 the west germanic languages constitute the largest of the three branches of the germanic family of languages and include german, english, dutch, afrikaans, the frisian languages, low saxon languages and yiddish. the other branches are north germanic and the extinct east germanic. english is part of the north sea germanic branch of the west germanic languages. ==history==  ===origins=== the west germanic languages share many lexemes not existing in north germanic and/or east germanic â archaisms as well as common neologisms. ===the west germanic proto-language=== most scholars doubt that there was a proto-west-germanic protolanguage common to the west germanic languages and no others, though a few maintain that proto-west-germanic existed.robinson (1992): p. 17-18 most agree that after east germanic broke off (an event usually dated to the 2nd or 1st century bc), the remaining germanic languages, the northwest germanic languages, divided into four main dialects: north germanic, and the three groups conventionally called "west germanic", namely #north sea germanic (ingvaeonic, ancestral to anglo-frisian and also old saxon) #weser-rhine germanic (istvaeonic, ancestral to [[ol
Germanic_languages West_Germanic_languages