Travis,
In Dutch you say "eerstE" most of the times. :)
eg,
Ik was (de) eerste.
=
I was (the) first.
Jij was eerst.
=
You where (the) first
If you can put "de" in front of it,you have to use "eerste".
If you can use both (like sometimes with the German "erst" and "erste"),but sometimes "eerst" sounds...a bit arrogant.Its mainly a thing for children.
eg,
C1"I want to go on the bike".C2 "But I was first!"
K1"Ik wil op de fiets".K2 "maar ik was eerst!"
Do you get what I mean?
Whoops about "eerst" there; I got confused by German "erst" versus "erste", where "erste" is the former except being one of its many ways of being conjugated to agree with a noun (that is, in isolation "erst" not "erste" is used), and as a result assumed that the "e" in "eerste" is just a conjugation-related suffix.
Hi Travis,
Basically, I don't dispute anything that you wrote. If I may ramble on a little, however... It is true that English is an offshoot of Low-German and so is Dutch and its near-twin Flemish. However, there seems to be a Celtic substratum in Dutch which gives it its special flavor.( In fact, there are still place names of Celtic origin in Holland today like Amsterdam<Amstelodamum, Leyde<Lugdunum and Lynden<Lindobrogen and a few others). As a result, English is sometimes closer to German in general than it is to Dutch.
The Angles were almost the same thing as the Frisians, as far as I know, and some of them lived right next door to Denmark. The Jutes, another early English people, also came from Jutland in Denmark. So there could have been an adstratum of some North Germanic in English early on. The word "first" in English, though, is actually a Norse intruder along with words like and "jump", "kill" and "sky" and that's why they look like the Scandinavian rather than the Dutch or German equivalents. Take care!
--- Brennus
Well, I wouldn't necessarily say that Old Norse influence on Old English was as early as the Jutes themselves, but rather that it was probably primarily associated with the invasion and subsequent long term occupation and settlement of much of what is now England by Vikings, from primarily what is now Denmark. One way or another, though, Old Norse has had a /far/ heavier influence on English than on any of the other West Germanic languages overall, even though, if I recall correctly, it did have some influence on Frisian as well.
Hey Brennus, interesting topic, but....
where do you get the idea that "Amstelodamum" has the faintest celtic origin? By the time Amsterdam came into being (around 1100) the celts were long gone. Amstelodamum is actually a retroactive latinization of an honest Old Dutch name. I'd almost grant you that the River Amstel could have a name of Celtic origin, but even IT hardly existed as such before the time of the Romans. The historic records of the fenlands around Amsterdam are notoriously scanty.
Anyway, as for the rest of the topic, it should come as no surprise that English is full of Scandinavian words, considering the Norwegians controlled much of England for a while.
Cheers.
Some of Barnes' and Grainger's suggestions have actually been carried out in Norwegian:
medicine > leechcraft / legevitenskap = doctor science
lunatic > moonmad / månesyk = moon ill
aviary > birdstow / fuglebur = fowl bower
horizon > skysill / himmelrand = sky edge
noun > thing-name / tingord = thing word
polygamist > many-wedder / mangegifte = many marriage = polygamy
performance > dish-up / oppvisning = show-up
democratic > a-chance-for-all / folkestyre = folk rule = democracy
omnibus > folkwain / folkevogn = folk waggon = VOLKSWAGEN (Beetle)
Todd wrote:
"Anyway, as for the rest of the topic, it should come as no surprise that English is full of Scandinavian words, considering the Norwegians controlled much of England for a while. "
The Norwegian Vikings settled mostly in Northern Scotland (Shetland, Orkenys, Sutherland and Hebrides), Cumbria, Yorkshire and Ireland while Eastern England, the Danelaw, was settled by Danes.
But anyway, Danes and Norwegians at that time spoke the same language, Norse, often called "Danish tongue".
The famous English last name Braithwaite (known from the TV series about the Leeds family who won 1 billion pounds or something and then went bananas!) comes from a place in Cumbria named by Norse Vikings.
Braithwaite = Breidtveit = broad (forest) clearing. Breidtveit is also a very common farm name in Norway.
The first name "Howard" might also have Scandinavian origins, as Håvard was a very common Viking male first name, and still is in Norway.
Howard Braithwaite = Håvard Breidtveit
!
Todd,
The Germanic tribes began arriving in present day Holland only towards the end of the 5th century A.D. Prior to that time it was part of the Roman province of Germania Inferior and was inhabited by two Celtic tribes, the Batavii and the Morii (whose name appears to have meant "sea farers" or "sea people"). The Batavii served as auxiliaries in the Roman Army. Cohors Primus Batavorum ("The first cohort of Batavians) served in Britain near Hadrian's Wall and also fought in Trajan's Dacian war of 106 A.D. in what is now Romania.
Many place names in central and western Europe have names of Celtic origin just as many place names in North and South America are of native Indian origin. History repeats itself.
The Germanic invaders of the area where relatively few in number and did not completely displace the Celtic population. Rather, they simply moved in and imposed their rule and language on them. This kind of stuff happens in history all the time. Similar scenarios were the movement of the Scots to northern Britian, the Magyars to Pannonia (Hungary) and the Slavic Croats and Serbs to Roman Illyria . However, in all three cases they were minorities whose languages took root in their respective regions by a process linguists call "elite dominance".
Anyhow, this is the way I see it but don't get me wrong. I'm not trying to shove anything down your throat. You still have a right to read the history on it for yourself and form your own views if you like.
I'll leave you with one final thought. Colliers Encyclopedia once said that "The Dutch are of old Celtic stock modified with some Germanic elements: Saxons, Franks and Frisians. " This is probably the case, I think.
If I recall correctly, though, the name of Amsterdam comes from Old Dutch Aemstelledamme, not from some pre-Germanic Celtic name, by the way.
=> Amsterdam<Amstelodamum<=
Now your making things up!
Amsterdam was "founded"in the late 10th century by then all the celtic tribes were gone.
Amsterdams origin is simple...
the "Amstel" is a river in the Netherlands (it doenst excist anymore by the way!)
And a "Dam' is a ..well a 'dam'.When they build a dam over the Amstel they called the little settlement Amsterdam.(though they used different spelling..ofcourse)
Thanks for the textbook lecture, Brennus, but you still don't have a grasp on the history of all the Dutch towns or their very changing topography. No one is disputing that the Celts preceded the Germanic groups in Holland, but Amsterdam is no example of celtic vestiges. That's all. You have to consider how much Dutch topography has changed since the Roman occupation, with its series of catastrophic floods in the early dark ages.
As for the Amstel, she's very alive and kicking, meandering from the polders southeast of Amsterdam.
I forgot: "Amstelodamum" is something you see on old maps a lot, from when rennaissance mapmakers wanted to bestow the city an air of Latin authority. By the time the name Amstelodamum showed up the Romans had been gone for about a 1000 years.
But here's somehting for you: is it a Celtic thing that so many rivers have similar names, al beginning with a yawning long vowel? The Aa, The Ee, The IJ, The Ijsel, The Aemstel, The Aengstel, the Em, etc.
My dialect of Dutch ( West Flemish ) still shows features of Celtic in pronounciation ( WFL/ENG : skoews = shoes , eboorn = born )