Germany - Language
The Modern German Language, as written, spoken on the stage and also, with certain provincial variations, in the ordinary intercourse of the educated classes of Germany and of parts of Austria and Switzerland, is a literary language which arose by a process of selection and refinement from the popular dialects formerly used in their respective territories and preserved even now in the natural speech of the uneducated and, to some extent, in dialectic literature.
Each of the Teutonic tribes skirting the northern or north-eastern boundary of the Roman empire, had its own distinctive denomination. Their peculiar names were unknown or disregarded by the Romans; hence these hostile bands of the Teutoni, from their martial appearance, were classed together, and by the Gauls and Romans called Germani. When united as one people, under Charlemagne, the Germans styled themselves Teutschen or Deutschen, from the Teutons mentioned by Caesar and Livy. While at the present day the Germans most frequently apply to themselves the name of Deutschen, they are generally called Germans by foreigners.
At the beginning of historical tradition these dialects, in their entirety, had certain important characteristics which justify their classification under the common head of German. They were distinguished from, though closely related to, the Frisian and the Anglo-Saxon, and together with them they constituted the West Germanic branch of the Germanic family of languages, the other branches of which were the East Germanic, comprising Gothic, Vandalian, Burgundian. and the North permanic, or Scandinavian, comprising Swedish, Danish, Norwegian, Icelandic.
From the beginning, two main groups may be distinguished: High German and Low German, the former spoken in the hilly and mountainous midland and South, the latter in the low and level North. High German differs from Low German and from all the other Germanic dialects chiefly by the so-called High German shifting of consonants, which probably took place between A.d. 500 and 700.
By this process original d changed to t; original t, initial and after consonants (or doubled) to z or Iz (pronounced ts), after vowels to a sound similar to s, which much later became identical with s; original p, initial and after consonants (or doubled), to pf, after vowels to if, f; original k, initial and after consonants (or doubled) in the extreme South only, to kch, later ch, after vow-els to ch. A similar change, sometimes classified here, original th to d, began much later, but spread over the entire High and Low German territory. In consequence of these changes High German differs in its consonants more widely from Modern English than do the Low German dialects.
One of the chief divisions of Low German, Low Franconian, gradually separated from the other German dialects and developed a literary language of its own, which in its modern form is called Dutch or Hollandish. Hence "Low German" is sometimes used in the more restricted sense excluding Low Franconian.
The dialects thus designated were for a long time used extensively for literary purposes, but gradually High German gained ground, and by the end of the 16th century Low German had almost ceased to be written, the people of the North adopted the common High German literary language for all higher purposes, and the use of the Low German dialects, in their modern form also called Plattdeutsch, was restricted to more intimate intercourse and to consciously dialectic literature.
The modern literary language has drawn upon Low German for-contributions to its vocabulary, notably terms relating to the sea, navigation, and transmarine commerce, but in the main it is based upon High German dialects. The latter form two groups: Middle German and Upper German. Middle German comprises Franconian (not including the Low Franconian mentioned above) and Thuringian, Upper Saxon, and Silesian. Upper German comprises Alemannian with its subdivisions Swiss and Swabian, and Bavarian, which includes Austrian.
At first all the dialects ranked practically alike, every writer using the speech of his own region. There was, indeed, at first no name of national significance applied to the whole group of dialects; the word deutsch, which later came to mean "German," denoted orieinally "popular," and was used mainly of the language of the people as distinguished from Latin, which was the language of church, school, and, to some extent, of government. This indicates the beginning of a struggle for pre-eminence between German and Latin which continued for many centuries and w hich may be characterized by a few especially important facts and dates. Religious writings in poetry and prose are found in German as early as the 8th century, but for a long time the majority of them continued in Latin.
It is customary to divide the history of the German language in three periods. The first of these, from the beginnings to about 1150 (Old High German. Old Low German), was characterized by full inflectional and derivative suffixes, showing a great variety of vowels. The second period, from about 1150 to about 1500 (Middle High German, Middle Low German), was characterized by smoothness and melody of sounds, simplicity of grammatical forms, flexibility and variety of construction, and great richness of vocabulary. This was particularly true of the language of Middle High German poetry during the 13th Century, which was not inferior to any medieval language as a means of poetic expression.
The third period, from about 1500 to the present day (New High German, New Low German), is characterized by the creation of a common literary language and its superimposition upon the dialects. The latter continued to develop and diverge, and an inhabitant of the extreme South would by the end of the 19th Century probably find it difficult, if not impossible, to communicate with one from the North if each could understand only his own dialect.
Not until the middle of the 18th century had all resistance practically ceased, and the German-speaking countries possessed and were conscious of possessing a common literary language. The provincial characteristics which still remain, especially in Austria and Switzerland, are slight in comparison with the unity that has been attained. Moreover the common language not only supplanted the dialects in literature, government, school, and church, but also in the ordinary intercourse at least of the educated; on the other hand it was constantly drawing upon the dialects to replenish and rejuvenate its stock of words.
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