Sweden
95-471: The Theatre War ( Swedish : Teaterkriget ), Cowberry War , Cranberry War or Lingonberry War ( Norwegian : Tyttebærkrigen , Danish : Tyttebærkrigen ), was a brief war between Denmark–Norway and Sweden , starting on 24 September 1788, formally lasting until 9 July 1789. Although the decision to launch the attack was taken in Denmark , the majority of the attacking soldiers were Norwegians from
190-445: A common gender with the definite suffix -en and the definite article den , in contrast with the neuter gender equivalents -et and det . The verb system was also more complex: it included subjunctive and imperative moods and verbs were conjugated according to person as well as number . By the 16th century, the case and gender systems of the colloquial spoken language and the profane literature had been largely reduced to
285-477: A guttural or "French R" pronunciation in the South Swedish dialects ; consequently, these dialects lack retroflex consonants . Swedish is a stress-timed language, where the time intervals between stressed syllables are equal. However, when casually spoken, it tends to be syllable-timed . Any stressed syllable carries one of two tones , which gives Swedish much of its characteristic sound. Prosody
380-537: A change from tauþr into tuþr . Moreover, the øy diphthong changed into a long, close ø , as in the Old Norse word for "island". By the end of the period, these innovations had affected most of the Runic Swedish-speaking area as well, with the exception of the dialects spoken north and east of Mälardalen where the diphthongs still exist in remote areas. Old Swedish (Swedish: fornsvenska )
475-521: A condominial government binding both together, partially superseding their legally different affiliation as Holy Roman and Danish fiefs. The County of Holstein-Pinneberg, which had remained a separately ruled territory in Holstein until its line was extinct in 1640, was merged into the then royal share of the Duchy of Holstein. The Duke of Holstein-Gottorp became emperor of Russia in 1762 as Peter III and
570-528: A conversation. Due to the close relation between the Scandinavian languages, a considerable proportion of speakers of Danish and especially Norwegian are able to understand Swedish. There is considerable migration between the Nordic countries , but owing to the similarity between the cultures and languages (with the exception of Finnish ), expatriates generally assimilate quickly and do not stand out as
665-540: A factual partition. The elder three brothers determined their youngest brother Frederick for a career as Lutheran administrator of an ecclesiastical state within the Holy Roman Empire. So the revenues of the duchies were divided in three equal shares by assigning the revenues of particular areas and landed estates to each of the elder brothers, while other general revenues, such as taxes from towns and customs dues, were levied together but then shared among
760-611: A golden opportunity to turn the Swedish opinion in his favour. He left the battlefront in Finland and proceeded to Stockholm and then Dalarna where he managed to incite several free corps to participate in the defense against the Danes and Norwegians. Despite strong popular support, Sweden had only 10,000 men that had to be divided between Skåne , Jämtland and Bohuslän . The first Danish-Norwegian force of about 8,000-10,000 men under
855-692: A group. According to the 2000 United States Census , some 67,000 people over the age of five were reported as Swedish speakers, though without any information on the degree of language proficiency. Similarly, there were 16,915 reported Swedish speakers in Canada from the 2001 census. Although there are no certain numbers, some 40,000 Swedes are estimated to live in the London area in the United Kingdom. Outside Sweden and Finland, there are about 40,000 active learners enrolled in Swedish language courses. In
950-574: A large proportion of the remaining 100,000 in the Scandinavian countries, France, Switzerland, Belgium, the Netherlands, Canada and Australia. Over three million people speak Swedish as a second language, with about 2,410,000 of those in Finland. According to a survey by the European Commission , 44% of respondents from Finland who did not have Swedish as a native language considered themselves to be proficient enough in Swedish to hold
1045-425: A more abstract sense, such as that set of fish; while fisken means "the fish". In certain cases, the definite form indicates possession, e. g., jag måste tvätta hår et ("I must wash my hair"). Adjectives are inflected in two declensions – indefinite and definite – and they must match the noun they modify in gender and number. The indefinite neuter and plural forms of an adjective are usually created by adding
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#17327733999531140-435: A noun. They can double as demonstrative pronouns or demonstrative determiners when used with adverbs such as här ("here") or där ("there") to form den/det här (can also be "denna/detta") ("this"), de här (can also be "dessa") ("these"), den/det där ("that"), and de där ("those"). For example, den där fisken means "that fish" and refers to a specific fish; den fisken is less definite and means "that fish" in
1235-622: A sovereign state. Because of its personal union with Denmark, the Duchy of Holstein did not come under French occupation during the Napoleonic era (however, the neighboring duchy of Lauenburg was annexed by France in 1811 and became a part of Bouches-de-l'Elbe ). From 1815 to 1864 it was a member of the German Confederation , though still in personal union with Denmark (the King of Denmark being also Duke of Holstein). Following
1330-689: A special branch of the Research Institute for the Languages of Finland has official status as the regulatory body for Swedish in Finland. Among its highest priorities is to maintain intelligibility with the language spoken in Sweden. It has published Finlandssvensk ordbok , a dictionary about the differences between Swedish in Finland and Sweden. From the 13th to 20th century, there were Swedish-speaking communities in Estonia , particularly on
1425-442: A suffix ( -t or -a ) to the common form of the adjective, e. g., en grön stol (a green chair), ett grönt hus (a green house), and gröna stolar ("green chairs"). The definite form of an adjective is identical to the indefinite plural form, e. g., den gröna stolen ("the green chair"), det gröna huset ("the green house"), and de gröna stolarna ("the green chairs"). Swedish pronouns are similar to those of English. Besides
1520-413: A village, Gammalsvenskby ("Old Swedish Village"). A few elderly people in the village still speak a Swedish dialect and observe the holidays of the Swedish calendar, although their dialect is most likely facing extinction. From 1918 to 1940, when Estonia was independent, the small Swedish community was well treated. Municipalities with a Swedish majority, mainly found along the coast, used Swedish as
1615-524: A week the Danish–Norwegians took Uddevalla, Vänersborg, and Åmål and on 6 October they demanded the surrender of Gothenburg . The invading troops met little resistance, and occupied Uddevalla, Vänersborg and Åmål within a week, but were later stopped at Gothenburg. Out of 10,000 soldiers, the Norwegians lost only 8 in the ensuing confrontations. By this time, Gustav III himself had arrived in
1710-676: Is a North Germanic language from the Indo-European language family , spoken predominantly in Sweden and parts of Finland . It has at least 10 million native speakers, making it the fourth most spoken Germanic language , and the first among its type in the Nordic countries overall. Swedish, like the other Nordic languages , is a descendant of Old Norse , the common language of the Germanic peoples living in Scandinavia during
1805-892: Is an Indo-European language belonging to the North Germanic branch of the Germanic languages . In the established classification, it belongs to the East Scandinavian languages , together with Danish , separating it from the West Scandinavian languages , consisting of Faroese , Icelandic , and Norwegian . However, more recent analyses divide the North Germanic languages into two groups: Insular Scandinavian (Faroese and Icelandic), and Continental Scandinavian (Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish), based on mutual intelligibility due to heavy influence of East Scandinavian (particularly Danish) on Norwegian during
1900-481: Is generally seen as adding specific Central Swedish features to the new Bible. Though it might seem as if the Bible translation set a very powerful precedent for orthographic standards, spelling actually became more inconsistent during the remainder of the century. It was not until the 17th century that spelling began to be discussed, around the time when the first grammars were written. Capitalization during this time
1995-538: Is marked primarily through suffixes (endings), complemented with separate definite and indefinite articles . The prosody features both stress and in most dialects tonal qualities. The language has a comparatively large vowel inventory. Swedish is also notable for the voiceless dorso-palatal velar fricative , a highly variable consonant phoneme . Swedish nouns and adjectives are declined in genders as well as number . Nouns are of common gender ( en form) or neuter gender ( ett form). The gender determines
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#17327733999532090-568: Is often one of the most noticeable differences between dialects. The standard word order is, as in most Germanic languages , V2 , which means that the finite verb (V) appears in the second position (2) of a declarative main clause . Swedish morphology is similar to English; that is, words have comparatively few inflections . Swedish has two genders and is generally seen to have two grammatical cases – nominative and genitive (except for pronouns that, as in English, also are inflected in
2185-638: Is one of the official languages of the European Union , and one of the working languages of the Nordic Council . Under the Nordic Language Convention , citizens of the Nordic countries speaking Swedish have the opportunity to use their native language when interacting with official bodies in other Nordic countries without being liable for interpretation or translation costs. The Swedish Language Council ( Språkrådet )
2280-475: Is termed nusvenska (lit., "Now-Swedish") in linguistics, and started in the last decades of the 19th century. It saw a democratization of the language with a less formal written form that approached the spoken one. The growth of a public school system also led to the evolution of so-called boksvenska (literally, "book Swedish"), especially among the working classes, where spelling to some extent influenced pronunciation, particularly in official contexts. With
2375-527: Is the predominant language; in 19 municipalities , 16 of which are located in Åland , Swedish is the sole official language. Åland county is an autonomous region of Finland. According to a rough estimation, as of 2010 there were up to 300,000 Swedish-speakers living outside Sweden and Finland. The largest populations were in the United States (up to 100,000), the UK, Spain and Germany (c. 30,000 each) and
2470-455: Is the regulator of Swedish in Sweden but does not attempt to enforce control of the language, as for instance the Académie française does for French . However, many organizations and agencies require the use of the council's publication Svenska skrivregler in official contexts, with it otherwise being regarded as a de facto orthographic standard. Among the many organizations that make up
2565-407: Is the sole official language of Åland (an autonomous province under the sovereignty of Finland), where the vast majority of the 26,000 inhabitants speak Swedish as a first language. In Finland as a whole, Swedish is one of the two "national" languages, with the same official status as Finnish (spoken by the majority) at the state level and an official language in some municipalities . Swedish
2660-631: Is the term used for the medieval Swedish language. The start date is usually set to 1225 since this is the year that Västgötalagen ("the Västgöta Law") is believed to have been compiled for the first time. It is among the most important documents of the period written in Latin script and the oldest Swedish law codes . Old Swedish is divided into äldre fornsvenska (1225–1375) and yngre fornsvenska (1375–1526), "older" and "younger" Old Swedish. Important outside influences during this time came with
2755-465: The Gustav Vasa Bible , a translation deemed so successful and influential that, with revisions incorporated in successive editions, it remained the most common Bible translation until 1917. The main translators were Laurentius Andreæ and the brothers Laurentius and Olaus Petri . The Vasa Bible is often considered to be a reasonable compromise between old and new; while not adhering to
2850-638: The Battle of Stellau (1201), but was reconquered by the Count of Schauenburg and his allies in the Battle of Bornhöved (1227) . The Counts of Schauenburg and Holstein partitioned Holstein several times among the inheriting sons into up to six lines, named after their towns of residence: In 1386 King Oluf II of Denmark and his mother, Queen Margaret I , enfeoffed in Nyborg Gerhard VI, Count of Holstein-Rendsburg and his cognatic successors with
2945-467: The French vous (see T-V distinction ). Ni wound up being used as a slightly less familiar form of du , the singular second person pronoun, used to address people of lower social status. With the liberalization and radicalization of Swedish society in the 1950s and 1960s, these class distinctions became less important, and du became the standard, even in formal and official contexts. Though
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3040-834: The Holcetae , a Saxon tribe mentioned by Adam of Bremen as living on the north bank of the Elbe, to the west of Hamburg. The name means "dwellers in the wood" or "hill-sitters" (Northern Low Saxon: Hol(t)saten ; German: Holzsassen ). After the Migration Period of the Early Middle Ages , Holstein was adjacent to the Obotrites on the coast of the Baltic Sea and the land of the Danes in Jutland . With
3135-551: The Norwegian army . The attack was directed towards the region known as Bohuslän in Sweden, and was supposed to act as a diversion to relieve Russia , who was an ally of Denmark–Norway and had recently been attacked by Sweden ( Gustav III's Russian War ). This forced Denmark–Norway to honour their alliance between the two states that had been signed in 1773. When Gustav III of Sweden on his own initiative, and unconstitutionally , attacked Russia in 1788 and thereby started
3230-532: The Russo-Swedish War of 1788–90 , Denmark-Norway found itself in an awkward position. In the 1773 Treaty of Tsarskoye Selo , Denmark–Norway had committed itself to assist with 12,000 men, six ships of the line and three frigates in the case Russia were to be attacked. Soon after the Swedish attack, the Russians demanded that Denmark–Norway keep its promise, and Denmark–Norway was thus forced to join
3325-518: The United States , particularly during the 19th and early 20th centuries, there was a significant Swedish-speaking immigrant population. This was notably true in states like Minnesota , where many Swedish immigrants settled. By 1940, approximately 6% of Minnesota's population spoke Swedish. Although the use of Swedish has significantly declined, it is not uncommon to find older generations and communities that still retain some use and knowledge of
3420-585: The Viking Age . It is largely mutually intelligible with Norwegian and Danish , although the degree of mutual intelligibility is dependent on the dialect and accent of the speaker. Standard Swedish , spoken by most Swedes , is the national language that evolved from the Central Swedish dialects in the 19th century, and was well established by the beginning of the 20th century. While distinct regional varieties and rural dialects still exist,
3515-581: The nationalist ideas that emerged during the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the languages have separate orthographies , dictionaries, grammars, and regulatory bodies. Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish are thus from a linguistic perspective more accurately described as a dialect continuum of Scandinavian (North Germanic), and some of the dialects, such as those on the border between Norway and Sweden, especially parts of Bohuslän , Dalsland , western Värmland , western Dalarna , Härjedalen , Jämtland , and Scania , could be described as intermediate dialects of
3610-410: The object form) – although it is debated if the genitive in Swedish should be seen as a genitive case or just the nominative plus the so-called genitive s , then seen as a clitic . Swedish has two grammatical numbers – plural and singular . Adjectives have discrete comparative and superlative forms and are also inflected according to gender, number and definiteness . The definiteness of nouns
3705-399: The 1950s, when their use was removed from all official recommendations. A very significant change in Swedish occurred in the late 1960s, with the so-called du-reformen . Previously, the proper way to address people of the same or higher social status had been by title and surname. The use of herr ("Mr." or "Sir"), fru ("Mrs." or "Ma'am") or fröken ("Miss") was considered
3800-485: The 8th century, the common Germanic language of Scandinavia, Proto-Norse , evolved into Old Norse. This language underwent more changes that did not spread to all of Scandinavia, which resulted in the appearance of two similar dialects: Old West Norse (Norway, the Faroe Islands and Iceland) and Old East Norse (Denmark and Sweden). The dialects of Old East Norse spoken in Sweden are called Runic Swedish , while
3895-637: The British occupation government elevated the province to the State of Schleswig-Holstein , followed by the official dissolution of Prussia in 1947. For a list of rulers, see Counts of Schauenburg and Holstein and List of rulers of Schleswig-Holstein . As of 1864, Holstein bordered Denmark in the north, the Principality of Lübeck (formerly the Prince-Bishopric of Lübeck, an exclave of
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3990-769: The Duchies, and soon the German Confederation, led by Prussia and Austria , went to the Second Schleswig War with Denmark, quickly defeating it in 1864 and forcing it to cede the duchies. However, the duchies were not given to the Duke of Augustenborg. In 1865 an arrangement was worked out between Prussia and Austria where the Austrians occupied and administered Holstein, while the Prussians did
4085-622: The Duchy of Schleswig, a Danish fief. Through the Treaty of Ribe (1460) Christian was elected Count of Holstein-Rendsburg, then still a Saxe-Lauenburgian subfief within the Holy Roman Empire. In 1474 Lauenburg's liege lord , the German Emperor Frederick III , elevated Christian I as Count of Holstein-Rendsburg to Duke of Holstein, thus becoming an immediate imperial ( reichsunmittelbar ) vassal (see imperial immediacy ). The Duchy of Holstein retained that status until
4180-627: The Duchy of Schleswig. He thus became as Gerhard II duke of Schleswig. Until 1390 the Rendsburg branch united by inheritance all branches except of that of Holstein-Pinneberg. When the Holstein-Rendsburg line of the Schauenburg counts became extinct with the death of Adolf VIII of Holstein-Rendsburg (and in personal union as Adolf I Duke of Schleswig) in 1459, Christian I of Denmark inherited – from his maternal uncle Adolf I –
4275-519: The Elder conveniently called Duke of Schleswig-Holstein-Haderslev produced no issue, so no branch emerged from his side. Similar to the above-mentioned agreement Christian III's youngest son John the Younger gained for him and his heirs a share in Holstein's and Schleswig's revenues in 1564, comprising a third of the royal share, thus a ninth of Holstein and Schleswig as to the fiscal point of view. John
4370-594: The German County of Holstein (German: Grafschaft Holstein ; 811–1474), the later Duchy of Holstein (German: Herzogtum Holstein ; 1474–1866), and was the northernmost territory of the Holy Roman Empire . The history of Holstein is closely intertwined with the history of the Danish Duchy of Schleswig (Danish: Slesvig ). The capital of Holstein is Kiel . Holstein's name comes from
4465-471: The Modern Swedish period were the gradual assimilation of several different consonant clusters into the fricative [ʃ] and later into [ɧ] . There was also the gradual softening of [ɡ] and [k] into [j] and the fricative [ɕ] before front vowels . The velar fricative [ɣ] was also transformed into the corresponding plosive [ɡ] . The period that includes Swedish as it is spoken today
4560-753: The Saxons were restored to Western Holstein. The Wagrians were pushed out of the Limes Saxoniae - the new border running from the Elbe River near Boizenburg northwards along the Bille River to the mouth of the Schwentine at the Kiel Fjord and the Baltic Sea . For the following 300 years, Holstein continued to be a part of Saxony. The new county of Holstein was established in 1111; it
4655-601: The Swedish Language Council, the Swedish Academy (established 1786) is arguably the most influential. Its primary instruments are the spelling dictionary Svenska Akademiens ordlista ( SAOL , currently in its 14th edition) and the dictionary Svenska Akademiens Ordbok , in addition to various books on grammar, spelling and manuals of style. Although the dictionaries have a prescriptive element, they mainly describe current usage. In Finland,
4750-464: The Younger and his heirs, however, had no share in the condominial rule, so they were not ruling but mere titular dukes. The share of John the Elder, who died in 1581, was halved between Adolf and Frederick II, thus increasing again the royal share by a fiscal sixth of Holstein and Schleswig. As an effect the complicated fiscal division of both separate duchies, Holstein and Schleswig, with shares of each party scattered in both duchies, provided them with
4845-502: The administrative language and Swedish-Estonian culture saw an upswing. However, most Swedish-speaking people fled to Sweden before the end of World War II , that is, before the invasion of Estonia by the Soviet army in 1944. Only a handful of speakers remain. Swedish dialects have either 17 or 18 vowel phonemes , 9 long and 9 short. As in the other Germanic languages, including English, most long vowels are phonetically paired with one of
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#17327733999534940-515: The armistice in stages to May 1789. Faced with the armistice, threats of a joint attack on Holstein from both Great Britain and Prussia , and an ever more strongly defended Gothenburg, the Danish–Norwegian troops marched off on 12 November 1788 toward Norway, and Gustav III could use this as an excuse to call it a victory. This was convenient for Sweden since the fighting on the Finnish front
5035-568: The brothers. The estates, whose revenues were assigned to the parties, made Holstein and Schleswig look like patchworks, technically inhibiting the emergence of separate new duchies, as intended by the estates of the duchies. The secular rule in the fiscally divided duchies thus became a condominium of the parties. As dukes of Holstein and Schleswig the rulers of both houses bore the formal title of "Duke of Schleswig, Holstein, Ditmarsh and Stormarn ". The three shares are usually called: The dynastic name Holstein-Gottorp comes as convenient usage from
5130-501: The city and took resolute action; he dismissed the passive Lieutenant General Anders Rudolf du Rietz and replaced him with Lieutenant General Johan Sparre af Söfdeborg . The defenses of Gothenburg were quickly strengthened. In addition, the British ambassador to Copenhagen Sir Hugh Elliot arrived in Gothenburg and brokered a short armistice with the Danish–Norwegian commander on 9 October. Delaying and stalling tactics prolonged
5225-504: The colloquial spoken language of its day, it was not overly conservative in its use of archaic forms. It was a major step towards a more consistent Swedish orthography . It established the use of the vowels "å", "ä", and "ö", and the spelling "ck" in place of "kk", distinguishing it clearly from the Danish Bible, perhaps intentionally, given the ongoing rivalry between the countries. All three translators came from central Sweden, which
5320-459: The command of Prince Charles of Hesse attacked Bohuslän from Norway on 24 September and advanced quickly toward Vänersborg meeting feeble Swedish resistance. Colonel Johan Werner Tranefelt ensconced himself in Kvistrum north of Uddevalla with his 700 men but was defeated on 29 September by a much larger Danish–Norwegian force led by Major General Johann Friedrich von und zu Mansbach . In
5415-493: The conflict do not reflect the real suffering caused by it: the Danish–Norwegian army lost 1,500-3,000 men to hunger, disease, poor sanitary conditions, and exposure to continual autumn rainfall. On 12 November, the Norwegian division retreated back to Norway. On 9 July 1789, before the threat of a combined might of Britain and Prussia, Denmark-Norway agreed to cease active engagement in the conflict. A statement of neutrality
5510-623: The conquest of Old Saxony by Charlemagne circa 800, he granted the land north of the Eider River (Schleswig) to the Danes by the Treaty of Heiligen signed in 811. The ownership of what would late become eastern Holstein (districts of Plön and Ostholstein) was given to the Obotrites , namely the Wagrians , and the Saxon elite was deported to various areas of the empire. After 814, however,
5605-419: The death of King Frederick VII of Denmark ( House of Oldenburg ) in 1863, the inheritance of Schleswig and Holstein was disputed. The new king, Christian IX ( House of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg , a cadet branch of the House of Oldenburg), made his claim to the Danish throne through a female line. The Duke of Augustenborg , a minor scion from another cadet line of the House of Oldenburg, claimed
5700-403: The declension of the adjectives . For example, the word fisk ("fish") is a noun of common gender ( en fisk ) and can have the following forms: The definite singular form of a noun is created by adding a suffix ( -en , -n , -et or -t ), depending on its gender and if the noun ends in a vowel or not. The definite articles den , det , and de are used for variations to the definitiveness of
5795-415: The dialects of Denmark are referred to as Runic Danish . The dialects are described as "runic" because the main body of text appears in the runic alphabet . Unlike Proto-Norse, which was written with the Elder Futhark alphabet, Old Norse was written with the Younger Futhark alphabet, which had only 16 letters. Because the number of runes was limited, some runes were used for a range of phonemes , such as
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#17327733999535890-479: The dissolution of the Empire in 1806. In 1490, the Duchy of Holstein was divided into Holstein-Segeberg and Holstein-Gottorp . Holstein-Segeberg remained with the Danish king and was also known as Royal Holstein ; later it came to be known as Holstein-Glückstadt . Holstein-Gottorp, also known as Ducal Holstein , was given to a cadet branch of the House of Oldenburg , to which the kings of Denmark belonged. Between 1533 and 1544 King Christian III of Denmark ruled
5985-435: The entire Duchies of Holstein and of Schleswig also in the name of his then still minor half-brothers John the Elder and Adolf . In 1544 they partitioned the Duchies of Holstein (a fief of the Holy Roman Empire) and of Schleswig (a Danish fief) in an unusual way, following negotiations between the brothers and the Estates of the Realm of the duchies, which had constituted in 1460 by the Treaty of Ribe and strictly opposed
6080-489: The firm establishment of the Christian church and various monastic orders, introducing many Greek and Latin loanwords. With the rise of Hanseatic power in the late 13th and early 14th century, Middle Low German became very influential. The Hanseatic league provided Swedish commerce and administration with a large number of Low German -speaking immigrants. Many became quite influential members of Swedish medieval society, and brought terms from their native languages into
6175-430: The industrialization and urbanization of Sweden well under way by the last decades of the 19th century, a new breed of authors made their mark on Swedish literature . Many scholars, politicians and other public figures had a great influence on the emerging national language, among them prolific authors like the poet Gustaf Fröding , Nobel laureate Selma Lagerlöf and radical writer and playwright August Strindberg . It
6270-499: The islands (e. g., Hiiumaa , Vormsi , Ruhnu ; in Swedish, known as Dagö , Ormsö , Runö , respectively) along the coast of the Baltic , communities that today have all disappeared. The Swedish-speaking minority was represented in parliament , and entitled to use their native language in parliamentary debates. After the loss of Estonia to the Russian Empire in the early 18th century, around 1,000 Estonian Swedish speakers were forced to march to southern Ukraine , where they founded
6365-484: The language, particularly in rural communities like Lindström and Scandia . Swedish is the official main language of Sweden. Swedish is also one of two official languages of Finland. In Sweden, it has long been used in local and state government, and most of the educational system, but remained only a de facto primary language with no official status in law until 2009. A bill was proposed in 2005 that would have made Swedish an official language, but failed to pass by
6460-413: The last millennium and divergence from both Faroese and Icelandic. By many general criteria of mutual intelligibility, the Continental Scandinavian languages could very well be considered dialects of a common Scandinavian language. However, because of several hundred years of sometimes quite intense rivalry between Denmark and Sweden, including a long series of wars from the 16th to 18th centuries, and
6555-404: The narrowest possible margin (145–147) due to a pairing-off failure. A proposal for a broader language law, designating Swedish as the main language of the country and bolstering the status of the minority languages, was submitted by an expert committee to the Swedish Ministry of Culture in March 2008. It was subsequently enacted by the Riksdag , and entered into effect on 1 July 2009. Swedish
6650-421: The national standard languages. Swedish pronunciations also vary greatly from one region to another, a legacy of the vast geographic distances and historical isolation. Even so, the vocabulary is standardized to a level that make dialects within Sweden virtually fully mutually intelligible. East Germanic languages West Germanic languages Icelandic Faroese Norwegian Danish Swedish In
6745-424: The north. An early change that separated Runic Danish from the other dialects of Old East Norse was the change of the diphthong æi to the monophthong é , as in stæinn to sténn "stone". This is reflected in runic inscriptions where the older read stain and the later stin . There was also a change of au as in dauðr into a long open ø as in døðr "dead". This change is shown in runic inscriptions as
6840-441: The only acceptable way to begin conversation with strangers of unknown occupation, academic title or military rank. The fact that the listener should preferably be referred to in the third person tended to further complicate spoken communication between members of society. In the early 20th century, an unsuccessful attempt was made to replace the insistence on titles with ni —the standard second person plural pronoun)—analogous to
6935-402: The original Germanic three- gender system. Nouns , adjectives , pronouns and certain numerals were inflected in four cases; besides the extant nominative , there were also the genitive (later possessive ), dative and accusative . The gender system resembled that of modern German , having masculine, feminine and neuter genders. The masculine and feminine genders were later merged into
7030-480: The reform was not an act of any centralized political decree, but rather the result of sweeping change in social attitudes, it was completed in just a few years, from the late 1960s to early 1970s. The use of ni as a polite form of address is sometimes encountered today in both the written and spoken language, particularly among older speakers. Swedish is the sole official national language of Sweden , and one of two in Finland (alongside Finnish ). As of 2006, it
7125-468: The rune for the vowel u , which was also used for the vowels o , ø and y , and the rune for i , also used for e . From 1200 onwards, the dialects in Denmark began to diverge from those of Sweden. The innovations spread unevenly from Denmark, creating a series of minor dialectal boundaries, or isoglosses , ranging from Zealand in the south to Norrland , Österbotten and northwestern Finland in
7220-615: The same in Schleswig. This arrangement came to an end with the Austro-Prussian War of 1866, which resulted in Schleswig and Holstein both being incorporated into Prussia as the Province of Schleswig-Holstein . Holstein, meanwhile including former Saxe-Lauenburg (as of 1876) and the former Free and Hanseatic City of Lübeck and Region of Lübeck (both as of 1937) regained statehood, now united with Schleswig, in 1946, when
7315-444: The short /e/ (transcribed ⟨ ɛ ⟩ in the chart below). There are 18 consonant phonemes, two of which, / ɧ / and /r/ , vary considerably in pronunciation depending on the dialect and social status of the speaker. In many dialects, sequences of /r/ (pronounced alveolarly) with a dental consonant result in retroflex consonants ; alveolarity of the pronunciation of /r/ is a precondition for this retroflexion. /r/ has
7410-428: The short vowels, and the pairs are such that the two vowels are of similar quality , but with the short vowel being slightly lower and slightly centralized. In contrast to e.g. Danish, which has only tense vowels, the short vowels are slightly more lax, but the tense vs. lax contrast is not nearly as pronounced as in English, German or Dutch. In many dialects, the short vowel sound pronounced [ɛ] or [æ] has merged with
7505-472: The subject in a clause, a trait that is restricted to North Germanic languages: Holstein Holstein ( German pronunciation: [ˈhɔlʃtaɪn] ; Northern Low Saxon : Holsteen ; Danish : Holsten ; Latin : Holsatia ) is the region between the rivers Elbe and Eider . It is the southern half of Schleswig-Holstein , the northernmost state of Germany . Holstein once existed as
7600-548: The technically more correct Duke of Schleswig and Holstein at Gottorp . Adolf, the third son of Duke and King Frederick I and the second youngest half-brother of King Christian III , founded the dynastic branch called House of Holstein-Gottorp , which is a cadet branch of the then royal Danish House of Oldenburg . The Danish monarchs and the Dukes of Holstein-Gottorp ruled both duchies together as to general government, however, collected their revenues in their separate estates. John
7695-534: The two cases and two genders of modern Swedish. A transitional change of the Latin script in the Nordic countries was to spell the letter combination "ae" as æ – and sometimes as a' – though it varied between persons and regions. The combination "ao" was similarly rendered a , and "oe" became o . These three were later to evolve into the separate letters ä , å and ö . The first time the new letters were used in print
7790-517: The two natural genders han and hon ("he" and "she"), there are also the two grammatical genders den and det , usually termed common and neuter . In recent years, a gender-neutral pronoun hen has been introduced, particularly in literary Swedish. Unlike the nouns, pronouns have an additional object form, derived from the old dative form. Hon , for example, has the following nominative, possessive, and object forms: Swedish also uses third-person possessive reflexive pronouns that refer to
7885-500: The view in later times that the war in practice was a theatrical spectacle rather than a "real" martial conflict. In Norwegian, the war is known as Tyttebærkrigen after the Norwegian word for the mountain cranberry , in remembrance of how the Norwegian troops, denied assistance by the local population, had to live off the land in berry season. Swedish language This is an accepted version of this page Swedish ( endonym : svenska [ˈsvɛ̂nːska] )
7980-439: The vocabulary. Besides a great number of loanwords for such areas as warfare, trade and administration, general grammatical suffixes and even conjunctions were imported. The League also brought a certain measure of influence from Danish (at the time Swedish and Danish were much more similar than today). Early Old Swedish was markedly different from the modern language in that it had a more complex case structure and also retained
8075-401: The war. When Gustav III received news of this, he exclaimed "I am saved!". Considering that the attack on Russia was Gustav's own initiative, that many Swedish officers and the king's opponents were strongly against the war (see Anjala conspiracy ), and that the war was not being fought very successfully, this exclamation might seem strange. However, Gustav III the astute politician saw this as
8170-584: The written language is uniform and standardized . Swedish is the most widely spoken second language in Finland where its status is co- official language . Swedish was long spoken in parts of Estonia , although the current status of the Estonian Swedish speakers is almost extinct. It is also used in the Swedish diaspora , most notably in Oslo , Norway, with more than 50,000 Swedish residents. Swedish
8265-546: Was again united in one state. The territory of Holstein was enlarged by the conquest of the independent Republic of Dithmarschen in 1559, which was divided among the three ducal houses. After 1581 the southern part remained to the Danish Crown, the northern part was ruled by the House of Gottorp until 1773. With the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire in 1806 Holstein's imperial vassal status turned void. It thus became
8360-484: Was during the 20th century that a common, standardized national language became available to all Swedes. The orthography finally stabilized and became almost completely uniform, with some minor deviations, by the time of the spelling reform of 1906. With the exception of plural forms of verbs and a slightly different syntax, particularly in the written language, the language was the same as the Swedish of today. The plural verb forms appeared decreasingly in formal writing into
8455-647: Was first a fief of the Duchy of Saxony , then of the Duchy of Saxe-Lauenburg , and finally of the Prince-Bishopric of Lübeck . With the establishment of the new territorial unit, expansion to the East began and the Wagrians were finally defeated in 1138. The County of Holstein was ruled by the House of Schaumburg ; the first count was Adolf I, Count of Holstein . Holstein was temporarily occupied by Denmark after
8550-656: Was in Aff dyäffwlsens frästilse ("By the Devil's temptation") published by Johan Gerson in 1495. Modern Swedish (Swedish: nysvenska ) begins with the advent of the printing press and the European Reformation . After assuming power, the new monarch Gustav Vasa ordered a Swedish translation of the Bible . The New Testament was published in 1526, followed by a full Bible translation in 1541, usually referred to as
8645-465: Was issued by Denmark-Norway, not a formal peace treaty. Frederik von Haxthausen took part in this campaign as an officer. As a result of the disastrous provision of the troops, which was the cause of a fatal plague among them, he travelled abroad in 1793 in order to study military supply provision. To do this he visited the Prussian, Austrian and other armies. The Swedish term "Theatre War" reflects
8740-523: Was not standardized. It depended on the authors and their background. Those influenced by German capitalized all nouns, while others capitalized more sparsely. It is also not always apparent which letters are capitalized owing to the Gothic or blackletter typeface that was used to print the Bible. This typeface was in use until the mid-18th century, when it was gradually replaced with a Latin typeface (often Antiqua ). Some important changes in sound during
8835-697: Was planning an attack on Denmark to recover the Holstein-Gottorp lands possessions in Schleswig, which were seized by the Danish king in 1713. Although Peter was soon overthrown by his wife, Catherine the Great , the Danes determined to rid themselves of this problem. In 1773, they exchanged the County of Oldenburg for the Gottorp lands in Holstein, bringing all of Holstein under their control. Thus, Holstein
8930-537: Was the sole native language of 83% of Swedish residents. In 2007, around 5.5% (c. 290,000) of the population of Finland were native speakers of Swedish, partially due to a decline following the Russian annexation of Finland after the Finnish War 1808–1809. The Fenno-Swedish - speaking minority is concentrated in the coastal areas and archipelagos of southern and western Finland. In some of these areas, Swedish
9025-479: Was very much still in progress. The success could have turned into a debâcle when it was revealed that a lieutenant Benzelstjärna with the king's approval had planned to burn the seven Russian ships in the Copenhagen harbor. Through the revelation the plans were never carried out. The attacking Danish–Norwegian force only lost eight men through acts of war. The almost frivolous Swedish and Norwegian names for
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