As someone from Sylt and who was taught Sölring in elementary school, this is a very welcome and unexpected surprise. My experience is pretty much the same as Moritz's. My family also moved to the island, we also lived in List and were pretty much lower middle class I guess. I was born there and lived there for 11 years. Every once in a while I still visit it, and sadly the "Touristification" and commercialization keeps increasing and Sylt seems to lose ever increasingly its Frisian identity. Thanks Simon and Moritz!
@@randomtutorials9189 North Frisian did receive a heavy influence from Danish, so it makes sense that it would sound Danish to you. Chances are that the words in North Frisian you don't understand may be Danish in origin. But, as I'm sure you know, North Frisian is not necessarily closely related to Danish, other than being a Germanic language.
I visited Sylt a couple times as a teenager (from Canada living in Kiel while on exchange) a little over 20 years ago. I heard a few people speaking a local language in the smaller towns and assumed it was Plattdeutsch, but maybe it wasn't! I didn't know until this video that there is a distinct Sylt language! So I'm excited to learn about this, and now, knowing how endangered the language is, I feel especially privileged to have heard a bit of it spoken by native speakers.
Chances are it was not Frisian. There are many languages spoken in the region, and the local dialect, Söl'ring North Frisian, is spoken by so few people. But then again, maybe it was. It depends on where you were.
Whoa, this is so cool! Always nice to see more about North Frisian and having it get a larger platform. Thank you to both Moritz and Simon for making this video, and especially to Moritz for sharing his expertise about his own language.
I did a MOOC - Intro to the Frisian language Groningen University - and the idea that Frisian is the closest to the English language was stunning to me, and I saw the similarities. However for me there was even more similarity to Afrikaans, and this helped me fly through the intro course with no obstacles. I've made inquiries and I am very interested to spend time in Friesland - Leeuwarden - to see how long it will take me to become reasonably fluent in the language. I loved it.
Frisian is most closely related to Old English. But modern English actually has more words of romance origin (primarily French and Latin) than of Germanic origin. This means that the closest language to English in terms of vocabulary would probably be French. I know that sounds contradictory given English is classified as a Germanic language. But I am talking purely in terms of vocabulary, not the history or origins of English.
This is really cool. My Spanish teacher back in high school (Gymnasium here in Germany) was a native speaker of North Frisian (and German, obviously), though I don't know which dialect, don't remember if he ever mentioned it. Dude was absolutely cracked when it comes to languages, in addition to his two native languages he was also a certified translator and interpreter for English, French and Spanish, was conversational in Dutch, Catalan and Indonesian, and had basic knowledge of a few others including Russian and Danish.
Thanks for this Simon (and 'bout time you got a haircut!) But mad props to Moritz. Not only does he need a great command of English to even have this conversation, but he has to also understand deep technical aspects of the language and be able to speak about it. I'm sure he's in a pretty small club! I also cracked up at his "It's not difficult [to learn North Frisian] if you know German. And English. And Danish." 😄 Re: Sylt, a similar region that comes to mind is Brittany. They were also a distinct culture and language who were subsumed by a neighboring greater power, although usage of the language persists.
Very interesting interview, thank you both. I think the situation of North Frisian on the island of Föhr is much more stable. The Western villages still have a majority of Frisian speakers, at least they did in the 1990s. I remember spending a holiday there and getting to know a group of similarly aged Föhrer people and there were 4 people we got to know and 2 spoke Frisian at home (teenagers), one was a Low German speaker and one spoke Danish. That was so fascinating. Just 10 years ago.I returned to Föhr and on the ferry I overheard Frisian in many of the groups (something that I think would never happen on public transport to Sylt). One younger woman was studying in Hamburg and spoke a kind a "rusty" Frisian with older acquaintances she met on the ferry but you could see that she mixed in German words a lot and probably was not going to return to the island, so outward migration and "mixed" couples opting to speak High German are also eating away the language. The problem is with many of these languages that the most authentic speakers value it least, so probably this young woman was not going to raise her Hamburg born children (I'm speculating wildly here) in Frisian as she didn't think it was worth it all anyway.
Sylt (and the Marschbahn in general) is a haven for rail enthusiasts as well because of the very frequent car trains hauled by a variety of diesel locomotives, interspersed with all sorts of bizarre regular operations. On visiting I was very interested to see the Frisian language on signage etc.. So it's fun to see two of my hobbies come together like this!
@@Isochest All of the East Frisian islands except Baltrum have or used to have small rail lines connecting the port to the main town of the respective island, in Norderney and Juist unfortunately abandoned, horse drawn on Spiekeroog, but intact on the others. In the North Frisian Halligen islands, three are connected to the mainland by narrow gauge rail lines on dams through the sea running draisine stock. Those islands are Oland, Langeneß and Nordstrandischmoor.
"achter" as soon as Lauer said it was "nautical" I was like, "aft!" Sure enough, I looked it up, and this is related to the English words "aft" and "after!" Fascinating!
Yes, that’s a Low German and Dutch sound change, compare English “soft” with High German “sanft” and Low German “sacht”… there are more examples, I think High German “Kraft” and Dutch “kracht”….
As with any discussion between people who have a good understanding of and passion for their subject, this was fascinating! Thank you both, Moritz and Simon!
I use 'eldest' all the time so presumably it is an Anglian ( Norfolk and Suffolk leftover ) also, RP upper class tends to keep some older features and I believe RP speakers would use 'eldest' RP also keeps a rhotic R with some speakers ( like the Scottish R ).
@49:25 for comparison Terp in West Frisian and Dutch is a mound (mostly artificial, but not always). IOW farms and villages are build on Terps/terpen (dry land) so that they don't flood, and one of the most well known Frisian loanwords in standard Dutch. If you go that way, you might also check out Dutch "brink" which is a term for village square in the North and Western parts of the country. The brink in turn is often on top of of a dam/dry land. Many Western and Northern Dutch towns have Brink as "main street/square" name. However the Dutch cognate for German Dorf is "Dorp", but I don't know if that translates into West Frisian as I'm far from knowledgable, coming from the south-eastern end of the Dutch spectrum.. Tand is also Dutch for Tooth.
The suffix -terp (Oerterp, Weinterp...) seen in some Frisian placenames in the Netherlands comes from an old Frisian word meaning something like village or settlement actually!
Hallo Moritz, hast Du gut gemacht! Man konnte Dir anmerken, dass Du sehr aufgeregt warst. Wäre bei mir nicht anders gewesen... liebe Grüße aus Düsseldorf
In French the word for sheet (e.g. of paper) is also the same as the one for leaf, feuille. In Italian, however, leaf is feminine (foglia) and sheet is masculine (foglio). It's somewhat common in Italian for metaphorical new meanings of words to get the opposite gender as the old meaning.
51:06 I should say look at the Dutch words for the ones you say. They are quite common in the Dutch language as terp, kerk, weer in 2 meanings weather and again, tand ... Very interesting video and sad that all those dialects / old languages disappear in time.
In terms of similar things happening in the UK, certainly not exactly the same but I'm reminded of the systematic gentrification of traditionally working-class parts of London, which for instance forced the Cockney dialect further out into Kent and Essex where it became Estuary English. That sort of thing is still ongoing today.
It's certainly been happening for quite a while in both Wales and Cornwall and it has profoundly negative social consequences - including serious implications affecting the continuing growth of the Welsh language and hindering the possible resurrection of Cornish.
The situation with Scottish Gaelic was mentioned. It’s a language I know quite well, having learned it on and off for the last 40 years. I have several mother language friends in the Western Isles. It is most certainly more alive and kicking than North Frisian is. Most speakers are bilingual, but at least one parish has 70% Gaelic speakers. It’s become quite cool to speak Gaelic and not a matter for shame, despite centuries of English attempts to suppress it! Suas leis a' Ghàidhlig!
'S Èireannach a th' annamsa, agus cha bhidh nàire air dhaoine bruidhinn sa Ghàidhlig an seo, taing a Dhia! Here in Ireland it's not shameful to speak it either, sometimes you'd get eejits though. I remember someone from a podcast I was listening to was in Dublin speaking Irish and she was told to "go back to your own country". In my own experience, most people are lovely though!
@@faelan1950 Tha fios agam. Tha an riaghachd Èireannach mòran na’s chuideachail na'n riaghachd Breatannach. Ach, taing do Dhia, tha'n riaghachd Albannach mòran na's fheàrr. I know. The Irish government is much more helpful than the British. But, thank God, the Scottish government is. If only they’d support ferry services too!
I grew up on Sylt and lived there for 22years and I had a "solring" class in primary school I think and I think I knew of a couple of old people who were able to speak it. Maybe I should get around to doing it now
On the subject of rare Germanic grammatical numbers, Southern US and African-American varieties of American English do have constructions for dual and partial-plural persons. words like bofuˀm (AAVE dual third person), sum[əˀ]us (Southern US partial-plural first person) for example.
40:00 In Carinthian dialect (Austrian borderregion to Slovenia) the final dental sound of "🦷" is still present in the plural. the singular is [tså:n], the plural is ['tsent]. The Standard German forms are Zahn & Zähne.
in Pennsylvania Dutch, similar to Pfaelzisch, we have 'Zaah' (among other spelling variations like Zoh) and 'Zaeh' for Zahn. I wonder what Hutterite German has, it's a dialect of Carinthian origin mostly in the Pacific Northwest of the US and especially Canada. They might have a similar one to yours
German is likely the largest ancestry group in the midwestern us. I am at least partially german as my maternal grandma has german heritage. Also, they provided a german service in my church until the early 1900s. English only became the official language used in the church in the 1920s and they eventually dropped the german services
I'd love to see a channel about Frisian language and history, a little bit like Cambrian Chronicles for Welsh but with more linguistic topics thrown in as well, such as dialect comparisons, historical dialect ranges, relations between the dialects, and the mutual intelligibility between them, in fact my own paternal ancestors came from a village in modern Denmark that might have been Frisian in the past, on the very southeastern most point of the Danish side of the Jutland peninsula, so I'm wondering what kind of Frisian would've been spoken there and when it last was spoken there.
Do you mean the southwestern point of the Jutland Peninsula? There wouldn't be any Frisian speakers on the eastern side of the Jutland peninsula. Frisian was spoken from southwest Denmark to the northeast of the Netherlands. And they were more of a coastal people, as in, they wouldn't necessarily cross the Jutland Peninsula on foot to get to the southeast part.
Very interesting to see the development of linked languages - as a point I’m a RP speaker from London and I would say the word eldest is still in common use and not replaced by oldest but used as much 😊
German speaker here: I live in the center of Germany but late relatives of mine stemmed from Frisia. The old people spoke nothing but Frisian. It is so far off from Standard German that I couldn´t understand it even though I understand a bit Dutch if the accent isn´t too heavy and it is not spoken too fast.
Moin töhop, I thought I'd make a small AMA in the replies to this comments, if there are things that you want to know and weren't covered in the video :)
It was my understanding that Frisian originated from the ingvaeonic/North Sea Germanic speaking population like Low German. So by "came into contact with Low German" etc do you mean as a superstrate as opposed to being allowed to exist somewhat more isolated from the influence of other linguistic communities as might be the case for West Frisian during Fryske frijheid for instance?
@@CraftsmanOfAwsomenes Thank you for your question :) The history of NF is a bit complicated, because it stems from a group of people who moved away from their old home territory at the Dutch-German border to a very different linguistic area at the Danish-German border. So, yes. NF is an ingvaeonic language, having a shared ancestor with Low German and they existed side by side for a long time, evolving and sharing new features. But when the North Frisians settled in Sleeswig they found a very sparsely populared area with mostly Danish (Jutlandic) speaking people. The contact that NFs had with Low German started when Saxons moved into Sleeswig centuries later. I mostly refered to rather recent influence through Middle Low German during the Hanseatic times when it was a lingua franca in the region. I hope this somewhat answers your question. :)
Moin Moritz, my question is less specific to Söl’ring but since you mentioned that you’re writing your thesis on the Sprachraum of Northern Europe, I’d thought maybe you know something about this: Was there something like a North Sea / Baltic Sea trade language that was most commonly spoken? I ask this because when listening to other Germanic languages, but also Gaelic languages like Welsh and Irish, and Finnic languages like Finnish and Estonian, they all sound, to me at least, similar in terms of phonetic inventory but also in terms of the „musicality“ or "rhythm" which isn’t the case with Romance and Slavic languages. Like if you ignore vocabulary and grammar they sound like something you might hear in Lister Hafen. Which is why I was wondering whether there was a commonly spoken dominant trade language or Lingua franca in the North Sea / Baltic Sea area, from which the local languages adopted some qualities? Or maybe it’s just a coincidence and I’m making stuff up? Fuul Dank!
@@benkolya I have no social media channels at the moment, but I am planning on creating something. I not sure yet in what format, but I'll let you know when I come up with something.
Thank you for letting me listen in on this interesting conversation. It's admirable the efforts being made to help regional languages and dialects survive. You asked about Italian: it has both the "ly" sound (sorry, don't know the linguistic term, but you sort of hear it in "million", but shorter) e.g. in famiglia (not familia); but also the nasal "ny" consonant (bit like "onion" in English but shorter) e.g. gnocchi or bagno (not niocchi or banio).
Thank you for this video.👍👍 Your discussion proofs that an endangered language must be protected by the national government in some way, if the people are serious about their origin.
If you want to get an idea of all the languages spoken in Schleswig-Holstein that Moritz mentioned you might want to watch the movie "Der Krug an der Wiedau". Spoken languages in this movie from 2021 are: High German, Danish, Frisian, Sonderjysk, Low German. Very interesting and a quite funny and recommandable movie as well 🙂
Simon, as regards Irish Gaelic your information is spot on. If there were such a place as one made up of entirely monolingual native Irish speakers, they wouldn't be able to understand the neo-Gaels, who make up the majority of people ticking the yes box on the census. There is a strong argument that says unless one speaks English, one cannot understand modern Irish as it is spoken outside of the Gaeltachtaí. I'd like to hear the opinion of any fluent learners of Irish who haven't previously learned English.
Thanks for the interview! Good stuff. You can see Moritz's passion in Sölring and linguistic in general just radiating out. Also re: t-lenition, I think in Australian English we do this in words like water?
1:43 in my experience as a speaker of an English lexified creole language, the Phonology and especially vowels is much more representative of substrate languages than the lexifier so I'd say that's definitely a no gi
You guys mentioned the situation on the Channel Islands of Jersey and Guernsey; both islands used to be predominantly speakers of the Norman languages of Jèrriais and Dgèrnésiais (though many were bilingual in French and English also) until WW2. During the War we were the only part of Britain to be occupied by the Germans and many native people fled to the UK (particularly children). Living in England, most of them lost their native Norman language. After the war, the English education system was implemented into schools (we still follow the English curriculum for some reason) and the Norman language was literally beaten out of children during the late 40s and 50s. If you were caught speaking Norman in school, you were chastised and the teacher would beat you with a stick. One teacher told my grandmother “Oh you stupid country girls, with your stupid country language!”. Nowadays, only a few thousand elderly people (and a number of enthusiasts) still speak Jèrriais. This problem is compounded by the fact that ethnic ‘Jersey’ people are a minority in Jersey, making up only 45% of the population (those with Jèrriais-language ancestry backing up barely 20-25%). There has been slow progress in advocating for its survival, including plans for a Jèrriais-language nursery. But at the moment there is only optional extracurricular Jèrriais courses in some schools from ages 8-12, as well as weekly Jèrriais language lessons for all ages and a tri-weekly spoken Jèrriais meeting up. There have been efforts to have Jèrriais be taught more formally in schools and make the language more publicly visible, but this has received backlash from people (mostly people who are not from Jersey) who see it as a “waste of money” to be funding and supporting our native language. We are in a lot worse position than that of Ireland, Wales and even the Isle of Mann. However.. Nouos pèrsévéth’tha! (We we will persevere!)
Thanks for the insight. In the Wikipedia it was said that both of the Channel Normans have government support so i thought it was in a safe spot. Seems like the situation is more nuanced than that.
@@harrynewiss4630 For the most part, yes. This was largely due to immigration from the mainland, the demise of French-language schools in favour of English instruction, the integration of the local French community, but mainly the situation was not helped by conflict with the French over the sovereignty of fishing reefs and overfishing in our waters by French trawlers. The fishing dispute was in the news recently, but it has been an issue for over 70 years now.
It's interesting how the Normans used to be the ruling elite and think English speakers were low class, but now English speakers think of the Norman speakers as low class.
Regarding the Dravidian language you put an annotation about: how on earth does one palatalise a lingual trill? Doesn't trilling kind of require the tongue to be relaxed? That being said, I always struggled at a muscular level with the Italian R as a native Italian speaker.
A fascinating video, but I have a question about the point made at 41.46. If the Germanic 'k' sound morphed into a softer 'ts' or 'ch' on the continent of Europe prior to the Ango-Saxon arrival in what is now England, why is the 'k' sound retained in Scots and some northern English dialects in a word like kirk for example?
It didn't soften in all dialects and the ancestors of the English were made up of a number of different tribes/groups speaking related (but not identical) dialects.
As a west-lauwers frisian (fryslân) hearing ost-frisians and north-frisian, they have been influenced a lot by saksen- language (ost-friesland and ost-lauwers friesland/Groningen) and saksen/dänish-language (north-friesland). The sound of words is very different. West-friesland (region) in north-holland is completly dutch.
I can't tell you how exciting it was to see nordfriesisch talked about on this channel!! My great grandparents are from Föhr, an island nearby Sylt where they speak a variety called Fering. My family came to the US to escape the Nazis, but they never passed the language on. One of the rationalizations they gave is that "Fering is really only good for fishing, farming and raising children." But now there's no way I can learn Fering, and it feels bad to have lost that culture. When I visited Föhr about 10 years ago, I remember being struck by how much of the history had also been erased by Christian missionaries. I feel like my heritage is being slowly wiped off the face of the earth and I've been profoundly detached from it as a result. I tried to go for a master's degree in linguistics so I could do some English language studies on it, but going into academia would mean losing access to healthcare, so I was forced to give up on that. I'm glad to see people are talking about nordfriesisch, even if it's not Fering - any information about the history of the area deserves to be recorded!!
Hi. I am from Northern Germany and no native Fering-speaker, but I learned (still do) Fering on my own with a book from Antje Arfsten called "Friesischer Sprachkurs Fering" which is really good. You will find that book using google or directly in the webshop of the Nordfriisk Instituut. I can really recommend it if you want to "brush up" your Fering :-) Adjis
55:35 There are quite a few varieties. East Germans tend to use [oˤ] for -er. ua-cam.com/video/zfkjAui0ZgE/v-deo.html Old-fashioned Siegerland accent, he uses [ɚ] for -er, just like American English but you won't really hear this from a person younger than him. ua-cam.com/video/HqxkCyUIw3k/v-deo.html Native Swiss German speaker speaking Standard German, he uses for [er] for -er as it is typical for Alemannic German. (Southwestern German dialects are closely related to Swiss German) Traditionally most dialects and accents are rhotic, except Northern German, some Eastern German and Bavarian dialects and accents.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but Frisians did originally come from the same population as Low German speakers right? There are the Frisii dating to the Roman period, but to my understanding ecological collapse around the 5th century led to a significant decline in their population and culture, with the ancestors of modern Frisians coming from the later kingdom of Magna Frisia, which was founded by the same familiar groups we know from the settlement of England, the Angles, Jutes, and Saxons some time in the early 7th century.
The Frisians were originally to the south-west along the coast of the peoples that settled post-Roman Britain, and the Low Germans to the south. Originally English, Frisian and Low German formed dialects of pretty much a single language, but subsequent influences made them drift apart, with Low German getting very much influence from further south loosing many of the Anglo-Frisian characteristics that English and Frisian retained.
@@morvil73 I think the first group you're referring to might be the Frisii? Everything else you said aligns with my understanding though w/r/t ingvaeonic.
Actualy it was earlier in 4th century. Because a floading frisians moved southwards and to Brittain. They knew Brittain from their overseas trading and they already worked in the roman army in Brittain
You can tell that the language is endangered by how the auto-generated captions struggle with its name; so far I've seen "North Korean", "Phrygian" and "North Christian".
I'd say that the only sensical romanisation of [ə] is e, because while it's peripheral like all Latin vowels (except the sonus medius which never had a character) it is only peripheral in the horizontal axis and not in the vertical one, and it's unrounded unlike its counterpart o. The only alternative would be a if you count it as central (it is pronounced as near-front but didn't ever trigger the same sound changes as other front vowels in any romance languages afaik)
Isle of Tenerife, Spain, Africa. Simon, you're right about Gaelic often being given English constructions, but only to a limited amount, so that's not the problem, and the real situation is MUCH WORSE. Any Gaelic learner who persists soon starts using more typical and functional Gaelic constructions. HOWEVER, a much bigger problem is that 99% of learners in my opinion I KID YOU NOT just simply don't learn the correct pronunciations, unfathomably ignoring the very Gaelic phenomenon of dual consonant contrast. As far as I can see the only learners who learn the correct traditional pronunciation seem to be those few who learn it with me, which boggles the mind. Therefore the learned version spoken by most non-natives is linguistically dysfunctional. I swear I fail to comprehend such a lack of basic understanding of how a language should be learned, but it basically means that most new speakers of Irish Gaelic actually NEVER speak it according to how the language naturally works, phonologically. I must presume that this also happens with the Scotch and Manx variants, so I'm 99% sure that the Manx revival never actually happened, in real phonological terms. It's super weird, but mispronunciation is the norm among most non-natives, meaning the real language is quickly dying, while the public believe it's growing. I'm super curious about West Frisian. Can you please do a video on it, and its similarity or otherwise with Old and Middle English, please? Best wishes, Patchy.
So how different are the various types of Frisian? Are they mutually intellegible to a great degree ( like Danish, Norwegian and Swedish are ) or just to a small degree? ( only in writing for instance) - Or not at all? 😉
I don’t think they are. The varieties of Frisian spoken in the Netherlands sounds much different - to me, if I’m not paying attention, they sound like Dutch.
@@dteun that's so fascinating! I don't speak any of these languages. My Beppe was born in Friesland, but I always just thought she spoke Dutch. I didn't realize until I was an adult that they were basically different languages.
This is not a language question, but is that new haircut because you are presenting yourself as more employable now Simon.? This was still a really interesting topic to learn from, thank you both 🙂
@@newenglandgreenman so you didn't like the younger, more free spirited long scruffy look of the student years as much? As I am not gay I have never considered it, but that is obvious isn't it 🙂
Dån koone wii tuhuupe spale! Then we can play together! A sentence in Mooring North Frisian I was able to remember from documentary. BTW the mainland North Frisian dialects usually have “ai” or “ei” as negative particles, where Sölring has “ek”. “Ik koon dåt ai.” “I can’t do that.” “Ik koon ai Frasch snååke.” “I can’t speak Frisian.”
Interesting. In my Norwegian dialect, I can say "ihop" for "together". Norwegian Nynorsk has it too, and it's common in Swedish. The languages are of course related, but it's still interesting to note how words or elements of words turn up in different places.
@@Ramngrim The Söl'ring word for "where" and "how" is "hur" and as far as I know it, it's the same in Swedish. I don't know if these are coincidents or if they are maybe the Old and Middle Danish influence on the language
@@MoLauer , also interesting. I can't tell for sure. "Hur" is definitely not standard Danish, but I have next to no knowledge of Sønderjysk, so it could come from there. Or...it could be an old word that arrived at the same place through different routes in the two languages. For now, it's a toss up.
@@MoLauer "Ei and ek seem close enough to Danish ej and ikke to not be coincidental. . Where in Swedish is var, hur only means how. Frisian hur might show the influence of Danish hvor (where) but, then again, it could equally just be from standard Frisian hoe (how).
I had to look up the word "plebiscite" as it's hardly an everyday word to me. If you want to pass it on to Lauer, I think "referendum" would've been the word he was looking for. At least in the US, that word would be more familiar to us.
@@Muzer0 "Regular use" seems surprising for me, but maybe it's a more normal word across the pond? Are you from the UK or US or elsewhere? My impression, from my experience in America, is that "plebiscite" seems like highly technical, maybe historical term. I'm fairly educated I had never heard the term before. Anyway, it's important for non-native speakers to understand that even if we have a certain word, it might not be the most normal or appropriate word. If you use too many "10 dollar words," you risk confusing people or sounding pretentious. I think Mr. Lauer's goal was to be easily understood, and definitely think "referendum" would have been the simpler word for that, at least if the rest of the audience is more like me. But if it's true that "plebiscite" is a more normal word for others, then using it obviously wouldn't be much a problem. I had no trouble looking up the word, after all. It just sounded like Lauer really wanted to understand the nuances of English, if he was using the right word or not, so I thought I'd share my insight.
@@rdreher7380 "Regular" as in it's used frequently, but I think I would not expect people who are particularly uninterested in politics to know it; but anyone who has at least a passing interest in politics I'd expect to understand it. When having political discussions with people over here I've found a sizeable minority will use it instead of "referendum". I'm from the UK as you surmised. (Personally I would say referendum but I think like Simon in this video I would be completely unsurprised to hear anyone say plebiscite instead).
Simon my man, i would love to see you go to Friesland and test the mutual intelligibility between Anglo-Saxon and Frisian personally like this guy in youtube who buys a cow in Old English.
Hi. The Nordfriisk Instituut publishes on their homepage the newspaper "Nordfriesland" as pdf files. Every paper includes at least one article written in one of the German Frisian dialects.
I think it's sad that an entire culture just erodes away like that... Literally, even, land eroding away where many people and cultures used to live along what is not the Wadden Sea stretching from Jutland all the way to the Dutch northern provinces. I can only imagine the amount of cultural damage and erasure took place, especially with the North-Sea Germanic/Ingvae people, Anglo Frisian, Old Saxon and the likes. There used to be plenty of land there that doesn't exist anymore, and for all we know; never existed. Where are all the Anglo-Frisian futhorc inscriptions, lmao. How many more vimose combs existed but will never be found... Or, I guess depending on your philosophy you could say those people all moved to England during the migration period. Though, that would mean that Anglo-Saxon was an umbrella term for all North-Sea Germanic settlers. I think there really was a need for mass migration due to disastrous floods. I wish we had records of this...
Sylt sounds much like North Norfolk and into Lincolnshire, with large sandy beaches, sandy grassland, marshland, wetland, pine tress, seals and tidal sand islands and so on. Sylt has a similar meaning to the English: Silt, does it not ? The story of the upper class or money divide, is the same as North Norfolk - since the 90s, 'Chelsea tractors' come on at the weekend and the fishing villages are half dead in winter, on the plus side, it keeps buildings in good condition or shops but it has priced local people out. Isle Of Wight has had a similar situation in tourism . . . Jersey and Guernsey have dialects of that is related to Old Norman. Shetland has the revival of Norn
I just looked at photos and I definitively see similarities, but I think Listland (Northern Part of Sylt) has a lot more sand dunes and heath steppe than Norfolk. But Sylt's cliffs aren't as impressive. And we don't really have that many trees. Too windy :)
@@MoLauer Yes once you go inland from the North Norfolk coast, it is low but steep chalk hills but the west and east of the county are sea level flat and were former wetlands in the east ( the Yarmouth area was basically an Island with some smaller sand bank Islands ) and the west side really was more like a sea area, shallow sea, and partly tidal wetlands, all the way to the west ( Peterborough ) and the south ( Cambridge ) - was drained over some decades and largely by Dutch engineers at the mid 1800s time, heavily opposed and attacked by local people, who lost their fishing lands, villages and reed harvesting cottage industries. The region was also not industrialised ( apart from some farming latterly ). Though I think the east of Norfolk you will see very familiar sandstone cliffs while north Norfolk is mostly massive sandy beaches and tidal sand Islands. 'Scolt Head Island' is one. Scolt is related to the English 'scald' and I think there are cognates in modern German and Dutch and perhaps North Frisian ? ( though it is an adaption from old French maybe but uncertain as to when ). 'Scolt' meant more like: 'turbulent water' originally I think. www.scoltheadisland.co.uk/gallery_734714.html#photos_id=16195948 - At any rate - It is said that Norfolk and Suffolk are the original 'English' in terms of first large migration area of 'Angle' speakers. Also, that they would likely largely have sailed over time and / or had contact with, that Schleswig-Holstein area, perhaps specifically, toward the Danish border areas. So - I am wondering if your dialect and the North Frisian language, must be related to the Anglian (?) perhaps ? There is a dialect around Norfolk and Suffolk ( north people and south people of 'Anglia' ) who knows, perhaps it directly relates to your dialect ? I guess the people coming from around what is now that Border area, would have seen something familiar. Norfolk and Suffolk also have a very shifting coastline. There is a famous photo from 100 years ago of a church tower on a beach, now that is 1 mile out to sea underwater. Also Dunwich, is a famous large town that was lost to sea, in Suffolk. Unless I am talking out of my hat 🙂 Interesting to hear more about Sylt, I know it is a tourist place also.
@@MoLauer Sorry, to amend my previous comment, it seems to my layman knowledge of Frisian in general, it is more related to Saxon, rather than Anglian (?) - unless it is different in North Frisian - I guess the various connections are a matter of debate -
I'm westfrisian. From the netherland, knowing we were trading already in roman times with Brittain and scandinavia, east anglia would be the closest trade for trading.
Re Guernsey - Guernesiais is just about hanging on, with a mix of learners and elderly L1 speakers ua-cam.com/video/-5BHrLxczU0/v-deo.html Re breaking of /jen/ for End & one, I was thinking of Geordie and modern Norwegian 'hjem' from ON heimr.
Plebiscite /ˈplɛbɪsʌɪt,ˈplɛbɪsɪt/ noun The direct vote of all the members of an electorate on an important public question such as a change in the constitution.
I actually had to double check the spelling of the Frisian Uurterbok since I could not tell the difference in pronunciation between it and the German Wörterbuch.
There are many loanwords from Danish within the north Frisian dialect and also dialetical loanwords from south-Jutish which obviously makes sense. As a child i spent many summers on the island, Rømø and we often went to Sylt. The Dialect of Rømø and the north Frisian dialect of Sylt, to me had a very similar soundscape when spoken.
As someone from Sylt and who was taught Sölring in elementary school, this is a very welcome and unexpected surprise. My experience is pretty much the same as Moritz's. My family also moved to the island, we also lived in List and were pretty much lower middle class I guess. I was born there and lived there for 11 years. Every once in a while I still visit it, and sadly the "Touristification" and commercialization keeps increasing and Sylt seems to lose ever increasingly its Frisian identity. Thanks Simon and Moritz!
I am West-Frisian (Friesland in Netherlands), and man I have a hard time understanding North-Frisian, it sounds like Danish to me.
@@randomtutorials9189 North Frisian did receive a heavy influence from Danish, so it makes sense that it would sound Danish to you. Chances are that the words in North Frisian you don't understand may be Danish in origin. But, as I'm sure you know, North Frisian is not necessarily closely related to Danish, other than being a Germanic language.
I visited Sylt a couple times as a teenager (from Canada living in Kiel while on exchange) a little over 20 years ago. I heard a few people speaking a local language in the smaller towns and assumed it was Plattdeutsch, but maybe it wasn't! I didn't know until this video that there is a distinct Sylt language! So I'm excited to learn about this, and now, knowing how endangered the language is, I feel especially privileged to have heard a bit of it spoken by native speakers.
Chances are it was not Frisian. There are many languages spoken in the region, and the local dialect, Söl'ring North Frisian, is spoken by so few people. But then again, maybe it was. It depends on where you were.
Another Sylt but not Söl’ring speaking resident here. Thanks a lot for this talk, I‘ve lerned a lot.
20:00
So Sylt is in a similar situation like Venice. Both places became too expensive for the original population.
Ah Venexia, cara...
Cara da dí!
Whoa, this is so cool! Always nice to see more about North Frisian and having it get a larger platform. Thank you to both Moritz and Simon for making this video, and especially to Moritz for sharing his expertise about his own language.
I did a MOOC - Intro to the Frisian language Groningen University - and the idea that Frisian is the closest to the English language was stunning to me, and I saw the similarities. However for me there was even more similarity to Afrikaans, and this helped me fly through the intro course with no obstacles. I've made inquiries and I am very interested to spend time in Friesland - Leeuwarden - to see how long it will take me to become reasonably fluent in the language. I loved it.
Frisian is most closely related to Old English. But modern English actually has more words of romance origin (primarily French and Latin) than of Germanic origin. This means that the closest language to English in terms of vocabulary would probably be French. I know that sounds contradictory given English is classified as a Germanic language. But I am talking purely in terms of vocabulary, not the history or origins of English.
This is really cool. My Spanish teacher back in high school (Gymnasium here in Germany) was a native speaker of North Frisian (and German, obviously), though I don't know which dialect, don't remember if he ever mentioned it. Dude was absolutely cracked when it comes to languages, in addition to his two native languages he was also a certified translator and interpreter for English, French and Spanish, was conversational in Dutch, Catalan and Indonesian, and had basic knowledge of a few others including Russian and Danish.
Polyglots are ao cool
I am West-Frisian (Friesland in Netherlands), and man I have a hard time understanding North-Frisian, it sounds like Danish to me.
Thanks for this Simon (and 'bout time you got a haircut!) But mad props to Moritz. Not only does he need a great command of English to even have this conversation, but he has to also understand deep technical aspects of the language and be able to speak about it. I'm sure he's in a pretty small club! I also cracked up at his "It's not difficult [to learn North Frisian] if you know German. And English. And Danish." 😄 Re: Sylt, a similar region that comes to mind is Brittany. They were also a distinct culture and language who were subsumed by a neighboring greater power, although usage of the language persists.
I am West-Frisian (Friesland in Netherlands), and man I have a hard time understanding North-Frisian, it sounds like Danish to me.
I'm West-Frisian and I bought a North-Frisian book: Dechtungs by Wilhelm Siemens.
It's fun to read, it's like a mixture of Frisian, German and Danish.
Please do a video comparing Low Saxon to English.
Very interesting interview, thank you both. I think the situation of North Frisian on the island of Föhr is much more stable. The Western villages still have a majority of Frisian speakers, at least they did in the 1990s. I remember spending a holiday there and getting to know a group of similarly aged Föhrer people and there were 4 people we got to know and 2 spoke Frisian at home (teenagers), one was a Low German speaker and one spoke Danish. That was so fascinating. Just 10 years ago.I returned to Föhr and on the ferry I overheard Frisian in many of the groups (something that I think would never happen on public transport to Sylt).
One younger woman was studying in Hamburg and spoke a kind a "rusty" Frisian with older acquaintances she met on the ferry but you could see that she mixed in German words a lot and probably was not going to return to the island, so outward migration and "mixed" couples opting to speak High German are also eating away the language.
The problem is with many of these languages that the most authentic speakers value it least, so probably this young woman was not going to raise her Hamburg born children (I'm speculating wildly here) in Frisian as she didn't think it was worth it all anyway.
It was great to have access to this information about Frisian (or, perhaps, one of the Frisians). Thanks!
Sylt (and the Marschbahn in general) is a haven for rail enthusiasts as well because of the very frequent car trains hauled by a variety of diesel locomotives, interspersed with all sorts of bizarre regular operations. On visiting I was very interested to see the Frisian language on signage etc.. So it's fun to see two of my hobbies come together like this!
Thanks for the reminder of the rail scene regarding Sylt. There's a German island with a narrow gauge railway on it but I have forgotten the name
borkum
@@Isochest All of the East Frisian islands except Baltrum have or used to have small rail lines connecting the port to the main town of the respective island, in Norderney and Juist unfortunately abandoned, horse drawn on Spiekeroog, but intact on the others.
In the North Frisian Halligen islands, three are connected to the mainland by narrow gauge rail lines on dams through the sea running draisine stock. Those islands are Oland, Langeneß and Nordstrandischmoor.
First time I heard about Frisians, when I was reading the "Beowulf". I like that ancient Frisian ethnic identity is still a thing.
"achter" as soon as Lauer said it was "nautical" I was like, "aft!" Sure enough, I looked it up, and this is related to the English words "aft" and "after!" Fascinating!
Yes, that’s a Low German and Dutch sound change, compare English “soft” with High German “sanft” and Low German “sacht”… there are more examples, I think High German “Kraft” and Dutch “kracht”….
@@morvil73 Luft (DE) Lucht (NL)
As with any discussion between people who have a good understanding of and passion for their subject, this was fascinating! Thank you both, Moritz and Simon!
Simon! Your hair looks great!
Would love to see a North Frisian channel
I use 'eldest' all the time so presumably it is an Anglian ( Norfolk and Suffolk leftover ) also, RP upper class tends to keep some older features and I believe RP speakers would use 'eldest'
RP also keeps a rhotic R with some speakers ( like the Scottish R ).
@49:25 for comparison Terp in West Frisian and Dutch is a mound (mostly artificial, but not always). IOW farms and villages are build on Terps/terpen (dry land) so that they don't flood, and one of the most well known Frisian loanwords in standard Dutch. If you go that way, you might also check out Dutch "brink" which is a term for village square in the North and Western parts of the country. The brink in turn is often on top of of a dam/dry land. Many Western and Northern Dutch towns have Brink as "main street/square" name. However the Dutch cognate for German Dorf is "Dorp", but I don't know if that translates into West Frisian as I'm far from knowledgable, coming from the south-eastern end of the Dutch spectrum.. Tand is also Dutch for Tooth.
The suffix -terp (Oerterp, Weinterp...) seen in some Frisian placenames in the Netherlands comes from an old Frisian word meaning something like village or settlement actually!
Hallo Moritz, hast Du gut gemacht! Man konnte Dir anmerken, dass Du sehr aufgeregt warst. Wäre bei mir nicht anders gewesen... liebe Grüße aus Düsseldorf
Interesting that their velar fricative became an 'f' sound in some cases, just as it has in English with words like cough and tough.
Might have gone through [ʍ]
I immediately looked for your channel before the exchange you two had on the topic of you starting one. I would follow you in a heartbeat if you did!
In French the word for sheet (e.g. of paper) is also the same as the one for leaf, feuille. In Italian, however, leaf is feminine (foglia) and sheet is masculine (foglio). It's somewhat common in Italian for metaphorical new meanings of words to get the opposite gender as the old meaning.
Auf jeden Moritz. Wenn so ein UA-cam-Kanal gab, wurde Ich mich einnahme!
I was going to say Great haircut! And as always a very interesting vid :)
51:06 I should say look at the Dutch words for the ones you say. They are quite common in the Dutch language as terp, kerk, weer in 2 meanings weather and again, tand ... Very interesting video and sad that all those dialects / old languages disappear in time.
In terms of similar things happening in the UK, certainly not exactly the same but I'm reminded of the systematic gentrification of traditionally working-class parts of London, which for instance forced the Cockney dialect further out into Kent and Essex where it became Estuary English. That sort of thing is still ongoing today.
It's certainly been happening for quite a while in both Wales and Cornwall and it has profoundly negative social consequences - including serious implications affecting the continuing growth of the Welsh language and hindering the possible resurrection of Cornish.
The situation with Scottish Gaelic was mentioned. It’s a language I know quite well, having learned it on and off for the last 40 years. I have several mother language friends in the Western Isles. It is most certainly more alive and kicking than North Frisian is. Most speakers are bilingual, but at least one parish has 70% Gaelic speakers. It’s become quite cool to speak Gaelic and not a matter for shame, despite centuries of English attempts to suppress it!
Suas leis a' Ghàidhlig!
'S Èireannach a th' annamsa, agus cha bhidh nàire air dhaoine bruidhinn sa Ghàidhlig an seo, taing a Dhia! Here in Ireland it's not shameful to speak it either, sometimes you'd get eejits though. I remember someone from a podcast I was listening to was in Dublin speaking Irish and she was told to "go back to your own country". In my own experience, most people are lovely though!
@@faelan1950 Tha fios agam. Tha an riaghachd Èireannach mòran na’s chuideachail na'n riaghachd Breatannach. Ach, taing do Dhia, tha'n riaghachd Albannach mòran na's fheàrr. I know. The Irish government is much more helpful than the British. But, thank God, the Scottish government is. If only they’d support ferry services too!
I am West-Frisian (Friesland in Netherlands), and man I have a hard time understanding North-Frisian, it sounds like Danish to me.
Actually I can't understand any North Frisian to be honoust. Yes its that different.
I grew up on Sylt and lived there for 22years and I had a "solring" class in primary school I think and I think I knew of a couple of old people who were able to speak it. Maybe I should get around to doing it now
On the subject of rare Germanic grammatical numbers, Southern US and African-American varieties of American English do have constructions for dual and partial-plural persons. words like bofuˀm (AAVE dual third person), sum[əˀ]us (Southern US partial-plural first person) for example.
Would that be "both of them" and "some of us"?
40:00
In Carinthian dialect (Austrian borderregion to Slovenia) the final dental sound of "🦷" is still present in the plural. the singular is [tså:n], the plural is ['tsent].
The Standard German forms are Zahn & Zähne.
This is pretty much the case in all Bavarian and Austro-Bavarian dialects.
in Pennsylvania Dutch, similar to Pfaelzisch, we have 'Zaah' (among other spelling variations like Zoh) and 'Zaeh' for Zahn.
I wonder what Hutterite German has, it's a dialect of Carinthian origin mostly in the Pacific Northwest of the US and especially Canada. They might have a similar one to yours
You cut your hair!! Ohhh I liked it long!
24:00 The Sylt dam was constructed in the 1920s.
German is likely the largest ancestry group in the midwestern us. I am at least partially german as my maternal grandma has german heritage. Also, they provided a german service in my church until the early 1900s. English only became the official language used in the church in the 1920s and they eventually dropped the german services
im honestly suprised this video dudnt got more views i loved this
I'd love to see a channel about Frisian language and history, a little bit like Cambrian Chronicles for Welsh but with more linguistic topics thrown in as well, such as dialect comparisons, historical dialect ranges, relations between the dialects, and the mutual intelligibility between them, in fact my own paternal ancestors came from a village in modern Denmark that might have been Frisian in the past, on the very southeastern most point of the Danish side of the Jutland peninsula, so I'm wondering what kind of Frisian would've been spoken there and when it last was spoken there.
Check Background History!
Do you mean the southwestern point of the Jutland Peninsula? There wouldn't be any Frisian speakers on the eastern side of the Jutland peninsula. Frisian was spoken from southwest Denmark to the northeast of the Netherlands. And they were more of a coastal people, as in, they wouldn't necessarily cross the Jutland Peninsula on foot to get to the southeast part.
Trist iawn, it's a similar story here in Cymru
Very interesting to see the development of linked languages - as a point I’m a RP speaker from London and I would say the word eldest is still in common use and not replaced by oldest but used as much 😊
I was thinking the same - I don't speak RP but have never stopped saying eldest. The word elderly is surely important here - it's said all the time.
Dan. ældst(e) [elst] & ældre [el-dre], Norw. eldst(e) & eldre,
Swe. äldst(a) & äldra 😉
German speaker here: I live in the center of Germany but late relatives of mine stemmed from Frisia. The old people spoke nothing but Frisian. It is so far off from Standard German that I couldn´t understand it even though I understand a bit Dutch if the accent isn´t too heavy and it is not spoken too fast.
1:32:42 funny we have that in Swabian (southern Germany), there is a city called Aalen and we pronounce it more like "Oala" (ˈɔ:lɐ̃)
Simon, if you ever want to do something on Cornish…. drop me a line. Great video…
Like that haircut, Simon! Great video.
In Low German, våder and moder are phonemically with a d. An intervocalic t is possible too, like in wåter.
Moin töhop, I thought I'd make a small AMA in the replies to this comments, if there are things that you want to know and weren't covered in the video :)
It was my understanding that Frisian originated from the ingvaeonic/North Sea Germanic speaking population like Low German. So by "came into contact with Low German" etc do you mean as a superstrate as opposed to being allowed to exist somewhat more isolated from the influence of other linguistic communities as might be the case for West Frisian during Fryske frijheid for instance?
@@CraftsmanOfAwsomenes Thank you for your question :) The history of NF is a bit complicated, because it stems from a group of people who moved away from their old home territory at the Dutch-German border to a very different linguistic area at the Danish-German border.
So, yes. NF is an ingvaeonic language, having a shared ancestor with Low German and they existed side by side for a long time, evolving and sharing new features. But when the North Frisians settled in Sleeswig they found a very sparsely populared area with mostly Danish (Jutlandic) speaking people. The contact that NFs had with Low German started when Saxons moved into Sleeswig centuries later. I mostly refered to rather recent influence through Middle Low German during the Hanseatic times when it was a lingua franca in the region.
I hope this somewhat answers your question. :)
You explained things very well in this video, thank you! Do you have any social media accounts where we would be able to follow you or your work?
Moin Moritz, my question is less specific to Söl’ring but since you mentioned that you’re writing your thesis on the Sprachraum of Northern Europe, I’d thought maybe you know something about this: Was there something like a North Sea / Baltic Sea trade language that was most commonly spoken? I ask this because when listening to other Germanic languages, but also Gaelic languages like Welsh and Irish, and Finnic languages like Finnish and Estonian, they all sound, to me at least, similar in terms of phonetic inventory but also in terms of the „musicality“ or "rhythm" which isn’t the case with Romance and Slavic languages. Like if you ignore vocabulary and grammar they sound like something you might hear in Lister Hafen. Which is why I was wondering whether there was a commonly spoken dominant trade language or Lingua franca in the North Sea / Baltic Sea area, from which the local languages adopted some qualities? Or maybe it’s just a coincidence and I’m making stuff up? Fuul Dank!
@@benkolya I have no social media channels at the moment, but I am planning on creating something. I not sure yet in what format, but I'll let you know when I come up with something.
I think the Isle of Wight is in a relatively similar situation to Sylt, but for festival goers rather than gentrifiers
Fun fact: "sylt" is the Swedish word for "jam" and some similar preserves. :)
Thank you for letting me listen in on this interesting conversation. It's admirable the efforts being made to help regional languages and dialects survive. You asked about Italian: it has both the "ly" sound (sorry, don't know the linguistic term, but you sort of hear it in "million", but shorter) e.g. in famiglia (not familia); but also the nasal "ny" consonant (bit like "onion" in English but shorter) e.g. gnocchi or bagno (not niocchi or banio).
Thank you for this video.👍👍 Your discussion proofs that an endangered language must be protected by the national government in some way, if the people are serious about their origin.
Moritz? Moritz! Cuz, it’s me, Erich! So cool!
sounds very similar to martha's vinyard or the hamptons in the US
If you want to get an idea of all the languages spoken in Schleswig-Holstein that Moritz mentioned you might want to watch the movie "Der Krug an der Wiedau". Spoken languages in this movie from 2021 are: High German, Danish, Frisian, Sonderjysk, Low German. Very interesting and a quite funny and recommandable movie as well 🙂
With crazy plot twists... ^^
Simon, as regards Irish Gaelic your information is spot on. If there were such a place as one made up of entirely monolingual native Irish speakers, they wouldn't be able to understand the neo-Gaels, who make up the majority of people ticking the yes box on the census. There is a strong argument that says unless one speaks English, one cannot understand modern Irish as it is spoken outside of the Gaeltachtaí. I'd like to hear the opinion of any fluent learners of Irish who haven't previously learned English.
Thanks for the interview! Good stuff. You can see Moritz's passion in Sölring and linguistic in general just radiating out.
Also re: t-lenition, I think in Australian English we do this in words like water?
Very cool video, thanks to you both!
So interesting. It's a long video, but I will watch it entirely in parts. :)
You are very handsome. Xx I love your videos. I am looking forward to other videos from you. X
1:43 in my experience as a speaker of an English lexified creole language, the Phonology and especially vowels is much more representative of substrate languages than the lexifier so I'd say that's definitely a no gi
You guys mentioned the situation on the Channel Islands of Jersey and Guernsey; both islands used to be predominantly speakers of the Norman languages of Jèrriais and Dgèrnésiais (though many were bilingual in French and English also) until WW2. During the War we were the only part of Britain to be occupied by the Germans and many native people fled to the UK (particularly children). Living in England, most of them lost their native Norman language. After the war, the English education system was implemented into schools (we still follow the English curriculum for some reason) and the Norman language was literally beaten out of children during the late 40s and 50s. If you were caught speaking Norman in school, you were chastised and the teacher would beat you with a stick. One teacher told my grandmother “Oh you stupid country girls, with your stupid country language!”.
Nowadays, only a few thousand elderly people (and a number of enthusiasts) still speak Jèrriais. This problem is compounded by the fact that ethnic ‘Jersey’ people are a minority in Jersey, making up only 45% of the population (those with Jèrriais-language ancestry backing up barely 20-25%). There has been slow progress in advocating for its survival, including plans for a Jèrriais-language nursery. But at the moment there is only optional extracurricular Jèrriais courses in some schools from ages 8-12, as well as weekly Jèrriais language lessons for all ages and a tri-weekly spoken Jèrriais meeting up. There have been efforts to have Jèrriais be taught more formally in schools and make the language more publicly visible, but this has received backlash from people (mostly people who are not from Jersey) who see it as a “waste of money” to be funding and supporting our native language.
We are in a lot worse position than that of Ireland, Wales and even the Isle of Mann. However..
Nouos pèrsévéth’tha!
(We we will persevere!)
Thanks for the insight. In the Wikipedia it was said that both of the Channel Normans have government support so i thought it was in a safe spot. Seems like the situation is more nuanced than that.
I wonder if post WWII there was also a desire to be less associated with things French.
Fascinating ! And, as always, life offers so many more possibilities once the beatings finally stop. 🙄
@@harrynewiss4630 For the most part, yes. This was largely due to immigration from the mainland, the demise of French-language schools in favour of English instruction, the integration of the local French community, but mainly the situation was not helped by conflict with the French over the sovereignty of fishing reefs and overfishing in our waters by French trawlers. The fishing dispute was in the news recently, but it has been an issue for over 70 years now.
It's interesting how the Normans used to be the ruling elite and think English speakers were low class, but now English speakers think of the Norman speakers as low class.
Cornwall is a good comparison
Regarding the Dravidian language you put an annotation about: how on earth does one palatalise a lingual trill? Doesn't trilling kind of require the tongue to be relaxed? That being said, I always struggled at a muscular level with the Italian R as a native Italian speaker.
A fascinating video, but I have a question about the point made at 41.46. If the Germanic 'k' sound morphed into a softer 'ts' or 'ch' on the continent of Europe prior to the Ango-Saxon arrival in what is now England, why is the 'k' sound retained in Scots and some northern English dialects in a word like kirk for example?
It didn't soften in all dialects and the ancestors of the English were made up of a number of different tribes/groups speaking related (but not identical) dialects.
As a west-lauwers frisian (fryslân) hearing ost-frisians and north-frisian, they have been influenced a lot by saksen- language (ost-friesland and ost-lauwers friesland/Groningen) and saksen/dänish-language (north-friesland).
The sound of words is very different.
West-friesland (region) in north-holland is completly dutch.
I can't tell you how exciting it was to see nordfriesisch talked about on this channel!! My great grandparents are from Föhr, an island nearby Sylt where they speak a variety called Fering. My family came to the US to escape the Nazis, but they never passed the language on. One of the rationalizations they gave is that "Fering is really only good for fishing, farming and raising children." But now there's no way I can learn Fering, and it feels bad to have lost that culture. When I visited Föhr about 10 years ago, I remember being struck by how much of the history had also been erased by Christian missionaries. I feel like my heritage is being slowly wiped off the face of the earth and I've been profoundly detached from it as a result. I tried to go for a master's degree in linguistics so I could do some English language studies on it, but going into academia would mean losing access to healthcare, so I was forced to give up on that. I'm glad to see people are talking about nordfriesisch, even if it's not Fering - any information about the history of the area deserves to be recorded!!
Hi. I am from Northern Germany and no native Fering-speaker, but I learned (still do) Fering on my own with a book from Antje Arfsten called "Friesischer Sprachkurs Fering" which is really good. You will find that book using google or directly in the webshop of the Nordfriisk Instituut. I can really recommend it if you want to "brush up" your Fering :-) Adjis
@@d42-adventure-fan33 thank you for your kind recommendation!!
55:35 There are quite a few varieties.
East Germans tend to use [oˤ] for -er.
ua-cam.com/video/zfkjAui0ZgE/v-deo.html Old-fashioned Siegerland accent, he uses [ɚ] for -er, just like American English but you won't really hear this from a person younger than him.
ua-cam.com/video/HqxkCyUIw3k/v-deo.html Native Swiss German speaker speaking Standard German, he uses for [er] for -er as it is typical for Alemannic German. (Southwestern German dialects are closely related to Swiss German)
Traditionally most dialects and accents are rhotic, except Northern German, some Eastern German and Bavarian dialects and accents.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but Frisians did originally come from the same population as Low German speakers right? There are the Frisii dating to the Roman period, but to my understanding ecological collapse around the 5th century led to a significant decline in their population and culture, with the ancestors of modern Frisians coming from the later kingdom of Magna Frisia, which was founded by the same familiar groups we know from the settlement of England, the Angles, Jutes, and Saxons some time in the early 7th century.
The Frisians were originally to the south-west along the coast of the peoples that settled post-Roman Britain, and the Low Germans to the south. Originally English, Frisian and Low German formed dialects of pretty much a single language, but subsequent influences made them drift apart, with Low German getting very much influence from further south loosing many of the Anglo-Frisian characteristics that English and Frisian retained.
@@morvil73 I think the first group you're referring to might be the Frisii? Everything else you said aligns with my understanding though w/r/t ingvaeonic.
Actualy it was earlier in 4th century. Because a floading frisians moved southwards and to Brittain. They knew Brittain from their overseas trading and they already worked in the roman army in Brittain
Very interesting!
Very nice video 👍🏻👍🏻💯💯☕👈
Thanks.
Low German speakers from the Netherlands never capitalize nouns (just like in Dutch), many speakers from Germany do, but some don't.
THAT’S FUNNY, BECAUSE I USE CAPITAL LETTERS FOR EVERYTHING.
You can tell that the language is endangered by how the auto-generated captions struggle with its name; so far I've seen "North Korean", "Phrygian" and "North Christian".
I'd say that the only sensical romanisation of [ə] is e, because while it's peripheral like all Latin vowels (except the sonus medius which never had a character) it is only peripheral in the horizontal axis and not in the vertical one, and it's unrounded unlike its counterpart o.
The only alternative would be a if you count it as central (it is pronounced as near-front but didn't ever trigger the same sound changes as other front vowels in any romance languages afaik)
rise against shirt nice
Thank you very much ^^
Isle of Tenerife,
Spain,
Africa.
Simon, you're right about Gaelic often being given English constructions, but only to a limited amount, so that's not the problem, and the real situation is MUCH WORSE.
Any Gaelic learner who persists soon starts using more typical and functional Gaelic constructions.
HOWEVER, a much bigger problem is that 99% of learners in my opinion I KID YOU NOT just simply don't learn the correct pronunciations, unfathomably ignoring the very Gaelic phenomenon of dual consonant contrast.
As far as I can see the only learners who learn the correct traditional pronunciation seem to be those few who learn it with me, which boggles the mind.
Therefore the learned version spoken by most non-natives is linguistically dysfunctional.
I swear I fail to comprehend such a lack of basic understanding of how a language should be learned, but it basically means that most new speakers of Irish Gaelic actually NEVER speak it according to how the language naturally works, phonologically.
I must presume that this also happens with the Scotch and Manx variants, so I'm 99% sure that the Manx revival never actually happened, in real phonological terms.
It's super weird, but mispronunciation is the norm among most non-natives, meaning the real language is quickly dying, while the public believe it's growing.
I'm super curious about West Frisian.
Can you please do a video on it, and its similarity or otherwise with Old and Middle English, please?
Best wishes,
Patchy.
So how different are the various types of Frisian?
Are they mutually intellegible to a great degree ( like Danish, Norwegian and Swedish are ) or just to a small degree? ( only in writing for instance) - Or not at all? 😉
I don’t think they are. The varieties of Frisian spoken in the Netherlands sounds much different - to me, if I’m not paying attention, they sound like Dutch.
@@michaelcannon7640 Thank you 😊
What about the Dutch Frisian?
That's a different, less endangered dialect of Frisian, called West Frisian.
@@OntarioTrafficMan just ja tak så mycket
I was wondering about this too, as my grandmother speaks it. I wasn't sure if they were related.
@@Ash.MR. as a Dutch i didnt understand a word Fries ,but now that i speak Swedish i can make something out of it.
@@dteun that's so fascinating! I don't speak any of these languages. My Beppe was born in Friesland, but I always just thought she spoke Dutch. I didn't realize until I was an adult that they were basically different languages.
Where can I find Moritz? Does he have a channel or something?
This is not a language question, but is that new haircut because you are presenting yourself as more employable now Simon.?
This was still a really interesting topic to learn from, thank you both 🙂
At last a language point, I am a Roma that cannot speak Jib because I was never taught it and now cannot learn it.
As a gay man, I have to say that the new haircut is more attractive.
@@newenglandgreenman so you didn't like the younger, more free spirited long scruffy look of the student years as much? As I am not gay I have never considered it, but that is obvious isn't it 🙂
Dån koone wii tuhuupe spale! Then we can play together! A sentence in Mooring North Frisian I was able to remember from documentary. BTW the mainland North Frisian dialects usually have “ai” or “ei” as negative particles, where Sölring has “ek”. “Ik koon dåt ai.” “I can’t do that.” “Ik koon ai Frasch snååke.” “I can’t speak Frisian.”
In Sölring the sentence would be: "Dan ken wü töhop spöli." I find it fascinating how different to Insular and Mainland dialects are.
Interesting. In my Norwegian dialect, I can say "ihop" for "together". Norwegian Nynorsk has it too, and it's common in Swedish. The languages are of course related, but it's still interesting to note how words or elements of words turn up in different places.
@@Ramngrim The Söl'ring word for "where" and "how" is "hur" and as far as I know it, it's the same in Swedish. I don't know if these are coincidents or if they are maybe the Old and Middle Danish influence on the language
@@MoLauer , also interesting. I can't tell for sure. "Hur" is definitely not standard Danish, but I have next to no knowledge of Sønderjysk, so it could come from there. Or...it could be an old word that arrived at the same place through different routes in the two languages. For now, it's a toss up.
@@MoLauer "Ei and ek seem close enough to Danish ej and ikke to not be coincidental. . Where in Swedish is var, hur only means how. Frisian hur might show the influence of Danish hvor (where) but, then again, it could equally just be from standard Frisian hoe (how).
I had to look up the word "plebiscite" as it's hardly an everyday word to me. If you want to pass it on to Lauer, I think "referendum" would've been the word he was looking for. At least in the US, that word would be more familiar to us.
Both terms are in regular use in English but I'd agree "referendum" is much more common.
@@Muzer0 "Regular use" seems surprising for me, but maybe it's a more normal word across the pond? Are you from the UK or US or elsewhere? My impression, from my experience in America, is that "plebiscite" seems like highly technical, maybe historical term. I'm fairly educated I had never heard the term before.
Anyway, it's important for non-native speakers to understand that even if we have a certain word, it might not be the most normal or appropriate word. If you use too many "10 dollar words," you risk confusing people or sounding pretentious. I think Mr. Lauer's goal was to be easily understood, and definitely think "referendum" would have been the simpler word for that, at least if the rest of the audience is more like me.
But if it's true that "plebiscite" is a more normal word for others, then using it obviously wouldn't be much a problem. I had no trouble looking up the word, after all. It just sounded like Lauer really wanted to understand the nuances of English, if he was using the right word or not, so I thought I'd share my insight.
@@rdreher7380 "Regular" as in it's used frequently, but I think I would not expect people who are particularly uninterested in politics to know it; but anyone who has at least a passing interest in politics I'd expect to understand it. When having political discussions with people over here I've found a sizeable minority will use it instead of "referendum". I'm from the UK as you surmised. (Personally I would say referendum but I think like Simon in this video I would be completely unsurprised to hear anyone say plebiscite instead).
Yeah, I get your point. I think I still made myself somewhat understood :)
@@rdreher7380 I think in this case it's a pretty common word at least w/r/t the topic it is about, pretty much interchangeable with "referendum"
Simon my man, i would love to see you go to Friesland and test the mutual intelligibility between Anglo-Saxon and Frisian personally like this guy in youtube who buys a cow in Old English.
The link in your description to a UA-cam channel does not work btw!
Is there any frisian newspapers online, etc ? Or online reading material for it?
Hi. The Nordfriisk Instituut publishes on their homepage the newspaper "Nordfriesland" as pdf files. Every paper includes at least one article written in one of the German Frisian dialects.
@@d42-adventure-fan33 Thanks for the reply!. I'll take a look.
I think it's sad that an entire culture just erodes away like that... Literally, even, land eroding away where many people and cultures used to live along what is not the Wadden Sea stretching from Jutland all the way to the Dutch northern provinces. I can only imagine the amount of cultural damage and erasure took place, especially with the North-Sea Germanic/Ingvae people, Anglo Frisian, Old Saxon and the likes. There used to be plenty of land there that doesn't exist anymore, and for all we know; never existed.
Where are all the Anglo-Frisian futhorc inscriptions, lmao. How many more vimose combs existed but will never be found...
Or, I guess depending on your philosophy you could say those people all moved to England during the migration period. Though, that would mean that Anglo-Saxon was an umbrella term for all North-Sea Germanic settlers. I think there really was a need for mass migration due to disastrous floods. I wish we had records of this...
Does North Frisian have many similarities with Danish as well?
Sylt sounds much like North Norfolk and into Lincolnshire, with large sandy beaches, sandy grassland, marshland, wetland, pine tress, seals and tidal sand islands and so on.
Sylt has a similar meaning to the English: Silt, does it not ?
The story of the upper class or money divide, is the same as North Norfolk - since the 90s, 'Chelsea tractors' come on at the weekend and the fishing villages are half dead in winter, on the plus side, it keeps buildings in good condition or shops but it has priced local people out.
Isle Of Wight has had a similar situation in tourism . . .
Jersey and Guernsey have dialects of that is related to Old Norman.
Shetland has the revival of Norn
I just looked at photos and I definitively see similarities, but I think Listland (Northern Part of Sylt) has a lot more sand dunes and heath steppe than Norfolk. But Sylt's cliffs aren't as impressive. And we don't really have that many trees. Too windy :)
@@MoLauer
Yes once you go inland from the North Norfolk coast, it is low but steep chalk hills but the west and east of the county are sea level flat and were former wetlands in the east ( the Yarmouth area was basically an Island with some smaller sand bank Islands ) and the west side really was more like a sea area, shallow sea, and partly tidal wetlands, all the way to the west ( Peterborough ) and the south ( Cambridge ) - was drained over some decades and largely by Dutch engineers at the mid 1800s time, heavily opposed and attacked by local people, who lost their fishing lands, villages and reed harvesting cottage industries. The region was also not industrialised ( apart from some farming latterly ).
Though I think the east of Norfolk you will see very familiar sandstone cliffs while north Norfolk is mostly massive sandy beaches and tidal sand Islands. 'Scolt Head Island' is one.
Scolt is related to the English 'scald' and I think there are cognates in modern German and Dutch and perhaps North Frisian ? ( though it is an adaption from old French maybe but uncertain as to when ).
'Scolt' meant more like: 'turbulent water' originally I think.
www.scoltheadisland.co.uk/gallery_734714.html#photos_id=16195948
- At any rate - It is said that Norfolk and Suffolk are the original 'English' in terms of first large migration area of 'Angle' speakers.
Also, that they would likely largely have sailed over time and / or had contact with, that Schleswig-Holstein area, perhaps specifically, toward the Danish border areas.
So - I am wondering if your dialect and the North Frisian language, must be related to the Anglian (?) perhaps ?
There is a dialect around Norfolk and Suffolk ( north people and south people of 'Anglia' ) who knows, perhaps it directly relates to your dialect ?
I guess the people coming from around what is now that Border area, would have seen something familiar.
Norfolk and Suffolk also have a very shifting coastline.
There is a famous photo from 100 years ago of a church tower on a beach, now that is 1 mile out to sea underwater.
Also Dunwich, is a famous large town that was lost to sea, in Suffolk.
Unless I am talking out of my hat 🙂
Interesting to hear more about Sylt, I know it is a tourist place also.
@@MoLauer Sorry, to amend my previous comment, it seems to my layman knowledge of Frisian in general, it is more related to Saxon, rather than Anglian (?) - unless it is different in North Frisian - I guess the various connections are a matter of debate -
I'm westfrisian. From the netherland, knowing we were trading already in roman times with Brittain and scandinavia, east anglia would be the closest trade for trading.
Am I going crazy? Moritz I think I know you. Did you go to boarding school in Wernigerode?
Jup, von 2014 bis 2018 ^^
Re Guernsey - Guernesiais is just about hanging on, with a mix of learners and elderly L1 speakers ua-cam.com/video/-5BHrLxczU0/v-deo.html Re breaking of /jen/ for End & one, I was thinking of Geordie and modern Norwegian 'hjem' from ON heimr.
🤠💜
This seems a bit pessimistic about the status of the Gaelic languages. There are still tens of thousands of real L1 speakers.
What was that word he said? Ple/bi/sīd?
Plebiscite /ˈplɛbɪsʌɪt,ˈplɛbɪsɪt/
noun
The direct vote of all the members of an electorate on an important public question such as a change in the constitution.
RIP the long hair!
I actually had to double check the spelling of the Frisian Uurterbok since I could not tell the difference in pronunciation between it and the German Wörterbuch.
Please keep the short hair
Sylt voll mit punks… das soll mal was sein!
Uh... Is it just me, or is this completely silent?
Nope, for me too
Getting sound here guy's try clicking off back on
@@johntabner9346 I tried that a few minutes ago and it didn't work, but now it works again.
It works fine for me
I am West-Frisian (Friesland in Netherlands), and man I have a hard time understanding North-Frisian, it sounds like Danish to me.
Actually I can't understand any North Frisian to be honoust. Yes its that different.
There are many loanwords from Danish within the north Frisian dialect and also dialetical loanwords from south-Jutish which obviously makes sense. As a child i spent many summers on the island, Rømø and we often went to Sylt. The Dialect of Rømø and the north Frisian dialect of Sylt, to me had a very similar soundscape when spoken.