Proto Germanic / Germanic Languages Similarities

Sander ,
Now I understand why they mixed up old Dutch with old English in Kent ...
They probably we're dialects of the same language , like you said ...

<we're> I meant "were"

Short history of English :


The language we now call English is actually a blend of many languages. Even the original Anglo-Saxon was already a blend of the dialects of west Germanic tribes living along the North Sea coast: The Saxons in Germany and eastern Holland, the Jutes, possibly from northern Denmark (the area now called Jutland), and the Angles, probably living along the coast and on islands between Denmark and Holland. It is also likely that the invaders included Frisians from northern Holland and northern Franks from southern Holland (whose relatives gave their name to France). The dialects were close enough for each to understand the other.

This also the reason why Dutch is considered an older language than English.

What about Gothic , the only known East germanic Language ...
What do they actually know about it ?

=>What about Gothic , the only known East germanic Language ...
What do they actually know about it ? <=

Well Gothic isn't the only east-germanic laguage...its the only written one.
I know that its a dead language and that it sound a bit "slavic".

Gothic is in kind of a gray area. Some linguists consider it to have been not quite Germanic pointing out that it shares some characteristics with other branches of Indo-European Italic, Celtic, Baltic etc. not shared by Anglo-Saxon, Old High German or Old Norse. They propose a hypothetical "Gotho-Germanic" group instead with Gothic having split off a little earlier.

The most mysterious Germnaic language, Gothic, is connected with the most boring and least cultural distinct area of Sweden: Götaland / Gothia.

Fredrik, I understand that the Goths lived in Southern Sweden for a while before going on to invade the Roman Empire under Alaric. A few writers I have read claim that the Swedes are basically Goths who later adopted a Scandinavian language but this needs further research. Certainly people do adopt new languages from time to time . The Franks gave up Old High German for Gallo-Roman (now French & Provencal); the Bulgars gave up Hunnic (or Turkic) for Slavic; many Romano-Britons and Welsh eventually gave up Celtic for English etc. ;the Picts gave up their native tongue for Scots Gaelic and the descendents of both Scots and Picts all speak English today.

It is still debated, but the ancient Goths might very well have originated in Götaland. Götaland is still today divided into West-Götaland and East-Götaland, maybe corresponding to the Visigoths and Ostrogoths.

The Gothic historian Jordanes tells that the Goths came over to Poland from the islands of Scandza, which might be Scandia = Scania/ Skåne or Scandinavia.

In Viking times Götaland was inhabited by a people called Geats in Anglo-Saxon, Gautar in Old Norse (Gaute (= Goth) is still a Norwegian male first name) and Götar in modern Swedish.
Modern Sweden was first established when the Gautar united with the Svear and they all became Swedes (svenskar). This unification os traditionally supposed to have spread out from Uppsala in Uppland outside Stockholm, the legendary seat of Odin. But there is also a Götaland theory that claims that the original Uppsala and Uppland was located in Götaland and that modern Sweden was united from Götaland.

I must admit I was amazed by all the Scandinavian tribes that Jordanes, writing in Bulgaria in the 6th century (but also drwaing on the accounts of Cassiodorus at the court of Thedoric the Great in Italy some time before) could tell about the tribes of Scandinavia:

Fennae = Finns = Samis (hunter-gatherers who "found" their food)
Suehans = swedes
Theustes = people of Tjust hundred in modern Småland
Vagots = Gotlanders?
Finnaithae = people of Finnveden in modern Småland
Ragnaricii = people of Ranrike = modern Bohuslän
Raumaricii = people of Romerike in modern Norway
Granni = people of Grenland in modern Norway
Auganzi = people of Agder in modern Norway
Rugi = people of Rogaland in modern Norway - and I am one of them!

Here's "Our Father" in Gothic. I believe it's quite obvious that it's a Germanic language, although it did split off quite early:

"Atta unsar þu in himinam,
weihnai namo þein.
qimai þiudinassus þeins.
wairþai wilja þeins,
swe in himina jah ana airþai.
hlaif unsarana þana sinteinan
gif uns himma daga.
jah aflet uns þatei skulans sijaima,
swaswe jah weis afletam
þaim skulam unsaraim.
jah ni briggais uns
in fraistubnjai,
ak lausei uns af þamma ubilin."

Interestingly the Goths and the Swedes were the only ones to call themselves in this fashion:
Gut-þiuda = Goth-people
Svi-þiod = Swede-people (but used about Sweden)

Just like the Goths might have originated in Götaland, the Cimbri(ans) might have come from the North-Jutish province of Himmerland. -C and -h were more interchangeable before, think of Latin cornus and Germanic hornus.
The Burgundians might have come from Borgundarholm = present-day Bornholm.
The Vandals from Vend-syssel in Jutland (Himmerland's neighbour province) or Vendel in Sweden.
And the Teutones from Thy (bordering Himmerland and Vend-syssel)

The two subdivisions of the Vandals were the Silingi and the Hasdingi. (Wikipedia).
MY GOD! There is an area in / by Himmerland called Salling!

A wild and un-academic guess:
The Cimbrians were Celts from Himmerland and they had some connection with Wales (=Cymru or Cambria)!