Talk:High German

Hochdeutsch, i believe

2002.04.09:
In some High German dialects - the High Alemannic dialects spoken in parts of Germany and Switzerland, there is even initial [x] and [kx], which makes the second sound shifting complete.

I'm not sure this is accurate. Note that English /p/ and /t/ correspond to High German initial & medial affricates and to final fricatives, but /k/ follows an unexpected pattern of /k/ initially and /x/ medially, rather than the expected /kx/:

Linguistically, I suspect that rather than the sound shift being from [x] to [kx], it was from [kx] to [x]. That is, the sequence was stop-affricate-fricative: [k]~[kx]~[x], which would follow the linguistic rule of thumb of sound tending to undergo lenition rather than fortition. This would mean that High German [x] is a later development than Swiss German [kx], which would require revision of the above text. But then why does initial /k/ stay put? Or am I using faulty examples? Anybody know for sure? pgdudda

Why is "Fränkisch" described as extinct? afaik, there are dialects in Northern Bavaria and in Hesse that are called "Fränkisch". --zeno 08:25 Jan 7, 2003 (UTC)

I described it as extinct because Ethnologue (http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=FRK) says that it is. But their information is surprisingly brief; maybe it's wrong. -- Toby 01:09 Feb 6, 2003 (UTC)

I have to correct myself, the "Fränkisch" I was referring to is called "Franconian" in English. Frankish was the language of the Franks, but I think it became "extinct" a long time before the 1827 century (this date is stated by Ethnologue). This is the best overview of German dialects (including Lower German) I have seen so far: http://www.genealogienetz.de/misc/dialect-e -- zeno

I'm not sure that I buy something that classifies Frisian under Low German but doesn't so classify Dutch. (At least the text corrects this.) -- Toby 20:51 Feb 12, 2003 (UTC)

You have to be carfeul not to mix something up!

• There is a Low Franconian Dialect of Low German, which developed further to Dutch and is related to Low Saxon.
• Secondly there is a region called "Franken" in Northern Bavaria. It has absolutely nothing to do with Dutch dialects.
• The empire of Charlemagne (Karl der Grosse) stretched across Germany and France so many dialects and regions in these two countries, the Netherlands or Belgium have names refering to his empire (Franconian Empire), which itself was named after a tribe which spoke a now extinct language: Franconian.

Ethnologue is probably not speaking of a Bavarian dialect, or they'd classify it as Upper German. But they don't classify it at all, so who knows? Probably they're not sure! -- Toby 20:51 Feb 12, 2003 (UTC)

The /k/ to /kx/ shift can also be watched in some Bavarian dialects spoken in Austria and northern Italy. However, I do not know about any literature about that. --zeno 08:32 Jan 7, 2003 (UTC)

P. Stoltzfus: Is Pennsylvania Dutch really a kind of Pfälzisch, or are you making that assumption since the Pennsylvania Dutch originally came from the Palatinate? I wouldn't want to assume that the dialects predominant in that area have stayed the same over the past few centuries. -- Toby 20:40 Feb 12, 2003 (UTC)