# Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition/Scandinavian Languages

See also North Germanic languages on Wikipedia; the 11th edition; and the disclaimer.
SCANDINAVIAN LANGUAGES. By this expression we understand the closely allied languages which are and have been spoken by the Germanic population in Scandinavia, and by the inhabitants of the countries that have been wholly or partially peopled from it. Territory.At present the territory of these languages embraces—Sweden, except the most northerly part (Lapland and inland parts of Vesterbotten, where Finnish and Lappish exclusively or chiefly prevail); certain islands and districts on the coast of western and southern Finland, as well as Åland; a small tract on the coast of Esthonia, where Swedish is spoken, as it is also to some extent in the Esthonian islands of Dagö, Nargö, Nukkö, Ormsö, and Rågö; Gammalsvenskby ("Galsvenskbi") in southern Russia (government of Kherson), a village colonized from Dagö; the Livonian island of Runö, where Swedish is spoken, as it formerly was on the island of Ösel; Norway, except certain regions in the northern part of the country, peopled by Finns and Lapps (diocese of Tromsö); Denmark, with the Faroes, Iceland, and Greenland, where, however, Danish is only spoken by a very small part of the population; the northernmost part of Schleswig; and, finally, several Scandinavian colonies in the United States of North America. Scandinavian dialects have besides been spoken for varying periods in the following places: Norwegian in certain parts of Ireland (800-1300 A.D.) and northern Scotland, in the Isle of Man, the Hebrides (800-1400, or longer), the Shetland Islands (800-1800), and the Orkneys (800-1800); Danish in the whole of Schleswig, in the north-eastern part of England (the "Danelag"), and in Normandy (900-1000, or a little longer); Swedish in Russia (from the end of the 9th to the beginning of the 11th century). Age.At what epoch the Germanic population settled in Scandinavia we cannot as yet even approximately decide. It is quite certain, however, that it already existed there before the Christian era, nay, most probably as early as the beginning of the so-called Stone Age (three thousand years before Christ). If this view be correct, the Scandinavian languages have had an existence of more than four thousand years.But we do not know anything about them during the period before the birth of Christ. It is only from that epoch we can get any information concerning the language of the old Scandinavians, which seems by that time not only to have spread over Denmark and great parts of southern and middle Sweden and of (southern) Norway, but also to have reached Finland (at least Nyland) and Esthonia. In spite of its extension over this considerable geographical area, the language appears to have been fairly homogeneous throughout the whole territory.The primitive Scandinavian language. Consequently, it may be regarded as a uniform language, the mother of the younger Scandinavian tongues, and accordingly has been named the primitive Scandinavian (urnordisk) language. The oldest sources of our knowledge of this tongue are the words which were borrowed during the first centuries of the Christian era (some of them perhaps even earlier) by the Lapps from the inhabitants of central Sweden and Norway, and by the Finns from their neighbours in Finland and Esthonia, and which have been preserved in Finnish and Lappish down to our own days.Borrowed words.These borrowed words, denoting chiefly utensils belonging to a fairly advanced stage of culture, amount to several hundreds, with a phonetic form of a very primitive stamp; as Finn. terva (O. Sw. tiæra, Germ. theer), tar; airo (O. Sw. ar.), oar; kansa (O.H.G. hansa), people; napakaira (O.H.G. nabagêr, O. Sw. navar), auger; nekla (Got. nêþla, O. Sw. nal), needle; ansas (Got. ans, O. Sw. as), beam; Lapp sajet (Got. saian, O. Sw. sa), sow; garves (O.H.G. garawêr, O. Sw. gör), finished; divres (O. Sax. diuri, O. Swed. dyr), dear; saipo (O.H.G. seifa, Sw. såpa), soap. These words, with those mentioned by contemporary Roman and Greek authors, are the oldest existing traces of any Germanic language. Wrested from their context, however, they throw but little light on the nature of the original northern tongue. But a series of linguistic monuments have come down to us dating from the end of the so-called early Iron Age (about 450 A.D.),—the knowledge and the use of the oldest runic alphabet (with twenty-four characters) having at that period been propagated among the Scandinavians by the southern Germanic tribes. Runic inscriptions.In fact we still possess, preserved down to our own times, primitive northern runic inscriptions, the oldest upon the utensils found at Thorsbjerg, dating back to about 300 A.D., which, together with the MS. fragments of Ulfila's Gothic translation of the Bible, about two hundred years later in date, constitute the oldest veritable monuments of any Germanic tongue. These runic inscriptions are for the most part found on stone-monuments (sometimes on rocks) and bracteates (gold coins stamped on one side and used for ornaments), as well as on metallic and wooden utensils, weapons, and ornaments. Up to this time there have been discovered more than one hundred, but of these only about one-half give us any information concerning the language, and most of them are only too short. The longest one, the stone-monument of Tune, in south-eastern Norway, contains only sixteen words. Their language is somewhat later in character than that of the oldest words borrowed by the Lapps and Finns: accented ê, for example, is already changed into a (cf. mariR = Goth. mêrs, renowned; but the Finn, borrowed word nêkla = Goth. neþla, needle), and the voiced s into a kind of r (cf. dagaR = Goth. dags, ​day; but Finn. armas = Goth. arms, poor). On the other hand, in all essential matters it is much earlier in character than the language of contemporary Gothic manuscripts, and no doubt approaches more nearly than any Germanic idiom the primitive form of the Germanic tongue. For the sake of comparison, we give a Gothic translation of one of the oldest of the primitive Scandinavian inscriptions, that on the golden horn of Gallehus, found on the Danish-German frontier, and dating from about 400 A.D.:—
    Scand.: EK HLEWAGASTIR. HOLTINGAR. HORNA. TAWIDO;
    Goth.: ik hliugasts. hultiggs. haurn. tawida;
    Engl.: I, HlewagastiR, son of Holta, made the horn;
as well as the inscription on the stone-monument of Järsbärg in western Sweden, which is at least a hundred years later:—
    Scand.: UBAR HITE. HARABANAR WIT IAH EK ERILAR RUNOR WARITU;
    Goth.: ufar hita, hrabns wit jah ik airils rûnôs writu;
    Engl.: In memory of HitaR. We both, HarabanaR and I ErilaR, wrote the runes.
Relation to other languages.Although very brief, and not yet thoroughly interpreted, these primitive Scandinavian inscriptions are nevertheless sufficient to enable us to determine with some certainty the relation which the language in which they are written bears to other languages. Thus it is proved that it belongs to the Germanic family of the Indo-European stock of languages, of which it constitutes an independent and individual branch. Its nearest relation being the Gothic, these two branches are sometimes taken together under the general denomination Eastern Germanic, as opposed to the other Germanic idioms (German, English, Dutch, &c.), which are then called Western Germanic. The most essential point of correspondence between the Gothic and Scandinavian branches is the insertion in certain cases of gg before w and j (ggj in Gothic was changed into ddj), as in gen. plur. O. H. G. zweiio, O. Engl. twega (two), compared with O. Icel., O. Norw. tveggja, O. Sw., O. Dan. tviggjæ, Goth. twaddjê and, still, in Germ. treu, Engl. true, compared with Sw., Norw., Dan. trygg, Icel. tryggr, Goth. triggws. However, even in the primitive Scandinavian age the difference between Gothic and Scandinavian is more clearly marked than the resemblance; thus, for example—just to hint only at some of the oldest and most essential differences—Goth. nom. sing. ending in -s corresponds to primitive Scandinavian -aR, -iR (as Goth. dags, day, gasts, guest = Scand. dagaR, gastiR); Goth. gen. sing. in -is to Scand. -as (as Goth. dagis, day's = Scand. dagas); Goth. dat. sing, in -a to Scand. -e (as Goth. kaurna, corn = Scand. kurne) Goth. 1st pers. sing. pret. in -da to Scand. -do (as Goth. tawida, did = Scand. tawido).
As early as the beginning of the so-called later Iron Age (about 700 A.D.) the primitive Scandinavian language Transformation. had undergone a considerable transformation, as is proved for example by the remarkable runic stone, at Istaby in the south of Sweden, with the inscription—
    AFĄTR HARIWULĄFĄ HAþUWULĄFR HAERUWULĄFIR WĄRAIT RUNAR þAIAR;}}
    Engl.: In memory of HariwulfR, HaþuwulfR, son of HeruwulfR, wrote these runes.
Here, e.g., we find nom. sing, in -aR changed into -r (cf. haþuwulafR with holtingaR on the golden horn), and the plural ending -oR into -aR (cf. runaR with runoR on the Järsbärg-stone). At the beginning of the so-called Viking Period (about 800 A.D.) the Scandinavian language seems to have undergone an extraordinarily rapid development, which in a comparatively short time almost completely transformed its character. This change is especially noticeable in the dropping of unaccented vowels, and in the introduction of a certain vowel harmony of different kinds ("Umlaut", vowel changes, caused by a following i (j) or u (w), as kvœði for kwáði, poem, and "Brechung", as healpa instead of helpa, to help), different assimilations of consonants (as ll, nn for lþ, nþ; ll, nn, rr, and ss for lR, nR, rR, and sR), dropping of w before o and u (as orð, ulfr for worð, word, wulfR, wolf), simplified inflexion of the verbs, a new passive formed by means of affixing the reflexive pronoun sik to the active form (as kalla-sk, to call one's self, to be called), &c.
At this epoch, therefore, the primitive Scandinavian language must be considered as no longer existing. The next two centuries form a period of transition as regards the language as well as the alphabet which it employed. Period of transition. We possess some inscriptions belonging to this period in which the old runic alphabet of twenty-four characters is still used, and the language of which closely resembles that of the primitive Scandinavian monuments, as, for example, those on the stones of Stentoften and Björketorp, both from southern Sweden, probably dating from the 10th century, and being the longest inscriptions yet found with the old runic alphabet. On the other hand, inscriptions have come down to us dating from about the middle of the 9th century, in which the later and exclusively Scandinavian alphabet of sixteen characters has almost completely superseded the earlier alphabet, from which it was developed, while the language not only differs widely from the original Scandinavian, but also exhibits dialectical peculiarities suggesting the existence of a Danish-Swedish Dialects. language as opposed to Norwegian, as the form ruulf on the stone at Flemlöse in Denmark, which in a Norwegian inscription would have been written hruulf corresponding to Hrolf in Old Norwegian literature. These differences, however, are unimportant, and the Scandinavians still considered their language as one and the same throughout Scandinavia, and named it Dǫnsk tunga, Danish tongue. But when Iceland was colonized at the end of the 9th and the beginning of the 10th century, chiefly from western Norway, a separate (western) Norwegian dialect gradually sprang up, at first of course only differing slightly from the mother-tongue. It was not until the introduction of Christianity (about 1000 A.D.) that the language was so far differentiated as to enable us to distinguish, in runic inscriptions and in the literature which was then arising, four different dialects, which have ever since existed as the four literary languages—Icelandic, Norwegian, Swedish, and Danish. Of these the latter two, often comprehended within the name of Eastern Scandinavian, as well as the former two, Western Scandinavian, or, to use the Old Scandinavians' own name, Norrǿnt mál, Northern tongue, are very nearly related to Differences between Eastern and Western Scandinavian. each other. The most important differences between the two branches, as seen in the oldest preserved documents, are the following:—(1) In E. Scand. far fewer cases of "Umlaut," as vári, W. Scand. vǽri, were; land, W. Scand. lǫnd (from landu), lands; (2) E. Scand. "Brechung" of i into iu (or io) before ng(w), nk(w), as siungæ, W. Scand. syngva (from singwa), to sing; (3) in E. Scand. mp, nk, nt are in many cases not assimilated into pp, kk, tt, as krumpen, W. Scand. kroppenn, shrunken; ænkiæ, W. Scand. ekkja, widow; bant, W. Scand. batt, he bound; (4) in E. Scand. the dative of the definite plural ends in -omen instead of W. Scand. -onom, as in handomen, hǫndonom, (to) the hands; (5) in E. Scand. the simplification of the verbal inflexional endings is far further advanced, and the passive ends in -s for -sk, as in kallæs, W. Scand. kallask, to be called. In several of these points, and indeed generally speaking, the Western Scandinavian languages have preserved the more primitive forms, as may be seen in the ​oldest Eastern Scandinavian runic inscriptions, dating from a period before the beginning of the literature, as well as in many modern Eastern Scandinavian dialects. For, having regard to the Scandinavian dialects generally, we must adopt quite a different classification from that indicated by the dialects which are represented in the literature. We now pass on to review the latter and their history.
Icelandic.I. Icelandic.—In ancient times Icelandic was by far the most important of the Scandinavian languages, in form as well as in literature. To avoid ambiguity, the language before the Reformation (about 1530-40) is often called Old Icelandic.
Old Icelandic.1. Old Icelandic was spoken not only in Iceland, but also in Greenland, where Icelandic colonists lived for a lengthened period (983-about 1400). Our knowledge of its character is almost exclusively Sources. derived from the remarkably voluminous literature, dating from the middle of the 12th century, and written in the Latin alphabet, adapted to the special requirements of this language. Nothing is preserved of older runic literature. Indeed, Old Icelandic possesses only very few runic monuments (about forty), all of them almost worthless from a philological point of view. The oldest, the inscription on the church door of Valþjófstaðr, dates from the beginning of the 13th century, and is consequently later than the oldest preserved manuscripts in the Latin alphabet, some of which are as old as the end of the 12th century. A small fragment (Cod. AM. 237, fol.) of a Book of Homilies (of which a short specimen is given below) is considered the oldest of all. About contemporary with this is the oldest part of an inventory entitled Reykjaholts máldage. From about 1200 we possess a fragment (Cod. Reg. old sign. 1812) of the only existing Old Icelandic glossary, and from the first years of the 13th century the Stockholm Book of Homilies (Cod. Holm. 15, 4to), which from a philological point of view is of the greatest importance, chiefly on account of its very accurate orthography, which is especially noticeable in the indication of quantity; from the early part of the same century comes the fragment (Cod. AM. 325, 2, 4to) entitled Ágríp ("abridgment" of the history of Norway), probably a copy of a Norwegian original, also orthographically important. Among later manuscripts we may mention, as philologically interesting, the Annales Regii (Cod. Reg. 2087) from the beginning of the 14th century, orthographically of great value; the rich manuscript of miscellanies, Hauksbók (Codd. AM. 371, 544, 675, 4to), a great part of which is written with Haukr Erlendsson's (†1334) own hand; and, above all, three short essays, in which some Icelanders have tried to write a grammatical and orthographical treatise on their own mother-tongue, all three appearing as an appendix to the manuscripts of the Prose Edda. The oldest and most important of these essays (preserved in the Cod. Worm, from about 1330) is by an unknown author of about 1150, and is probably intended to be a continuation of a lost work of the first grammarian of Iceland, Ƿóroddr Rúnameistari (who flourished at the beginning of the 12th century); the second (the oldest known manuscript of which is preserved in the Cod. Ups., c. 1290) is perhaps the work of the famous Snorri Sturloson (†1241); the third (the oldest manuscript in Cod. AM. 748, 4to, of the beginning of the 14th century) is by Snorri's nephew Ólafr Hvítaskáld (†1259), and is no doubt based partly upon Ƿórodd's work above mentioned, partly and chiefly upon Priscian and Donatus.
Form of the language.The oldest form of the Icelandic language is, however, not preserved in the above-mentioned earliest manuscripts of the end of the 12th century, which are written in the language of their own age, but in far later ones of the 13th century, which contain poems by the oldest Icelandic poets, such as the renowned Egill Skallagrimson (about 930) and the unknown authors of the so-called Edda-songs. In spite of the late date of the manuscripts, the metrical form has been the means of preserving a good deal of the ancient language. But, as already remarked, during the 10th and 11th centuries this dialect differs but little from Norwegian, though in the 12th this is no longer the case.
We may here contrast a specimen of the above-mentioned oldest Icelandic manuscript (from the end of the 12th century) with an almost contemporary Norwegian one (Cod. AM. 619; see below):—
| Icel.—En þat es vitanda, at allt ma andlega merkiasc oc fyllasc í oss, þat es til kirkio bunings eþa þionosto þarf at haua, cf ver liuom sva hreinlega at vér sem verþer at callasc goþs mustere. | Norw.—En þat er vitanda, at allt ma andlega merkiasc oc fyllasc i os, þat er til kirkiu bunings eða til þionasto þarf at hafa, ef vér lifum sva ræinlega, at vér sem verðir at kallasc guðs mysteri. | Engl.—And that is to be known that all that is needed for the decoration of the church or the service may, spiritually, be found and imitated within us, if we live so cleanly that we are worthy to be called God's temple. |
Apart from the fact that the language is, generally speaking, archaic, we find in the Icelandic text two of the oldest and most essential characteristics of Icelandic as opposed to Norwegian, viz., the more complete vowel assimilation (þionosto, þionasto; cf. also, e.g., Icel. kǫlloþom, Norw. kallaðum, we called) and the retention of initial h before r (hreinlega, ræinlega), l, and n. Other differences, some of which occur at this period, others a little later, are in Icel. lengthening of a, o, u before lf, lg, lk, lm, and lp (as Icel. hálfr, Norw. and oldest Icel. halfr, half); later still, also of a, i, u, and y before ng and nk; Icel. ǽ and ey for older ǿ and ǿy (as in Icel. dǽma, heyra, Norw. and oldest Icel. dǿma, to deem, hǿyra, to hear); Icel. termination of 2nd plur. of verbs in -ð (þ) or -t, but Norw. often in -r (as Icel. takið, -t, Norw. takir, you take). These points may be sufficient to characterize the language of the earlier "classical" period of Icelandic (about 1190-1350). At the middle of the 13th century the written language undergoes material changes, owing in a great measure, no doubt, to the powerful influence of Snorri Sturloson. Thus in unaccented syllables i now appears for older e, and u (at first only when followed by one or more consonants belonging to the same syllable) for o; the passive ends in -z for -sk. The other differences from Norwegian, mentioned above as occurring later, are now completely established. With the beginning of the 14th century there appear several new linguistic phenomena: a u is inserted between final r and a preceding consonant (as in ríkur, mighty); ǫ (pronounced as an open o) passes into ö (the character ö was not introduced till the 16th century), or before ng, nk into au (as lǫng, fiǫll, pronounced laung, fiöll); e before ng, nk passes into ei; a little later é passes into ie, and the passive changes its termination from -z, oldest -sk, into -zt (or -zst) (as in kallazt, to be called). The post-classical period of Old Icelandic (1350-1530), which is, from a literary point of view, of but little importance, already shows marked differences that are characteristic of Modern Icelandic; as early as the 15th century we find ddl for ll and rl (as falla, pronounced faddla, to fall), ddn for nn and rn (as horn, pron. hoddn, horn); about the year 1500 ve after h passes into vo, in other positions to vö (as hvelpr, pron. χvolpur, whelp; kvern, pron. kvörn, mill), etc.
Dialects.Although dialectical differences are not altogether wanting, they do not occur to any great extent in the Old Icelandic literary language. Thus, in some manuscripts we find ft replaced by fst (oft, ofst, often); in manuscripts from the western part of the island there appears in the 13th and 14th centuries a tendency to change lf, rf into lb, rb (tolf, tolb, twelve; þǫrf, þǫrb, want), &c. To what extent the language of Greenland differed from that of Iceland we cannot judge from the few runic monuments which have come down to us from that colony.
Grammatical treatment.Apart from the comparatively inconsiderable attempts at a grammatical treatment of Old Icelandic in the Middle Ages which we have mentioned above, grammar as a science can only be said to have commenced in the 17th century. The first grammar, written by the Icelander Runolphus Jonas (†1654), dates from 1651. His contemporary and compatriot Gudmund Andreæ (†1654) compiled the first dictionary, which was not, however, edited till 1683 (by the Dane Petrus Resenius, †1688). The first scholars who studied Old Icelandic systematically were H. K. Rask (1787-1832), whose works laid the foundation to our knowledge of the language, and his great contemporary Jac. Grimm, in whose Deutsche Grammatik (1819 sq.) particular attention is paid to Icelandic. Those who since the time of Rask and Grimm have principally deserved well of Icelandic grammar are—the ingenious and learned Norwegian P. A. Munch, 1863, to whom we really owe the normalized orthography that has hitherto been most in use in editing Old Icelandic texts; the learned Icelander K. Gíslason, whose works are chiefly devoted to phonetic researches; the Danish scholars K. J. Lyngby (†1871), the author of an essay which is of fundamental importance in Icelandic orthography and phonetics, and L. F. A. Wimmer, who has rendered great services to the study of the etymology. The latest Icelandic grammar is by the Swede Ad. Noreen. As lexicographers the first rank is held by the ​Icelanders Sv. Egilsson (†1852), G. Vigfússon, and J. Þorkelsson, and the Norwegian J. Fritzner.
Modern Icelandic. Sources.2. Modern Icelandic is generally dated from the introduction of the Reformation into Iceland; the book first printed, the New Testament of 1540, may be considered as the earliest Modern Icelandic document. Although, on account of the exceedingly conservative tendency of Icelandic orthography, the language of Modern Icelandic literature still seems to be almost identical with the language of the 17th century, it has in reality undergone a constant and active development, and, phonetically regarded, has changed considerably. Indeed, energetic efforts to bring about an orthography more in accordance with phonetics were made during the years 1835-47 by the magazine entitled Fjölnir, where we find such authors as Jónas Hallgrimsson and Konr. Gíslason; but these attempts proved abortive. Of more remarkable etymological Form of the langauge. changes in Modern Icelandic we may note the following:—already about the year 1550 the passive termination -zt (-zst) passes into the till then very rare termination -st (as in kallast, to be called); y, ý, and ey at the beginning of the 17th century coincided with i, í, and ei; the long vowels á, ǽ and ó have passed into the diphthongs au (at least about 1650), ai (about 1700), ou (as mál, language, mœla, to speak, stóll, chair); g before i, j is changed into dj (after a consonant) or j (after a vowel),—e.g., liggia, to lie, eigi, not; in certain other cases g has passed into gw or w,—e.g., lágur, low, ljúga, to lie; initial g before n is silent,—e.g., (g)naga, to gnaw; kn has passed into hn,—e.g., knútr, knot; ps, pt into fs, ft; bb, dd, gg are pronounced as bp, dt, gk, and ll, rl, nn, rn now in most positions (not, however, before d, t, and s, and in abbreviated names) as dtl, dtn,—as fjall, mountain, björn, bear; f before n is now pronounced as bp,—as hrafn, raven, &c. Both in vocabulary and syntax we find early, e.g., in the lawbook Jónsbók, printed in 1578(-80), Danish exercising an important influence, as might be expected from political circumstances. In the 18th century, however, we meet with purist tendencies. As one of the leading men of this century may be mentioned the poet Eggert Ólafsson (†1768), whose poems were not printed till 1832. Worthy of mention in the history of Modern Icelandic language are the learned societies which appeared in the same century, of which the first, under the name of "Hið ósýnilega," was established in 1760. At this time archaic tendencies, going back to the Old Icelandic of the 13th and 14th centuries, were continually gaining ground. In our century the following have won especial renown in Icelandic literature: Bjarne Ƿórarensen (†1841), Iceland's greatest lyric poet, and Jónas Hallgrímsson (†1845), perhaps its most prominent prose-author in modern times.
Dialects.The dialectical differences in Modern Icelandic are comparatively trifling and chiefly phonetic. The Westland dialect has, for example, preserved the Old Icelandic long a, while the other dialects have changed it to the diphthong au; in the Northland dialect initial kn is preserved, in the others changed into hn; in the northern and western parts of the island Old Icelandic hv appears as kv, in a part of south-eastern Iceland as χ, in the other dialects as χw,—e.g., hvelpr, whelp. As a matter of curiosity it may be noted that on the western and eastern coasts traces are found of a French-Icelandic language, which arose from the long sojourn of French fishermen there.
Grammatical treatment.Owing to the exclusive interest taken in the ancient language, but little attention is given even now to the grammatical treatment of Modern Icelandic. Some notices of the language of the 17th century may be obtained from the above-mentioned grammar of Runolphus Jonas (1651), and for the language of the 18th from Rask's grammatical works. For the language of our own time there is hardly anything to refer to but N. Friðriksson's works, Íslenzk málmyndalýsíng, 1861, and Skýríng hinna almennu málfrœðislegu hugmynda, 1864, which, however, are not especially devoted to the modern state of philology; compare also B. Magnússon Ólsen's valuable paper "Zur neuisländischen Grammatik" (Germania, xxvii., 1882). A dictionary of merit was that of Björn Halldorsen (†1794), edited in 1814 by Rask. Cleasby-Vigfússon's dictionary mentioned above also pays some attention to the modern language. A really convenient Modern Icelandic dictionary is still wanting, the desideratum being only partly supplied by K. Gíslason's excellent Danish-Icelandic Dönsk orðabók med Íslenzkum þýðíngum, 1851.
Norwegian Old Norwegian.II. Norwegian or Norse.—The Old Norwegian language (till the Reformation) was not, like the modern language, confined to Norway and the Faroes, but was, as already stated, for some time spoken in parts of Ireland and the north of Scotland, the Isle of Man, the Hebrides, Shetland, and Orkney (in the last two groups of islands it continued to survive down to modern times), and also in certain parts of western Sweden as at present defined (Bohuslän, Särna in Dalarna, Jämtland, and Härjedalen).
Sources.Our knowledge of it is due only in a small measure to runic inscriptions, for these are comparatively few in number (a little more than one hundred) and of trifling importance from a philological point of view, especially as they almost wholly belong to the period between 1050 and 1350, and consequently are contemporary with or at least not much earlier than the earliest literature. The whole literature preserved is written in the Latin alphabet. The earliest manuscripts are not much later than the oldest Old Icelandic ones, and of the greatest interest. On the whole, however, the earliest Norwegian literature is in quality as well as in quantity incomparably inferior to the Icelandic. It amounts merely to about a score of different works, and of these but few are of any literary value. A small fragment (Cod. AM. 655, 4to, Fragm. ix., A, B, C), a collection of legends, no doubt written a little before 1200, is regarded as the earliest extant manuscript. From the very beginning of the 13th century we have the Norwegian Book of Homilies (Cod. AM. 619, 4to) and several fragments of law-books (the older Gulaþingslaw and the older Eiðsivaþingslaw). The chief manuscript (Cod. AM. 243B., fol.) of the principal work in Old Norwegian literature, the Speculum Regale, or Konungsskuggsjá ("Mirror for Kings"), is a little later. Of still later manuscripts the so-called legendary Olafssaga (Cod. Delag. 8, fol.), from about 1250, deserves mention. The masses of charters which—occurring throughout the whole Middle Age of Norway from the beginning of the 13th century—afford much information, especially concerning the dialectical differences of the language, are likewise of great philological importance.
Form of the language.As in Old Icelandic so in Old Norwegian we do not find the most primitive forms in the oldest MSS. that have come down to us; for that purpose we must recur to somewhat later ones, containing old poems from times as remote as the days of Brage Boddason (the beginning of the 8th century) and Þjóðolfr of Hvin (end of the same century). It has already been stated that the language at this epoch differed so little from other Scandinavian dialects that it could scarcely yet be called by a distinctive name, and also that, as Icelandic separated itself from the Norwegian mother-tongue (about 900), the difference between the two languages was at first infinitely small—as far, of course, as the literary language is concerned. From the 13th century, however, they exhibit more marked differences; for, while Icelandic develops to a great extent independently, Norwegian, owing to geographical and political circumstances, is considerably influenced by the Eastern Scandinavian languages. The most important differences between Icelandic and Norwegian at the epoch of the oldest MSS. (about 1200) have already been noted. The tendency in Norwegian to retain the use of the so-called u-Umlaut has already been mentioned. On the other hand, there appears in Norwegian in the 13th century another kind of vowel-assimilation, almost unknown to Icelandic, the vowel in terminations being in some degree influenced by the vowel of the preceding syllable. Thus, for instance, we find in some manuscripts (as the above-mentioned legendary Olafssaga) that the vowels e, o and long a, æ, ø are followed in terminations by e, o; i, u, y, and short a, æ, ø, on the other hand, by i, u,—as in bǿner, prayers, konor, women; but tiðir, times, tungur, tongues. The same fact occurs in certain Old Swedish manuscripts. When Norway had been united later with Sweden under one crown (1319) we meet pure Suecisms in the Norwegian literary language. In addition to this, the 14th century exhibits several differences from the old language:rl, rn are sometimes assimilated into ll, nn,—as kall (elder karl), man, konn (korn), corn, prestanner (prestarnir), the priests; i passes into y before r, l,—as hyrðir (hirðir), shepherd, lykyl (lykill), key; final -r after a consonant is changed into -er or -ær, sometimes only -e, -æ,—as hester (hestr), horse; bøker (bǿkr), books; the names Þolleifær (Þorleifr), Guðlæifæ (Guðleifr). About the beginning of the 15th century initial kv occurs for old hv (not, however, in pronouns, which take kv only in western Norway), as the local name Qviteseið (hvitr, white). During the 15th century, Norway being united with Denmark, and at intervals also with Sweden, a great many Danisms and a few Suecisms are imported into the language. As Suecisms we may mention the termination -in of the 2d pers. plur. instead of -ir, -ið (as vilin, you will), the pronoun jak instead of ek, I. The most important Danisms ​are the following: b, d, and g are substituted for p, t, and k,—as in the local names Nabø (earlier Napa), Tvedæ sogn (þveita'sókn); -a in terminations passes into -e,—as høre (høyra), to hear, søghe (sǿkja), to seek; single Danish words are introduced,—as jek (ek), I, se (sjá), to see; spørge (spyrja), to ask, &c. Towards the end of the Middle Ages the Danish influence shows an immense increase, which marks the gradual decline of Norwegian literature, until at last Norwegian as literary language is completely supplanted by Danish. During the 15th century Norway has hardly any literature except charters, and as early as the end of that century by far the greatest number of these are written in almost pure Danish. In the 16th century, again, charters written in Norwegian occur only as rare exceptions, and from the Reformation onward, when the Bible and the old laws were translated into Danish, not into Norwegian, Danish was not only the undisputed literary language of Norway, but also the colloquial language of dwellers in towns and of those who had learned to read. For the rise in recent times of a new Norwegian language, employed in literature and spoken by the educated classes, see p. 373.
Dialects.Dialectical differences, as above hinted, occur in great number in the Norwegian charters of the 13th, 14th, and 15th centuries. Especially marked is the difference between the language of western Norway, which, in many respects, shows a development parallel to that of Icelandic, and the language of eastern Norway, which exhibits still more striking correspondences with contemporary Old Swedish. The most remarkable characteristics of the eastern dialects of this epoch are the following:—a is changed into æ in the pronouns þænn, this, þæt, that, and the particle þær, there (the latter as early as the 13th century), and later on (in the 14th century) also in terminations after a long root syllable,—as sendæ, to send, høyræ, to hear (but gera, to do, vita, to know); ia passes (as in Old Swedish and Old Danish) into iæ,—as hiærta (Icel. hjarta), heart; y sometimes passes into iu before r, l,—as hiurder, shepherd, lykiul, key, instead of hyrðir, lykyl (older still, hirðir, lykill; see above, p. 369); final -r after a consonant often passes into -ar, sometimes only into -a,—as prestar (prestr), priest, bøkar (bøkr), books, dat. sing. brøða (brǿðr), (to a) brother; tl passes into tsl, sl,—as lisla (litla), (the) little, the name Atsle, Asle (Atle); rs gives a "thick" s-sound (written ls),—as Bærdols, genitive of the name Bergþórr; nd, ld are assimilated into nn, ll,—as bann (band), band, the local name Westfoll (Vestfold); and (as far back as the 13th century) traces occur of the vowel assimilation, "tiljævning," that is so highly characteristic of the modern Norwegian dialects,—as voko, vuku, for vaku, (Icel. vǫko, -u), accusative singular of vaka, wake, mykyll for mykill, much. On the other hand, as characteristics of the western dialects may be noted the following:—final -r after a consonant passes into -ur, -or,—as vetur (vetr), winter, rettur (réttr), right, aftor (aftr), again; sl passes into tl,—as sytlla (sýsla), charge; hv is changed into kv also in pronouns,—as kver (hverr), who, kvassu (hversu), how.
This splitting of the language into dialects seems to have continued to gain ground, probably with greater rapidity as a Norwegian literary language no longer existed. Thus it is very likely that the present dialectical division was in all essentials accomplished about the year 1600; for, judging from the first work on Norwegian dialectology, the Søndfjord (Western Norway) dialect at least possessed at that time most of its present features. A little clog-calendar of the year 1644 seems to prove the same regarding the Valders (Southern Norway) dialect. How far the Old Norwegian dialects on the Faroes, in Ireland and Scotland, on the Scottish islands, and on the Isle of Man differed from the mother-tongue it is impossible to decide, on account of the few remnants of these dialects which exist apart from local names, viz., some charters (from the beginning of the 15th century onward) from the Faroes and Orkneys, and a few runic inscriptions from the Orkneys (thirty in number) and the Isle of Man (fourteen in number). These runic inscriptions, however, on account of their imperfect orthography, throw but little light on the subject. Of the Orkney dialect we know at least that initial hl, hn, hr still preserved h in the 13th century,—that is, two hundred years longer than in Norway.
Grammatical treatment.Old Norwegian grammar has hitherto always been taken up in connexion with Old Icelandic, and confined to notes and appendices inserted in works on Icelandic grammar. A systematic treatise on Old Norwegian grammar is still wanting, with the exception of a short work by the Danish scholar N. M. Petersen (†1862), which, although brief and decidedly antiquated, deserves all praise. A most valuable collection of materials exists, however, in the Norwegian charters, carefully and accurately edited by the Norwegian scholars Chr. Lange (†1861) and C. R. Unger, and in a few texts edited with diplomatic accuracy.
Swedish.III. Swedish.—The Pre-Reformation language is called Old Swedish.
Old Swedish.1. Old Swedish.—The territory of the Old Swedish comprehended—(1) Sweden, except the most northerly part, where Lappish (and Finnish?) was spoken, the most southerly (Skåne, Halland, and Blekinge—see below, p. 373), and certain parts of western Sweden (see above, p. 369); (2) extensive maritime tracts of Finland, Esthonia, and Livonia, with their surrounding islands; and (3) certain places in Russia, where Swedish was spoken for a short time. Sources.The oldest but also the most meagre sources of our knowledge of Old Swedish are those words, almost exclusively personal names (nearly one hundred), which were introduced into the Russian language at the foundation of the Russian realm by Swedes (in 862), and which are for the most part somewhat influenced by Russian phonetic laws, preserved in two Russian documents of the years 912 and 945,—as Igor (O. Sw. Ingvar), Rurik (Hrørikr), Oleg (Hialge, secondary form of Helge), Olga (Hialga, Helga). Of about the same date, but of an infinitely greater variety, are the runic inscriptions, amounting in number to about two thousand, which have been found cut on stones (rarely wood, metal, or other materials) almost all over Sweden, though they occur most frequently (about half of the total number) in the province of Uppland, next to which come Södermanland, Östergötland, and Gotland, with about two hundred each. For the most part they are tombstones or monuments in memory of deceased relatives, rarely public notices. Their form is often metrical, in part at least. Most of them are anonymous, in so far that we do not know the name of the engraver, though, as a rule, the name of the man who ordered them is recorded. Of the engravers named, about seventy in number, the three most productive are Ubir, Bali, and Asmundr Karasun, all three principally working in Upland; the first-mentioned name is signed on about forty, the others on nearly twenty stones each. These inscriptions vary very much in age, belonging to all centuries of Old Swedish, but by far the greatest number of them date from the 11th and 12th centuries. From heathen times—as well as from the last two centuries of the Middle Ages—we have comparatively few. The oldest are probably the Ingelstad inscription in Östergötland, and the Gursten one found in the north of Småland. The rune stone from Rök in Östergötland probably dates from the first half of the 10th century. Its inscription surpasses all the others both in length (more than one hundred and fifty words) and in the importance of its contents, which are equally interesting as regards philology and the history of culture; it is a fragment (partly in metrical form) of an Old Swedish heroic tale. From about the year 1000 we possess the inscriptions of Asmundr Karasun, and from about 1050 the so-called Ingvar monuments (about twenty in number), erected most of them in Södermanland, in honour of the men who fell in a great war in eastern Europe under the command of a certain Ingvar; the stones cut by Bali belong to the same period. Somewhat later are the inscriptions cut by Ubir, and about contemporary with them, viz., from the beginning of the 12th century, is the remarkable inscription on the door-ring of the church of Forsa in Helsingland, containing the oldest Scandinavian statute now preserved, as well as other inscriptions from the same province, written in a particular variety of the common runic alphabet, the so-called "staflösa" (staffless, without the perpendicular staff) runes, as the long genealogical inscription on the Malstad-stone. The inscriptions of the following centuries are of far less philological interest, because after the 13th century there exists another and more fruitful source for Old Swedish, viz., a literature in the proper sense of the word, which was only in a limited degree written in runes. Of the runic literature hardly anything has been preserved to our days, while the literature in the Latin letters is both in quality and extent incomparably inferior to Old Icelandic, though it, at least in quantity, considerably surpasses Old Norwegian. In age, however, it is inferior to both of them, beginning only in the 13th century. The oldest of the extant manuscripts is a codex of the Older Vestgötalaw (Cod. Holm. B 59), written about the year 1290, and philologically of the greatest import Not much later is a codex of the Uplandslaw (Cod. Ups. 12) of the year 1300. Of other works of value from a philological point of view we only mention a codex of the Södermannalaw (Cod. Holm. B 53) of about 1330, the two manuscripts containing a ​collection of legends generally named Cod. Burcanus (written a little after 1350) and Cod. Bildstcniamis (between 1420 and 1450), and the great Oxenstiernian manuscript, which consists chiefly of a collection of legends written for the most part in 1385. The very numerous Old Swedish charters, from 1343 downwards, are also of great importance.
Form of the language. Old Swedish, during its earliest pre-literary period (900-1200), retains quite as original a character as contemporary Old Icelandic and Old Norwegian. The first part of the inscription of the Rökstone running thus—
AFT UAMUÞ STĄNTA RUNA R ÞA R IN UARIN FAÞI FAÞI R AFT FAIKIĄN SUNU,
and probably pronounced—
æft Wámód stąnda rúnar þœ́R; en Warenn fáðe faðeR æft fæighiąn sunu,
would, no doubt, have had the same form in contemporary Icelandic, except the last word, which would probably have had the less original form sun. The formal changes of the Swedish language during this period are, generally speaking, such as appear about the same time in all the members of the group,—as the change of soft R into common r (the Rök-stone runa R, later runar, runes; this appeared earliest after dental consonants, later after an accented vowel), and the change of sþ into st (in the 10th century raisþi, later reisti, raised); or they are, at least, common to it with Norwegian,—as the dropping of h before l, n, and r (in the 10th century hraur, younger, rör, cairn), and the changing of nasal vowels (the long ones latest) into non-nasalized. A very old specific Swedish characteristic, however, is the splitting up of i into iu before ngw, nkw,—as siunga, to sing, siunka, to sink, from primitive Scandinavian singwan, sinkwan (Icel.-Norw. syngva, søkkva). But the case is altogether different during what we may call the classical period of Old Swedish (1200-1350), the time of the later runic inscriptions and the oldest literature. During this period the language is already distinctly separate from the (literary) Icelandic-Norwegian (though not yet from Danish). The words of the Older Vestgötalaw—
FALDER KLOCKÆ NIDER I HOVOÞ MANNI, BÖTI SOPCN MARCHUM ÞRIM, EN HAN FAR BANÆ AF—
would in contemporary Icelandic be—
fellr klukka niðr i höfuð mauni, bǽti'sókn mörkum þrim, ef hann fǽr bana af.
These few words exhibit instances of the following innovations in Swedish:—d is inserted between ll (nn) and a following r (as b between m and l, r, and p between m and t, n—as hambrar, Icel. hamrar, hammers, sampt, Icel. samt, together with); an auxiliary vowel is inserted between final r and a preceding consonant; a in terminations is often changed into æ; a u in the final syllable causes no change of a preceding a; the present tense takes the vowel of the infinitive (and the preterite subjunctive that of preterite indicative plural). Other important changes, appearing at the same time, but probably, partly at least, of a somewhat older date, are the following:—all diphthongs are contracted (as ögha, Icel. Icel. auga, eye; dröma, Icel. drøyma, to dream; sten, Icel. steinn, stone—traces of which we find as early as the 12th century); é has passed into æ (as knæ, Icel. kné, knee); ia into iæ, as in Eastern Norwegian (as hiærta, Icel. hjarta, heart); iu into y after r, and a consonant + l (as flygha, Icel. fljúga, to fly); the forms of the three persons singular of verbs have assimilated (except in the so-called strong preterite); the 2d pers. plur. ends in -in for -ið, and the passive voice in -s for the earlier -sk; the dat. plur. of substantives with suffixed article ends in -umin (Icel. -onom, as sunumin, sunonom, to the sons). The transition to the 14th century is marked by important changes:—short y, e.g., passed into ö in many positions (as dör for dyr, door, &c.), and the forms of the dative and the accusative of pronouns gradually became the same. The number of borrowed words is as yet very limited, and is chiefly confined to ecclesiastical words of Latin and Greek origin, introduced along with Christianity (as kors, cross, bref, epistle, skoli, school, præster, priest, almosa, alms). At the middle of the 14th century the literary language undergoes a remarkable reform, developing at the same time to a "riksspråk," a uniform language, common to the whole country. The chief characteristics of this later Old Swedish are the following:—the long a has passed into å (that is, an open o), and io (except before rd, rt) into iö (as siö, sea, lake); at the same time there appears a so-called law of vowel balance, according to which the vowels i and u are always found in terminations after a short root syllable, and—at least when no consonant follows—e and o after a long one (as Gudi, to God, til salu, for sale, but i garþe, in the court, for visso, assuredly); g and k (sk) before palatal vowels are softened into dj and tj (stj); k and t in unaccented syllables often pass into gh, dh (as Sverighe for Sverike, Sweden, litedh for litet, a little); the articles þæn (or hin), the, and (a little later) en, a, come into use; the dual pronouns vanish; the relative ær, that, is changed with sum; the present participle takes a secondary form in -s (as gangandes, beside, gangande, going). A little later the following changes appear:—a short vowel is lengthened before a single consonant, first when the consonant belongs to the same syllable (as hat, hate), afterwards also when it belongs to the following one (as hata, to hate); an auxiliary vowel is inserted between l or n and a preceding consonant (as gavel, gable, öken, desert); short i, ending a syllable, passes into e (as leva, to live); th passes into t; a new conjugation is formed which has no infinitive termination, but doubles the sign of the preterite (as bo, bodde, bott, to dwell, dwelt, dwelt). Owing to the political and commercial state of the country the language at this period is deluged with borrowed words of Low German origin, mostly social and industrial terms, such as the great number of verbs in -era (e.g., hantera, to handle), the substantives in -eri (röveri, robbery), -inna (förstinna, princess), -het (fromhet, piety), be- (betala, to pay), and a great many others (klen, weak, smaka, to taste, grover, big, pung, purse, tukt, discipline, bruka, to use, tvist, quarrel, stövel, boot, arbeta, to work, frokoster, lunch, &c.). Owing to the political circumstances, we find towards the end of the period a very powerful Danish influence, which extends also to phonetics and etymology, so that, for example, nearly all the terminal vowels are supplanted by the uniform Danish e, the hard consonants p, t, k by b, d, g as in Danish, the second person plural of the imperative ends in -er, beside -en (as tagher, for older takin).
Dialects.Dialectical differences incontestably occur in the runic inscriptions as well as in the literature; in the former, however, most of them are hidden from our eyes by the character of the writing, which is, from a phonetic point of view, highly unsatisfactory, indicating the most different sounds by the same sign (for example, o, u, y, and ö are denoted by one and the same rune); in the literature again they are reduced to a minimum by the awakening desire to form a uniform literary language for the whole country, and by the literary productivity and consequent predominant influence of certain provinces (as Östergötland). This question, moreover, has not hitherto been investigated with sufficient care. Only one distinct dialect has been handed down to us, that of the island of Gotland, which differs so essentially from the Old Swedish of the mainland that it has with good reason been characterized, under the name Forngutniska, as in a certain sense a separate language. Forngutniska.Materials for its study are very abundant: on one hand we possess more than two hundred runic inscriptions, among them a very remarkable one of the 12th or 13th century, counting upwards of three hundred runes, cut on a font (now in Aakirkeby on the island of Bornholm), and representing the life of Christ in a series of pictures and words; on the other hand a literature has been preserved consisting of a runic calendar from 1328, the law of the island (from about 1350), a piece of traditional history, and a guild statute. The language is distinguished from the Old Swedish of the mainland especially by the following characteristics: the old diphthongs are preserved (e.g., auga, eye, droyma, to dream, stain, stone), and a new triphthong has arisen by the change of iú into iau (as fliauga, to fly); the long vowels e, œ, ö, have passed into i, e, y (as kni, knee, mela, to speak, dyma, to deem); short o rarely occurs except before r, being in other positions changed into u; w is dropped before r (as raiþi, wrath); the genitive singular of feminines in -a ends in -ur for -u (as kirkiur, of the church). Owing to the entire absence of documentary evidence it is impossible to determine how far the dialects east of the Baltic, which no doubt had a separate individuality, differed from the mother-tongue.
The study of Old Swedish.The first to pay attention to the study of Old Swedish was the Swedish savant J. Buræus (†1652), who by several works (from 1599 onwards) called attention to and excited a lively interest in the runic monuments, and, by his edition (1634) of the excellent Old Swedish work Um Styrilsi Konunga ok Höfþinga, in Old Swedish literature also. His no longer extant Specimen Primariæ Linguæ Scantzianæ gave but a very short review of Old Swedish inflexions, but is remarkable as the first essay of its kind, and is perhaps the oldest attempt in modern times at a grammatical treatment of any old Germanic language. The study of runes was very popular in the 17th century; M. Celsius (†1679) deciphered the "staffless" runes (see above, p. 370), and J. Hadorph (†1693), who also did good work in editing Old Swedish texts, copied more than a thousand runic inscriptions. During the 18th century, again, Old Swedish was almost completely neglected; but in the present century the study of runes has been well represented by the collection of the Swede Liljegren (†1837) and by the Norwegian S. ​Bugge's ingenious interpretation and grammatical treatment of some of the most remarkable inscriptions. Old Swedish literature has also been made the object of grammatical researches. A first outline of a history of the Swedish language is to be found in the work of N. M. Petersen (1830) mentioned above (p. 370), and a scheme of an Old Swedish grammar in P. A. Munch's essay, Fornswenskans och Fornnorskans språkbyggnad (1849); but Old Swedish grammar was never treated as an independent branch of science until the appearance of J. E. Rydqvist's († 1877) monumental work Svenska språkets lagar (in 6 vols., 1850-83), which was followed in Sweden by a whole literature on the same subject. Thus phonetics, which were comparatively neglected by Rydqvist, have been investigated with great success, especially by L. F. Leffler and A. Kock; while the other parts of grammar have been treated of above all by K. F. Söderwall, the chief of contemporary Old Swedish scholars. His principal work, Ordbok öfver Svenska medeltidsspråket (1884 sq.), now in course of publication, gives the list of words in the later Old Swedish language, and—taken along with the Ordbok till samlingen af Sveriges gamla lagar (1877), by C. J. Schlyter, the well-known editor of Old Swedish texts, which contains the vocabulary of the oldest literature—it worthily meets the demand for an Old Swedish dictionary. An Old Swedish grammar, answering the requirements of modern philology, is still needed.
Modern Swedish.2. Modern Swedish.—The first complete translation of the Bible, edited in 1541 by the brothers Olaus and Laurentius Petri, and generally called the Bible of Gustavus I., may be regarded as the earliest important monument of this. Sources.Owing to religious and political circumstances, and to the learned influence of humanism, theological and historico-political works preponderate in the Swedish literature of the following period, which therefore affords but scanty material for philological research. It is not until the middle of the 17th century that Swedish literature adequately exemplifies the language, for at that period literature first began to be cultivated as a fine art, and its principal representatives, such as Stiernhielm, Columbus, and Spegel, were in reality the first to study it as a means of expression and to develop its resources. Amongst the authors of the 18th century we have to mention in the first place Dalin, who was to some extent the creator of the prose style of that epoch; while of the end of the century Kellgren and Bellman are the most noteworthy examples, representing the higher and the more familiar style of poetry respectively. The language of the 19th century, or at any rate of the middle of it, is best represented in the works of Wallin and Tegnér, which, on account of their enormous circulation, have had a greater influence than those of any other authors.
Form of the language.As to the language itself the earliest Modern Swedish texts, as Gustavus I.'s Bible, differ considerably from the latest Old Swedish ones. We find a decided tendency to exterminate Danisms and reintroduce native and partially antiquated forms. At the same time there appear several traces of a later state of the language: all genitives (singular and plural), e.g., end in -s, which in earlier times was the proper ending of only certain declensions. In spite of the archaistic efforts of many writers, both in forms and in vocabulary, the language nevertheless underwent rapid changes during the 16th and 17th centuries. Thus sj and stj (original as well as derived from sk before a palatal vowel) assimilate into a simple sh-sound; dj (original as well as derived from g before a palatal vowel), at least at the end of the 17th century, dropped its d-sound (compare such spellings as diufwer, giättar, envogé, for jufver, udder, jättar, giants, envoyé, envoy); hj passes into j (such spellings are found as jort for hjort, hart, and hjärpe for järpe, hazel grouse); b and p inserted in such words as himblar, heavens, hambrar, hammers, jämpn, even, sampt, together with (see above, p. 371), are dropped; the first person plural of the verb takes the form of the third person (as vifara, foro, for vifarom, forom, we go, went); by the side of the pronoun I, you, there arises a secondary form Ni, in full use in the spoken language about 1650; the adjective gradually loses all the case-inflexions; in substantives the nominative, dative, and accusative take the same form as early as the middle of the 17th century; in the declension with suffixed article the old method of expressing number and case both in the substantive and the article is changed, so that the substantive alone takes the number-inflexion and the article alone the case-ending; neuter substantives ending in a vowel, which previously had no plural ending, take the plural ending -n, some -er,—as bi-n, bees, bageri-er, bakeries. About the year 1700 the Old Swedish inflexion may, in general, be considered as almost completely given up, although a work of such importance in the history of the language as Charles XII.'s Bible (so-called) of 1703 (edited by Bishop J. Svedberg), by a kind of conscious archaism has preserved a good many of the old forms. To these archaistic tendencies of certain authors at the end of the 17th century we owe the great number of Old Swedish and Icelandic borrowed words then introduced into the language,—as fager, fair, härja, to ravage, later, manners, snille, genius, tarna, girl, tima, to happen, &c. In addition to this, owing to humanistic influence, learned expressions were borrowed from Latin during the whole 16th and 17th centuries; and from German, chiefly at the Reformation and during the Thirty Years' War, numberless words wore introduced, as språk, language, tapper, brave, prakt, magnificence, hurtig, brisk, &c.; among these may be noted especially a great number of words beginning in an-, er-, för-, and ge-. Owing to the constantly increasing political and literary predominance of France French words were largely borrowed in the 17th century, and to an equally great extent in the 18th; such are affär, business, respekt, respect, talang, talent, charmant, charming, &c. In the 19th century, again, especially about the middle of it, we anew meet with conscious and energetic efforts after purism both in the formation of new words and in the adoption of words from the old language (id, diligence, mäla, to speak, fylking, battle-array, &c.), and from the dialects (bliga, to gaze, flis, flake, skrabbig, bad, &c. ). Consequently, the present vocabulary differs to a very great extent from that of the literature of the 17th century. As for the sounds and grammatical forms, on the other hand, comparatively few important changes have taken place during the last two centuries. In the 18th century, however, the aspirates dh and gh passed into d and g (after l and r into j), as lag for lagh, law, bröd for brödh, bread; hv passed into v (in dialects already about the year 1600), as valp for hvalper, whelp; lj likewise into j,—thus ljuster, leister, occurs written juster. In our time rd, rl, rn, rs, and rt are passing into simple sounds ("supradental" d, l, n, s, and t), while the singular of the verbs is gradually supplanting the plural. A vigorous reform, slowly but firmly carried on almost uniformly during all periods of the Swedish language, is the throwing back of the principal accent to the beginning of the word in cases where previously it stood nearer the end, a tendency that is characteristic of all the Scandinavian languages, but no doubt especially of Swedish. In the primitive Scandinavian age the accent was removed in most simple words; the originally accented syllable, however, preserved a musically high pitch and stress. Thus there arose two essentially different accentuations,—the one, with unaccented final syllable, as in Icel. stígr (Gr. στείχεις), thou goest, the comparative betre (cf. Gr. τάσσων from ταχύς), better, the other, with secondary stress and high pitch on the final, as in Icel. pret. plur. buðom (Sanskr. bubudhimá), we bade, part. pret. bitenn (Sanskr. bhinnás), bitten. The same change afterwards took place in those compound words that had the principal accent on the second member, so that such contrasts as German úrteil and ertheílen were gradually brought into conformity with the former accentuation. At the present day it is quite exceptionally (and chiefly in borrowed words of later date) that the principal accent in Swedish is on any other syllable than the first, as in lekámen, body, välsígna, to bless.
The study of Modern Swedish.The scientific study of Modern Swedish dates from Sweden's glorious epoch, the last half of the 17th century. The first regular Swedish grammar was written in 1684 (not edited till 1884) in Latin by Er. Aurivillius; the first in Swedish is by N. Tiallman, 1696. Nothing, however, of value was produced before the great work of Rydqvist mentioned above, which, although chiefly dealing with the old language, throws a flood of light on the modern also. Among the works of late years we must call special attention to the researches into the history of the language by K. F. Söderwall,F. A. Tamm, and A. Kock. But little study, and that only in isolated parts, has been devoted to the grammar of the modern language, if the advanced state of philology is considered. A good though short abstract is given in H. Sweet's essay on "Sounds and Forms of Spoken Swedish" (Trans. Phil. Soc., 1877-79). Attempts to construct a dictionary were made in the 16th century, the earliest being the anonymous Variarum Rerum Vocabula cum Sueca Interpretatione, in 1538, and the Synonymorum Libellus by Elavus Petri Helsingius, in 1587, both of which, however, followed German originals. The first regular dictionary is by H. Spegel, 1712; and in 1769 Joh. Ihre († 1780), probably the greatest philological genius of Sweden, published his Glossarium Sviogoticum, which still remains the most copious Swedish dictionary in existence. In the present century the diligent lexicographer A. F. Dalin has published several useful works. At present the Swedish Academy has in preparation a gigantic dictionary on about the same plan as Dr Murray's New English Dictionary; there will also appear as soon as possible a complete list (with grammatical and etymological notes), drawn up by A. Andersson, Ad. Noreen, and F. A. Tamm, of the words in use in the present language. The characteristic differences between the Swedish literary language used in Finland and that of Sweden are exhibited in the Finsk Tidskrift, vol. xix. pts. 5, 6, 1885 ("Studier på Svensk språkbotten i Finland," by Karl Lindström).
​Danish.IV. Danish, like Swedish, is divided into the two great Pre- and Post-Reformation epochs of Old and Modern Danish.
Old Danish.1. Old Danish.—The territory of Old Danish included not only the present Denmark, but also the southern Swedish provinces of Halland, Skåne, and Blekinge, the whole of Schleswig, and, as stated above, for a short period also a great part of England, and Normandy. Sources.The oldest monuments of the language are runic inscriptions, altogether about 250 in number. The oldest of them go as far back as to the beginning of the 9th century, the Snoldelev-stone for instance on Sealand, and the Flemløse-stone on Fünen. From about the year 900 date the very long inscriptions of Tryggevælde (Sealaud) and Glavendrup (Fünen); from the 10th century we have the stones of Jællinge (Jutland), in memory of two of the oldest historical kings of Denmark (Gorm and Harald); while from about 1000 we have a stone at Dannevirke (Schleswig), raised by the conqueror of England, Sven Tjuguskægg. Relics of about the same age are the words that were introduced by the Danes into English, the oldest of which date from the end of the 9th century, the time of the first Danish settlement in England; most of these are to be found in the early English work Ormulum. No Danish literature arose before the 13th century. The oldest manuscript that has come down to us dates from the end of that century, written in runes and containing the law of Skåne. From about the year 1300 we possess a manuscript written in Latin characters and containing Valdemar's and Erik's laws of Sealand, the Flensborg manuscript of the law of Jutland, and a manuscript of the municipal laws of Flensborg. Dialects.These three manuscripts represent three different dialects,—that, namely, of Skåne, Halland, and Blekinge, that of Sealand and the other islands, and that of Jutland and Schleswig. There existed no uniform literary language in the Old Danish period, although some of the most important works of the 15th century, such as Michael's Poems and the Rhymed Chronicle (the first book printed in Danish, in 1495), on account of their excellent diction, contributed materially to the final preponderance of their dialect, that of Sealand, towards the Reformation.
Form of the language.As to the form of the language, it hardly differs at all during the period between 800 and 1200 A.D. from Old Swedish. It is only in the oldest literature that we can trace any marked differences; these are not very important, and are generally attributable to the fact that Danish underwent a little earlier the same changes that afterwards took place in Swedish (e.g., h in hv and hj in Danish was mute as early as the end of the 14th century; cf. p. 372, above). The laws referred to above only agree in differing from the Swedish laws in the following points:—the nominative already takes the form of the accusative (as kalf, calf, but Old Sw. nom. kalver, acc. kalf); the second person plural ends in -æ, (as köpæ, but Old Sw. köpin, you buy); in the subjunctive no differences are expressed between persons and numbers. Among themselves, on the contrary, they show considerable differences; the law of Skåne most nearly corresponds with the Swedish laws, those of Sealand keep the middle place, while the law of Jutland exhibits the most distinctive individuality. The Skåne law, e.g., retains the vowels a, i, u in terminations, which otherwise in Danish have become uniformly æ; the same law inserts b and d between certain consonants (like Old Sw.; see p. 371), has preserved the dative, and in the present tense takes the vowel of the infinitive; the law of Jutland, again, does not insert b and d, and has dropped the dative, while the present tense (undergoing an "Umlaut") has not always accepted the vowel of the infinitive; in all three characteristics the laws of Sealand fluctuate. After 1350 we meet an essentially altered language, in which we must first note the change of k, p, t after a vowel into g, b, d (as tag, roof, løbe, to run, æde, to eat); th passes into t (as ting, thing), gh into w (as law for lagh, guild) and into i (as vei for wægh, way); ld, nd are pronounced like ll, nn; s is the general genitive ending in singular and plural, &c. The vocabulary, which in earlier times only borrowed a few and those mostly ecclesiastical words, is now—chiefly owing to the predominant influence of the Hanse towns—inundated by German words, such as those beginning with be-, bi-, ge-, for-, and und-, and ending in -hed, and a great number of others, as blive, to become, ske, to happen, fri, free, krig, war, buxer, pantaloons, ganske, quite, &c.
Grammatical treatment.An Old Danish grammar is still wanting, and the preparatory studies which exist are, although excellent, but few in number, being chiefly essays by the Danes K. J. Lyngby and L. F. A. Wimmer, with N. M. Petersen's treatise Det Danske, Norske, og Svenske sprogs historie, vol. i. (1829), one of the first works that paid any attention to Old Danish, which till then had been completely neglected. A dictionary on a large scale covering the whole of Old Danish literature, except the very oldest, by O. Kalkar, has been in course of publication since 1881; older and smaller is Chr. Molbech's Dansk Glossarium (1857-66).
Modern Danish. Sources.2. Modern Danish.—The first important monument of this is the translation of the Bible, by Chr. Pedersen, Peder Palladius, and others, the so-called Christian III.'s Bible (1550), famous for the unique purity and excellence of its language, the dialect of Sealand, then incontestably promoted to be the language of the kingdom. The first secular work deserving of the same praise is Vedel's translation of Saxo (1575). The succeeding period until 1750 otters but few works in really good Danish; as perfectly classical, however, we have to mention the so-called Christian V. 's Law of Denmark (1683). For the rest, humanism has stamped a highly Latin-French character on the literature, striking even in the works of the principal writer of this period, Holberg. But about the year 1750 there begins a new movement, characterized by a reaction against the language of the preceding period and purist tendencies, or, at least, efforts to enrich the language with new-formed words (not seldom after the German pattern), as omkreds, periphery, selvstændighed, independence, valgsprog, devise, digter, poet. The leading representatives of these tendencies were Eilschow and Sneedorf. From their time Danish may be said to have acquired its present essential features, though it cannot be denied that several later authors, as J. Ewald and Öhlenschläger, have exercised a considerable influence on the poetical style.Form of the language. As the most important differences between the grammatical forms of the 18th and 19th centuries on one hand and those of the 16th and 17th centuries on the other may be noted the following:—most neuter substantives take a plural ending; those ending in a vowel form their plural by adding -r (as riger, for older rige, plural of rige, kingdom), and many of those ending in a consonant by adding -e (as huse for hus, of hus, house); substantives ending in -ere drop their final -e (as dommer for dommere, judge); the declension with suffixed article becomes simplified in the same way as in Swedish (see above, p. 372); the plural of verbs takes the singular form (as drak for drukke, we drank); and the preterite subjunctive is supplanted by the infinitive (as var for vaare, were).Grammatical treatment. The first Modern Danish grammar is by E. Pontoppidan, 1668, but in Latin; the first in Danish is by the famous Peder Syv, 1685. The works of the self-taught J. Højsgaard (e.g., Accentueret og raisonneret grammatica, 1747) possess great merit, and are of especial importance as regards accent and syntax. The earlier part of this century gave us Rask's grammar (1830). A thoroughly satisfactory Modern Danish grammar does not exist; perhaps the best is that by Th. Möbius (1871). The vocabulary of the 16th and 17th centuries is collected in Kalkar's Ordbog, mentioned above, that of the 18th and 19th centuries in the voluminous and as yet unfinished dictionary of Videnskabernas Selskab, and in C. Molbech's Dansk ordbog (2d ed. 1859).
Dano-Norwegian.As already mentioned (p. 370), Danish at the Reformation became the language of the literary and educated classes of Norway and remained so for three hundred years, although it cannot be denied that many Norwegian authors even during this period wrote a language with a distinct Norwegian colour, as for instance the prominent prose-stylist Peder Claussøn Friis († 1614), the popular poet Peder Dass († 1708), and, in a certain degree, also the two literary masters of the 18th century, Holberg and Wessel. But it is only since 1814, when Norway gained her independence, that we can clearly perceive the so-called Dano-Norwegian gradually developing as a distinct offshoot of the general Danish language. The first representatives of this new language are the writer of popular life M. Hansen († 1842), the poet H. Wergeland († 1845), and above all the tale-writer P. C. Asbjørnsen († 1885). In our own days it has been further developed, especially by the great poets Ibsen and Bjørnson and the novelist Lie; and it has been said, not without reason, to have attained its classical perfection in the works of the first-named author. This language differs from Danish particularly in its vocabulary, having adopted very many Norwegian provincial words (6000 to 7000), less in its inflexions, but to a very great extent in its pronunciation.Form of the language. The most striking differences in this respect are the following:—Norwegian p, t, k answer to Danish b, d, g in cases where they are of later date (see above),—as løpe, Danish løbe, to run, liten, D. liden, little, bak, D. bag, back); to Danish k, g before palatal vowels answer Norwegian tj, j; r (point-trill, not back-trill as in Danish) is assimilated in some way with following t (d), l, n, and s into so-called supradental sounds (see p. 372); both the primitive Scandinavian systems of accentuation are still kept separate from a musical point of view, in opposition to the monotonous Danish. There are several other characteristics, nearly all of which are points of correspondence with Swedish. Dano-Norwegian is grammatically treated by J. Løkke (Modersmaalets formlære, 1855), K. Knudsen (Dansk-Norsk sproglære, 1856), and K. Brekke (Bídrag til Dansk-Norskens lydlære, 1881), and others.
Norwegian-Norwegian.At the middle of this century, however, far more advanced pretensions were urged to an independent Norwegian language. By ​the study of the Modern Norwegian dialects and their mother language, Old Norwegian, the eminent philologist J. Aasen was led to undertake the bold project of constructing, by the study of these two sources, and on the basis of his native dialect (Søndmøre), a Norwegian-Norwegian ("Norsk-Norsk") language, the so-called "Landsmål." In 1853 he exhibited a specimen of it, and, thanks to such excellent writers as Aasen himself, the poets O. Vinje and K. Janson, and the novelist A. Garborg, as well as a zealous propagandism of the society "Det Norske Samlag" (founded in 1868), there has since arisen a valuable though not very large literature in the "Landsmål." But it is nowhere spoken. Its grammatical structure and vocabulary are exhibited in Aasen's Norsk grammatik, 1864, and Norsk ordbog, 1873.
Dialects.Scandinavian Dialects.—As above remarked, the Scandinavian dialects are not grouped, so far as their relationship is concerned, as might be expected judging from the literary languages. Leaving out of account the Icelandic dialects and those of the Faroes, each of which constitutes a separate group, the remainder may be thus classified:—
(1) West-Norwegian Dialects,—spoken on the western coast of Norway between Christiansand and Molde.
(2) North-Scandinavian,—the remaining Norwegian and the Swedish dialects of Vestmanland, Dalarna, Norrland, Finland, and Russia.
(3) The dialects on the island of Gotland.
(4) Middle-Swedish,—spoken in the rest of Sweden, except the southernmost parts (No. 5).
(5) South-Scandinavian,—spoken in the greater part of Småland and Halland, the whole of Skåne, Blekinge, and Denmark, and the Danish-speaking part of Schleswig. This group is distinctly divided into three smaller groups,—the dialects of southern Sweden (with the island of Bornholm), of the Danish islands, and of Jutland (and Schleswig).
The study of the Modern Scandinavian dialects has been very unequally prosecuted. Hardly anything has been done towards the investigation of the Icelandic dialects, while those of the Faroes have been studied chiefly by Hammershaimb. The Norwegian dialects have been thoroughly examined by Aasen, whose works give a general account of them; while in our own days Joh. Storm, above all, displays an unwearying activity, especially in the minute investigation of their phonetic constitution, to which Aasen had paid but scant attention. The substance of these researches in the Norwegian dialects has recently been presented in a magazine, called Norvegia, of which the first volume is in course of publication; it employs an alphabet invented by Storm. For the study of Danish dialects but little has been done, Molbech's Dialect-Lexicon of 1841 being very deficient. The Schleswig dialect, on the contrary, has been admirably treated of by E. Hagerup (1854) and K. J. Lyngby (1858). At present two important works are in preparation,—H. F. Feilberg's great dictionary of the dialect of Jutland, and J. C. Espersen's of the dialect of Bornholm. There is no country in which the dialects have been and are studied with greater zeal and more fruitful results than in Sweden during the last hundred and fifty years. Archbishop E. Benzelius the younger († 1743) made collections of dialect words, and on his work is based the dialectical dictionary of Ihre of 1766. An excellent work considering its age is S. Hof's Dialectus Vestrogothica, 1772. The energy and zeal of C. Säve (essays on the dialects of Gotland and Dalarne) inspired these studies with extraordinary animation at the middle of the 19th century; in 1867 J. E. Rietz published a voluminous dialect dictionary; the number of special essays, too, increased yearly. From 1872 so-called "landsmålsföreningar" (dialect societies) were founded among the students at the universities of Upsala, Lund, and Helsingfors (at Upsala alone 13), for a systematic and thorough investigation of dialects. We find remarkable progress in scientific method especially with regard to phonetics in the constantly increasing literature; special mention may be made of the detailed descriptions of the dialects of Värmland, Gotland, and Dalarna by Ad. Noreen, and A. F. Freudenthal's monographs on the Finnish and Esthonian Swedish dialects. Since 1879 the Swedish dialect societies have published a magazine on a comprehensive plan, De Svenska Landsmålen, edited by J. A. Lundell, who has invented for this purpose an excellent phonetic alphabet (partially based on C. J. Sundevall's work Om phonetiska bokstafver, 1855).(A. NO.)
* ↑ See A. O. Freudenthal,Om Svenska allmogemålet i Nyland, 1870; Ueber den Närpesdialect, 1878.
* ↑ A. O. Freudenthal, Upplysningar om Rågö- och Wichterpalmålet, 1875; H. Vendell, Laut- und Formlehre der Schwedischen Mundarten in den Kirchspielen Ormsö und Nukkö, 1881.
* ↑ H. Vendell, "Om och från Gammalsvenskby" (Finsk Tidskrift, 1882).
* ↑ H. Vendell, Runömålets ljud- och formlära, 1882-6.
* ↑ J. J. A. Worsaae, Minder om de Danske og Nordmændene i England, Skotland, og Irland, 1851; A. Laurensen and K. J. Lyngby, "Om sproget paa Hjaltlandsöerne" (Ann. f. Nord. Oldkynd., 1860); P. A. Munch, Samlede Afhandlinger, iii., iv., 1875-76.
* ↑ Worsaae, l.c.; J. C. H. R. Steenstrup, Danelag, 1882; Es. Tegnér, "Norrmän eller Danskar i Normandie," and "Ytterligare om de nordiska ortnamnen i Normandie" (Nordisk Tidskrift, 1884).
* ↑ V. Thomson, Ryska rikets grundläggning genom Skandinaverna, 1882 (The Relations between Ancient Russia and Scandinavia, 1877); S. Bugge, "Oldsvenske navne i Rusland" (Arkiv for Nordisk Filologi, ii. 1885).
* ↑ O. Montelius, "Om våra förfäders invandring till Norden" (Nordisk Tidskrift, 1884).
* ↑ W. Thomson, Ueber den Einfluss der Germ. Sprachen auf die Finnisch-Lappischen, 1870.
* ↑ O. Montelius, Die Kultur Schwedens in vorchristlicher Zeit, 1885.
* ↑ See the plates in G. Stephens's Handbook of Old Northern Runic Monuments, 1884.
* ↑ For the interpretations we are principally indebted to Prof. S. Bugge's ingenious investigations, who in 1865 satisfactorily succeeded in deciphering the inscription of the golden horn, and by this means gained a fixed starting-point for further researches. A short review of their most important results is given by F. Burg, Die älteren Nordischen Runeninschriften, 1885.
* ↑ A complete catalogue of the literature edited hitherto is given by Th. Möbius, Catalogus Librorum Islandicorum et Norvegicorum Ætatis Mediæ, 1856, and Verzeichnis der . . . altisländischen und altnorwegischen . . . von 1855 bis 1879 erschienenen Schriften, 1880. Compare Iceland.
* ↑ See B. Magnússon Ólsen, Runerne i den Oldislandske literatur, 1883.
* ↑ See Kr. Kålund, "Islands fortidslevninger" (in the Aarbøger for Nordisk Oldkyndighed, 1882).
* ↑ An account of all the oldest Icelandic manuscripts (to about 1230) is given by J. Hoffory in the Gött. Gel. Anz., 1884, p. 478 sq.
* ↑ A short review of the most important Old Icelandic manuscripts (and their editions), classed according to subjects, is given by O. Brenner, Altnordisches Handbuch, pp. 13 sq. The principal collections of manuscripts are—1, the Arnamagnæan (AM.) in Copenhagen, founded by Arni Magnússon (†1730); 2, the collection of the Royal Library (Reg.) in Copenhagen, founded by Th. Torfæus (†1719) and Brynjólfr Sveinsson (†1674); 3, the Delagardian collection (Delag. or Ups.) at Upsala, founded in 1651 by Magnus Gabriel de la Gardie; 4, the Stockholm collection (Holm.), founded by Jón Rugman (in 1662) and Jón Eggertson (in 1682).
* ↑ E.g., Veiledning til det Islandske sprog, 1811; in a new, much improved Swedish edition, Anvisning til Isländskan, 1818.
* ↑ Fornswenskans och Fornnorskans språkbyggnad, 1849, and (along with C. R. Unger) Norrönasprogets grammatik, 1847.
* ↑ Especially Um frumparta Islenzkrar túngu i fornöld, 1846.
* ↑ Den Oldnordiske udtale, 1861.
* ↑ Fornnordisk formlära, 1874.
* ↑ Altisländische und altnorwegische Grammatik unter Berücksichtigung des Urnordischen, 1884.
* ↑ Lexicon poeticum, 1854-60.
* ↑ An Icelandic-English Dictionary, based on the MS. collections of the late R. Cleasby, 1869-74.
* ↑ Supplement til Islandske ordbøger (1876 and 1879-1885).
* ↑ Ordbog over det Gamle Norske sprog, 1862-1867; new ed. 1883 sq.).
* ↑ See R. Arpi, "Islands yngre literatur och språk" (Språkvetenskapliga'sällskapets förhandlingar, 1883-85).
* ↑ Notices of the Modern Icelandic pronunciation are also to be found in H. Sweet's Handbook of Phonetics, 1877, Chr. Vidsteen's Oplysninger om Bygdemaalene i Hardanger, 1885, and R. Arpi's above-quoted paper.
* ↑ For these see especially Nicolaysen, Norske formlevninger, 1862-66.
* ↑ The oldest are those on the Valdby- (Larvik) and Strand- (Aafjord) stones, both from pagan times. The latest rune-stones are from the end of the 14th century. Owing to influence of the learned such stones appear again in the 17th century, e.g., in Telemarken.
* ↑ On the Old Norwegian manuscripts see the works cited in notes 4, 5, page 368; for the literature hitherto edited see note 1, page 368.
* ↑ The present writer is indebted to Prof. Joh. Storm for the following remarks on the history of the Norwegian language and its dialects during the 14th and 15th centuries.
* ↑ Chr. Jensen's Norsk dictionarium eller glosebog, 1646.
* ↑ See Diplomatarium Norvegicum vol. i. n. 589 and 591.
* ↑ See Dipl. Norv., i. n. 308.
* ↑ See P. A. Munch, Samlede afhandlinger, iv. 516 sq.
* ↑ See Munch, Saml. afh., iii. 181 sq.
* ↑ Det Danske, Norske, og Svenske sprogs historie, part ii. pp. 1-96 (ed. 1830).
* ↑ Diplomatarium Norvegicum, 1857 sq.; 10 vols. have already appeared.
* ↑ Compare the prefaces to Vigfússon's edition of the Eyrbyggjasaga (1864), Keyser's and Unger's editions of the legendary Olafssaga (1849), and Barlaams Saga ok Josaphats (1851), Unger's ed. of Þidrekssaga (1853), and Th. Möbius's essay Ueber die altnordische Sprache, pp. 15-18 (1872).
* ↑ See V. Thomsen, Ryska rikets grundläggning, especially p. 114 sq.; S. Bugge, "Oldsvenske navne i Rusland" (Arkiv f. Nord. Filol., ii.).
* ↑ Kindly communicated by Prof. S. Bugge.
* ↑ See S. Bugge, "Tolkning af runeindskriften pa Rökstenen" (Antiqvarisk Tidskrift f. Sverige, v., 1878).
* ↑ See S. Bugge, Runeindskriften paa ringen i Forsa Kirke, 1877.
* ↑ For the runic inscriptions in general, see above all J. G. Liljegren, Runurkunder, 1833; J. Göransson, Bautil, 1750; R. Dybeck, Svenska runurkunder, 1855-59, and Sverikes runurkunder, 1860-76; and the Journals of the antiquarian societies in Sweden.
* ↑ See L. F. Leffler, "Fornsvenska runhandskrifter" (Nordisk Tidskrift, 1870).
* ↑ The Old Swedish monuments are for the most part published in the following collections:—Svenska fornskriftsällskapets samlingar, 84 parts, 1844-84; C. J. Schlyter, Samling af Sveriges gamla lagar, vols. i.-vii. and x.-xii., 1827-69; Svenskt Diplomatarium, 6 vols., 1829-78, new series, 2 vols., 1875-84.
* ↑ In memory of Wámód these runes stand; and Warenn, his father, wrote them in memory of his son (by destiny) condemned to death.
* ↑ If the bell fall down on anybody's head, the parish pays a fine of three marks should he die from it.
* ↑ See especially K. J. Lyngby, Antiqu. Tidskr., 1858-60, pp. 242 sq. and 260 sq.; J. E. Rydqvist, Sv. Språkets lagar, lv. 153 sq.; L. F. Leffler, Om v-omljudet, 1877, pp. 37 sq., 55, 76; S. Bugge, Runeindskriften fra Forsa, p. 49 sq.; A. Kock, Studier i Fornsvensk ljudlära, i., 1882, pp. 55 sq., 144 sq., 159 sq., 238.
* ↑ See C. Säve, Gutniska urkunder, 1859; J. G. Liljegren, Runurkunder, 1833.
* ↑ See A. Noreen, "Aperçu de l'histoire de la science linguistique suédoise" (Le Muséon, ii., 1883).
* ↑ A. Noreen has an Old Swedish grammar in preparation.
* ↑ The printed characters are also considerably changed by the introduction of the new letters å (with the transl. of the New Testament of 1526), and ä, ö (both already in the first print in Swedish of 1495) for aa, æ, ø.
* ↑ See A. Noreen, "Aperçu," &c.; H. Hernlund, Förslag och åtgärder till Svenska skriftspråkets reglerande, 1883.
* ↑ Hufvudepokerna af Svenska språkets utbildning, 1870.
* ↑ Several essays on the borrowed words in Swedish.
* ↑ Språkhistoriska undersökningar om Svensk akcent, i., 1878, ii., 1884-5.
* ↑ See P. G. Thorsen, De Danske runemindesmærker, i. 1864, ii. 1879-81; L. F. A. Wimmer, "Runeskriftens Oprindelse" (Aarbøger for Nordisk Oldkyndighed, 1874.
* ↑ See E. Brate, "Nordische Lehnwörter im Ormulum" (Paul Braune's Beiträge, x., 1884).
* ↑ See L(udvig) W(immer), "Det Danske Sprog," in Nordisk Conversations-lexikon, 3d ed., 1885; T Ström, Dansk Literaturhistorie, 2d ed., 1878.
* ↑ See J. A. Lundell, "Norskt språk" (Nordisk Tidskrift, 1882).
* ↑ See J. Storm, "Det Norske maalstræv" (Nordisk Tidskrift, 1878).
* ↑ See J. A. Lundell, "Om de Svenska folkmålens frändskaper" (Antropologiska Sektionens Tidskrift, 1880).
* ↑ See J. A, Lundell, "Öfversikt af de senaste årtiondenas värksamhet för kännedom om folkmål" (Svenska Landsmålen, i., 1880).