North Germanic languages

The North Germanic languages make up one of the three branches of the Germanic
languages, a sub-family of the Indo-European languages, along with the West Germanic
languages and the extinct East Germanic languages. The language group is sometimes
referred to as the "Nordic languages", a direct translation of the most common term used
among Danish, Swedish, Faroese, Icelandic and Norwegian scholars and laypeople.

North Germanic
Nordic
Scandinavian
Ethnicity
Germanic peoples
Geographic
distribution
Northern Europe
Linguistic classification
Indo-European
Germanic
North Germanic
Proto-language
Proto-Norse, later Old Norse
Subdivisions
Continental Scandinavian
Insular Scandinavian
ISO 639-5
gmq
Glottolog
nort3160[1]
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North Germanic-speaking lands
Continental Scandinavian languages:
Danish
Norwegian
Swedish
Insular Scandinavian languages:

Faroese
Icelandic
Norn (†)
Greenlandic Norse (†)
Extinct Norn was spoken in Orkney, Shetland and Caithness in what is now Scotland until
the 19th century.
Extinct Greenlandic Norse was spoken in the Norse settlements of Greenland until their
demise in the late 15th century.
In Scandinavia, the term "Scandinavian languages" refers specifically to the generally
mutually intelligible languages of the three continental Scandinavian countries, and is thus
used in a more narrow sense as a subset of the Nordic languages, leaving aside the insular
subset of Faroese and Icelandic. Danish, Norwegian and Swedish are also referred to as
Continental Scandinavian or Nordic languages, while Faroese and Icelandic are grouped
together as Insular Scandinavian or Nordic languages. The term Scandinavian arose in the
18th century as a result of the early linguistic and cultural Scandinavist movement, referring
to the people, cultures, and languages of the three Scandinavian countries and stressing
their common heritage.

The term "North Germanic languages" is used in comparative linguistics,[2] whereas the
term "Scandinavian languages" appears in studies of the modern standard languages and
the dialect continuum of Scandinavia.[3][4]

Approximately 20 million people in the Nordic countries speak a Scandinavian language as

their native language,[5] including an approximately 5% minority in Finland. Languages
belonging to the North Germanic language tree are also commonly spoken on Greenland
and, to a lesser extent, by immigrants in North America.

Contents
Modern languages and dialects Edit

The modern languages in this group are:

Danish
Jutlandic dialect
North Jutlandic
East Jutlandic
West Jutlandic
South Jutlandic
Insular Danish
Bornholmsk dialect
Swedish[6]
South Swedish dialects
Scanian
Göta dialects
Gotland dialects
Svea dialects
Dalecarlian dialects
Elfdalian
Norrland dialects
Jämtland dialects
East Swedish dialects
Finland Swedish
Estonian Swedish
Norwegian
Bokmål (written)
Nynorsk (written)
Trønder dialects (Norway and parts of Sweden)
East Norwegian dialects (Norway and minor parts of Sweden)
West Norwegian dialects
North Norwegian dialects
Faroese
Icelandic
History Edit
Distinction from East and West Germanic Edit
The Germanic languages are traditionally divided into three groups: West, East and North
Germanic.[7] Their exact relation is difficult to determine from the sparse evidence of runic
inscriptions, and they remained mutually intelligible to some degree during the Migration
Period, so that some individual varieties are difficult to classify. Dialects with the features
assigned to the northern group formed from the Proto-Germanic language in the late Pre-
Roman Iron Age in Northern Europe.

At last around the year 200 AD, speakers of the North Germanic branch became
distinguishable from the other Germanic language speakers. The early development of this
language branch is attested through runic inscriptions.

Features shared with West Germanic Edit

The North Germanic group is characterized by a number of phonological and morphological
innovations shared with West Germanic:

The retraction of Proto-Germanic ē (/ɛː/, also written ǣ) to ā.[8]

Proto-Germanic *jēran ‘year’ > Northwest Germanic *jāran >:
North Germanic *āra > Old Norse ár; and
West Germanic *jāra > Old High German jār, Old English ġēar [jæ͡ɑːr]; vs. Gothic jēr.