Page:A Danish and Dano-Norwegian grammar.djvu/15



SCANDINAVIAN LANGUAGES. HISTORY OF THE DANO-NORWEGIAN LANGUAGE.

1. and  language belongs to the  group of the Teutonic languages. This group comprises, in modern times, besides the language already mentioned, the and  languages.

2. The earliest specimens of Scandinavian language are found in the inscriptions, written in the earlier Runic characters and dating as far back as the 4th century A. D. In these inscriptions the similarity with the other earlier specimens of Teutonic languages (especially Gothic) is more prominent than the peculiar Scandinavian characteristics.

3. During the (750–1000 A. D.) the language of the Scandinavian nations underwent a very decided change. The Scandinavian peculiarities distinguishing the language from the other Teutonic idioms appear fully developed, and by and by dialectic differences between the languages of the several Scandinavian nations commence to assert themselves.

4. In the Middle Ages the Danish and Swedish languages form one group that may be designated as the group of the Scandinavian languages, having in common the monophthongification of original diphthongs, while the Danish language had a development of its own in the direction of substituting voiced stops (mediae) or even open consonants (spirants) for voiceless stops (tenues, hard consonants) after