were renamed "Maas" (i.e. Meuse) and served as the primary outflow of that river. Those branches are currently known as the Nieuwe Maas and Oude Maas. However during another series of severe floods the Meuse found an additional path towards the sea, resulting in the creation of the Biesbosch wetlands and Hollands Diep estuaries. Thereafter
2576-540: The river can only carry more modest vessels, although a barge as long as 100 m (328 ft). can still reach the French border town of Givet. From Givet, the river is canalized over a distance of 272 kilometres (169 mi). The canalized Meuse used to be called the "Canal de l'Est — Branche Nord" but was recently rebaptized into "Canal de la Meuse". The waterway can be used by the smallest barges that are still in use commercially almost 40 m (131 ft) long and just over 5 metres (16 ft) wide. Just upstream of
2632-600: The same as in Middle High German.) The main difference between Old High German and the West Germanic dialects from which it developed is that the former underwent the Second Sound Shift . The result of the sound change has been that the consonantal system of German is different from all other West Germanic languages, including English and Low German . This list has the sound changes that transformed Common West Germanic into Old High German but not
2688-701: The similarity, the Germanic name is not derived from the Celtic name, judging from the change from earlier o into a , which is characteristic of the Germanic languages. The Meuse rises in Pouilly-en-Bassigny, commune of Le Châtelet-sur-Meuse on the Langres plateau in France from where it flows northwards past Sedan (the head of navigation ) and Charleville-Mézières into Belgium. At Namur it
2744-460: The sort on which modern dialect maps are based. For this reason the dialects may be termed "monastery dialects" (German Klosterdialekte ). The main dialects, with their bishoprics and monasteries : In addition, there are two poorly attested dialects: The continued existence of a West Frankish dialect in the Western, Romanized part of Francia is uncertain. Claims that this might have been
2800-408: The speakers starting to abandon the language by the 8th century, others exclude Langobardic from discussion of OHG. As Heidermanns observes, this exclusion is based solely on the external circumstances of preservation and not on the internal features of the language. The end of the period is less controversial. The sound changes reflected in spelling during the 11th century led to the remodelling of
2856-563: The town of Commercy, the Canal de la Meuse connects with the Marne–Rhine Canal by means of a short diversion canal. The Cretaceous sea reptile Mosasaur is named after the river Meuse. The first fossils of it were discovered outside Maastricht in 1780. An international agreement was signed in 2002 in Ghent , Belgium, about the management of the river amongst France, Germany, Luxembourg ,
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#17327869088552912-485: The weakening of unstressed vowels in the endings of nouns and verbs (see above). The early part of the period saw considerable missionary activity, and by 800 the whole of the Frankish Empire had, in principle, been Christianized. All the manuscripts which contain Old High German texts were written in ecclesiastical scriptoria by scribes whose main task was writing in Latin rather than German. Consequently,
2968-537: The western part of Francia ( Neustria and western Austrasia ) gradually adopted Gallo-Romance by the beginning of the OHG period, with the linguistic boundary later stabilised approximately along the course of the Meuse and Moselle in the east, and the northern boundary probably a little further south than the current boundary between French and Dutch . North of this line, the Franks retained their language, but it
3024-540: Was a fig tree that some man had planted", literally "Fig-tree had certain ( or someone) planted" Latin: arborem fici habebat quidam plantatam (Luke 13:6) In time, however, these endings fell out of use and the participle came to be seen no longer as an adjective but as part of the verb, as in Modern German. This development is taken to be arising from a need to render Medieval Latin forms, but parallels in other Germanic languages (particularly Gothic, where
3080-442: Was not affected by the Second Sound Shift, which thus separated the Low Franconian or Old Dutch varieties from the more easterly Franconian dialects which formed part of Old High German. In the south, the Lombards , who had settled in Northern Italy , maintained their dialect until their conquest by Charlemagne in 774. After this the Germanic-speaking population, who were by then almost certainly bilingual, gradually switched to
3136-459: Was the neglect or religious zeal of later generations that led to the loss of these records. Thus, it was Charlemagne's weak successor, Louis the Pious , who destroyed his father's collection of epic poetry on account of its pagan content. Rabanus Maurus , a student of Alcuin and later an abbot at Fulda, was an important advocate of the cultivation of German literacy. Among his students were Walafrid Strabo and Otfrid of Weissenburg . Towards
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