Ripuarian
Also several minor cities, and hundreds of villages. About 1 million people speak a Ripuarian language. Ripuarian dialects are usually bound to a village or a municipality. Almost every place has a somewhat different language. People know where other people grew up, if they listen to their Ripuarian talk. Ripuarian languages are part of the west middle continental Germanic language group. They are related to Moselle Franconian languages of Rhineland-Palatinate in Germany, to the Luxembourgian language in Luxembourg, and to the Limburgish language in the Province Limbourg in the Netherlands. Many historic roots of ripuarian languages are in Middle High German. Many other influences too, like Latin, Low German, Dutch, French, and Limburgish-Bergish, are in today's Ripuarian languages. Several elements of grammar are unique to Ripuarian, they do not exist in any other German language. The states Belgium and The Netherlands officially recorgnize some Ripuarian dialects as minority languages.