From: poser@vxdsyc.desy.de (Till Poser)
Subject: Re: Germanic Dialtects (was: Welche Sprache benutzen)
Reply-To: Poser@vxdsyc.desy.de
Organization: Deutsches Elektronen Synchrotron, Experiment ZEUS bei HERA
Date: Fri, 24 Jul 1992 16:32:33 GMT

In article <1992Jul24.125822.4170@paramount.nikhefk.nikhef.nl>, keeshu@paramount.nikhefk.nikhef.nl (Kees Huyser) writes:

|>In article <1992Jul24.083243.25862@coli.uni-sb.de> simon@fsinfo.cs.uni-sb.de (Julia Simon) writes:

|>#I didn't know it is also spoken in Schleswig-Holstein; I know a Dutchman who
|>#was raised bilingual Dutch/Frisian, so it must be spoken somewhere in the
|>#Netherlands too. Unfortunately I don't know what part of the Netherlands he
|>#comes from.

|>Fries (Frisian) is spoken in the province of Friesland. Historically, there
|>were three Frieslands: West-Friesland (now in the province of North-Holland),
|>Friesland (the middle of the three northern provinces) and Ost-Friesland (now
|>in Germany). Of these three only Friesland and Ost-Friesland use the Fries
|>language. West-Friesland speaks a North-Dutch dialect.

You are missing out on North Friesland, which is the area from Husum to 
Toenders (Danmark) and includes the (babaDum) North Friesian Islands of 
Amrum, Foehr, Wyck and Sylt, plus the Halligen. Yes and Frisian is still 
spoken there, though the number of speakers is ~50000 and shrinking. Below 
Husum is Dithmarschen, which, linguistically is a totally different 
territory.

|>Schematic map of the north sea coast:

modified:
                                                              .        |Nord
                                                              .Wattenm.|Friesl.
                                                              .N.F.    |
                                                              .Islands |--------
                                                              .        |Dithm.
                                                              .        |
                                                              .        |--------
+-------+		+---------------+---------------+--------------|
|	|===============|		|		|              |
| west  | 		|  friesland	|  groningen	| ost-         |Hamburg/
|fries- | IJsselmeer	|		|		| friesland    |Holstein
|land   | (former	|		|		| (germany)    |
|	| Zuiderzee)	|		|		|              |
| dutch |		|  frisian	|  dutch	| frisian      |

North Friesland is to the North and East of the Ostfriesland Square of this
stylised little map. Actually, and that is an interesting story in itself,
Nordfriesland and Ostfriesland were once directly connected via land. The 
dotted area in the above map, in which the Nordfriesian Islands reside was
once inhabited marshlands. In the "Grote Mandraenke" of 1367, a disaster
of the "once a millenium" kind, this area was obliterated and cut into
smallish islands, a process that was finished somewhere around 1632 in the
island configuration we have now. 

|>* Kees Huyser   	(System Adminstrator and resident Macintosh Guru )  *

       Till Poser         Internet: poser@vxdsyc.desy.de
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