Online Encyclopedia
West Germanic languages
(Redirected from West Germanic)
West Germanic is the largest branch of the Germanic family of languages, including such languages as English, Dutch, and German.
The other families of Germanic are North Germanic and East Germanic.
Language classification | ||||||
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History
There was never a West Germanic proto-language from which all the languges currently in the group seem to have derived. As such the grouping is more of a geographical convenience to categorize languages that share many similarities with each other but also individually compare closely to particular aspects of North Germanic or East Germanic.
Family tree
Note that divisions between subfamilies of Germanic are rarely precisely defined; most form dialect continua, with adjacent dialects being mutually intelligible and more separated ones not.
-
Anglic (descending from Anglo-Saxon)
- Modern English (with a significant influx of French vocabulary)
- Lowland Scots
- Cayman Islands English (not a creole)
- Angloromani (with a significant influx of Romany vocabulary)
- Frisian
-
Low German (descending from Old Saxon / Old Low Franconian)
-
Low Franconian
- Dutch
- West Flemish
- Limburgish
- Afrikaans (with a significant influx of vocabulary from Malay and native African languages)
-
Low Saxon
- Several dialects in northern Germany and the Netherlands
- Plautdietsch (Mennonite Low German)
- East Low German
-
Low Franconian
-
High German
- German
- Middle German
- East Middle German
- Standard German
- Lower Silesian
- Upper Saxon
-
West Middle German
- Luxembourgeois
- Several dialects in western Germany
- Pennsylvania German
- East Middle German
-
Upper German
-
Alemannic
- Swiss German
- Swabian
- Alemán Coloneiro (spoken in Venezuela)
- Walser
-
Austro-Bavarian
- Bavarian
- Cimbrian (with a heavy influx of Italian vocabulary)
- Mócheno
- Hutterite German (spoken by Hutterites)
-
Alemannic
- Fränkisch (extinct in the 1800s)
- Middle German
- Yiddish (with a significant influx of vocabulary from Hebrew and written in the Hebrew alphabet)
- Wymysojer
- German
See also
Last updated: 02-27-2005 19:17:40