History of the Dutch language
Among the words with which Dutch has enriched the English vocabulary are: brandy, coleslaw, cookie, cruiser, dock, easel, freight, landscape, spook, stoop, and yacht. Dutch is noteworthy as the language of an outstanding
Relation to the Germanic languages group
Within the Indo-European language tree, Dutch is grouped within the Germanic languages, which means it shares a common ancestor with languages such as English, German, and Scandinavian languages.
This common, but not direct, ancestor (
There are no known documents in Proto-Germanic, which was unwritten, and virtually all our knowledge of this early language has been obtained by application of the
West Germanic
From the time of their earliest attestation, the Germanic dialects were divided into three groups,
During the Early Middle Ages, the West Germanic languages were separated by the insular development of Old English (Anglo-Saxon) and related Old Frisian, the High German consonant shift, and the relatively conservative (in respect to common West Germanic) ancestors of Low Saxon and Old Dutch.
Frankish language
The Frankish language, also Old Frankish was the language of the Franks. Classified as a West Germanic language, it was spoken in areas covering modern France, Germany, and the Low Countries in Merovingian times, preceding the 6th/7th century. The Franks first established themselves in the Netherlands and Flanders before they started to fight their way down south and east. The language had a significant impact on Old French. It evolved into
The singular direct attestation from Old Frankish is the Bergakker inscription, that was found in 1996 near the Dutch town of Bergakker, near Tiel. It is a 5th-century Elder Futhark inscription on a metal mount for a sword scabbard.
The inscription can be read as
- ha?VþV??s : ann : kVsjam :
- : logVns :
where V is a non-standard rune, apparently a vowel (variously read as e or u, or as "any vowel").
Several readings have been presented in literature. Quak (2000) for example, reads "Ha(þu)þ[e]was ann k(u)sjam log(u)ns", interpreting it as "[property] of Haþuþewaz. I bestow upon the choosers of the swords".
Old Dutch
Old Dutch is the language ancestral to the Low Franconian languages, including Dutch itself. It was spoken between the 6th and 11th centuries, continuing the earlier Old Frankish language. It did not participate in the High German Consonant Shift. In this period a perfect dialect continuum remained between Franconian and Saxon areas, as well as between Low Franconian and Middle or High Franconian. Old Dutch is considered a separate language mainly because it gave rise to the much later Dutch standard language, for contingent political and economic reasons.
The present Dutch standard language is derived from Old Dutch dialects spoken in the Low Countries that were first recorded in the Salic law, a Frankish document written around 510. From this document originated the oldest sentence that has been identified as Dutch: "Maltho thi afrio lito" as sentence used to free a serf. Other old segments of Dutch are "Visc flot aftar themo uuatare" ("A fish was swimming in the water") and "Gelobistu in got alamehtigan fadaer" ("Do you believe in God the almighty father"). The latter fragment was written around 900.
Arguably the most famous text containing what is traditionally taken to be Old Dutch is: "Hebban olla vogala nestas hagunnan, hinase hic enda tu, wat unbidan we nu" ("All birds have started making nests, except me and you, what are we waiting for"), dating around the year 1100, written by a Flemish monk in a convent in Rochester, England.
The oldest known single word is wad, attested in the toponym vadam (modern Wadenoijen), meaning a ford (where one wades), in Tacitus's Histories.[2]
Middle Dutch
Linguistically speaking, Middle Dutch is a collective name for closely related dialects which were spoken and written between about 1150 and 1550 in the present-day Dutch-speaking region. There was at that time as yet no overarching standard language, but they were all probably mutually intelligible.
In historic literature Diets and Middle Dutch (Middelnederlands) are used interchangeably to describe the ancestor of Modern Dutch. Although almost from the beginning, several Middle Dutch variations emerged, the similarities between the different regional languages were likely much stronger than their differences, especially for written languages and various literary works of that time.
Within Middle Dutch five large groups can be distinguished:
- Flemish, (sometimes subdivided into West and East Flemish), was spoken in the modern region of West and East Flanders;
- Antwerp as well as the Brusselscapital region;
- ;
- Limburgish, spoken by the people in the district of modern Limburg, Belgian Limburg and in the neighbouring regions of Germany (North Rhine-Westphalia);
- Low Saxon, spoken in the area of the modern provinces of Gelderland, Overijssel, Drenthe and parts of Groningen.
The last two of the Middle Dutch dialects mentioned above could also be considered part of, respectively, Middle High German and Middle Low German, on purely linguistical grounds. The Dutch state border would later intersect these dialect areas and as a result regions west of it would use the Dutch standard language, the reason why they are subsumed under Middle Dutch.
Standardization and Modern Dutch
A process of
Genesis 1:1–3 | |
---|---|
Dutch from 1637 | Contemporary Dutch |
Inden beginne schiep Godt den Hemel, ende de Aerde. | In het begin schiep God de hemel en de aarde |
De Aerde nu was woest ende ledich, ende duysternisse was op den afgront: ende de Geest Godts sweefde op de Wateren. | De aarde nu was woest en leeg, en duisternis was op de afgrond, en de Geest van God zweefde over de wateren. |
Ende Godt seyde: Daer zy Licht: ende daer wert Licht. | En God zei: Laat er licht zijn! En er was licht. |
Development of Germanic sounds
Vowels
Proto-Germanic | Old Dutch | Middle Dutch | Modern Dutch | ||
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Closed Syllable | Open Syllable | Closed Syllable | Open Syllable | ||
a | a | ɑ | ɑː | ɑ | aː |
ɛ (i-umlaut) | ɛ | ɛː | ɛ | eː | |
e | e | ||||
i | i | ɪ | eː | ɪ | |
u | u, o | ɔ | ɔː | ɔ | oː |
y, ø (i-umlaut) | ʏ | øː | ʏ | øː | |
ɛː | aː | aː | aː | ||
iː | iː | iː | ɛi & iː (before r) | ||
eː | ie | iə | i | ||
eu | io | ||||
iu | iu | ||||
yː | œy & yː (before r) | ||||
uː | yː | ||||
oː | uo | uə | u | ||
ai | eː | eː | eː | ||
ei̯ (i-umlaut/irregular) | ɛi | ɛi | |||
au | oː | oː | oː |
Specific sound changes
Proto-Germanic | Old Dutch | Middle Dutch | Modern Dutch |
---|---|---|---|
-ɛ:- (before hiatus) | -a:- | -ai̯:- | -ai̯:- |
-o:w- / -o:- (before hiatus) | -uo:i- / -uo:w- | -u:i̯- / -ɑu̯- | -ui̯- / -ɑu̯- |
-u:- (before hiatus) | -u:- | -yu̯- / -ɑu̯- | -yu̯- / -ɑu̯- |
-i:w- | -i:w- | ||
-ɛːw- | -ɛːw- | ||
-iww- | -iww- | ||
-eww- | -eww- | ||
-aww- | -aww- | -o:i̯- / -ɑu- | -oi̯- / -ɑu- |
-iuw- | -iuw- | -iu̯- | -iu̯- |
Consonants
Proto Germanic | Old Dutch | Middle & Modern Dutch | ||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Initial | Between vowels | Geminated | Word final | Initial | Between vowels | Geminated* | Word final | |
k | k- | -k- | -kk- | -k | k- | -k- | -k | |
g ~ ɣ | ɣ- | -ɣ- | -gg- | -x | ɣ- | -ɣ- | -x | |
h ~ x | h- | -∅- (h syncope) | -xx- | h- | -∅- | -x- | ||
p | p- | -p- | -pp- | -p | p- | -p- | -p | |
b ~ β | b- | -v- | -bb- | -f | b- | -v- | -b-, -p* (final) | -f |
f | f- | -f- | -ff- | v- | -f- | |||
t | t- | -t- | -tt- | -t | t- | -t- | -t | |
d ~ ð | d- | -d- | -dd- | d- | -d-, -∅-* (d syncope) | -d- | ||
þ | þ- (> ð) | -þ- | -þþ- | -þ | -s- / -t- | |||
s | s- | -s- | -ss- | -s | z- | -z- | -s- | -s |
-z(-) | – | -r- | -* | -Ø* | – | -r- | – | -r |
Specific sound changes
Proto Germanic | Old Dutch | Modern Dutch |
---|---|---|
ald/uld – alt/ult | ald/uld/old – alt/ult/olt | ɑu̯d – ɑu̯t |
-egi-/-ehi- | -egi-/-ehi- | -ɛi- |
ft | ft | xt |
xs | xs / ss | s |
mb | mb / mm | m |
ŋg | ŋg | ŋ |
wr- | wr- | vr- (Still spelled wr-) |
xl- / xr- / xw- | l- / r- / w- | l- / r- / w- |
References
- ISBN 0-85229-571-5. This long-standing, well-known article on the languages can be found in almost any edition of Britannica.
- ISBN 9020420453.
- ^ "Taal in Nederland .:. Brabants".