German is one of themajor languages of the world, with nearly 80 million native speakers and over 130 million total speakers as of 2024.[10] It is the most spoken native language within theEuropean Union. German is the second-most widely spokenGermanic language, after English, both as afirst and as asecond language. German is also widely taught as aforeign language, especially incontinental Europe (where it is the third most taught foreign language after English and French) and in the United States (where it is the thirdmost commonly learned second language in K-12 education and among the most studied foreign languages in higher education after Spanish and French).[11] Overall, German is the fourth most commonly learned second language globally.[12] The language has been influential in the fields of philosophy, theology, science, and technology. It is the second most commonly usedlanguage in science[13] and thethird most widely used language on websites.[13][14] TheGerman-speaking countries are ranked fifth in terms of annual publication of new books, with one-tenth of all books (including e-books) in the world being published in German.[15]
German is aninflected language, with fourcases for nouns, pronouns, and adjectives (nominative, accusative, genitive, dative); threegenders (masculine, feminine, neuter) and twonumbers (singular, plural). It hasstrong and weak verbs. The majority of its vocabulary derives from the ancient Germanic branch of theIndo-European language family, while a smaller share is partly derived fromLatin andGreek, along with fewer words borrowed fromFrench andModern English. English, however, is the main source of more recentloanwords.
Within the West Germanic language dialect continuum, theBenrath andUerdingen lines (running throughDüsseldorf-Benrath andKrefeld-Uerdingen, respectively) serve to distinguish the Germanic dialects that were affected by theHigh German consonant shift (south of Benrath) from those that were not (north of Uerdingen). The various regional dialects spoken south of these lines are grouped asHigh German dialects, while those spoken to the north comprise theLow German andLow Franconian dialects. As members of the West Germanic language family, High German, Low German, and Low Franconian have been proposed to be further distinguished historically asIrminonic,Ingvaeonic, andIstvaeonic, respectively. This classification indicates their historical descent from dialects spoken by the Irminones (also known as the Elbe group), Ingvaeones (or North Sea Germanic group), and Istvaeones (or Weser–Rhine group).[18]
After these High German dialects, standard German is less closely related to languages based on Low Franconian dialects (e.g., Dutch and Afrikaans), Low German or Low Saxon dialects (spoken in northern Germany and southernDenmark), neither of which underwent the High German consonant shift. As has been noted, the former of these dialect types is Istvaeonic and the latter Ingvaeonic, whereas the High German dialects are all Irminonic; the differences between these languages and standard German are therefore considerable. Also related to German are the Frisian languages—North Frisian (spoken inNordfriesland),Saterland Frisian (spoken inSaterland), andWest Frisian (spoken inFriesland)—as well as the Anglic languages of English and Scots. TheseAnglo-Frisian dialects did not take part in the High German consonant shift, and the Anglic languages also adopted much vocabulary from bothOld Norse and theNorman language.
While there is written evidence of theOld High German language in severalElder Futhark inscriptions from as early as the sixth century AD (such as thePforzen buckle), the Old High German period is generally seen as beginning with theAbrogans (writtenc. 765–775), a Latin-Germanglossary supplying over 3,000 Old High German words with theirLatin equivalents. After theAbrogans, the first coherent works written in Old High German appear in the ninth century, chief among them being theMuspilli,Merseburg charms, andHildebrandslied, and other religious texts (theGeorgslied,Ludwigslied,Evangelienbuch, and translated hymns and prayers).[20] TheMuspilli is a Christian poem written in aBavarian dialect offering an account of the soul after theLast Judgment, and the Merseburg charms are transcriptions of spells and charms from thepagan Germanic tradition. Of particular interest to scholars, however, has been theHildebrandslied, a secularepic poem telling the tale of an estranged father and son unknowingly meeting each other in battle. Linguistically, this text is highly interesting due to the mixed use ofOld Saxon and Old High German dialects in its composition. The written works of this period stem mainly from theAlamanni, Bavarian, andThuringian groups, all belonging to the Elbe Germanic group (Irminones), which had settled in what is now southern-central Germany andAustria between the second and sixth centuries, during the great migration.[19]
In general, the surviving texts of Old High German (OHG) show a wide range ofdialectal diversity with very little written uniformity. The early written tradition of OHG survived mostly throughmonasteries andscriptoria as local translations of Latin originals; as a result, the surviving texts are written in highly disparate regional dialects and exhibit significant Latin influence, particularly in vocabulary.[19] At this point monasteries, where most written works were produced, were dominated by Latin, and German saw only occasional use in official and ecclesiastical writing.
While there is no complete agreement over the dates of theMiddle High German (MHG) period, it is generally seen as lasting from 1050 to 1350.[21] This was a period of significant expansion of the geographical territory occupied by Germanic tribes, and consequently of the number of German speakers. Whereas during the Old High German period the Germanic tribes extended only as far east as theElbe andSaale rivers, the MHG period saw a number of these tribes expanding beyond this eastern boundary intoSlavic territory (known as theOstsiedlung). With the increasing wealth and geographic spread of the Germanic groups came greater use of German in the courts of nobles as the standard language of official proceedings and literature.[21] A clear example of this is themittelhochdeutsche Dichtersprache employed in theHohenstaufen court inSwabia as a standardized supra-dialectal written language. While these efforts were still regionally bound, German began to be used in place of Latin for certain official purposes, leading to a greater need for regularity in written conventions.
While the major changes of the MHG period were socio-cultural, High German was still undergoing significant linguistic changes in syntax, phonetics, and morphology as well (e.g.,diphthongization of certain vowel sounds:hus (OHG & MHG "house")→haus (regionally in later MHG)→Haus (NHG), and weakening of unstressed short vowels toschwa [ə]:taga (OHG "days")→tage (MHG)).[22]
German language area and major dialectal divisions around1900[24]
Modern High German begins with the Early New High German (ENHG) period, whichWilhelm Scherer dates 1350–1650, terminating with the end of theThirty Years' War.[23] This period saw the further displacement of Latin by German as the primary language of courtly proceedings and, increasingly, of literature in theGerman states. While these states were still part of theHoly Roman Empire, and far from any form of unification, the desire for a cohesive written language that would be understandable across the many German-speakingprincipalities and kingdoms was stronger than ever. As a spoken language German remained highly fractured throughout this period, with a vast number of often mutually incomprehensibleregional dialects being spoken throughout the German states; the invention of theprinting pressc. 1440 and the publication ofLuther's vernacular translation of the Bible in 1534, however, had an immense effect on standardizing German as a supra-dialectal written language.
Alongside these courtly written standards, the invention of the printing press led to the development of a number of printers' languages (Druckersprachen) aimed at making printed material readable and understandable across as many diverse dialects of German as possible.[26] The greater ease of production and increased availability of written texts brought about increased standardisation in the written form of German.
One of the central events in the development of ENHG was the publication ofLuther's translation of the Bible into High German (theNew Testament was published in 1522; theOld Testament was published in parts and completed in 1534).[27] Luther based his translation primarily on theMeißner Deutsch ofSaxony, spending much time among the population of Saxony researching the dialect so as to make the work as natural and accessible to German speakers as possible. Copies of Luther's Bible featured a long list ofglosses for each region, translating words which were unknown in the region into the regional dialect. Luther said the following concerning his translation method:
One who would talk German does not ask the Latin how he shall do it; he must ask the mother in the home, the children on the streets, the common man in the market-place and note carefully how they talk, then translate accordingly. They will then understand what is said to them because it is German. When Christ says 'ex abundantia cordis os loquitur,' I would translate, if I followed the papists,aus dem Überflusz des Herzens redet der Mund. But tell me is this talking German? What German understands such stuff? No, the mother in the home and the plain man would say,Wesz das Herz voll ist, des gehet der Mund über.[28]
Luther's translation of the Bible into High German was also decisive for the German language and its evolution fromEarly New High German to modern Standard German.[27] The publication of Luther's Bible was a decisive moment in thespread of literacy in early modern Germany,[27] and promoted the development of non-local forms of language and exposed all speakers to forms of German from outside their own area.[29] With Luther's rendering of the Bible in the vernacular, German asserted itself against the dominance of Latin as a legitimate language for courtly, literary, and now ecclesiastical subject-matter. His Bible was ubiquitous in the German states: nearly every household possessed a copy.[30] Nevertheless, even with the influence of Luther's Bible as an unofficial written standard, a widely accepted standard for written German did not appear until the middle of the eighteenth century.[31]
Ethnolinguistic map comprising the territories ofAustria-Hungary (1910), with German-speaking areas shown in red
German was the language of commerce and government in theHabsburg Empire, which encompassed a large area ofCentral andEastern Europe. Until the mid-nineteenth century, it was essentially the language of townspeople throughout most of the Empire. Its use indicated that the speaker was a merchant or someone from an urban area, regardless of nationality.
Prague (German:Prag) andBudapest (Buda, German:Ofen), to name two examples, were graduallyGermanized in the years after their incorporation into the Habsburg domain. However, Prague had a large German-speaking population since the Middle Ages, as had Pressburg (Pozsony, now Bratislava), which was settled by Germans in the 10th century. Significant portions of Bohemia and Moravia, now part of theCzech Republic, had become German-speaking duringOstsiedlung. During the Habsburg time, Budapest and cities likeZagreb (German:Agram) orLjubljana (German:Laibach), contained significant German minorities.
In the eastern provinces ofBanat,Bukovina, andTransylvania (German:Banat, Buchenland, Siebenbürgen), German was the predominant language not only in the larger towns—likeTemeschburg (Timișoara),Hermannstadt (Sibiu), andKronstadt (Brașov)—but also in many smaller localities in the surrounding areas.[32]
Standardization
In 1901, theSecond Orthographic Conference ended with a (nearly) completestandardization of theStandard German language in its written form, and the Duden Handbook was declared its standard definition.[33] Punctuation and compound spelling (joined or isolated compounds) were not standardized in the process.
Participants of Meetings of German-speaking countries (2004–present)
TheDeutsche Bühnensprache (lit.'German stage language') byTheodor Siebs had establishedconventions for German pronunciation in theatres,[34] three years earlier; however, this was an artificial standard that did not correspond to any traditional spoken dialect. Rather, it was based on the pronunciation of German in Northern Germany, although it was subsequently regarded often as a general prescriptive norm, despite differing pronunciation traditions especially in the Upper-German-speaking regions that still characterise the dialect of the area today – especially the pronunciation of the ending-ig as [ɪk] instead of [ɪç]. In Northern Germany, High German was a foreign language to most inhabitants, whose native dialects were subsets of Low German. It was usually encountered only in writing or formal speech; in fact, most of High German was a written language, not identical to any spoken dialect, throughout the German-speaking area until well into the 19th century. However, widerstandardization of pronunciation was established on the basis of public speaking in theatres and the media during the 20th century and documented in pronouncing dictionaries.
Official revisions of some of the rules from 1901 were not issued until the controversialGerman orthography reform of 1996 was made the official standard by governments of all German-speaking countries.[35] Media and written works are now almost all produced in Standard German which is understood in all areas where German is spoken.
However, an exact, global number of native German speakers is complicated by the existence of several varieties whose status as separate "languages" or "dialects" is disputed for political and linguistic reasons, including quantitatively strong varieties like certain forms ofAlemannic andLow German.[8] With the inclusion or exclusion of certain varieties, it is estimated that approximately 90–95 million people speak German as afirst language,[38][page needed][39] 10–25million speak it as asecond language,[38][page needed] and 75–100million as aforeign language.[2] This would imply the existence of approximately 175–220million German speakers worldwide.[40]
German sociolinguistUlrich Ammon estimated a number of 289 million German foreign language speakers without clarifying the criteria by which he classified a speaker.[41]
Europe
The German language in Europe:
GermanSprachraum: German is the official language (de jure orde facto) and first language of the majority of the population
German is a co-official language but not the first language of the majority of the population
German (or a German dialect) is a legally recognized minority language (squares: geographic distribution too dispersed/small for map scale)
German (or a variety of German) is spoken by a sizeable minority but has no legal recognition
Most ofAustria lies in theBavarian dialect area; only the very west of the country is
As of 2012[update], about 90million people, or 16% of theEuropean Union's population, spoke German as their mother tongue, making it the second most widely spoken language on the continent after Russian and the second biggest language in terms of overall speakers (after English), as well as the most spoken native language.[2]
German Sprachraum
The area in central Europe where the majority of the population speaks German as a first language and has German as a (co-)official language is called the "GermanSprachraum". German is the official language of the following countries:
As a result of implemenation of theOder–Neisse line and ensuing expusion and ethnic cleansing in post-war Poland, the German Sprachraum significantly shrank, as well as by dissolution of the large German-speaking areas in Bohemia and Moravia. Former German-speaking exclaves ofEast Prussia, theFree City of Danzig an theMemelland ceased to exist, whileFrancization in Alsace and Lorraine removed use of German in these areas.
German is a co-official language of the following countries:
Switzerland, co-official at the federal level with French, Italian, and Romansh, and at the local level in fourcantons:Bern (with French),Fribourg (with French),Grisons (with Italian and Romansh) andValais (with French)
Althoughexpulsions and(forced) assimilation after the twoWorld wars greatly diminished them, minority communities of mostly bilingual German native speakers exist in areas both adjacent to and detached from the Sprachraum.
Within Europe, German is a recognized minority language in the following countries:[42]
In theBaltic states ofEstonia,Latvia, andLithuania, there are still around 8,000 members of the German minority (Baltic Germans, East Prussians, andRussian Germans) who speak Standard German and, to some extent, Low German. For Estonia, the number is estimated quite precisely at under 2,000 (in 2000: 1,870), for Latvia at just over 3,000 (in 2004: 3,311), and also for Lithuania at just over 3,000.[46]
In 2010, 394,000 Germans lived inRussia, some of whom spoke German. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, many Russian Germans immigrated to Germany.
Bilingual German-English sign at a bakery inNamibia, where German is a national language
Namibia also was acolony of the German Empire, from 1884 to 1915. About 30,000 people still speak German as a native tongue today, mostlydescendants of German colonial settlers.[47] The period of German colonialism in Namibia also led to the evolution of a Standard German-basedpidgin language called "Namibian Black German", which became a second language for parts of the indigenous population. Although it is nearly extinct today, some older Namibians still have some knowledge of it.[48]
German remained ade facto official language of Namibia after the end of German colonial rule alongside English andAfrikaans, and hadde jure co-official status from 1984 until its independence from South Africa in 1990. However, the Namibian government perceived Afrikaans and German as symbols ofapartheid and colonialism, and decided English would be the sole official language upon independence, stating that it was a "neutral" language as there were virtually no English native speakers in Namibia at that time.[47] German, Afrikaans, and several indigenous languages thus became "national languages" by law, identifying them as elements of the cultural heritage of the nation and ensuring that the state acknowledged and supported their presence in the country.
Today, Namibia is considered to be the only German-speaking country outside of theSprachraum in Europe.[47] German is used in a wide variety of spheres throughout the country, especially in business, tourism, and public signage, as well as in education, churches (most notably the German-speakingEvangelical Lutheran Church in Namibia (GELK)), other cultural spheres such as music, and media (such as German language radio programs by theNamibian Broadcasting Corporation). TheAllgemeine Zeitung is one of the three biggest newspapers in Namibia and the only German-language daily in Africa.[47]
Rest of Africa
An estimated 12,000 people speak German or a German variety as a first language in South Africa, mostly originating from different waves of immigration during the 19th and 20th centuries.[49] One of the largest communities consists of the speakers of "Nataler Deutsch",[50] a variety ofLow German concentrated in and aroundWartburg. The South African constitution identifies German as a "commonly used" language and thePan South African Language Board is obligated to promote and ensure respect for it.[51]
Cameroon was also acolony of theGerman Empire from the same period (1884 to 1916). However, German was replaced by French and English, the languages of the two successor colonial powers, after its loss inWorld War I. Nevertheless, since the 21st century, German has become a popular foreign language among pupils and students, with 300,000 people learning or speaking German in Cameroon in 2010 and over 230,000 in 2020.[52] Today Cameroon is one of the African countries outside Namibia with the highest number of people learning German.[53]
In the United States, German is the fifth most spoken language in terms of native and second language speakers after English,Spanish,French, andChinese (with figures forCantonese andMandarin combined), with over 1 million total speakers.[54] In the states ofNorth Dakota andSouth Dakota, German is the most common language spoken at home after English.[55] As a legacy of significantGerman immigration to the country, German geographical names can be found throughout theMidwest region, such asNew Ulm andBismarck (North Dakota's state capital), plus many other regions.[56]
A number of German varieties have developed in the country and are still spoken today, such asPennsylvania Dutch andTexas German.
In Chile, during the 19th and 20th centuries, there was amassive immigration of Germans, Swiss and Austrians. Because of that, two dialects of German emerged,Lagunen-Deutsch and Chiloten-Deutsch.[61] Immigrants even founded prosperous cities and towns. The impact of nineteenth century German immigration to southern Chile was such thatValdivia was for a while a Spanish-German bilingual city with "German signboards and placards alongside the Spanish".[62] Currently, German and its dialects are spoken in many cities, towns and rural areas of southern Chile, such asValdivia,Osorno,Puerto Montt,Puerto Varas,Frutillar,Nueva Braunau,Castro,Ancud, among many others.
In Australia, the state ofSouth Australia experienced a pronounced wave of Prussian immigration in the 1840s (particularly fromSilesia region). With the prolonged isolation from other German speakers and contact withAustralian English, a unique dialect known asBarossa German developed, spoken predominantly in theBarossa Valley nearAdelaide. Usage of German sharply declined with the advent ofWorld War I, due to the prevailing anti-German sentiment in the population and related government action. It continued to be used as a first language into the 20th century, but its use is now limited to a few older speakers.[63]
As of the 2013 census, 36,642 people inNew Zealand spoke German, mostly descendants of a small wave of 19th century German immigrants, making it the third most spoken European language after English and French and overall the ninth most spoken language.[64]
A Germancreole namedUnserdeutsch was historically spoken in the former German colony ofGerman New Guinea, modern dayPapua New Guinea. It is at a high risk of extinction, with only about 100 speakers remaining, and a topic of interest among linguists seeking to revive interest in the language.[65]
As a foreign language
Self-reported knowledge of German as aforeign language in the EU member states (+Turkey andUK), in per cent of the adult population (+15), 2005
Like English, French, and Spanish, German has become a standard foreign language throughout the world, especially in the Western World.[2][66] German ranks second on par with French among the best known foreign languages in theEuropean Union (EU) after English,[2] as well as inRussia,[67] andTurkey.[2] In terms of student numbers across all levels of education, German ranks third in the EU (after English and French)[37] and in the United States (after Spanish and French).[36][68] In British schools, where learning a foreign language is not mandatory, a dramatic decline in entries for German A-Level has been observed.[69] In 2020, approximately 15.4million people were enrolled in learning German across all levels of education worldwide. This number has decreased from a peak of 20.1million in 2000.[70] Within the EU, not counting countries where it is an official language, German as a foreign language is most popular inEastern andNorthern Europe, namely theCzech Republic,Croatia,Denmark,Greece,Hungary, theNetherlands,Norway,Poland,Slovakia,Slovenia,Bosnia and Herzegovina, andSerbia.[2][71] German was once, and to some extent still is, alingua franca in those parts of Europe.[72]
German-language media worldwide
A visible sign of the geographical extension of the German language is the German-language media outside the German-speaking countries.German is the second most commonly used scientific language[73][better source needed] as well as the third most widely used language on websites after English and Spanish.[74]
Deutsche Welle (German pronunciation: [ˈdɔʏtʃə ˈvɛlə]; "German Wave" in German), orDW, is Germany's public international broadcaster. The service is available in 30 languages. DW's satellite television service consists of channels in German, English, Spanish, and Arabic.
Goethe-Institut [ˈɡøːtə ʔɪnstiˌtuːt] (a non-profit German cultural association operational worldwide with 159 institutes, promoting the study of the German language abroad and encouraging international cultural exchange and relations.)
Self-reported knowledge of German within the nations of the European Union
The basis of Standard German developed with theLuther Bible and the chancery language spoken by theSaxon court, part of the regional High German group.[75] However, there are places where the traditional regional dialects have been replaced by new vernaculars based on Standard German; that is the case in large stretches ofNorthern Germany but also in major cities in other parts of the country. It is important to note, however, that the colloquial Standard German differs from the formal written language, especially in grammar and syntax, in which it has been influenced by dialectal speech.
Standard German differs regionally among German-speaking countries invocabulary and some instances ofpronunciation and evengrammar andorthography. This variation must not be confused with the variation of localdialects. Even though the national varieties of Standard German are only somewhat influenced by the local dialects, they are very distinct. German is thus considered apluricentric language, with currently three national standard varieties of German:German Standard German,Austrian Standard German andSwiss Standard German. In comparison to other European languages (e.g., Portuguese, English), the multi-standard character of German is still not widely acknowledged.[76] However, 90% of Austrian secondary school teachers of German consider German as having "more than one" standard variety.[77] In this context, some scholars speak of aOne Standard German Axiom that has been maintained as a core assumption of German dialectology.[78]
In most regions, the speakers use a continuum, e.g., "Umgangssprache" (colloquial standards) from more dialectal varieties to more standard varieties depending on the circumstances.
Varieties
The national and regional standard varieties of German[79]
In Germanlinguistics, Germandialects are distinguished fromvarieties ofStandard German.Thevarieties of Standard German refer to the different local varieties of thepluricentric German. They differ mainly in lexicon and phonology, but also smaller grammatical differences. In certain regions, they have replaced the traditional German dialects, especially in Northern Germany.
In the German-speaking parts ofSwitzerland, mixtures of dialect and standard are very seldom used, and the use of Standard German is largely restricted to the written language. About 11% of the Swiss residents speak Standard German at home, but this is mainly due to German immigrants.[80] This situation has been called amedialdiglossia.Swiss Standard German is used in the Swiss education system, whileAustrian German is officially used in the Austrian education system.
The German dialects are the traditional local varieties of the language; many of them are notmutually intelligible with standard German, and they have great differences inlexicon,phonology, andsyntax. If a narrow definition oflanguage based on mutual intelligibility is used, many German dialects are considered to be separate languages (for instance byISO 639-3). However, such a point of view is unusual in German linguistics.
The German dialect continuum is traditionally divided most broadly intoHigh German andLow German, also calledLow Saxon. However, historically, High German dialects and Low Saxon/Low German dialects do not belong to the same language. Nevertheless, in today's Germany, Low Saxon/Low German is often perceived as a dialectal variation of Standard German on a functional level even by many native speakers.
The variation among the German dialects is considerable, with often only neighbouring dialects being mutually intelligible. Some dialects are not intelligible to people who know only Standard German. However, all German dialects belong to the dialect continuum of High German and Low Saxon.
Middle Low German was thelingua franca of theHanseatic League. It was the predominant language in Northern Germany until the 16th century. In 1534, theLuther Bible was published. It aimed to be understandable to a broad audience and was based mainly onCentral andUpper German varieties. The Early New High German language gained more prestige thanLow German and became the language of science and literature. Around the same time, the Hanseatic League, a confederation of northern ports, lost its importance as new trade routes to Asia and the Americas were established, and the most powerful German states of that period were located in Middle and Southern Germany.
The 18th and 19th centuries were marked by mass education inStandard German in schools. Gradually, Low German came to be politically viewed as a mere dialect spoken by the uneducated. The proportion of the population who can understand and speak it has decreased continuously sinceWorld War II.
TheLow Franconian dialects fall within a linguistic category used to classify a number of historical and contemporary West Germanic varieties most closely related to, and including, theDutch language. Consequently, the vast majority of the Low Franconian dialects are spoken outside of the German language area. Low Franconian dialects are spoken in the Netherlands, Belgium, South Africa, Namibia, and Suriname, and along theLower Rhine in Germany, inNorth Rhine-Westphalia. The region in Germany encompasses parts of theRhine-Ruhr metropolitan region.
The Low Franconian dialects have three different standard varieties: In the Netherlands, Belgium and Suriname, it is Dutch, which is itself a Low Franconian language. In South Africa, it isAfrikaans, which is also categorized as Low Franconian. During theMiddle Ages andEarly Modern Period, the Low Franconian dialects now spoken in Germany, usedMiddle Dutch or Early Modern Dutch as theirliterary language andDachsprache. Following a 19th-century change in Prussian language policy, use of Dutch as an official and public language was forbidden; resulting inStandard German taking its place as the region's official language.[81][82] As a result, these dialects are now considered German dialects from a socio-linguistic point of view.[83]
The Low Franconian dialects in Germany are divided by theUerdingen line (north of which the word for "I" is pronounced as "ik" and south of which as "ich") into northern and southern Low Franconian. The northern variants compriseKleverlandish, which is most similar to Standard Dutch. The other ones are transitional between Low Franconian andRipuarian, but closer to Low Franconian.
The High German dialects consist of theCentral German,High Franconian andUpper German dialects. The High Franconian dialects are transitional dialects between Central and Upper German. The High German varieties spoken by theAshkenazi Jews have several unique features and are considered as a separate language,Yiddish, written with theHebrew alphabet.
Central German
TheCentral German dialects are spoken in Central Germany, fromAachen in the west toGörlitz in the east. Modern Standard German is mostly based on Central German dialects.
South Franconian is spoken in northernBaden-Württemberg and in the northeasternmost tip ofAlsace (aroundWissembourg) in France. In Baden-Württemberg, they are considered dialects of German, and in Alsace a South Franconian variant ofAlsatian.
Cities with more than 100,000 inhabitants in the area:Karlsruhe andHeilbronn.
In Germany, the Alemannic dialects are often referred to as Swabian inBavarian Swabia and in the historical region ofWürttemberg, and as Badian in the historical region ofBaden.
The northernmost Austro-Bavarian village is Breitenfeld (municipality ofMarkneukirchen, Saxony), the southernmost village isSalorno sulla Strada del Vino (German: Salurn an der Weinstraße), South Tyrol.
threegenders: masculine, feminine, and neuter. For the majority of nouns (especially masculine and neuter ones), the gender is not predictable from the word's shape.Affixes sometimes reveal grammatical gender: for instance, nouns ending in-ung (-ing),-schaft (-ship),-keit orheit (-hood, -ness) are feminine, nouns ending in-chen or-lein (diminutive forms) are neuter and nouns ending in-ismus (-ism) are masculine. However, most words do not have strictly gendered affixes.
two numbers: singular and plural.
This degree of inflection is considerably less than inOld High German and other oldIndo-European languages such asLatin,Ancient Greek, andSanskrit, and it is also somewhat less than, for instance,Old English, modernIcelandic, or Russian. The three genders have collapsed in the plural. With four cases and three genders plus plural, there are 16 permutations of case and gender/number of the article (not the nouns), but there are only six forms of thedefinite article, which together cover all 16 permutations. In nouns, inflection for case is required in the singular for strong masculine and neuter nouns only in the genitive and in the dative (only in fixed or archaic expressions), and even this is losing ground to substitutes in informal speech.[84] Weak masculine nouns share a common case ending for genitive, dative, and accusative in the singular. Feminine nouns are not declined in the singular. The plural has an inflection for the dative. In total, seven inflectional endings (not counting plural markers) exist in German:-s, -es, -n, -ns, -en, -ens, -e.
Compounding
Like the other Germanic languages, German forms nouncompounds in which the first noun modifies the category given by the second:Hundehütte ("dog hut"; specifically: "dog kennel"). Unlike English, whose newer compounds or combinations of longer nouns are often written "open" with separating spaces, German (like some other Germanic languages) nearly always uses the "closed" form without spaces, for example:Baumhaus ("tree house"). Like English, German allows arbitrarily long compounds in theory (see alsoEnglish compounds). The longest German word verified to be actually in (albeit very limited) use isRindfleischetikettierungsüberwachungsaufgabenübertragungsgesetz, which, literally translated, is "beef labelling supervision duties assignment law" [fromRind (cattle),Fleisch (meat),Etikettierung(s) (labelling),Überwachung(s) (supervision),Aufgaben (duties),Übertragung(s) (assignment),Gesetz (law)]. However, examples like this are perceived by native speakers as excessively bureaucratic, stylistically awkward, or even satirical. On the other hand, even this compound could be expanded by any native speaker.
Two mainconjugation classes:weak andstrong (as in English). Additionally, there is a third class, known as mixed verbs, whose conjugation combines features of both the strong and weak patterns.
Twovoices: active and passive. The passive voice uses auxiliary verbs and is divisible into static and dynamic. Static forms show a constant state and use the verbto be (sein). Dynamic forms show an action and use the verbto become (werden).
The distinction betweengrammatical aspects is rendered by combined use of the subjunctive or preterite marking so the plain indicative voice uses neither of those two markers; the subjunctive by itself often conveys reported speech; subjunctive plus preterite marks the conditional state; and the preterite alone shows either plain indicative (in the past), or functions as a (literal) alternative for either reported speech or the conditional state of the verb, when necessary for clarity.
The distinction between perfect andprogressive aspect is and has, at every stage of development, been a productive category of the older language and in nearly all documented dialects, but strangely enough it is now rigorously excluded from written usage in its present normalised form.
Disambiguation of completed vs. uncompleted forms is widely observed and regularly generated by common prefixes (blicken [to look],erblicken [to see – unrelated form:sehen]).
Verb prefixes
The meaning of basic verbs can be expanded and sometimes radically changed through the use of a number of prefixes. Some prefixes have a specific meaning; the prefixzer- refers to destruction, as inzerreißen (to tear apart),zerbrechen (to break apart),zerschneiden (to cut apart). Other prefixes have only the vaguest meaning in themselves;ver- is found in a number of verbs with a large variety of meanings, as inversuchen (to try) fromsuchen (to seek),vernehmen (to interrogate) fromnehmen (to take),verteilen (to distribute) fromteilen (to share),verstehen (to understand) fromstehen (to stand).
Other examples include the following:haften (to stick),verhaften (to detain);kaufen (to buy),verkaufen (to sell);hören (to hear),aufhören (to cease);fahren (to drive),erfahren (to experience).
ManyGerman verbs have a separable prefix, often with an adverbial function. Infinite verb forms, it is split off and moved to the end of the clause and is hence considered by some to be a "resultative particle". For example,mitgehen, meaning "to go along", would be split, givingGehen Sie mit? (Literal: "Go you with?"; Idiomatic: "Are you going along?").
Indeed, severalparenthetical clauses may occur between the prefix of a finite verb and its complement (ankommen = to arrive, er kam an = he arrived, er ist angekommen = he has arrived):
Erkam am Freitagabend nach einem harten Arbeitstag und dem üblichen Ärger, der ihn schon seit Jahren immer wieder an seinem Arbeitsplatz plagt, mit fraglicher Freude auf ein Mahl, das seine Frau ihm, wie er hoffte, bereits aufgetischt hatte, endlich zu Hausean.
A selectively literal translation of this example to illustrate the point might look like this:
He "came" on Friday evening, after a hard day at work and the usual annoyances that had time and again been troubling him for years now at his workplace, with questionable joy, to a meal which, as he hoped, his wife had already put on the table, finally home "to".
Word order
German word order is generally with theV2 word order restriction and also with theSOV word order restriction for subordinate as well as for mainclauses including anauxiliary verb. As to subordinate clauses, all verb forms occur at the very end. Foryes–no questions, exclamations, and wishes, thefinite verb usually has the first position.
German requires a verbal element (main verb, modal verb or auxiliary verb as finite verb) to appearsecond in the sentence. The verb is preceded by thetopic of the sentence or anadverbial of flexible length. The element in focus appears at the end of the sentence. For a sentence without an auxiliary, these are several possibilities:
Der alte Mann gab mir gestern das Buch. (The old man gave me yesterday the book; normalsubject-verb-object order)
Das Buch gab mir gestern der alte Mann. (The book gave [to] me yesterday the old man)
Das Buch gab der alte Mann mir gestern. (The book gave the old man [to] me yesterday)
Das Buch gab mir der alte Mann gestern. (The book gave [to] me the old man yesterday)
Gestern gab mir der alte Mann das Buch. (Yesterday gave [to] me the old man the book; normal order)
Gestern gab der alte Mann mir das Buch. (Yesterday gave the old man [to] me the book;verb-subject-object order)
Mir gab der alte Mann das Buch gestern. ([To] me gave the old man the book yesterday (entailing: as for someone else, it was another date))
While the subject typically preceeds the object, the position of a noun in a German sentence has no bearing on its being a subject, an object or another argument. In adeclarative sentence in English, if the subject does not occur before the predicate, the sentence could well be misunderstood.
However, German's flexible word order allows one to emphasise specific words:
Normal word order:
Der Direktor betrat gestern um 10 Uhr mit einem Schirm in der Hand sein Büro.
The manager entered yesterday at 10 o'clock with an umbrella in the hand his office.
Second variant in normal word order:
Der Direktor betrat sein Büro gestern um 10 Uhr mit einem Schirm in der Hand.
The manager entered his office yesterday at 10 o'clock with an umbrella in the hand.
This variant accentuates the time specification and that he carried an umbrella.
Object in front:
Sein Büro betrat der Direktor gestern um 10 Uhr mit einem Schirm in der Hand.
His office entered the manager yesterday at 10 o'clock with an umbrella in the hand.
The objectSein Büro (his office) is thus highlighted; it could be the topic of the next sentence.
Adverb of time in front:
Gestern betrat der Direktor um 10 Uhr mit einem Schirm in der Hand sein Büro. (aber heute ohne Schirm)
Yesterday entered the manager at 10 o'clock with an umbrella in the hand his office. (but today without umbrella)
Both time expressions in front:
Gestern um 10 Uhr betrat der Direktor mit einem Schirm in der Hand sein Büro.
Yesterday at 10 o'clock entered the manager with an umbrella in the hand his office.
The full-time specificationGestern um 10 Uhr is highlighted.
Another possibility:
Gestern um 10 Uhr betrat der Direktor sein Büro mit einem Schirm in der Hand.
Yesterday at 10 o'clock entered the manager his office with an umbrella in the hand.
Both the time specification and the fact he carried an umbrella are accentuated.
Swapped adverbs:
Der Direktor betrat mit einem Schirm in der Hand gestern um 10 Uhr sein Büro.
The manager entered with an umbrella in the hand yesterday at 10 o'clock his office.
The phrasemit einem Schirm in der Hand is highlighted.
Swapped object:
Der Direktor betrat gestern um 10 Uhr sein Büro mit einem Schirm in der Hand.
The manager entered yesterday at 10 o'clock his office with an umbrella in the hand.
The time specification and the objectsein Büro (his office) are lightly accentuated.
The flexible word order also allows one to use language "tools" (such aspoetic meter andfigures of speech) more freely.
Auxiliary verbs
When anauxiliary verb is present in the main clause, it appears in second position, and the main verb appears at the end. This occurs notably in the creation of theperfect tense. Many word orders are still possible:
Der alte Mann hat mir heute das Buch gegeben. (The old man has [to] me today the book given.)
Das Buch hat der alte Mann mir heute gegeben. (The book has the old man [to] me today given.)
Heute hat der alte Mann mir das Buch gegeben. (Today has the old man [to] me the book given.)
The main verb may appear in first position to put stress on the action itself. Theauxiliary verb is still in second position.
Gegeben hat mir der alte Mann das Buch heute. (Given has me the old man the booktoday.) The bare fact that the book has been given is emphasized, as well as 'today'.
Modal verbs
Sentences usingmodal verbs as finite verbs place the infinitive at the end. For example, the English sentence "Should he go home?" would be rearranged in German to say "Should he (to) home go?" (Soll er nach Hause gehen?). Thus, in sentences with several subordinate or relative clauses, the infinitives are clustered at the end. Compare the similar clustering of prepositions in the following (highly contrived) English sentence: "What did you bring that book that I do not like to be read to out of up for?"
Multiple infinitives
German subordinate clauses have all verbs clustered at the end, with the finite verb normally in the final position of the cluster. Given that auxiliaries encodefuture,passive,modality, and theperfect, very long chains of verbs at the end of the sentence can occur. In these constructions, the past participle formed withge- is often replaced by the infinitive.
Man nimmt an, dass der Deserteur wohl erschossenVwordenpsvseinperfsollmod
One suspects that the deserter probably shot become be should.
("It is suspected that the deserter probably had been shot")
Er wusste nicht, dass der Agent einen Nachschlüssel hatte machen lassen
He knew not that the agent a picklock had make let
Er wusste nicht, dass der Agent einen Nachschlüssel machen lassen hatte
He knew not that the agent a picklock make let had
("He did not know that the agent had had a picklock made")
The order at the end of such strings is subject to variation, but the second one in the last example is unusual.
Vocabulary
Most German vocabulary is derived from the Germanic branch of the Indo-European language family.[85] However, there is a significant number of loanwords from other languages, in particularLatin,Greek,Italian,French, and most recentlyEnglish.[86] In the early 19th century,Joachim Heinrich Campe estimated that one fifth of the total German vocabulary was of French or Latin origin.[87]
Latin words were already imported into the predecessor of the German language during theRoman Empire and underwent all the characteristic phonetic changes in German. Their origin is thus no longer recognizable for most speakers (e.g.,Pforte,Tafel,Mauer,Käse,Köln from Latinporta,tabula,murus,caseus,Colonia). Borrowing from Latin continued after the fall of the Roman Empire duringChristianisation, mediated by the church and monasteries. Another important influx of Latin words can be observed duringRenaissance humanism. In a scholarly context, the borrowings from Latin have continued until today, in the last few decades often indirectly through borrowings from English. During the 15th to 17th centuries, the influence of Italian was great, leading to many Italian loanwords in the fields of architecture, finance and music. The influence of the French language in the 17th to 19th centuries resulted in an even greater import of French words. The English influence was already present in the 19th century, but it did not become dominant until the second half of the 20th century.
Thus,Notker Labeo translated the Aristotelian treatises into pure (Old High) German in the decades after the year 1000.[88] The tradition of loan translation revitalized in the 17th and 18th century with poets likePhilipp von Zesen or linguists likeJoachim Heinrich Campe, who introduced close to 300 words, which are still used in modern German. Even today, there are movements that promote the substitution of foreign words that are deemed unnecessary with German alternatives.[89]
As in other Germanic languages, there are many pairs ofsynonyms due to the enrichment of the Germanic vocabulary withloanwords from Latin and Latinized Greek. These words often have different connotations from their Germanic counterparts and are usually perceived as more scholarly.
The size of the vocabulary of German is difficult to estimate. TheDeutsches Wörterbuch (German Dictionary), initiated by theBrothers Grimm (Jacob andWilhelm Grimm) and the most comprehensive guide to the vocabulary of the German language, already contained over 330,000 headwords in its first edition. The modern German scientific vocabulary is estimated at nine million words and word groups (based on the analysis of 35 million sentences of acorpus in Leipzig, which as of July 2003 included 500million words in total).[90]
Written texts in German are easily recognisable as such by distinguishing features such asumlauts and certainorthographical features, such as the capitalization of all nouns, and the frequent occurrence of long compounds. Because legibility and convenience set certain boundaries, compounds consisting of more than three or four nouns are almost exclusively found in humorous contexts. (English also can string nouns together, though it usually separates the nouns with spaces: as, for example, "toilet bowl cleaner".)
In German orthography, nouns are capitalized, which makes it easier for readers to determine the function of a word within a sentence. This convention is almost unique to German today (shared perhaps only by the closely relatedLuxembourgish language and several insular dialects of theNorth Frisian language), but it was historically common in Northern Europe in the early modern era, including in languages such as Danish which abolished the capitalization of nouns in 1948, and English for a while, into the 1700s.
Since there is no traditional capital form ofß, it was replaced bySS (orSZ) when capitalization was required. For example,Maßband (tape measure) becameMASSBAND in capitals. An exception was the use of ß in legal documents and forms when capitalizing names. To avoid confusion with similar names, lower caseß was sometimes maintained (thus "KREßLEIN" instead of "KRESSLEIN").Capital ß (ẞ) was ultimately adopted into German orthography in 2017, ending a long orthographic debate (thus "KREẞLEIN andKRESSLEIN").[91]
Umlaut vowels (ä, ö, ü) are commonly transcribed with ae, oe, and ue if the umlauts are not available on the keyboard or other medium used. In the same manner, ß can be transcribed as ss. Someoperating systems use key sequences to extend the set of possible characters to include, amongst other things, umlauts; inMicrosoft Windows this is done usingAlt codes. German readers understand these transcriptions (although they appear unusual), but they are avoided if the regular umlauts are available, because they are a makeshift and not proper spelling. (In Westphalia and Schleswig-Holstein, city and family names exist where the extra e has a vowel lengthening effect, e.g.,Raesfeld[ˈraːsfɛlt],Coesfeld[ˈkoːsfɛlt] andItzehoe[ɪtsəˈhoː], but this use of the letter e after a/o/u does not occur in the present-day spelling of words other thanproper nouns.)
There is no general agreement on where letters with umlauts occur in the sorting sequence. Telephone directories treat them by replacing them with the base vowel followed by an e. Some dictionaries sort each umlauted vowel as a separate letter after the base vowel, but more commonly words with umlauts are ordered immediately after the same word without umlauts. As an example in atelephone bookÄrzte occurs afterAdressenverlage but beforeAnlagenbauer (because Ä is replaced by Ae). In a dictionaryÄrzte comes afterArzt, but in some dictionariesÄrzte and all other words starting withÄ may occur after all words starting withA. In some older dictionaries or indexes, initialSch andSt are treated as separate letters and are listed as separate entries afterS, but they are usually treated as S+C+H and S+T.
Written German also typically uses an alternative opening inverted comma (quotation mark) as in„Guten Morgen!“.
Past
A Russian dictionary from 1931, showing the "German alphabet" – the 3rd and 4th columns of each half areFraktur andKurrent respectively, with the footnote explainingligatures used in Fraktur
Until the early 20th century, German was printed inblacklettertypefaces (inFraktur, and inSchwabacher), and written in correspondinghandwriting (for exampleKurrent andSütterlin). These variants of the Latin alphabet are very different from the serif orsans-serifAntiqua typefaces used today, and the handwritten forms in particular are difficult for the untrained to read. The printed forms, however, were claimed by some to be more readable when used forGermanic languages.[92] TheNazis initially promoted Fraktur and Schwabacher because they were consideredAryan, but abolished them in 1941, claiming the letters were Jewish.[93] It is also believed this script was banned, as the German government understood Fraktur would inhibit communication in the territories occupied during World War II.[94]
The Fraktur script however remains present in everyday life in pub signs, beer brands and other forms of advertisement, where it is used to convey a certain rusticality and antiquity.
A proper use of thelong s (langes s),ſ, is essential for writing German text inFraktur typefaces. ManyAntiqua typefaces also include the long s. A specific set of rules applies for the use of long s in German text, but nowadays it is rarely used in Antiqua typesetting. Any lower case "s" at the beginning of a syllable would be a long s, as opposed to a terminal s or short s (the more common variation of the letter s), which marks the end of a syllable; for example, in differentiating between the wordsWachſtube (guard-house) andWachstube (tube of polish/wax). One can easily decide which "s" to use by appropriate hyphenation, (Wach-ſtube vs.Wachs-tube). The long s only appears inlower case.
German does not have anydental fricatives (the category containing English⟨th⟩). All of the⟨th⟩ sounds, which the English language still has, disappeared on the continent in German with the consonant shifts between the 8th and 10th centuries.[95] It is sometimes possible to find parallels between English and German by replacing the English⟨th⟩ with⟨d⟩ in German, e.g., "thank" →Dank, "this" and "that" →dies anddas, "thou" (old 2nd person singular pronoun) →du, "think" →denken, "thirsty" →durstig, etc.
Likewise, the⟨gh⟩ inGermanic English words, pronounced in several different ways in modern English (as an⟨f⟩ or not at all), can often be linked to German⟨ch⟩, e.g., "to laugh" →lachen, "through" →durch, "high" →hoch, "naught" →nichts, "light" →leicht orLicht, "sight" →Sicht, "daughter" →Tochter, "neighbour" →Nachbar. This is due to the fact that English⟨gh⟩ was historically pronounced in the same way as German⟨ch⟩ (as/x/ and/ç/ in an allophonic relationship, or potentially as/x/ in all circumstances as in modern Dutch) with these word pairs originally (up until around the mid to late 16th century) sounding far more similar than they do today.
The German language is used in German literature and can be traced back to theMiddle Ages, with the most notable authors of the period beingWalther von der Vogelweide andWolfram von Eschenbach.TheNibelungenlied, whose author remains unknown, is also an important work of the epoch. The fairy tales collected and published byJacob and Wilhelm Grimm in the 19th century became famous throughout the world.
^in danger of extinction due to the Francization of Alsace
^in danger of extinction due to the Francization of Alsace
^menschlich, and occasionallyhuman, may also mean "human, pertaining to humans", whereasMenschlichkeit andHumanität never mean "humanity, human race", which translates toMenschheit.
^In modern German,Diktionär is mostly considered archaic.
References
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^Ha, Thu-Huong (20 July 2017)."Germany has ended a century-long debate over a missing letter in its alphabet".Quartz.Archived from the original on 22 November 2017. Retrieved5 December 2017.According to the council's 2017 spelling manual: When writing the uppercase [of ß], write SS. It's also possible to use the uppercase ẞ. Example: Straße – STRASSE – STRAẞE.
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