Languages of the Faroe Islands
Appearance
Languages of Faroe Islands | |
---|---|
Official | Faroese, Danish |
Foreign | Danish, English and German |
Signed | Faroese Sign Language |
Keyboard layout |
The national
Faroese is similar in grammar to
Kingdom of Denmark, Danish
is taught in Faroese schools.
Historically
This section needs additional citations for verification. (July 2019) |
20 most used first languages in the Faroe Islands (2014)[3] | |
---|---|
Faroese | 45,361 (90.8%) |
Danish | 1,546 (3.1%) |
Icelandic | 201 (0.4%) |
English | 190 (0.3%) |
Filipino | 103 (0.2%) |
Norwegian | 99 (0.2%) |
Thai | 86 (0.1%) |
Romanian | 67 (0.1%) |
Greenlandic | 62 (0.1%) |
Serbian | 57 (0.1%) |
Russian | 55 (0.1%) |
Spanish | 49 (0.1%) |
Swedish | 45 (0.09%) |
Polish | 40 (0.08%) |
Chinese | 29 (0.06%) |
Croatian | 25 |
Portuguese | 19 |
French | 18 |
German | 17 |
Dutch | 13 |
The first recorded settlers of the Faroe Islands were Irish monks (
speaking when the Norse arrived.Norse settlers arrived in the middle of the 9th century, bringing their West Norse language (from which the Faroese language evolved).
Other groups are known to have lived in the Faroes as well. These include Norwegian peoples, and this is evident in certain Faroese places names, such as Signabøur (Bø of 'Sygnir') and Øravík (bay of 'Hörðir'). People from Suðuroy also refer to 'Frísarnir í Akrabergi' (The Frisians of Akraberg).
English and German are sometimes used for the purposes of tourism. Norwegian is occasionally heard too, due to the islands' geographical proximity to Norway.[citation needed]
References
- ^ "Layouts: Faroese (fo)". www.unicode.org.
- ^ "The Language of the Faroe Islands". Visit Faroe Islands. Retrieved 2020-11-28.
- ^ "Filipinsk og teilenskt vunnu fram sum móðurmál - Hagstova Føroya". www.hagstova.fo. Archived from the original on 2018-07-29. Retrieved 2015-01-16.