Frisian languages
Frisian | |
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Frysk | |
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Native to | Netherlands, Germany |
Region | Friesland, Groningen, Lower Saxony, Schleswig-Holstein |
Ethnicity | Frisians |
Native speakers | 480,000 (ca. 2001 census)[1] |
Early forms |
Old Frisian
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Dialects | |
Latin | |
Official status | |
Official language in |
Netherlands Germany |
Regulated by |
NL: Fryske Akademy D: no official regulation unofficial: the Seelter Buund (for Sater Frisian), the Nordfriisk Instituut (for North Frisian) |
Language codes | |
ISO 639-3 |
Variously: fry – West Frisian frr – North Frisian stq – Saterland Frisian |
Glottolog |
fris1239 [2] |
Linguasphere |
52-ACA |
Present-day distribution of the Frisian languages in Europe:
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The Frisian /ˈfriːʒən/[3] languages are a closely related group of Germanic languages, spoken by about 500,000 Frisian people, who live on the southern fringes of the North Sea in the Netherlands, Germany and Denmark. The Frisian dialects are the closest living languages to English, after Scots. However, modern English and Frisian are unintelligible to each other. Rather, the three Frisian languages have been heavily influenced by and bear similarities to Dutch, Danish, and/or Low German, depending upon their respective locations. Additional shared linguistic characteristics between the Great Yarmouth area, Friesland, and Denmark are likely to have resulted from the close trading relationship these areas maintained during the centuries-long Hanseatic League of the Late Middle Ages.
Division
There are three varieties of Frisian: West Frisian, Saterland Frisian, and North Frisian. Some linguists consider these three varieties, despite their mutual unintelligibility, to be dialects of one single Frisian language, whereas others consider them to be three separate languages, as do their speakers. West Frisian is strongly influenced by Dutch, and, similar to Dutch, is described as being "between" English and German. The other Frisian varieties, meanwhile, have been influenced by German, Low German, and Danish. The North Frisian language especially is further segmented into several strongly diverse dialects. Stadsfries is not Frisian, but a Dutch dialect influenced by Frisian. Frisian is called Frysk in West Frisian, Fräisk in Saterland Frisian, and Frasch, Fresk, Freesk, and Friisk in the dialects of North Frisian.
The situation in the Dutch province of Groningen and the German region of East Frisia is more complex: The local Low Saxon dialects of Gronings and East Frisian Low Saxon are a mixture of Frisian and Low Saxon dialects; it is believed that Frisian was spoken there at one time, only to have been gradually replaced by the language of the city of Groningen. This local language is now, in turn, being replaced by standard Dutch.
Speakers
Most Frisian speakers live in the Netherlands, primarily in the province of Friesland, since 1997 officially using its West Frisian name of Fryslân, where the number of native speakers is about 350,000. An increasing number of native Dutch speakers in the province are learning Frisian as a second language.
In Germany, there are about 2,000[4] speakers of Saterland Frisian in the Saterland region of Lower Saxony; the Saterland's marshy fringe areas have long protected Frisian speech there from pressure by the surrounding Low German and standard German.
In the Nordfriesland (North Frisia) region of the German province of Schleswig-Holstein, there were 10,000 North Frisian speakers in the 1970s.[1] Although many of these live on the mainland, most are found on the islands, notably Sylt, Föhr, Amrum, and Heligoland. The local corresponding North Frisian dialects are still in use.
Status
Saterland and North Frisian[5] are officially recognised and protected as minority languages in Germany, and West Frisian is one of the two official languages in the Netherlands, the other being Dutch.
ISO 639-1 code fy
and ISO 639-2 code fry
were assigned to "Frisian", but that was changed in November 2005 to "Western Frisian". According to the ISO 639 Registration Authority the "previous usage of [this] code has been for Western Frisian, although [the] language name was "Frisian".[6]
The new ISO 639 code stq
is used for the Saterland Frisian language, a variety of Eastern Frisian (not to be confused with East Frisian Low Saxon, a West Low German dialect).
The new ISO 639 code frr
is used for the North Frisian language variants spoken in parts of Schleswig-Holstein.
The Ried fan de Fryske Beweging took care of the Frisian language varieties being constitutionalized. Nevertheless, Saterland Frisian and most dialects of North Frisian are seriously endangered.[7]
History
Old Frisian
In the early Middle Ages the Frisian lands stretched from the area around Bruges, in what is now Belgium, to the river Weser, in northern Germany. At that time, the Frisian language was spoken along the entire southern North Sea coast. Today this region is sometimes referred to as Great Frisia or Frisia Magna, and many of the areas within it still treasure their Frisian heritage, even though in most places the Frisian languages have been lost.
Frisian is the language most closely related to English and Scots, but after at least five hundred years of being subject to the influence of Dutch, modern Frisian in some aspects bears a greater similarity to Dutch than to English; one must also take into account the centuries-long drift of English away from Frisian. Thus the two languages have become less mutually intelligible over time, partly due to the marks which Dutch and Low German have left on Frisian, and partly due to the vast influence some languages (in particular Norman French) have had on English throughout the centuries.
Old Frisian,[8] however, was very similar to Old English. Historically, both English and Frisian are marked by the loss of the Germanic nasal in words like us (ús; uns in German), soft (sêft; sanft) or goose (goes; Gans): see Anglo-Frisian nasal spirant law. Also, when followed by some vowels, the Germanic k softened to a ch sound; for example, the Frisian for cheese and church is tsiis and tsjerke, whereas in Dutch it is kaas and kerk, and in High German the respective words are Käse and Kirche. Contrarily, this did not happen for chin and choose, which are kin and kieze.[9]
One rhyme demonstrates the palpable similarity between Frisian and English: "Butter, bread, and green cheese is good English and good Frise," which is pronounced more or less the same in both languages (Frisian: "Bûter, brea, en griene tsiis is goed Ingelsk en goed Frysk.") [10]
One major difference between Old Frisian and modern Frisian is that in the Old Frisian period (c.1150-c.1550) grammatical cases still existed. Some of the texts that are preserved from this period are from the twelfth or thirteenth, but most are from the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. Generally, all these texts are restricted to legalistic writings. Although the earliest definite written examples of Frisian are from approximately the 9th century, there are a few examples of runic inscriptions from the region which are probably older and possibly in the Frisian language. These runic writings however usually do not amount to more than single- or few-word inscriptions, and cannot be said to constitute literature as such. The transition from the Old Frisian to the Middle Frisian period (c.1550-c.1820) in the sixteenth century is based on the fairly abrupt halt in the use of Frisian as a written language.
Middle Frisian
Up until the fifteenth century Frisian was a language widely spoken and written, but from 1500 onwards it became an almost exclusively oral language, mainly used in rural areas. This was in part due to the occupation of its stronghold, the Dutch province of Friesland (Fryslân), in 1498, by Duke Albert of Saxony, who replaced Frisian as the language of government with Dutch.
Afterwards this practice was continued under the Habsburg rulers of the Netherlands (the German Emperor Charles V and his son, the Spanish King Philip II), and even when the Netherlands became independent, in 1585, Frisian did not regain its former status. The reason for this was the rise of Holland as the dominant part of the Netherlands, and its language, Dutch, as the dominant language in judicial, administrative and religious affairs.
In this period the great Frisian poet Gysbert Japiks (1603–66), a schoolteacher and cantor from the city of Bolsward, who largely fathered modern Frisian literature and orthography, was really an exception to the rule.
His example was not followed until the nineteenth century, when entire generations of Frisian authors and poets appeared. This coincided with the introduction of the so-called newer breaking system, a prominent grammatical feature in almost all West Frisian dialects, with the notable exception of Southwest Frisian. Therefore, the Modern Frisian period is considered to have begun at this point in time, around 1820.
Family tree
Each of the Frisian languages has several dialects. Between some, the differences are such that they rarely hamper understanding; only the number of speakers justifies the denominator of "dialect". In other cases, even neighbouring dialects may hardly be mutually intelligible.
- West Frisian language, spoken in the Netherlands.
- Clay Frisian (Klaaifrysk)
- Wood Frisian (Wâldfrysk)
- Noardhoeks
- South Frisian (Súdhoeks)
- Southwest Frisian (Súdwesthoeksk)
- Schiermonnikoogs
- Hindeloopen Frisian
- Aasters
- Westers
- East Frisian language, spoken in Lower Saxony, Germany.
- Saterland Frisian language
- Several extinct dialects
- North Frisian language, spoken in Schleswig-Holstein, Germany.
- Mainland dialects
- Island dialects
Text samples
The Lord's Prayer
The Lord's Prayer in Standard Western Frisian (Frysk):
- Us Heit, dy't yn de himelen is
- jins namme wurde hillige.
- Jins keninkryk komme.
- Jins wollen barre,
- allyk yn 'e himel
- sa ek op ierde.
- Jou ús hjoed ús deistich brea.
- En ferjou ús ús skulden,
- allyk ek wy ferjouwe ús skuldners.
- En lied ús net yn fersiking,
- mar ferlos ús fan 'e kweade.
- [Want Jowes is it keninkryk en de krêft
- en de hearlikheid oant yn ivichheid.] "Amen"
The English translation in the 1662 Anglican Book of Common Prayer:
- Our Father, which art in Heaven
- Hallowed be thy Name.
- Thy Kingdom come.
- Thy will be done,
- in earth as it is in Heaven.
- Give us this day our daily bread.
- And forgive us our trespasses,
- As we forgive them that trespass against us.
- And lead us not into temptation;
- But deliver us from evil.
- [For thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory,
- For ever and ever.] Amen.
(NB: Which was changed to "who", in earth to "on earth," and them that to "those who" in the 1928 version of the Church of England prayer book and used in other later Anglican prayer books too. However, the words given here are those of the original 1662 book as stated)
The Standard Dutch translation from the Dutch Bible Society
- Onze Vader die in de hemelen zijt,
- Uw naam worde geheiligd;
- Uw Koninkrijk kome;
- Uw wil geschiede,
- gelijk in de hemel alzo ook op de aarde.
- Geef ons heden ons dagelijks brood;
- en vergeef ons onze schulden,
- gelijk ook wij vergeven onze schuldenaren;
- en leid ons niet in verzoeking,
- maar verlos ons van de boze.
- [Want van U is het Koninkrijk
- "en de kracht en de heerlijkheid
- in der eeuwigheid.] Amen.
Comparative sentence
- Saterland Frisian: Die Wänt strookede dät Wucht uum ju Keeuwe un oapede hier ap do Sooken.
- North Frisian (Mooring dialect): Di dreng aide dåt foomen am dåt kan än mäket har aw da siike.
- West Frisian: De jonge streake it famke om it kin en tute har op 'e wangen.
- Gronings: t Jong fleerde t wicht om kinne tou en smokte heur op wange.
- East Frisian Low Saxon: De Fent/Jung straktde dat Wicht um't Kinn to un tuutjede hör up de Wangen.
- Dutch: De jongen aaide/streek het meisje langs haar/de kin en kuste/zoende haar op de wangen.
- Dutch Low Saxon: De jonge strek 't dearntje um de kinne en gaf heur een smok op de wangen.
- German: Der Junge streichelte das Mädchen ums Kinn und küsste es auf die Wange.
- English: The boy stroked the girl around the chin and kissed her on the cheeks.
- Lancashire dialect and accent: Th' lad strorkt 'lass on 'jib an busst er on th' cheaks.
- Modern Scots: The laddie straikit the lassie aboot the chin an kisst her on the chowk.
- Swedish: Pojken strök/smekte flickan på hakan och kysste henne på kinden.
- Danish: Drengen strøg/aede pigen på hagen og kyssede hende på kinden.
See also
References
Notes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 West Frisian at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
North Frisian at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015)
Saterland Frisian at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) - ↑ Nordhoff, Sebastian; Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin, eds. (2013). "Frisian". Glottolog. Leipzig: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology.
- ↑ Laurie Bauer, 2007, The Linguistics Student’s Handbook, Edinburgh
- ↑ "Gegenwärtige Schätzungen schwanken zwischen 1.500 und 2.500." Marron C. Fort: Das Saterfriesische. In: Horst Haider Munske,Nils Århammar: Handbuch des Friesischen – Handbook of Frisian Studies. Niemayer (Tübingen 2001).
- ↑ Gesetz zur Förderung des Friesischen im öffentlichen Raum - Wikisource (German)
- ↑ Christian Galinski; Rebecca Guenther; Håvard Hjulstad. "Registration Authority Report 2004-2005" (PDF). p. 4. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2007-10-20. Retrieved 2007-11-23.
- ↑ Matthias Brenzinger, Language Diversity Endangered, Mouton de Gruter, The Hague: 222
- ↑ Rolf H. Bremmer Jr, An Introduction to Old Frisian. History, Grammar, Reader, Glossary (Amsterdam & Philadelphia, 2009)
- ↑ "English to Frisian dictionary".
- ↑ The History of English: A Linguistic Introduction. Scott Shay, Wardja Press, 2008, ISBN 0-615-16817-5, ISBN 978-0-615-16817-3
General references
External links
North Frisian edition of Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia |
West Frisian edition of Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia |
Saterland Frisian edition of Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia |
- The Frisian foundation
- Frisian-English dictionary
- [PDF]Hewett, Waterman Thomas, The Frisian language and literature
- 'Hover & Hear' Frisian pronunciations, and compare with equivalents in English and other Germanic languages.
- Frisian: Standardisation in Progress of a Language in Decay PDF (231 KiB)
- Description of language including audio files
- Frisian radio
- Radio news in North Frisian
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