High German dialects

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The High German dialects are located south of the Benrath line (the Uerdinger line is also used in isolated cases to separate) and are again divided into Central and Upper German subdialects. They include regional language varieties of the higher-lying areas of the German-speaking area and have as a common characteristic the fully or partially implemented second or (old) High German sound shift .

The commonly used abbreviation “ Standard German” can easily be misunderstood, since most speakers use it synonymously with “ Standard German ” or “written German”. This article deals with "High German" in the sense of a regional language variety in the higher areas of the German-speaking area, which, historically speaking, is in a narrow dialect continuum with the regional language varieties to the north of it ( Lower Saxon and Lower Franconian ) in the lower areas of the German and Dutch-speaking areas.

term

The languages ​​that arose from High German dialects include Standard German (usually simply called "German" or "Written German"), Yiddish and Luxembourgish . Today's high German written language emerged in the past 500 years after the invention of the printing press. Since then it has increasingly supplanted the spoken German dialects as the official and school language .

High German dialects (vernaculars) are spoken in the central and southern areas of the German-speaking area, namely in Germany , Austria , German-speaking Switzerland , Liechtenstein , Luxembourg , Alsace and Lorraine ( France ), in the southern part of East Belgium and in South Tyrol ( Italy ). In addition, there are or were High German language islands, for example in northern Italy outside of South Tyrol ( Zimbern , South Walser ), Poland ( Upper Silesia ), Romania ( Transylvanian Saxony , Banat Swabia , Sathmar Swabia ), Hungary , Russia , the USA and Canada ( for example Pennsylvania Dutch and Hutterian ) and in Brazil ( Riograndenser Hunsrückisch ).

The high in the name High German dialects refers to the dialects in the higher (mountainous) regions of the central and southern German-speaking area, in contrast to the low in the name Low German dialects, which refers to the lower, flat regions in the north of the German dialect area relates. The terms appear in translations from High German into Dutch in the 15th century - High German for the first time in 1440: "Uut hoghen duutsche ghetransfereert / Ende in onser talen ghekeert" and Low German for the first time in 1457: "vanden hooghen duutsche int neder duutsche".

German etymologically means "belonging to the people", "popular" and, in contrast to other nationality adjectives, first referred to a language, from which the names for the speakers and the area they inhabited were later derived: the Latin term theodiscus for it first appears in 786, when the papal nuncio George of Ostia reported to Pope Hadrian I about two synods in England. The resolutions were read out both in Latin and in the vernacular (Latin and theodisce) so that everyone could understand them; here the word designates a variant of Old English or Anglo-Saxon. In 813 Charlemagne recommended that the clergy not only preach in Latin, but also in rusticam Romanam linguam aut Theodiscam . This theodiscus of scholarly language would correspond to a West Franconian adjective * theodisk (to Got. Þiuda, ahd. Diot "people").

For the Germanic language, the term tiedeis, tieis, tiois was used in Old French until the 15th century , and in Flemish dietsch (hence the English Dutch for the Dutch language ). At the end of the 9th century, the term teutonicus appears in Latin , which is placed next to theodiscus . It has been preserved to this day in Italian tedesco .

history

Old High German glosses from the 8th century are among the earliest evidence of the High German language.

Around the year 1200, Middle High German, based on Swabian varieties , gained supraregional importance as a poet's language as far as northern Germany.

In the early modern period, the modern High German language developed on the basis of East Central German, East Franconian and Bavarian chancellery languages as a supra-regional written language, which was used in northern Germany until the 17th century (when Low German, which was perceived as old-fashioned), until the 18th century in all of today's linguistic areas asserted.

The High German language epochs are divided as follows:

  1. Old High German (Ahd.) 750 to 1050
  2. Middle High German (Mhd.) 1050 to 1350
  3. Early New High German (Fnhd.) 1350 to 1600/1650
  4. New High German (Nhd.) 1650/1700 to the present

The dates are only to be understood as approximate values. On the one hand, the year 750 only indicates the presumed beginning of the Old High German language, since the current state of research localizes the oldest known written language sources in the second half of the 8th century, for example the Abrogans glossary around the year 770. On the other hand, the transitions between the individual epochs are very fluid - language change takes place on many levels and does not take place simultaneously in the different language areas.

structure

The different varieties of the High German languages ​​are strongly structured. Often only neighboring varieties are mutually understandable (continuum), while speakers of more distant varieties cannot communicate with one another in their own dialects, but have to use a so-called umbrella language .

The High German varieties are affected by the High German sound shift to very different degrees: Only Bairische (. Eg Tirolerisch ), maximum and high Alemannic dialects have completed the shift in sound, most High German varieties but only partially, to the extreme of East Bergish that only have participated in the shift from ik to I , but even to the north of the maken – make - isoglosses ( Benrath line ) and could therefore just as easily be assigned to the Lower Franconian dialects. In West-Central Germany in particular, the effect of the High German sound shift is often graduated, with an increasingly greater influence towards the south ( Rhenish fan ). The reason for this is the German dialect continuum, in which the dialects continuously change a little from place to place without a change being recognizable at first glance. Differences can only be made out with increasing distance. There is no generally recognized dialect boundary between High and Low German dialects.

literature

  • Rudolf Ernst Keller : German Dialects. Phonology and Morphology. With selected texts. Manchester University Press, Manchester 1961, reprinted 1979.
  • Werner König : dtv atlas on the German language. Boards and texts. With dialect cards. dtv, Munich 1978, ISBN 3-423-03025-9 , numerous new editions.
  • Charles VJ Russ (Ed.): The Dialects of Modern German. Routledge, London 1990.
  • Peter Wiesinger : The division of the German dialects. In: Werner Besch u. a .: dialectology. A manual on German and general dialectogy. de Gruyter, Berlin / New York 1983 (HSK 1), pp. 807-900.

Web links

Wikiversity: Department of German Studies  - Course Materials

swell

  1. ↑ a b Raphael Berthele (Ed.): The German written language and the regions. Walter de Gruyter, Berlin 2003, ISBN 3-11-017497-9 , p. 137.
  2. ↑ Werner König: dtv-Atlas German language. Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag, Munich 2004, ISBN 3-423-03025-9 , p. 66 f.