Relationship between Danish and Dutch
Ja (yes) -- Ja
Oorlog (war) -- krig ("Orlog" partially used for naval warfare)
Krijger (warrior/tribesman) -- kriger
Stam (tribe) -- stamme
Taal (language) -- sprog
Spraak (speech) -- tale (not 100 % sure about this)
Vlinder (butterfly) -- sommerfugl
Ooievaar (stork) -- stork
Stront (shit) -- skid, lort
Gemakkelijk (easy) -- magelig
Schoon (clean) -- ren
Meerderheid (majority) -- flertall
Meerderheden (majorities) -- flertall
Blikje (beverage can) -- dåse
Bolwerk (Bastion) -- bollverk (but only in an abstract sense)
Omwenteling (revolution, as in "revolutions per minute") - omvælting?
Leger (army) -- hær
Vriendin (girlfriend) -- kæreste (unisex)
Vijand (enemy) -- fjende
Hangslot (padlock) -- hængelås
Luchtmacht (airforce) -- flyvevåben
Onderzeeër (submarine) --undervandsbåd
Woestijn (dessert, as in landscape) -- ørken
Frederik från Norge,
Jag väntar förtfarande på examplarna av de många "clitics" du talade i går om....
Det våre värkligen intressant att veta mer om det, för att visa om man har de också på svenska.
Ha det bra och vi hörs...
That "jeg" (I), pronounced /jai/, often changes to /ja/ when put together with other words:
That "ikke" (not), pronounced /ige/, often changes to /ig/ or even /i:/ when put together with other words.
Ex:
Jeg hedder ikke Morten = I am not called Morten
/jai heðer ige mortn/ = /ja heðer i mortn/
I am sure there are many other clitics in Danish. It kind of explains why Danish sounds as it does.
By the way, what's your native language, Arthur?
Frederik från Norge,
Kanske ska du inte komma att tro det, men jag pratar faktiskt spanska som moderspråk.
Hälsningar,
Arthur
Ja, det var jamenn en overraskelse! Imponerende!
A minor correction: "flertal" ends with only one 'l', since no Danish word (nor Dutch!) may end with a double consonant.
Hi HT,
After I read your post, I listened Danish Radio for a couple of hours, and I found that different people pronounce "v" in a very different way, sometimes, as you said, as a "w" sound but sometimes as a "v" sound, even when intervocalic. Do you have some additional information about this matter?
I was wondering where does the Danish phonetics come from, because it is really very different to Swedish or Norgewian (generally spoken) phonetics, and the melody is quite particular as well, something that remembers the Oberösterreichisches Deutsch (Linz region) anyhow. How came this language to such a degree of assimilation, what triggered it? was it the mere contact with German? was this an isolated branch of proto-Norse, which such traits already being present in an early stage or are we talking about a recent change, say, 200 years? are there evidence for either answer? why only Danish presents the glottal stop or "stød", whereas there is not even a single rest of it in its neighbour languages, Sw, No, and Ge?.... I have a lot of questions, I hope I won't overwhelm you with them.
Concerning the Dutch consonant cluster "sch", as far as I have listened, it is not pronounced like "sk" but like "s + German "ch" (the "ch" sound like in "Buch"). What do you say to this?
Hi again HT, Sander and Frederik from Norway,
You could help me with a question concerning the Dutch pronountiation again.
I have read that "ui" (Huis, Cruijff) in standard Dutch is pronounced exactly in the same way like "øy" in standard Norwegian. There is no counterpart of this sound in any other germanic language, is there?
Is it true?
Sorry for not using either xSampa or IPA symbols, I am not used to them yet, and I don't want to create a bigger confusion...
I wouldn't know how "øy" sounds, but in the IPA "ui" is [œy]
Arthur:
The stød was, just as the Norwegian and Swedish tones, an answer to the problem of the many homophones that appeared when, in the late Middle Ages, the definite article placed itself at the end of the word.
Something I wrote on another thread:
Old Norse most probably had only one tone. The two tone systems thus developed a few hundred years ago, probably because of the development of the definite article as a suffix, something that created minimal pairs like:
lokit = locked = shut (now tone 2)
lokit = lok-it = the lid (now tone 1)
In early Old Norse this was not a problem, as the definite article was mostly a prefix, hitt lok = the lid.
I also think "øy" is the Norwegian equivalent of Dutch "ui", although I think "ui" often tends to go a bit in the direction of /oi/ or just /ø/.
Sander, "øy" (and "øi") would be written "öy" or "öi" in German, Get it?
Officially Norwegian "øy" is /øi/ in IPA and "ui" is /œy/, as /ø/ is a close-mid front rounded vowel while /œ/ is a open-mid front rounded vowel.
So there is a small difference.
But as you point Arthur, Norwegian and Dutch seems to be the only Germanic languages where this diphtong is quite common. In German is it by all means linguistically possible, as /öy/, but I can't think of a word where it appears.
I really don't know about Danish and Swedish, but I see that at least in Danish the word for "berth" (as in bed on a ship) is "køje", similar to Norwegian "køye". But I am not sure wether it is pronounced /køie/ or /koie/ in Danish.
There is also the issue of Icelandic "ey" (ey itself means island). I once found it out, but now I have forgotten, wether "ey" was pronounced /øi/ in Old Norse or in modern Icelandic. I see from Wikipedia that Reykjavik is pronounced /reikjavik/ in modern Icelandic, so I suppose it must have been /røikjavik/ in Old norse. By the way "reyk" corresponds to modern Norwegian "røyk" and means smoke.
Frederik,
Is the "R" in Norway pronounced mostly like the Swedish "R" (på riksvenska) or like the Danish "R"? I think it is so unstable like the Dutch "R", i.e. both pronounciations are present, aren't they?
Can you tell me in which parts of the country is pronounced like either version?
What other traits from the Danish languages have influenced the standard spoken Norwegian?
Is standard spoken Norwegian phonetically and grammatically closer to bokmål or to nynorsk? (I take for granted that like in each Skandinavian language, there are a number of dialects, but the average of them should present a tendency, shouldn't they?)
I think you'd be quite surprised by the variation in Norwegian dialects.
The Norwegian r is pronounced similar as an alveolar flap, like the rikssvensk r, in Eastern Norway (Östlandet), Middle Norway (Tröndelag), North Norway (Nord-Norge) and in the northern parts of Western Norway (Vestlandet, and in this case the provinces of Sogn og Fjordane and Möre og Romsdal).
The uvular r is found on the southern coast (Sörlandet) and the southern and central parts of Western Norway (Vestalndet, in this case the provinces of Rogaland and Hordaland, including the city of Bergen).
Danish traits in dialects close to Bokmaal:
- Little or no use of the female gender
(en hånd vs. ei hånd)
- Common articles and plural for masculine and female
(mannen og damen vs. mannen og dama/damå;
armer og hender vs. arma(r) og hende(r) )
- Monophtongs instead of diphtongs
(sten vs. stein)
- Pronounciation and use of certain pronouns
(vi vs. me; /dei/ vs. /deg/
But be aware of that dialects in the extreme south-east of Norway (Östfold province) has developed these Dano-Swedish characteristics naturally
In Oslo, central eastern Norway and in the city of Bergen, the dialects are closer to Bokmaal then to Nynorsk. In all other parts of Norway, and escpecially on the west coast and in the central mountain valleys, the dialects are closer to Nynorsk.
And then you have dialect characteristics that you don't find in either Bokmaal or Nynorsk. Like the Danish-style lenization of p,t, k on the southwestern coast (mad vs. mat), the Icelandic-style extreme diphtongization in Sogn og Fjordane on the west Coast (baot/baut vs. båt) and the apocope (kast vs. kaste) and palatalization (mainn me' hainnhuind i bainn vs. mann med hannhund i band) in Middle Norway (Tröndelag).