This article includes a list of general references, but it lacks sufficient corresponding inline citations. (October 2015) |
Old Frisian was a West Germanic language spoken between the 8th and 16th centuries along the North Sea coast, roughly between the mouths of the Rhine and Weser rivers. The Frisian settlers on the coast of South Jutland (today's Northern Friesland) also spoke Old Frisian, but there are no known medieval texts from this area. The language of the earlier inhabitants of the region between the Zuiderzee and Ems River (the Frisii mentioned by Tacitus) is attested in only a few personal names and place-names. Old Frisian evolved into Middle Frisian, spoken from the 16th to the 19th century.
| Old Frisian | |
|---|---|
| Frisesk | |
| Region | Netherlands, Germany, Southern Denmark |
| Ethnicity | Frisians |
| Era | 8th to 16th centuries |
Indo-European
| |
Early forms | |
| Anglo–Frisian runes Latin | |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | ofs |
Linguist List | ofs |
| Glottolog | oldf1241 |
| This article contains IPA phonetic symbols. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Unicode characters. For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, see Help:IPA. | |
In the early Middle Ages, Frisia stretched from the area around Bruges, in what is now Belgium, to the Weser River in northern Germany. At the time, the Frisian language was spoken along the entire southern North Sea coast. This region is referred to as Greater Frisia or Magna Frisia, and many of the areas within it still treasure their Frisian heritage. However, by 1300, their territory had been pushed back to the Zuiderzee (now the IJsselmeer), and the Frisian language survives along the coast only as a substrate.
A close relationship exists between Old Frisian and Old English; this is due to a shared history, language and culture of the people from Northern Germany and Denmark who came to settle in England from around 400 A.D. onwards.
Phonological development
Consonants
Generally, Old Frisian phonologically resembles Old English. In particular, it shares the palatalisation of velar consonants also found in Old English. For example, whereas the closely related Old Saxon and Old Dutch retain the velar in dag, Old Frisian has dei and Old English has dæġ [dæj]. When initial and followed by front vowels the Germanic /k/, changed to the sounds /ts/ and /j/. Proto-Germanic /ɣ/ became /j/ after /e/, and word-initially before front vowels. Proto-Germanic /g/, where it existed, became /dz/. The Old Frisian for church was tzirke or tzerke, in Old English it was ċiriċe [ˈtʃiritʃe], while Old Saxon and Old Dutch have the unpalatalised kirika. Palatalization postdated fronting, and predated monophthongization and i-umlaut.
Between vowels, h generally disappears (sian from *sehwaną), as in Old English and Old Dutch. Word-initial h- on the other hand is retained. Old Frisian retains th in all positions for longer than Old Dutch and Old Saxon do, showing the gradual spread of the shift from th to d from south to north, beginning in southern Germany in the 9th century, but not reaching Frisian until the 13th or 14th century.
Vowels
Another feature shared between Old Frisian and Old English is the Anglo-Frisian brightening, which fronted a to æ except in certain conditions:
- stressed and before nasals
- in the sequence (-)warC.
- before h(C), lC.
Much later, after breaking, /æ/ became /e/.
Before /xx/, /xs/, /xt/, short /e/, /i/ became /iu/ in a process known as "breaking". An unrelated sound change where /i/ became /iu/ if /u/ or /w/ followed in the next syllable occurred later, after I-mutation.
Vowels were fronted or raised in before /i/, /j/ a process called I-mutation:
- /a(ː)/ > /æ(ː)/
- /æ/ > /e/
- /u(ː)/ > /y(ː)/
- /o(ː)/ > /æ(ː)/
The old Germanic diphthongs *ai and *au become ē/ā and ā, respectively, in Old Frisian, as in ēn/ān ("one") from Proto-Germanic *ainaz, and brād from *braudą ("bread"). In comparison, these diphthongs become ā and ēa (ān and brēad) in Old English, and ē and ō (ēn and brōd) in Old Saxon. The diphthong *eu generally becomes ia, and Germanic *iu is retained. These diphthongs initially began with a syllabic (stressed) i, but the stress later shifts to the second component, giving to iā and iū. For example, thiād ("people") and liūde from Proto-Germanic *þeudō and *liudīz.
Phonology
| Type | Front | Back | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| short | long | short | long | |
| Close | i | iː | u | uː |
| Mid | e | eː, ɛː | o | o:, ɔː |
| Open | ɑ | ɑː | ||
| Type | Bilabial | Dental | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | m(ː) | n(ː) | (ŋ) | |||||||
| Stop | p(ː) | b(ː) | t(ː) | d(ː) | k(ː) | ɡ(ː) | ||||
| Fricative | f(ː) | (v) | θ(ː) | (ð) | s(ː) | z | x(ː) | (ɣ) | ||
| Approximant | j | w | ||||||||
| Liquid | r(ː) | l(ː) | ||||||||
Grammar
Old Frisian (c. 1150 – c. 1550) retained grammatical cases. Some of the texts that are preserved from this period are from the 12th or 13th century, but most are from the 14th and 15th centuries. Generally, all these texts are restricted to legal writings. Although the earliest written examples of Frisian—stray words in a Latin context—are from approximately the 9th century, there are a few examples of runic inscriptions from the region which are older and in a very early form of the Frisian language. These runic writings however usually consist of no more than inscriptions of a single or few words.
Old Frisian had three genders (masculine, feminine, and neuter), two numbers (singular and plural), and four cases (Nominative, accusative, genitive, dative, although traces of an instrumental and locative case exist)
Pronouns
| First person | Second person | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Singular | Plural | Singular | Plural | |
| Nominative | ik | wī | thū | jī, ī, gī |
| Accusative | mī | ūs | þī | iu, io |
| Genitive | mīn | ūser | þīn | iuwer |
| Dative/instrumental | mī | ūs | þī | iu, io |
Dual forms are unattested in Old Frisian but their presence is confirmed by their continued existence in later Frisian dialects until the mid-20th century.
Nouns
A significant portion of Old Frisian nouns fall into the a-stem declension pattern. Most a-stem nouns are masculine or neuter.
| Case | Masculine bām « beam» | Neuter | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Light skip « boat » | Heavy word « word» | |||||
| Singular | Plural | Singular | Plural | Singular | Plural | |
| Nominative−Accusative | bām | bāmar, -er, -an, -a | skip | skipu | word | word |
| Genitive | bāmes | bāma | skipes | skipa | wordes | worda |
| Dative | bāme | bāmum, -em, -im | skipe | skipum | worde | wordum |
Certain words like dei "day" have "g" in the plural endings.
All nouns in the ō-stem declension were feminine. The nominative Singular -e comes from the accusative case.
Text sample
| English | Old Frisian |
|---|---|
| God created the first man, that was Adam, from eight things: | God scop thene eresta meneska - thet was Adam - fon achta wendem: |
| the bones from the rock, | thet benete fon tha stene, |
| the flesh from the earth, | thet flask fon tha erthe, |
| the blood from the water, | thet blod fon tha wetere, |
| the heart from the wind, | tha herta fon tha winde, |
| the thoughts from the clouds, | thene thogta fon tha wolkem, |
| the sweat from the dew, | thet swet fon tha dawe, |
| the (hair)locks from the grass, | tha lokkar fon tha gerse, |
| the eyes from the sun, | tha agene fon there sunna, |
| and then He breathed holy breath on it. | and tha ble'r'em on thene helga om. |
| And then He created Eve from his rib, Adam's beloved. | And tha scop'er Eva fon sine ribbe, Adames liava. |
Corpus
There are some early Frisian names preserved in Latin texts, and some runic (Futhorc) inscriptions, but the oldest surviving texts in Old Frisian date from the 13th century, in particular official and legal documents. They show a considerable degree of linguistic uniformity.
- Westeremden yew-stick (c. 750–900)
- Fon Alra Fresena Fridome (at TITUS: TITUS)
- Ten Commandements (TITUS)
- 17 petitiones (TITUS)
- Londriucht (TITUS)
- Thet Freske Riim (TITUS, ed. E. Epkema, Google Books)
- Skeltana Riucht law code (TITUS)
Notes
- Hines, John; IJssennagger, Nelleke, eds. (2021). Frisians of the Early Middle Ages. Studies in historical archaeoethnology. Woodbridge: The Boydell Press. p. 94. ISBN 978-1-78327-561-8. OCLC 1201655870.
- Bremmer 2009, pp. 30–32.
- Bremmer 2009, pp. 36–37.
- Bremmer 2009, pp. 29–30.
- Bremmer 2009, p. 30.
- Bremmer 2009, pp. 33–35.
- Bremmer 2009, pp. 35–36.
- Bremmer 2009, pp. 32–33.
- Bremmer 2009, pp. 27–29.
- Bremmer 2009, pp. 42, 43.
- Bremmer 2009, p. 47.
- Bremmer 2009, p. 53.
- Bremmer 2009, pp. 55–56.
- Bremmer 2009, pp. 56.
- Bremmer 2009, pp. 60–62.
- Bremmer 2009, p. 61.
- Bremmer 2009, p. 62.
References
- Bremmer, Rolf H. (2009). An Introduction to Old Frisian. History, Grammar, Reader, Glossary. Amsterdam and Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing. ISBN 978-90-272-3255-7.
- Hartmann, Frederik, Old Frisian breaking and labial mutation revisited. Amsterdamer Beiträge zur älteren Germanistik, 2021.
Further reading
- Hofmann, Dietrich; Popkema, Anne Tjerk [in Western Frisian] (2008). Altfriesisches Handwörterbuch (in German). Heidelberg: Universitätsverlag Winter. ISBN 978-3-8253-5555-5. OCLC 301547295.
This article includes a list of general references but it lacks sufficient corresponding inline citations Please help to improve this article by introducing more precise citations October 2015 Learn how and when to remove this message Old Frisian was a West Germanic language spoken between the 8th and 16th centuries along the North Sea coast roughly between the mouths of the Rhine and Weser rivers The Frisian settlers on the coast of South Jutland today s Northern Friesland also spoke Old Frisian but there are no known medieval texts from this area The language of the earlier inhabitants of the region between the Zuiderzee and Ems River the Frisii mentioned by Tacitus is attested in only a few personal names and place names Old Frisian evolved into Middle Frisian spoken from the 16th to the 19th century Old FrisianFriseskRegionNetherlands Germany Southern DenmarkEthnicityFrisiansEra8th to 16th centuriesLanguage familyIndo European GermanicWest GermanicNorth Sea Germanic Anglo FrisianFrisianOld FrisianEarly formsProto Indo European Proto GermanicWriting systemAnglo Frisian runes LatinLanguage codesISO 639 3 a href https iso639 3 sil org code ofs class extiw title iso639 3 ofs ofs a Linguist ListofsGlottologoldf1241This article contains IPA phonetic symbols Without proper rendering support you may see question marks boxes or other symbols instead of Unicode characters For an introductory guide on IPA symbols see Help IPA In the early Middle Ages Frisia stretched from the area around Bruges in what is now Belgium to the Weser River in northern Germany At the time the Frisian language was spoken along the entire southern North Sea coast This region is referred to as Greater Frisia or Magna Frisia and many of the areas within it still treasure their Frisian heritage However by 1300 their territory had been pushed back to the Zuiderzee now the IJsselmeer and the Frisian language survives along the coast only as a substrate A close relationship exists between Old Frisian and Old English this is due to a shared history language and culture of the people from Northern Germany and Denmark who came to settle in England from around 400 A D onwards Phonological developmentThe Codex Roorda is a medieval document with Latin and Old Frisian law texts Consonants Generally Old Frisian phonologically resembles Old English In particular it shares the palatalisation of velar consonants also found in Old English For example whereas the closely related Old Saxon and Old Dutch retain the velar in dag Old Frisian has dei and Old English has daeġ daej When initial and followed by front vowels the Germanic k changed to the sounds ts and j Proto Germanic ɣ became j after e and word initially before front vowels Proto Germanic g where it existed became dz The Old Frisian for church was tzirke or tzerke in Old English it was ċiriċe ˈtʃiritʃe while Old Saxon and Old Dutch have the unpalatalised kirika Palatalization postdated fronting and predated monophthongization and i umlaut Between vowels h generally disappears sian from sehwana as in Old English and Old Dutch Word initial h on the other hand is retained Old Frisian retains th in all positions for longer than Old Dutch and Old Saxon do showing the gradual spread of the shift from th to d from south to north beginning in southern Germany in the 9th century but not reaching Frisian until the 13th or 14th century Vowels Another feature shared between Old Frisian and Old English is the Anglo Frisian brightening which fronted a to ae except in certain conditions stressed and before nasals in the sequence warC before h C lC Much later after breaking ae became e Before xx xs xt short e i became iu in a process known as breaking An unrelated sound change where i became iu if u or w followed in the next syllable occurred later after I mutation Vowels were fronted or raised in before i j a process called I mutation a ː gt ae ː ae gt e u ː gt y ː o ː gt ae ː The old Germanic diphthongs ai and au become e a and a respectively in Old Frisian as in en an one from Proto Germanic ainaz and brad from brauda bread In comparison these diphthongs become a and ea an and bread in Old English and e and ō en and brōd in Old Saxon The diphthong eu generally becomes ia and Germanic iu is retained These diphthongs initially began with a syllabic stressed i but the stress later shifts to the second component giving to ia and iu For example thiad people and liude from Proto Germanic theudō and liudiz Phonologyvowels Type Front Backshort long short longClose i iː u uːMid e eː ɛː o o ɔːOpen ɑ ɑːOld Frisian Consonants Type Bilabial Dental Alveolar Palatal VelarNasal m ː n ː ŋ Stop p ː b ː t ː d ː k ː ɡ ː Fricative f ː v 8 ː d s ː z x ː ɣ Approximant j wLiquid r ː l ː GrammarOld Frisian c 1150 c 1550 retained grammatical cases Some of the texts that are preserved from this period are from the 12th or 13th century but most are from the 14th and 15th centuries Generally all these texts are restricted to legal writings Although the earliest written examples of Frisian stray words in a Latin context are from approximately the 9th century there are a few examples of runic inscriptions from the region which are older and in a very early form of the Frisian language These runic writings however usually consist of no more than inscriptions of a single or few words Old Frisian had three genders masculine feminine and neuter two numbers singular and plural and four cases Nominative accusative genitive dative although traces of an instrumental and locative case exist Pronouns First and second person pronouns First person Second personSingular Plural Singular PluralNominative ik wi thu ji i giAccusative mi us thi iu ioGenitive min user thin iuwerDative instrumental mi us thi iu io Dual forms are unattested in Old Frisian but their presence is confirmed by their continued existence in later Frisian dialects until the mid 20th century Nouns A significant portion of Old Frisian nouns fall into the a stem declension pattern Most a stem nouns are masculine or neuter a stem declension Case Masculine bam beam NeuterLight skip boat Heavy word word Singular Plural Singular Plural Singular PluralNominative Accusative bam bamar er an a skip skipu word wordGenitive bames bama skipes skipa wordes wordaDative bame bamum em im skipe skipum worde wordum Certain words like dei day have g in the plural endings All nouns in the ō stem declension were feminine The nominative Singular e comes from the accusative case Text sampleThe Creation of Adam English Old FrisianGod created the first man that was Adam from eight things God scop thene eresta meneska thet was Adam fon achta wendem the bones from the rock thet benete fon tha stene the flesh from the earth thet flask fon tha erthe the blood from the water thet blod fon tha wetere the heart from the wind tha herta fon tha winde the thoughts from the clouds thene thogta fon tha wolkem the sweat from the dew thet swet fon tha dawe the hair locks from the grass tha lokkar fon tha gerse the eyes from the sun tha agene fon there sunna and then He breathed holy breath on it and tha ble r em on thene helga om And then He created Eve from his rib Adam s beloved And tha scop er Eva fon sine ribbe Adames liava CorpusThere are some early Frisian names preserved in Latin texts and some runic Futhorc inscriptions but the oldest surviving texts in Old Frisian date from the 13th century in particular official and legal documents They show a considerable degree of linguistic uniformity Westeremden yew stick c 750 900 Fon Alra Fresena Fridome at TITUS TITUS Ten Commandements TITUS 17 petitiones TITUS Londriucht TITUS Thet Freske Riim TITUS ed E Epkema Google Books Skeltana Riucht law code TITUS NotesHines John IJssennagger Nelleke eds 2021 Frisians of the Early Middle Ages Studies in historical archaeoethnology Woodbridge The Boydell Press p 94 ISBN 978 1 78327 561 8 OCLC 1201655870 Bremmer 2009 pp 30 32 Bremmer 2009 pp 36 37 Bremmer 2009 pp 29 30 Bremmer 2009 p 30 Bremmer 2009 pp 33 35 Bremmer 2009 pp 35 36 Bremmer 2009 pp 32 33 Bremmer 2009 pp 27 29 Bremmer 2009 pp 42 43 Bremmer 2009 p 47 Bremmer 2009 p 53 Bremmer 2009 pp 55 56 Bremmer 2009 pp 56 Bremmer 2009 pp 60 62 Bremmer 2009 p 61 Bremmer 2009 p 62 ReferencesBremmer Rolf H 2009 An Introduction to Old Frisian History Grammar Reader Glossary Amsterdam and Philadelphia John Benjamins Publishing ISBN 978 90 272 3255 7 Hartmann Frederik Old Frisian breaking and labial mutation revisited Amsterdamer Beitrage zur alteren Germanistik 2021 Further readingHofmann Dietrich Popkema Anne Tjerk in Western Frisian 2008 Altfriesisches Handworterbuch in German Heidelberg Universitatsverlag Winter ISBN 978 3 8253 5555 5 OCLC 301547295
