Plautdietsch
Encyclopedia
Plautdietsch, or Mennonite Low German, was originally a Low Prussian
variety of East Low German
, with Dutch
influence, that developed in the 16th and 17th centuries in the Vistula
delta area of Royal Prussia
, today Polish territory. The word is another pronunciation of Plattdeutsch, or Low German
. Plaut is the same word as German platt or Dutch plat, meaning 'flat' or 'low' but formerly meaning 'intelligible', and the name Dietsch
corresponds etymologically to Dutch Duits and German Deutsch (both meaning "German"), which originally meant 'ordinary language, language of the people' in all the continental West Germanic languages
.
The language (or groups of dialects of Low German) is spoken in Canada, the United States, Mexico, Brazil, Bolivia, Paraguay, Uruguay, Peru, Honduras, Belize, and Argentina by over 300,000 Mennonites (Russian Mennonites). They are members of a religious group that originally fled from Holland and Belgium in the 16th century to escape persecution and eventually resettled in these areas. They introduced and developed their particular East Low German
dialect, the so-called Weichselplatt, while they came to and lived in the Vistula
delta area, beginning in the early-to-mid 16th century. These colonists from the Low Countries
were especially welcome there because of their experience with and knowledge of land reclaiming and making polders. As Mennonites they kept their own (primarily Dutch and Low-German) identity, using their Dutch/Low German language. Their East Low German dialect is still classified as Low Prussian
, or simply Prussian. All Mennonites including Russian Mennonites trace their roots to the Low Countries
and north Germany.
Beginning in the late 18th century, the expanding Russian Empire
invited Germans and many from the Kingdom of Prussia
, including many Mennonites, left and created new colonies north of the Black Sea
in an area that Russia
had recently acquired in one of the Russo-Turkish Wars
but which is now situated in present-day Ukraine
as well as other countries. Many Mennonites migrated to North America
— especially Canada
, Mexico
and the United States
— and Latin America
— especially south Brazil
and Paraguay
; most of them live as rural settlers and added some Spanish
and Portuguese
words to their own language.
Today Plautdietsch is spoken in Paraguay, Mexico, Ukraine, Germany, Canada (particularly Manitoba
and Saskatchewan
), Brazil, Belize, and the United States. There are two major dialects that trace their division to Ukraine. These two dialects are split between the New Colony
and Old Colony Mennonites
. Many younger Russian Mennonites in Canada and the United States today speak only English. For example, Homer Groening, the father of Matt Groening
(creator of The Simpsons
), spoke Plautdietsch as a child in Saskatchewan
in the 1920s, but his son Matt never learned the language.
In 2007, Mexican filmmaker Carlos Reygadas
directed the film Stellet Lijcht (Silent Light
), set in a Mennonite community in Chihuahua, Mexico. Most of the dialogue is in Plautdietsch.
Arguments for a dialect:
Arguments for classifying it as a language of its own:
or Old Colony and Molotschna
(New Colony), as noted above. Some of the major differences between these two varieties are:
A few other differences sometimes related to this issue are the exact pronunciation of the IPA c sound and words as jenau/jeneiw, but according to some studies, those might be due to the level of education and the influence of Russian and German.
Some Plautdietsch speakers might show a mixture of both dialects. Those, for instance, who trace their origin to the Bergthal Colony
in New Russia (Ukraine), a daughter colony of the Old Colony, show all the phonetic distinction of the Old Colony version, but they drop the final -n as the Molotschna speakers do.
, which separated the High German dialects from the Low German dialects and all other Germanic languages. The basic distinctions between High German and Low German are:
Like Dutch, Frisian and Low German, Plautdietsch only shows the mutation of th into d.
As shown, while Dutch, English and German have experienced similar vowel shifts, Plautdietsch has only merged the old Germanic /yː/ sound with /iː/, while long /uː/ is retained in the Molotschna dialect. The Old Colony variety has fronted it to the now vacant /yː/.
The deletion of r has been completed in most final positions, after front vowels and before alveolar consonants, but is still retained in the infinitive of verbs, after short vowels, and sometimes after back vowels as seen in the example Huarn, Hieena.
) have been shifted to /j/ and /c/ (the latter has been written as kj or tj), even if there is another consonant between the vowel and the consonant. An intervocalic /g/ is palatalized as /ɟ/, written gj or dj. (A similar event occurred with English, but not as generalized). Where an /e/ or /i/ has been sunken to /a/, the palatalized sound is retained. Also where German has a /ç/ sound, Plautdietsch retains it even after lowering a front vowel.
This is the case particularly on nouns made out of verbs. The verb normally shows the unshifted consonant, whereas the noun has a shifted Germanized consonant: schluten, Schluss; bräakjen, Bruch (to close, closure; to break, a break)
in the Spanish Low Countries
during the Dutch revolution ( Eighty years war), that was centered on religious freedom for the Protestants. As a result, many Mennonites and Reformed left the country. This continued in the 17th century, when the Dutch Reformed Church
became the official religion, being less than indulgent to other types of Protestantism, let alone the types perceived as radical (non-violent, no bearing of arms, no recognition of worldy authorities). In the Low German language area, they left their language traces in particular at the lower Vistula
, around Danzig and Elbing
, and up the river towards Toruń
.
The Mennonites for a long time maintained their old language. In Danzig, Dutch as the language of the church disappeared about 1800. As a spoken language, the Mennonites took up the Vistula
Low German
, the vocabulary of which they themselves had already influenced. As a written language, they took up High German. It was this Vistula Low German or Weichselplatt that the Mennonites took with them and kept while migrating to Russia, Canada and elsewhere.
Bockelzhonn; German: Tomate, English: tomato
Arbus/Erbus/Rebus; German: Wassermelone, English: watermelon
Schisnikj; German: Knoblauch, English: garlic
Particularly words for auto parts are taken from English: hood, fender, brakes (along with the more Low German form Brams), spark plugs (pluralized Ploggen), but also words like peanuts, belt, tax.
A special case is the word jleichen. It is an adaption of the English verb "to like", but taken from the German adverb gleich (equivalent of the English adverb like: this is like joking)
One problem has been what letters to use for sounds that do not exist in German, such as the palatal /c/ and /ʝ/ sounds, which are both pronounced and spelled differently in various dialects of Plautdietsch. Old Colony speakers pronounce these sounds by striking the middle of the tongue against the palate. Others, especially speakers of the Molotschna dialect, instead strike the tongue against the alveolar ridge
and spell them and . Most Plautdietsch speakers' ears are not accustomed to realize these subtle, if not trivial, differences, and will often confuse one with the other.
Other problematic areas: use or non-use of v for some words with f sound, use or non-use of Dehnungs-h, when to double consonants and when not to.
When comparing different writers, one must take into account the dialect of that writer. The most famous Plautdietsch writer, Arnold Dyck, wrote in the Molotschna dialect, though his origins were from the Old Colony. During his life he made many changes in his spelling system. His developments are the basis for the various spellings used today. In the following table, only his final system is taken into account, as used in his famous Koop enn Bua series, along with Herman Rempel (Kjennn Jie noch Plautdietsch?), Reuben Epp
(Plautdietsche Schreftsteckja), J. Thiessen (Mennonite Low German Dictionary), J. J. Neufeld (Daut niehe Tastament) and Ed Zacharias (De Bibel). The latter two claim to write in the Old Colony dialect, as seen in their verb endings, while the other three use the Plautdietsch as spoken by the descenders of the Bergthal Colony, i. e. the Old Colony dialect with a loss of -n endings.
Where symbols for consonants occur in pairs, the left represents the voiceless consonant and the right represents the voiced consonant. Observations: According to the spelling system of De Bibel these sounds are spelled as follows:
inventory of Plautdietsch is large, with 13 simple vowels, 10 diphthongs and 1 thriphthong.
The /u/ sound has been shifted to /y/ in the Old Colony dialect, leaving the sound only as part of the ua diphthong. However, in certain areas and age groups, there is a heavy tendency to shift /o/ sound up to [u].
Pronunciation of certain vowels and diphthongs vary from some speakers to others; the diphthong represented by ee for instances is pronounced [oi] or even [ei] by some. Likewise the long vowels represented by au and ei might have a diphthong glide into [ʊ] and [ɪ], respectively.
it has only two definite article
s (like Dutch and Low Saxon); masculine and feminine articles
are homophonous. However, masculine and feminine indefinite articles are still different (like German) and thus, the three genders can still be perfectly established. In the Objective case, the masculine has a special definite article, making it once more different from the feminine, which, like the neuter, does not change. In the plural number, all gender identification is lost (as in German, Dutch and Low Saxon); all plural determiners and adjective endings are homophonous with the feminine singular.
Some Plautdietsch writers try to use a three case system with the definite articles, without much consistency. The system looks somewhat like this, some might use the dative neuter articles, others might not:
All possessives (see under pronouns) are declined like in this way. With the form äa (her/their) an r has to be reinserted before adding endings (äaren, äare).
and plural
, three genders: masculine, feminine, and neuter, but only two cases, nominative, and objective
. The historical dative
and accusative
have merged, even though some writers try to maintain a three cases distinction, which has been lost for most speakers, perhaps centuries ago. The objective case is distinct from the nominative only in 1) personal pronouns: ekj froag am, hee auntwuat mie (I ask him, he answers me) 2) articles and demonstrative and possessive adjectives in the singular masculine gender: de Voda halpt dän Sän (the father helps the son) (observe: nouns are not inflected themselves) and 3) proper names, i. e. traditional Mennonite names: Peeta frajcht Marie-en, Marie auntwuat Peetren (Peter asks Mary, Mary answers Peter)
{| class="wikitable"
|-
! || colspan="3" | Singular
! colspan="3" | Plural
|-
||||Masculine || Feminine || Neuter ||Masculine || Feminine || Neuter
|-
|Nominative|| de Mensch ||de Sonn ||daut Hüs||de Menschen ||de Sonnen ||de Hiesa
|-
| | Objective||dän Mensch ||de Sonn ||daut Hüs||de Menschen ||de Sonnen ||de Hiesa
|}
No ending, no voicing, no vowel fronting: de Fesch de Fesch, daut Schop, de Schop, daut Been, de Been (fish, fishes; sheep, sheep; leg, legs)
Voicing, no ending, no vowel fronting: Frint, Frind; Boajch, Boaj (friend/s, mountain/s)
No ending, no voicing, vowel fronting: Foot, Feet (foot, feet)
Voicing and vowel fronting, no ending: Hoot, Heed (hat/s)
-a ending:
only: Licht, Lichta (light/s)
with voicing: (picture/s)
with vowel fronting: Maun, Mana (man, men)
with voicing, vowel fronting and palatalization: Kaulf, Kjalwa (calf, calves)
-en ending (the -en, -s and -sch endings have no vowel fronting)
only: Näs Näsen, (nose/s)
with voicing: de Tiet, de Tieden, de Erfoarunk, de Erfoarungen (time/s, experience/s)
Words where a historical r is dropped require it to be reinserted: Däa, Däaren (door/s)
Polysyllabic words with a vocalized r drop the final a: Sesta, Sestren (sister/s)
An unstressed schwa
also is dropped: Gaufel, Gauflen (fork/s)
-s ending
This class consists mainly of 1) short masculine and neuter nouns: Baul -s, Oarm -s (ball/s, arm/s)
2) words related with family members: Sän -s, Fru -es, (son/s, woman, women)
and 3) masculine and neuter nouns ending in -el and -en (the latter may drop the n): Läpel, Läpels; Goaden, Goades (spoon/s; garden/s)
-sch ending
This class consists of masculine and neuter polysyllabic nouns ending with -a: de Voda, de Vodasch; daut Massa, de Massasch (father/s, knife, knives)
For someone knowing (High) German, pluralizing is a fairly predictable process, with some exceptions: the -en ending covers pretty much the same words in both languages; the -a ending is the equivalent for the German -er plural, where German has Umlaut
, Plautdietsch will have vowel fronting in most cases. The -s and -sch groups are made almost entirely of polysyllabic nouns which in German have no plural ending.
The most problematic words are those with an -e plural ending in German. Although the entire class with no ending is made out of them, many other words are threated differently. For example, the plurals for Stool and Stock (chair and stick) are Steela and Stakja (compare German Stuhl, Stühle; Stock, Stöcke). Since they have their vowels fronted there seems to be no reason for the -a ending. Many others have been moved into the -en class: Jeboot, Jebooten (commandment/s, German: Gebot, Gebote). With some not so common words, there is no certainty about the correct plural, different speakers create them in different ways: the plural of Jesaz (law) could be Jesaza or Jesazen (German: Gesetz, Gesetze).
, i. e. naming the possessor in the objective case with the possessive adjective and the possessed object: Dän Maun sien Hus (the man's house). With proper nouns, and when the possessor is determined by a possessive adjective, the possessor is in the nominative case
instead: Peeta sien Hus (Peter's house); mien Voda sien Hus (my father's house). Very long possessive clauses can be created: Mien Voda seine Mutta äare Mutta es miene Uagrootmutta (my father's mother's mother is my great grandmother).
For inanimate or generalized constructions, the preposition von or a composition are used instead: De Lichta von de Staut/ de Stautslichta (the lights of the city).
With nouns ending in t or k, only -je is added; a few nouns ending in kj, an additional s is inserted: de Staut, daut Stautje, daut Buak, daut Buakje; daut Stekj, daut Stekjsje (the (little) city, the (little) book, the (little) piece).
Plural diminished nouns take -s ending: Jungkjes, Mejalkjes; however, if the original plural requires fronting of a back vowel or has an -a ending, these features are retained before adding the diminutive suffix: de Stool, de Steela --> daut Stoolkje, de Steelakjes (chair/s, little chair/s)
Some pronouns have two forms, different persons may use one or other form, or even alternate between them. Daut is used at the beginning of a sentence, but may be replaced for et in other positions.
Possessive adjectives of the masculine (nominative case) or neuter gender. Otherwise they are declined like the indefinite article and determiners (see under article section).
Demonstrative pronouns are frequently used instead of the personal pronouns. When used so, some people use special objective forms for feminine and plural. When used strictly demonstrative, only the singular masculine has a special objective form.
To determine the stem, take the infinitive and drop the -en ending.
There are a few modifications to this basic pattern: 1) If the stem ends with a plosive or fricative voiced consonant (d, g, j, soft s, w, zh), that consonant is devoiced in the 2nd and 3d persons of the present, since voiceless t and st automatically force the preceding consonant (compare the sound of the letter d in English lived and liked). 2) If the stem ends with a voiceless consonant (ch, f, jch, k, kj, p, hard s, sch, t) that consonant devoices the d, sd, d, den endings of the past tense (into t, st, t, ten) for the same reason. 3) If the stem ends with two consonants, the second one being a nasal
or lateral
, a schwa
e is inserted to ease pronunciation. 4) Verbs with a diphthong
and r have a special treatment; the r is dropped before endings are attached, and the st/sd of the second person is replaced by scht/zhd.
Examples of a regular verbs: spälen (to play), lachen (to laugh), läwen (to live), odmen (to breathe) and roaren (to cry). The first one follows strictly the basic pattern, the others show the various adjustments needed as described above.
If the inverted word order is used, the -en ending of the plural wie, jie (but not see) form is dropped, and a root-only form, identical to the 1st person singular, is used.
GENERALITIES: Vowel changes in present tense are somewhat predictable: long ie and u change into short i; long ä/o change into e or a; diphthongs äa and oa are simplified to a.
The first and third person of the past tense are identical (as in weak verbs).
With only a few exceptions (like the verb sajen), all voiced consonants are devoiced in the three persons of the singular past, the nasal ng and nj are retained in second person, but devoiced in first and third person.
The past tense has the same vowel through all persons.
If there is a vowel change from ä to e or a in the present tense, that feature is retained in the singular imperative.
The plural form for wie/jie in the inverted word order keep the final consonant voiced.
The past participle of weak verbs is formed with je- plus the stem of the verb plus -t. A voiced consonant is devoiced to go along with t, the inserted e between double consonant is retained, the r after a long vowel is dropped. For the weak verbs given above the past participles are: jespält, jelacht, jejäft, jeodemt, jeroat.
The past participle for strong and anomalous verbs is hard to predict, they could be formed in five or six different ways:
Adjectives are frequently made from the past participle by attaching an adjective inflection ending and voicing the final t; if the preceding consonant is voiced, with -en participles the e is dropped:
(to draw, drawn, a drawn picture)
koaken, jekoakt, eene jekoakte Ieedschock (to boil, boiled, a boiled potato)
stälen, jestolen, een jestolna Hunt (to steal, stolen, a stolen dog)
Some intransitive verbs take sennen instead of haben as auxiliary verbs if they: 1) indicate a motion from one place to another, or 2) indicate a change of condition, or 3) the verbs sennen (to be) and bliewen (to keep being, to remain). Example: ekj sie jekomen, ekj sie oolt jeworden, ekj sie jewast (I have come, I have become old, I have been).
also shows a rich inflectional system in its adjectives. Although once even richer, simplification has done its work here too, leaving Mennonite Low German
with only three genders: feminine
, masculine and neuter, and two comparison degrees: Comparative
and Superlative
.
The plural of all genders is identical to the feminine singular.
Strong and weak neuter declension
: after the definite article daut or the demonstratives daut and dit (neuter form of that, this) the t is dropped and a form identical to the feminine and plural is used. In other situations, as with indefinite articles, possessive adjectives or without article, the strong form is used.
The objective is used only in the masculine singular. However, if a preposition-article compound is used with a neuter noun, then the objective would be used. Example: em grooten Hus, but: en daut groote Hus, en een grootet Hus.
There is no predicate form for the superlative, a preposition-article compound with the objective or weak neuter is used: aum woamsten, or: oppet woamste, or newly just the neuter form without preposition: daut woamste: Zemorjes es et woam, opp Meddach woat et woama, no Meddach es et aum woamsten/ oppet woamste/ daut woamste (in the morning it is warm, at noon it is getting warmer, after noon it is the warmest)
The predicate form is used in predicate sentences for all genders: De Maun es oolt, de Fru es oolt, daut Hus es oolt (the man is old, the woman is old, the house is old)
Observation: the numeral eent (one) is declined like the indefinite article (masculine een [objective eenen], feminine eene, neuter een) or a demonstrative or possessive pronoun (eena [objective eenen], eene, eent for the respective genders); when counting, the neuter pronoun form eent is used.
Instead of fiew, alw, twalw, some speakers say fief, alf, twalf (5, 11, 12).
The ordinal for 11th and 12th are: alfta, twalfta; from 13-19 use the ordinal + da: drettieenda (13th) ; from 20-99 use the ordinal + sta: fiew un twintichsta (25th). All ordinal numbers are declined like an adjective, the forms given here are masculine nominative.
The partitive numbers for 1/10, 1/11, 1/12 are een Tieedel, een Alftel, een Twalftel, for 13-19 add -del to the ordinal number, for 20-99 add -stel.
Mennonite Low German word order: Jehaun haft dän Desch jemoakt (John has the table made).
English word order: John has made the table.
Mennonite Low German, like High German has been referred to as verb-second (V2) word order
. In embedded clauses, words relating to time or space, can be placed at the sentence's beginning, but then the subject has to move after the main verb to keep that verb in second position. This pattern is demonstrated here:
Mennonite Low German word order: Nu sie ekj schaftich. More Examples: Dan jeef de Kjennich seine Deena eenen Befäl. (Then the king gave his servants an order)
Also, effects tend to be placed last in the sentence. Example: En daut Kuffel wia soo väl Wota, daut et äwarand (In the cup, there was so much water, that it overflowed).
Mennonite Low German has syntactic patterns not found in High German, or at least not as often, such as the repetition of a subject, by a pronoun.
Example: Mien Hoot dee haft dree Akjen. My hat it has three corners.
Questions, orders and exclamations have a verb first word order: Hast du daut oole Hus aun de fefte Gauss jeseenen? (Have you seen the old house on fifth street?). All questions are arranged like this. There is no auxiliary verb to form questions. If there is a question word, that word precedes the verb: Wua es dien Voda jebuaren (Where is your father born?). As in English, when using verbs in the imperative mood, it is not necessary to specify the person addressed, but it can be added for emphasis: Brinj (du) mie emol dän Homa (Please, (you,) bring the hammer to me). The word emol is frequently asked to soften the order as a word for please. Example of an exclamation: Es daut vondoag oba kolt! (Is it cold today!).
Dependent clauses
As in High German, in dependent clauses, the verb goes at the end:
Ekj well morjen miene Mutta besieekjen, wan ekj Tiet hab. (I want to visit my mother, if I have time). Observe the construction of: if I have time.
However, when a dependent clause has an infinitive or past participle, this rule is no longer strictly applied; there is a strong tendency to move the finite (main) verb before the infinitive or participle, the direct object (or even a long circumstantial complement):
Example: German word order requires a sentence structure like: Hee fruach mie, auf ekj miene Mutta jistren daut Jelt jejäft haud. (Translation: He asked me if I had given the money yesterday to my mother.) Even though this sounds right and perfectly understandable, most speakers would rearrange these same words as follows: Hee fruach mie, auf ekj miene Mutta jistren haud daut Jelt jejäft. Another example: Hee sajcht, daut sien Brooda jrod no de Staut jefoaren es/ Hee sajcht, daut sien Brooda jrod es no de Staut jefoaren (He says that his brother has just gone to the city). Observe: the verb precedes a prepositional phrase, but an adverb is still placed before it.
in Plautdietsch, another form of Low German and Dutch.
Low Prussian
Low Prussian , sometimes known simply as Prussian , is a dialect of East Low German that developed in East Prussia. Low Prussian was spoken in East and West Prussia and Danzig up to 1945. It developed on a Baltic substrate through the influx of Dutch and Low German speaking immigrants...
variety of East Low German
East Low German
East Low German is a group of Low German dialects, including various varieties known as Pomeranian and Prussian, spoken in Northeast Germany as well as by minorities in present northern Poland. Together with West Low German, it constitutes Low German...
, with Dutch
Dutch language
Dutch is a West Germanic language and the native language of the majority of the population of the Netherlands, Belgium, and Suriname, the three member states of the Dutch Language Union. Most speakers live in the European Union, where it is a first language for about 23 million and a second...
influence, that developed in the 16th and 17th centuries in the Vistula
Vistula
The Vistula is the longest and the most important river in Poland, at 1,047 km in length. The watershed area of the Vistula is , of which lies within Poland ....
delta area of Royal Prussia
Royal Prussia
Royal Prussia was a Region of the Kingdom of Poland and of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth . Polish Prussia included Pomerelia, Chełmno Land , Malbork Voivodeship , Gdańsk , Toruń , and Elbląg . It is distinguished from Ducal Prussia...
, today Polish territory. The word is another pronunciation of Plattdeutsch, or Low German
Low German
Low German or Low Saxon is an Ingvaeonic West Germanic language spoken mainly in northern Germany and the eastern part of the Netherlands...
. Plaut is the same word as German platt or Dutch plat, meaning 'flat' or 'low' but formerly meaning 'intelligible', and the name Dietsch
Dietsch
-Languages:*German *Middle Dutch*Low German including Dutch*Low German excluding Dutch by definition*Low Dietsch, transitional Limburgish-Ripuarian dialects-People:* John Dietsch, author on the subject of fly fishing...
corresponds etymologically to Dutch Duits and German Deutsch (both meaning "German"), which originally meant 'ordinary language, language of the people' in all the continental West Germanic languages
West Germanic languages
The West Germanic languages constitute the largest of the three traditional branches of the Germanic family of languages and include languages such as German, English, Dutch, Afrikaans, the Frisian languages, and Yiddish...
.
The language (or groups of dialects of Low German) is spoken in Canada, the United States, Mexico, Brazil, Bolivia, Paraguay, Uruguay, Peru, Honduras, Belize, and Argentina by over 300,000 Mennonites (Russian Mennonites). They are members of a religious group that originally fled from Holland and Belgium in the 16th century to escape persecution and eventually resettled in these areas. They introduced and developed their particular East Low German
East Low German
East Low German is a group of Low German dialects, including various varieties known as Pomeranian and Prussian, spoken in Northeast Germany as well as by minorities in present northern Poland. Together with West Low German, it constitutes Low German...
dialect, the so-called Weichselplatt, while they came to and lived in the Vistula
Vistula
The Vistula is the longest and the most important river in Poland, at 1,047 km in length. The watershed area of the Vistula is , of which lies within Poland ....
delta area, beginning in the early-to-mid 16th century. These colonists from the Low Countries
Low Countries
The Low Countries are the historical lands around the low-lying delta of the Rhine, Scheldt, and Meuse rivers, including the modern countries of Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg and parts of northern France and western Germany....
were especially welcome there because of their experience with and knowledge of land reclaiming and making polders. As Mennonites they kept their own (primarily Dutch and Low-German) identity, using their Dutch/Low German language. Their East Low German dialect is still classified as Low Prussian
Low Prussian
Low Prussian , sometimes known simply as Prussian , is a dialect of East Low German that developed in East Prussia. Low Prussian was spoken in East and West Prussia and Danzig up to 1945. It developed on a Baltic substrate through the influx of Dutch and Low German speaking immigrants...
, or simply Prussian. All Mennonites including Russian Mennonites trace their roots to the Low Countries
Low Countries
The Low Countries are the historical lands around the low-lying delta of the Rhine, Scheldt, and Meuse rivers, including the modern countries of Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg and parts of northern France and western Germany....
and north Germany.
Beginning in the late 18th century, the expanding Russian Empire
Russian Empire
The Russian Empire was a state that existed from 1721 until the Russian Revolution of 1917. It was the successor to the Tsardom of Russia and the predecessor of the Soviet Union...
invited Germans and many from the Kingdom of Prussia
Kingdom of Prussia
The Kingdom of Prussia was a German kingdom from 1701 to 1918. Until the defeat of Germany in World War I, it comprised almost two-thirds of the area of the German Empire...
, including many Mennonites, left and created new colonies north of the Black Sea
Black Sea
The Black Sea is bounded by Europe, Anatolia and the Caucasus and is ultimately connected to the Atlantic Ocean via the Mediterranean and the Aegean seas and various straits. The Bosphorus strait connects it to the Sea of Marmara, and the strait of the Dardanelles connects that sea to the Aegean...
in an area that Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
had recently acquired in one of the Russo-Turkish Wars
Russo-Turkish War, 1768-1774
The Russo-Turkish War of 1768–1774 was a decisive conflict that brought Southern Ukraine, Northern Caucasus, and Crimea within the orbit of the Russian Empire.-Background:...
but which is now situated in present-day Ukraine
Ukraine
Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It has an area of 603,628 km², making it the second largest contiguous country on the European continent, after Russia...
as well as other countries. Many Mennonites migrated to North America
North America
North America is a continent wholly within the Northern Hemisphere and almost wholly within the Western Hemisphere. It is also considered a northern subcontinent of the Americas...
— especially Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
, Mexico
Mexico
The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...
and the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
— and Latin America
Latin America
Latin America is a region of the Americas where Romance languages – particularly Spanish and Portuguese, and variably French – are primarily spoken. Latin America has an area of approximately 21,069,500 km² , almost 3.9% of the Earth's surface or 14.1% of its land surface area...
— especially south Brazil
Brazil
Brazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is the largest country in South America. It is the world's fifth largest country, both by geographical area and by population with over 192 million people...
and Paraguay
Paraguay
Paraguay , officially the Republic of Paraguay , is a landlocked country in South America. It is bordered by Argentina to the south and southwest, Brazil to the east and northeast, and Bolivia to the northwest. Paraguay lies on both banks of the Paraguay River, which runs through the center of the...
; most of them live as rural settlers and added some Spanish
Spanish language
Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...
and Portuguese
Portuguese language
Portuguese is a Romance language that arose in the medieval Kingdom of Galicia, nowadays Galicia and Northern Portugal. The southern part of the Kingdom of Galicia became independent as the County of Portugal in 1095...
words to their own language.
Today Plautdietsch is spoken in Paraguay, Mexico, Ukraine, Germany, Canada (particularly Manitoba
Manitoba
Manitoba is a Canadian prairie province with an area of . The province has over 110,000 lakes and has a largely continental climate because of its flat topography. Agriculture, mostly concentrated in the fertile southern and western parts of the province, is vital to the province's economy; other...
and Saskatchewan
Saskatchewan
Saskatchewan is a prairie province in Canada, which has an area of . Saskatchewan is bordered on the west by Alberta, on the north by the Northwest Territories, on the east by Manitoba, and on the south by the U.S. states of Montana and North Dakota....
), Brazil, Belize, and the United States. There are two major dialects that trace their division to Ukraine. These two dialects are split between the New Colony
Molotschna
Molotschna Colony was a Russian Mennonite settlement in what is now Zaporizhia Oblast in Ukraine. Today is called Molochansk with a population of under 10,000. The settlement is named after the Molochna River which forms its western boundary. Today the land mostly falls within the Tokmatskyi and...
and Old Colony Mennonites
Chortitza
Chortitza Colony was a Russian Mennonite settlement northwest of Khortytsia Island and is now part of Zaporizhia, Ukraine. Chortitza was founded in 1789 by...
. Many younger Russian Mennonites in Canada and the United States today speak only English. For example, Homer Groening, the father of Matt Groening
Matt Groening
Matthew Abram "Matt" Groening is an American cartoonist, screenwriter, and producer. He is the creator of the comic strip Life in Hell as well as two successful television series, The Simpsons and Futurama....
(creator of The Simpsons
The Simpsons
The Simpsons is an American animated sitcom created by Matt Groening for the Fox Broadcasting Company. The series is a satirical parody of a middle class American lifestyle epitomized by its family of the same name, which consists of Homer, Marge, Bart, Lisa and Maggie...
), spoke Plautdietsch as a child in Saskatchewan
Saskatchewan
Saskatchewan is a prairie province in Canada, which has an area of . Saskatchewan is bordered on the west by Alberta, on the north by the Northwest Territories, on the east by Manitoba, and on the south by the U.S. states of Montana and North Dakota....
in the 1920s, but his son Matt never learned the language.
In 2007, Mexican filmmaker Carlos Reygadas
Carlos Reygadas
Carlos Reygadas is a Mexican filmmaker known for his three films Batalla en el Cielo, Japón and Silent Light . After Batalla en el Cielo, he was known for his raw depiction of sex in his films and the use of old or ugly-seeming characters...
directed the film Stellet Lijcht (Silent Light
Silent Light
- External links :* * at the 2007 Toronto International Film Festival* - External links :* * at the 2007 Toronto International Film Festival* - External links :* * at the 2007 Toronto International Film Festival*...
), set in a Mennonite community in Chihuahua, Mexico. Most of the dialogue is in Plautdietsch.
Status
There is disagreement whether Plautdietsch is a language or a dialect. Some classify it as a dialect of Low German (Plattdüütsch) based on mutual intelligibility. Others classify it as a language based on socio-linguistic reasons.Arguments for a dialect:
- It is primarily a spoken, not written language;
- It shares grammatical and lexical similarities with other varieties of Low German;
- It is intelligible to other Low German speakers after some acquaintance;
- Until at least 1750 it was in strict contact with the other Low German dialects along the North Sea and Baltic coasts, forming a consistent dialectal continuum of one proper language. (Saxon/Low German)
Arguments for classifying it as a language of its own:
- It has many developments and sound shifts not found in any other Low German dialect;
- It has many borrowings from other languages completely adapted into Plautdietsch phonetics, which would not be understood by a speaker of other dialects;
- It has many idiomatic expressions of its own and usages of particular words different from the ones in Northern (Low SaxonNorthern Low SaxonNorthern Low Saxon is a West Low German dialect.As such, it covers a great part of the West Low-German-speaking areas of northern Germany, with the exception of the border regions where Eastphalian and Westphalian are spoken...
, Mecklenburgic) and Southern (WestphalianWestphalian languageWestphalian is one of the major dialect groups of West Low German. Its most salient feature is the diphthongization . For example, speakers say iEten instead of Eːten for eat...
, EastphalianEastphalian languageEastphalian, or Eastfalian , is a West Low German dialect spoken east of the Weser river in southern parts of Lower Saxony and western parts of Saxony-Anhalt in Germany, including Hanover, Braunschweig, Hildesheim, Göttingen and Magdeburg, an area that roughly corresponds with the historic region...
, Märkisch) Low German. Many idiomatic expressions of Nothern/Southern Low German are not used nor understood by a Plautdietsch speaker.
Varieties
As one might expect from a spoken language which traditionally lacked a consistent writing system, several regional differences have developed. However, the major differences seem to have originated in the beginning of the 19th century in the two Mennonite settlements in New Russia (today Ukraine), known as ChortitzaChortitza
Chortitza Colony was a Russian Mennonite settlement northwest of Khortytsia Island and is now part of Zaporizhia, Ukraine. Chortitza was founded in 1789 by...
or Old Colony and Molotschna
Molotschna
Molotschna Colony was a Russian Mennonite settlement in what is now Zaporizhia Oblast in Ukraine. Today is called Molochansk with a population of under 10,000. The settlement is named after the Molochna River which forms its western boundary. Today the land mostly falls within the Tokmatskyi and...
(New Colony), as noted above. Some of the major differences between these two varieties are:
| Old Colony dialect | Molotschna dialect | Contemporary other Low German | meaning of word | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| verbs and other -en endings | räden, | räde | reden, räden | to speak, to talk |
| oa diphthong | Froag [freaɣ] | Froag [froaɣ] | Frag | question |
| u/y sound | Hus/Hüs [hys] | Hus [hus] | Hus | house |
| s/ts sound | Zol (Ssol) [sol] | Zol (Tsol) [tsol] | Tal | number |
A few other differences sometimes related to this issue are the exact pronunciation of the IPA c sound and words as jenau/jeneiw, but according to some studies, those might be due to the level of education and the influence of Russian and German.
Some Plautdietsch speakers might show a mixture of both dialects. Those, for instance, who trace their origin to the Bergthal Colony
Bergthal Colony
The Bergthal Colony was a Mennonite settlement in the southern part of the former Russian Empire, now Ukraine that emigrated to Manitoba, Canada....
in New Russia (Ukraine), a daughter colony of the Old Colony, show all the phonetic distinction of the Old Colony version, but they drop the final -n as the Molotschna speakers do.
Comparison with related languages
Plautdietsch has a Low German (Low Saxon) base, and as such, it does not show the effects of the High German consonant shiftHigh German consonant shift
In historical linguistics, the High German consonant shift or second Germanic consonant shift is a phonological development that took place in the southern parts of the West Germanic dialect continuum in several phases, probably beginning between the 3rd and 5th centuries AD, and was almost...
, which separated the High German dialects from the Low German dialects and all other Germanic languages. The basic distinctions between High German and Low German are:
Effects of the High German consonant shift
| German | Low German | Plautdietsch | Dutch | English | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| High German pf, f = Low German p | Pfeife | Piep | Piep | pijp | pipe |
| Apfel | Appel | Aupel | appel | apple | |
| High German z, s, ss, ß = Low German t | Zunge | Tung | Tung | tong | tongue |
| was | wat | waut | wat | what | |
| essen | eten, äten | äte(n) | eten | to eat | |
| Fuß | Foot | Foot | voet | foot | |
| High German ch = Low German k | machen | maken, moaken | moake(n) | maken | to make |
| High German t = Low German d | tun | doon | doone(n) | doen | to do |
| Teil | Deel | Deel | deel | part (compare "dole", "deal") | |
| High German b = Low German w (v sound), f | Leben | Lewen, Läwen | Läwe(n) | leven | life |
| Korb | Korf | Korf | korf | basket | |
| English th = other Germanic languages d | danken | danken | danke(n) | danken | to thank |
Like Dutch, Frisian and Low German, Plautdietsch only shows the mutation of th into d.
Vowel Shifts in various Germanic languages
| Original vowel sound | German | Low German | Plautdietsch | Dutch | English |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| iː | Wein [vaɪn] | Wien [viːn] | Wien [viːn] | wijn [ʋɛin] | wine [wain] |
| yː | Feuer [fɔʏɐ] | Füür [fyːɐ] | Fia [fiːɐ] | vuur [vyːr] | fire [faɪɚ] |
| uː | Haus [haʊ̯s] | Huus [huːs] | Hus [huːs] (Mol), [hyːs] (OCol) | huis [ɦœʏ̯s] | house [haʊs] |
As shown, while Dutch, English and German have experienced similar vowel shifts, Plautdietsch has only merged the old Germanic /yː/ sound with /iː/, while long /uː/ is retained in the Molotschna dialect. The Old Colony variety has fronted it to the now vacant /yː/.
Vowel lowering
| High German | Plautdietsch | Dutch | English | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| /ɪ/ to /ɛ/ | Fisch, dünn | Fesch, denn | vis, dun | fish, thin |
| /ɛ/ to /a/ | helfen, rennen | halpe(n), rane(n) | helpen, rennen | to help, to run |
| /ʊ/ to /ɔ/1 | Luft, Brust | Loft, Brost | lucht, borst | air (Latinate root; cf. Eng. "lift", "loft"), breast |
| /aː/ to /au/ | Mann, Hand | Maun, Haunt | man, hand | man, hand |
- This shift is still active, as some speakers { including a few from Hague} still retain the older pronunciation.
Vowel unrounding
| High German | Plautdietsch | Dutch | English | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| grün, schön | jreen, scheen | groen, mooi/schoon | green, beautiful {compare archaic sheen} | |
| to ei [ɛ] | Heu, rein | Hei, rein | hooi, schoon | hay, clean |
| /œ/ to e, a | Götter | Jetta | goden | gods |
Diphthongization before g, k, ch [IPA x] and r, with possible loss of r
| High German | Plautdietsch | Dutch | English |
|---|---|---|---|
| Herz | Hoat | hart | heart |
| machen | moake(n) | maken | to make |
| fragen | froage(n) | vragen | to ask (compare Old English fraegn) |
| hoch | huach | hoog | high |
| Horn, Hörner | Huarn, Hieena | hoorn, hoorns | horn, horns |
The deletion of r has been completed in most final positions, after front vowels and before alveolar consonants, but is still retained in the infinitive of verbs, after short vowels, and sometimes after back vowels as seen in the example Huarn, Hieena.
Various other vowel equivalences
| Proto-Germanic | High German | Plautdietsch | Dutch | English | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| /a/ = /o/ | *watraz, *fadar, *namōn | Wasser, Vater, Name | Wota, Voda, Nomen | water, vader, naam | water, father, name |
| /ai/ = ee [ɔɪ] | *saiwalō, *ainaz, *twai | Seele, eins, zwei | Seel, eent, twee | ziel, een, twee | soul, one, two |
| /æ/ /au/ = oo [ɔʊ]1 | *raudas, *hattuz | rot, Hut | root, Hoot | rood, hoed | red, hat |
- /æ/ shifted to /au/ before voiced consonants.
Palatalization
All words with a /g/ or /k/ preceding or following a front vowel (/e/ or /i/, not counting schwaSchwa
In linguistics, specifically phonetics and phonology, schwa can mean the following:*An unstressed and toneless neutral vowel sound in some languages, often but not necessarily a mid-central vowel...
) have been shifted to /j/ and /c/ (the latter has been written as kj or tj), even if there is another consonant between the vowel and the consonant. An intervocalic /g/ is palatalized as /ɟ/, written gj or dj. (A similar event occurred with English, but not as generalized). Where an /e/ or /i/ has been sunken to /a/, the palatalized sound is retained. Also where German has a /ç/ sound, Plautdietsch retains it even after lowering a front vowel.
| German | Plautdietsch | Dutch | English |
|---|---|---|---|
| gestern | jistren | gisteren | yesterday |
| geben | jäwen | geven | to give |
| Kirche | Kjoakj | kerk | church |
| Brücke | Brigj | brug | bridge |
| Milch | Malkj | melk | milk |
| recht | rajcht | recht | right |
German
Most Anabaptists that settled in the Vistula Delta were of Dutch or northern German origins, and were joined by refugees from different parts of Germany and Switzerland, who influenced their developing language. After almost two centuries in West Prussia, German replaced Dutch as church, school and written language and has become a source from where words are borrowed extensively, especially for religious terms. Many of these words show the effects of the High German consonant shift (something you would not expect in a Low German dialect), even though they are otherwise adapted into Plautdietsch phonetics. Compare:| Plautdietsch | High German | Low German | Dutch | English |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| hinja | hinter | achter | achter | behind (after) |
| Zol | Zahl | Tall | tal | number (compare "(to) tell" as in "I can't tell how many there are".) |
| jreessen | grüßen | gröten | groeten | to greet |
| kjamfen | kämpfen | vechten; kempen | vechten | to fight |
This is the case particularly on nouns made out of verbs. The verb normally shows the unshifted consonant, whereas the noun has a shifted Germanized consonant: schluten, Schluss; bräakjen, Bruch (to close, closure; to break, a break)
Dutch
The first half of the 16th century was the onset of the rule of terror by the Duke of AlbaFernando Álvarez de Toledo, 3rd Duke of Alba
Don Fernando Álvarez de Toledo y Pimentel, 3rd Duke of Alba was a Spanish general and governor of the Spanish Netherlands , nicknamed "the Iron Duke" in the Low Countries because of his harsh and cruel rule there and his role in the execution of his political opponents and the massacre of several...
in the Spanish Low Countries
Low Countries
The Low Countries are the historical lands around the low-lying delta of the Rhine, Scheldt, and Meuse rivers, including the modern countries of Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg and parts of northern France and western Germany....
during the Dutch revolution ( Eighty years war), that was centered on religious freedom for the Protestants. As a result, many Mennonites and Reformed left the country. This continued in the 17th century, when the Dutch Reformed Church
Dutch Reformed Church
The Dutch Reformed Church was a Reformed Christian denomination in the Netherlands. It existed from the 1570s to 2004, the year it merged with the Reformed Churches in the Netherlands and the Evangelical Lutheran Church in the Kingdom of the Netherlands to form the Protestant Church in the...
became the official religion, being less than indulgent to other types of Protestantism, let alone the types perceived as radical (non-violent, no bearing of arms, no recognition of worldy authorities). In the Low German language area, they left their language traces in particular at the lower Vistula
Vistula
The Vistula is the longest and the most important river in Poland, at 1,047 km in length. The watershed area of the Vistula is , of which lies within Poland ....
, around Danzig and Elbing
Elblag
Elbląg is a city in northern Poland with 127,892 inhabitants . It is the capital of Elbląg County and has been assigned to the Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship since 1999. Before then it was the capital of Elbląg Voivodeship and a county seat in Gdańsk Voivodeship...
, and up the river towards Toruń
Torun
Toruń is an ancient city in northern Poland, on the Vistula River. Its population is more than 205,934 as of June 2009. Toruń is one of the oldest cities in Poland. The medieval old town of Toruń is the birthplace of the astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus....
.
The Mennonites for a long time maintained their old language. In Danzig, Dutch as the language of the church disappeared about 1800. As a spoken language, the Mennonites took up the Vistula
Vistula
The Vistula is the longest and the most important river in Poland, at 1,047 km in length. The watershed area of the Vistula is , of which lies within Poland ....
Low German
Low German
Low German or Low Saxon is an Ingvaeonic West Germanic language spoken mainly in northern Germany and the eastern part of the Netherlands...
, the vocabulary of which they themselves had already influenced. As a written language, they took up High German. It was this Vistula Low German or Weichselplatt that the Mennonites took with them and kept while migrating to Russia, Canada and elsewhere.
Russian or Ukrainian
Wherever Mennonites settled, they found new foods and other items they were not familiar with, and when that happened, they took the name that local people used for those items. Following words are claimed to be from Russian or Ukrainian origin:Bockelzhonn; German: Tomate, English: tomato
Arbus/Erbus/Rebus; German: Wassermelone, English: watermelon
Schisnikj; German: Knoblauch, English: garlic
English
As Mennonites came into contact with new technology, they often adapted the names for the technologies they encountered. For those who had settled in North America in the 1870s, all new words were borrowed from English, and even though many left for South America only 50 years after their arrival, they kept and sometimes adapted these words into the Mennonite Low German Phonetics:| English word | Adapted PD word | IPA | alternate word |
|---|---|---|---|
| bicycle | Beissikjel | bɛsɪcl | Foaraut |
| highway | Heiwä | hɛve | Huachwajch |
| truck | Trock | trɔk | - |
Particularly words for auto parts are taken from English: hood, fender, brakes (along with the more Low German form Brams), spark plugs (pluralized Ploggen), but also words like peanuts, belt, tax.
A special case is the word jleichen. It is an adaption of the English verb "to like", but taken from the German adverb gleich (equivalent of the English adverb like: this is like joking)
Spanish
Plautdietsch speakers living in Spanish speaking countries use many words of Spanish in their daily speech, especially in business and communication (telephone, for instance) vocabulary. Two examples of words which are completely adapted into Mennonite Low German are Burra (Mexican Spanish burro, donkey) and Wratsch (Mexican Spanish huarache, sandal). Both have a Low German plural: Burrasch, Wratschen. The pure Low German words Äsel and Schlorr are seldom used in Mexico.Spelling
The spelling of Plautdietsch has also been controversial. The main criteria for spelling systems have been:- Spelling should be as phonetic as possible.
- German spelling rules should be applied whenever possible.
One problem has been what letters to use for sounds that do not exist in German, such as the palatal /c/ and /ʝ/ sounds, which are both pronounced and spelled differently in various dialects of Plautdietsch. Old Colony speakers pronounce these sounds by striking the middle of the tongue against the palate. Others, especially speakers of the Molotschna dialect, instead strike the tongue against the alveolar ridge
Alveolar ridge
An alveolar ridge is one of the two jaw ridges either on the roof of the mouth between the upper teeth and the hard palate or on the bottom of the mouth behind the lower teeth. The alveolar ridges contain the sockets of the teeth....
and spell them
Other problematic areas: use or non-use of v for some words with f sound, use or non-use of Dehnungs-h, when to double consonants and when not to.
When comparing different writers, one must take into account the dialect of that writer. The most famous Plautdietsch writer, Arnold Dyck, wrote in the Molotschna dialect, though his origins were from the Old Colony. During his life he made many changes in his spelling system. His developments are the basis for the various spellings used today. In the following table, only his final system is taken into account, as used in his famous Koop enn Bua series, along with Herman Rempel (Kjennn Jie noch Plautdietsch?), Reuben Epp
Reuben Epp
Reuben Epp is an author of works in Plautdietsch . His parents were Russian Mennonites who emigrated from Russia to Canada, where Epp was born. Epp was educated as a mechanic and became an instructor at a vocational school for mechanics. Later he became the director of a vocational school in...
(Plautdietsche Schreftsteckja), J. Thiessen (Mennonite Low German Dictionary), J. J. Neufeld (Daut niehe Tastament) and Ed Zacharias (De Bibel). The latter two claim to write in the Old Colony dialect, as seen in their verb endings, while the other three use the Plautdietsch as spoken by the descenders of the Bergthal Colony, i. e. the Old Colony dialect with a loss of -n endings.
| A. Dyck | H. Rempel | R. Epp | J. Thiessen | J. J. Neufeld | Ed Zacharias | word meaning | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| verb endings | saje | saje | saje | saje | sajen | sajen | to say |
| c sound | Tjoatj | Kjoakj | Kjoakj | Tjoatj | Kjoakj | Kjoakj | church |
| Dehnungs-h | ahm | am | ahm | ahm | am | am | him |
| oa diphthong | Froag | Froag | Froag | Froag | Fruog | Froag | question |
| ia/iə diphthong | Lea, learen, jeleat | Lea, learen, jeleat | Lea, learen, jeleat | Lea, learen, jeleat | Lea, learen, jeleat | Lia, lieren, jelieet | teaching, learn, learned |
| u/ü | du | dü | du | du | du | du | you |
| consonant doubling | rollen, jerollt, Golt | rollen, jerollt, Golt | rollen, jerollt, Golt | rollen, jerollt, Golt | rollen, jerollt, Gollt | rollen, jerolt, Golt | to roll, rolled, gold |
| ua/ya diphthong | Wuat, Buak | Wuat, Büak | Wuat, Büak | Wuat, Büak | Wuut, Buuk | Wuat, Buak | word, book |
| [s/ts] sound | Zocka | Ssocka | Zocka | Zocka | Tsocka | Zocka | sugar |
| [f] sound | von | fonn | von | von | fonn | von | from |
Phonetics
Mennonite Low German has many sounds, including a few not found in any other related language.Consonants
| Bilabial Bilabial consonant In phonetics, a bilabial consonant is a consonant articulated with both lips. The bilabial consonants identified by the International Phonetic Alphabet are:... |
Labio- dental Labiodental consonant In phonetics, labiodentals are consonants articulated with the lower lip and the upper teeth.-Labiodental consonant in IPA:The labiodental consonants identified by the International Phonetic Alphabet are:... |
Alveolar Alveolar consonant Alveolar consonants are articulated with the tongue against or close to the superior alveolar ridge, which is called that because it contains the alveoli of the superior teeth... |
Post- alveolar Postalveolar consonant Postalveolar consonants are consonants articulated with the tongue near or touching the back of the alveolar ridge, further back in the mouth than the alveolar consonants, which are at the ridge itself, but not as far back as the hard palate... |
Palatal Palatal consonant Palatal consonants are consonants articulated with the body of the tongue raised against the hard palate... |
Velar Velar consonant Velars are consonants articulated with the back part of the tongue against the soft palate, the back part of the roof of the mouth, known also as the velum).... |
Glottal Glottal consonant Glottal consonants, also called laryngeal consonants, are consonants articulated with the glottis. Many phoneticians consider them, or at least the so-called fricative, to be transitional states of the glottis without a point of articulation as other consonants have; in fact, some do not consider... |
|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal Nasal consonant A nasal consonant is a type of consonant produced with a lowered velum in the mouth, allowing air to escape freely through the nose. Examples of nasal consonants in English are and , in words such as nose and mouth.- Definition :... |
m | n | ɲ 3 | ŋ 4 | |||
| Plosive | p b | t d | c ɟ1 | k ɡ | ʔ 2 | ||
| Fricative Fricative consonant Fricatives are consonants produced by forcing air through a narrow channel made by placing two articulators close together. These may be the lower lip against the upper teeth, in the case of ; the back of the tongue against the soft palate, in the case of German , the final consonant of Bach; or... |
f v 5 | s z 6 | ʃ ʒ 7 | ç j 8 | x ɣ 9 | h | |
| Flap Flap consonant In phonetics, a flap or tap is a type of consonantal sound, which is produced with a single contraction of the muscles so that one articulator is thrown against another.-Contrast with stops and trills:... |
ɾ 10 | ||||||
| Approximant Approximant consonant Approximants are speech sounds that involve the articulators approaching each other but not narrowly enough or with enough articulatory precision to create turbulent airflow. Therefore, approximants fall between fricatives, which do produce a turbulent airstream, and vowels, which produce no... |
ɹ 10 | ||||||
| Lateral Lateral consonant A lateral is an el-like consonant, in which airstream proceeds along the sides of the tongue, but is blocked by the tongue from going through the middle of the mouth.... |
l ɫ 11 |
Where symbols for consonants occur in pairs, the left represents the voiceless consonant and the right represents the voiced consonant. Observations: According to the spelling system of De Bibel these sounds are spelled as follows:
-
and as in Kjoakj ('church') and Brigj ('bridge') - no letter, but has to be used if a word that begins with a vowel or a prefix is added to a word which by itself starts with a vowel: ve'achten (to despise)
-
as in Kjinja ('children') -
as in Hunga ('hunger') - /f/ could be written
or : Fada ('male cousin'), Voda ('father'). The only criteria is the spelling of these words in German. /v/ is spelled as in German: Wota ('water') - at the beginning of a word and between vowels /z/ is written <s>: sajen ('to say'), läsen ('to read'). The /s/ sound is written
at the beginning of a word (where some speakers pronounce it [ts]), between vowels and final after a short vowel: Zocka ('sugar'), waussen ('to grow'), Oss ('ox'). At the end of a word after a long vowel or consonant both are written <s>, the reader has to know the word to pronounce the correct sound: Hos /hoz/ ('rabbit'), Os /os/ ('carrion'). The combination of a short /ɔ/ and a voiced <s> adds still more confusion to this, as in the word Kos /kɔz/ ('goat'). -
and as in School ('school') and ruzhen ('rush'). and represent /ʃp/ and /ʃt/ at the beginning of a word and if a prefix is attached to a word starting with or : spälen ('to play') bestalen ('to order'). -
as in Joa ('year'). The /ç/ sound is written after consonants, , and <äa>: Erfolch ('success'), Jesecht ('face'), Jewicht ('weight'), läach ('low'). After , it is written to differentiate it from /x/: rajcht ('right') - /x/ is written
, only occurs after back vowels: Dach ('day'), Loch ('hole'). [ɣ] (an allophone of /ɡ/) is represented by between vowels and final: froagen ('to ask'), vondoag ('today'). At the beginning of a word and before consonants, g has the [ɡ] sound. -
is a flap (like the Spanish r), or depending on the person, even a trill (like Spanish rr), before vowels: root ('red'), groot ('big'), Liera ('teacher'); /r/ pronounced as an approximant (English r) before a consonant, at the end and in the -ren endings of Old Colony speakers: kort ('short'), ar ('her'), hieren ('to hear'). The uvular German r Guttural RIn linguistics, guttural R refers to pronunciation of a rhotic consonant as a guttural consonant. These consonants are usually uvular, but can also be realized as a velar, pharyngeal, or glottal rhotic...
[ʀ] is not heard in Plautdietsch. - [ɫ] is an allophone of [l] that occurs after vowels in words like Baul and well.
Vowels
The vowelVowel
In phonetics, a vowel is a sound in spoken language, such as English ah! or oh! , pronounced with an open vocal tract so that there is no build-up of air pressure at any point above the glottis. This contrasts with consonants, such as English sh! , where there is a constriction or closure at some...
inventory of Plautdietsch is large, with 13 simple vowels, 10 diphthongs and 1 thriphthong.
| Front Front vowel A front vowel is a type of vowel sound used in some spoken languages. The defining characteristic of a front vowel is that the tongue is positioned as far in front as possible in the mouth without creating a constriction that would be classified as a consonant. Front vowels are sometimes also... |
Central Central vowel A central vowel is a type of vowel sound used in some spoken languages. The defining characteristic of a central vowel is that the tongue is positioned halfway between a front vowel and a back vowel... |
Back Back vowel A back vowel is a type of vowel sound used in spoken languages. The defining characteristic of a back vowel is that the tongue is positioned as far back as possible in the mouth without creating a constriction that would be classified as a consonant. Back vowels are sometimes also called dark... |
|
|---|---|---|---|
| Close Close vowel A close vowel is a type of vowel sound used in many spoken languages. The defining characteristic of a close vowel is that the tongue is positioned as close as possible to the roof of the mouth without creating a constriction that would be classified as a consonant.This term is prescribed by the... |
i y1 | u | |
| Near-close Near-close vowel A near-close vowel is a type of vowel sound used in some spoken languages. The defining characteristic of a near-close vowel is that the tongue is positioned similarly to a close vowel, but slightly less constricted. Near-close vowels are sometimes described as lax variants of the fully close vowels... |
ɪ | ʊ | |
| Close-mid Close-mid vowel A close-mid vowel is a type of vowel sound used in some spoken languages. The defining characteristic of a close-mid vowel is that the tongue is positioned two-thirds of the way from a close vowel to a mid vowel... |
eː | ə | oː |
| Open-mid Open-mid vowel An open-mid vowel is a type of vowel sound used in some spoken languages. The defining characteristic of an open-mid vowel is that the tongue is positioned two-thirds of the way from an open vowel to a mid vowel... |
ɛ | ɔ | |
| Open Open vowel An open vowel is defined as a vowel sound in which the tongue is positioned as far as possible from the roof of the mouth. Open vowels are sometimes also called low vowels in reference to the low position of the tongue... |
æ2 | aː | ɑ |
- /y/ is rounded and is heard only in the Old Colony and Bergthal groups.
- /æ/ is an allophone of /a/ preceding an /l/ or a palatal consonant.
| Symbol | Example | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| IPA International Phonetic Alphabet The International Phonetic Alphabet "The acronym 'IPA' strictly refers [...] to the 'International Phonetic Association'. But it is now such a common practice to use the acronym also to refer to the alphabet itself that resistance seems pedantic... |
IPA International Phonetic Alphabet The International Phonetic Alphabet "The acronym 'IPA' strictly refers [...] to the 'International Phonetic Association'. But it is now such a common practice to use the acronym also to refer to the alphabet itself that resistance seems pedantic... |
orthography Orthography The orthography of a language specifies a standardized way of using a specific writing system to write the language. Where more than one writing system is used for a language, for example Kurdish, Uyghur, Serbian or Inuktitut, there can be more than one orthography... |
English translation |
| ɪ | bɪt | bitt | '(he) bites' |
| i | bit | Biet | 'piece' |
| y | byt | but | '(he) builds' |
| ɛ | ʃɛp | Schepp | 'ship' |
| eː | beːt | bät | 'bit' |
| æ | pæl | Pell | 'pill' |
| ə | də | de | 'the' |
| ɑ | bɑl | Baul | 'ball' |
| aː | baːd | Bad | 'bed' |
| ɔ | bɔl | Boll | 'bull' |
| oː | roːt | Rot | 'advice' |
| u | rua | Rua | 'tube, pipe' |
| ʊ | bʊk | Buck | 'stomach' |
| ɔɪ | bɔɪt | Beet | 'beet' |
| ɔʊ | bɔʊt | Boot | 'boat' |
| ia | via | wia | '(he) was' |
| iə | viət | wieet | 'worth' |
| ea | vea | wäa | 'who' |
| oa | boa | Boa | 'bear' |
| ua | vua | wua | 'where' |
| uə | vuət | Wuat | 'word' |
| ya | bya | Bua | 'farmer' |
| yə | byək | Buak | 'book' |
| ɔɪa | bɔɪa | Bea | 'beer' |
The /u/ sound has been shifted to /y/ in the Old Colony dialect, leaving the sound only as part of the ua diphthong. However, in certain areas and age groups, there is a heavy tendency to shift /o/ sound up to [u].
Pronunciation of certain vowels and diphthongs vary from some speakers to others; the diphthong represented by ee for instances is pronounced [oi] or even [ei] by some. Likewise the long vowels represented by au and ei might have a diphthong glide into [ʊ] and [ɪ], respectively.
- English sound equivalents are approximate. Long vowels ä and o do not have a diphthong glide.
Grammar
Low German grammar resembles High German, as the syntax and morphology is nearly the same as High German's. Over the years, Low German has lost many inflections, resulting in a greatly simplified Mennonite Low German. It is still moderately inflectional, having two numbers, three genders, two cases, two tenses, three persons, two moods, two voices, and two degrees of comparison.Articles
Even though Low German has three genders, in the Nominative caseNominative case
The nominative case is one of the grammatical cases of a noun or other part of speech, which generally marks the subject of a verb or the predicate noun or predicate adjective, as opposed to its object or other verb arguments...
it has only two definite article
Definite Article
Definite Article is the title of British comedian Eddie Izzard's 1996 performance released on VHS. It was recorded on different nights at the Shaftesbury Theatre...
s (like Dutch and Low Saxon); masculine and feminine articles
Grammatical gender
Grammatical gender is defined linguistically as a system of classes of nouns which trigger specific types of inflections in associated words, such as adjectives, verbs and others. For a system of noun classes to be a gender system, every noun must belong to one of the classes and there should be...
are homophonous. However, masculine and feminine indefinite articles are still different (like German) and thus, the three genders can still be perfectly established. In the Objective case, the masculine has a special definite article, making it once more different from the feminine, which, like the neuter, does not change. In the plural number, all gender identification is lost (as in German, Dutch and Low Saxon); all plural determiners and adjective endings are homophonous with the feminine singular.
| Definite | Indefinite | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Number | Singular | Plural | Singular | ||||
| Gender | masc | fem | neuter | all | masc | fem | neuter |
| Nominative | de | de | daut | de | een | eene | een |
| Objective | dän | eenen* | |||||
- In colloquial speech the indefinite article is reduced practically to a "n", or "ne" if feminine. If used so, there is no case distinction. However, when used as a numeral, meaning "one", the diphthong "ee" is heavily stressed and the objective of the masculine gender is used. There is no indefinite plural article; een has no plural.
Some Plautdietsch writers try to use a three case system with the definite articles, without much consistency. The system looks somewhat like this, some might use the dative neuter articles, others might not:
| Number | Singular | Plural | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Gender | masc | fem | neut | all |
| Nominative | de | de | daut | de |
| Accusative | dän | |||
| Dative | däm | däm | ||
Determiners
| Masc. Nom. | Mas. Obj. | Feminine | Neuter | Plural all | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| this | dis | disen | dise | dit | dise |
| that, short distance | dee | dän | dee | daut | dee |
| that, long distance | jan | janen | jane | jan | jane |
| which | woon | woonen | woone | woon | woone |
| such a | soon | soonen | soone | soon | soone |
| my | mien | mienen | miene | mien | miene |
All possessives (see under pronouns) are declined like in this way. With the form äa (her/their) an r has to be reinserted before adding endings (äaren, äare).
Nouns
Like High German, Mennonite Low German nouns inflect into two numbers: singularGrammatical number
In linguistics, grammatical number is a grammatical category of nouns, pronouns, and adjective and verb agreement that expresses count distinctions ....
and plural
Plural
In linguistics, plurality or [a] plural is a concept of quantity representing a value of more-than-one. Typically applied to nouns, a plural word or marker is used to distinguish a value other than the default quantity of a noun, which is typically one...
, three genders: masculine, feminine, and neuter, but only two cases, nominative, and objective
Objective (grammar)
An objective pronoun in grammar functions as the target of a verb, as distinguished from a subjective pronoun, which is the initiator of a verb. Objective pronouns are instances of the oblique case....
. The historical dative
Dative case
The dative case is a grammatical case generally used to indicate the noun to whom something is given, as in "George gave Jamie a drink"....
and accusative
Accusative case
The accusative case of a noun is the grammatical case used to mark the direct object of a transitive verb. The same case is used in many languages for the objects of prepositions...
have merged, even though some writers try to maintain a three cases distinction, which has been lost for most speakers, perhaps centuries ago. The objective case is distinct from the nominative only in 1) personal pronouns: ekj froag am, hee auntwuat mie (I ask him, he answers me) 2) articles and demonstrative and possessive adjectives in the singular masculine gender: de Voda halpt dän Sän (the father helps the son) (observe: nouns are not inflected themselves) and 3) proper names, i. e. traditional Mennonite names: Peeta frajcht Marie-en, Marie auntwuat Peetren (Peter asks Mary, Mary answers Peter)
{| class="wikitable"
|-
! || colspan="3" | Singular
! colspan="3" | Plural
|-
||||Masculine || Feminine || Neuter ||Masculine || Feminine || Neuter
|-
|Nominative|| de Mensch ||de Sonn ||daut Hüs||de Menschen ||de Sonnen ||de Hiesa
|-
| | Objective||dän Mensch ||de Sonn ||daut Hüs||de Menschen ||de Sonnen ||de Hiesa
|}
Plurals
The forming of plurals is complicated. Three major procedures can be established: 1) through an ending, -a, -en, -s, -sch or none at all; 2) voicing the final devoiced consonant and 3) fronting (and maybe lowering) a back vowel, which might require palatalization of a velar consonant. A given word could have one or two, all or none of these characteristics.Examples
No ending, no voicing, no vowel fronting: de Fesch de Fesch, daut Schop, de Schop, daut Been, de Been (fish, fishes; sheep, sheep; leg, legs)
Voicing, no ending, no vowel fronting: Frint, Frind; Boajch, Boaj (friend/s, mountain/s)
No ending, no voicing, vowel fronting: Foot, Feet (foot, feet)
Voicing and vowel fronting, no ending: Hoot, Heed (hat/s)
-a ending:
only: Licht, Lichta (light/s)
with voicing: (picture/s)
with vowel fronting: Maun, Mana (man, men)
with voicing, vowel fronting and palatalization: Kaulf, Kjalwa (calf, calves)
-en ending (the -en, -s and -sch endings have no vowel fronting)
only: Näs Näsen, (nose/s)
with voicing: de Tiet, de Tieden, de Erfoarunk, de Erfoarungen (time/s, experience/s)
Words where a historical r is dropped require it to be reinserted: Däa, Däaren (door/s)
Polysyllabic words with a vocalized r drop the final a: Sesta, Sestren (sister/s)
An unstressed schwa
Schwa
In linguistics, specifically phonetics and phonology, schwa can mean the following:*An unstressed and toneless neutral vowel sound in some languages, often but not necessarily a mid-central vowel...
also is dropped: Gaufel, Gauflen (fork/s)
-s ending
This class consists mainly of 1) short masculine and neuter nouns: Baul -s, Oarm -s (ball/s, arm/s)
2) words related with family members: Sän -s, Fru -es, (son/s, woman, women)
and 3) masculine and neuter nouns ending in -el and -en (the latter may drop the n): Läpel, Läpels; Goaden, Goades (spoon/s; garden/s)
-sch ending
This class consists of masculine and neuter polysyllabic nouns ending with -a: de Voda, de Vodasch; daut Massa, de Massasch (father/s, knife, knives)
For someone knowing (High) German, pluralizing is a fairly predictable process, with some exceptions: the -en ending covers pretty much the same words in both languages; the -a ending is the equivalent for the German -er plural, where German has Umlaut
Germanic umlaut
In linguistics, umlaut is a process whereby a vowel is pronounced more like a following vowel or semivowel. The term umlaut was originally coined and is used principally in connection with the study of the Germanic languages...
, Plautdietsch will have vowel fronting in most cases. The -s and -sch groups are made almost entirely of polysyllabic nouns which in German have no plural ending.
The most problematic words are those with an -e plural ending in German. Although the entire class with no ending is made out of them, many other words are threated differently. For example, the plurals for Stool and Stock (chair and stick) are Steela and Stakja (compare German Stuhl, Stühle; Stock, Stöcke). Since they have their vowels fronted there seems to be no reason for the -a ending. Many others have been moved into the -en class: Jeboot, Jebooten (commandment/s, German: Gebot, Gebote). With some not so common words, there is no certainty about the correct plural, different speakers create them in different ways: the plural of Jesaz (law) could be Jesaza or Jesazen (German: Gesetz, Gesetze).
Possession
The classical genitive is no longer used except in a few relic expressions. Instead, possession is expressed as in many German dialects with the his genitiveHis genitive
The his genitive is a means of forming a genitive construction by linking two nouns with a possessive pronoun such as "his"...
, i. e. naming the possessor in the objective case with the possessive adjective and the possessed object: Dän Maun sien Hus (the man's house). With proper nouns, and when the possessor is determined by a possessive adjective, the possessor is in the nominative case
Nominative case
The nominative case is one of the grammatical cases of a noun or other part of speech, which generally marks the subject of a verb or the predicate noun or predicate adjective, as opposed to its object or other verb arguments...
instead: Peeta sien Hus (Peter's house); mien Voda sien Hus (my father's house). Very long possessive clauses can be created: Mien Voda seine Mutta äare Mutta es miene Uagrootmutta (my father's mother's mother is my great grandmother).
For inanimate or generalized constructions, the preposition von or a composition are used instead: De Lichta von de Staut/ de Stautslichta (the lights of the city).
Diminutive
The diminutive is formed adding by -kje to the noun: de Jung, daut Jungkje; de Mejal, daut Mejalkje (the boy, the little boy; the girl, the little girl). All diminutive nouns take the neuter gender, with two exceptions: de Oomkje, de Mumkje, two forms used very commonly for mister/man/husband and mistress/woman/wife. These seem to have been created originally as diminutive forms of, respectively, Oom and Mumm (uncle and aunt). Today they are no longer seen as diminutives, and therefore retain their respective masculine and feminine genders.With nouns ending in t or k, only -je is added; a few nouns ending in kj, an additional s is inserted: de Staut, daut Stautje, daut Buak, daut Buakje; daut Stekj, daut Stekjsje (the (little) city, the (little) book, the (little) piece).
Plural diminished nouns take -s ending: Jungkjes, Mejalkjes; however, if the original plural requires fronting of a back vowel or has an -a ending, these features are retained before adding the diminutive suffix: de Stool, de Steela --> daut Stoolkje, de Steelakjes (chair/s, little chair/s)
Personal pronouns
| Singular | Plural | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Person | 1st | 2d | 3d masc | 3d fem | 3d nt | 1st | 2d | 3d |
| Nominative | ekj | du | hee | see | daut (et) | wie | jie | dee, see |
| Objective | mie | die | am | ar (äa) | ons | junt (ju) | an (äant) | |
| Reflexive | sikj | sikj | ||||||
| Possessive Adjectives | mien | dien | sien | äa | sien | ons | jun | äa |
Some pronouns have two forms, different persons may use one or other form, or even alternate between them. Daut is used at the beginning of a sentence, but may be replaced for et in other positions.
Possessive adjectives of the masculine (nominative case) or neuter gender. Otherwise they are declined like the indefinite article and determiners (see under article section).
Demonstrative pronouns
| masc | fem | nt | plural | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nominative | dee | dee | daut | dee |
| Objective | dän | dee/däa | daut | dee/dän |
Demonstrative pronouns are frequently used instead of the personal pronouns. When used so, some people use special objective forms for feminine and plural. When used strictly demonstrative, only the singular masculine has a special objective form.
Verbs
Mennonite Low German verbs have six tenses. The present and first past tenses are inflected, while the second and third past and both future tenses are different words marked by auxiliary verbs. Verbs can have two moods: Declarative and Imperative, two voices: active and passive, and three persons:1st pers. sing., 2nd pers. sing., 3rd pers. sing., and plural.Weak verbs
The basic conjugation pattern is as follows:| - | 1st sing | 2nd sing | 3rd sing | plural |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| present | stem | stem + st | stem + t | infinitive* |
| past | stem + d | stem + sd | stem + d | stem + den |
| imperative | - | stem | - | stem + t |
To determine the stem, take the infinitive and drop the -en ending.
There are a few modifications to this basic pattern: 1) If the stem ends with a plosive or fricative voiced consonant (d, g, j, soft s, w, zh), that consonant is devoiced in the 2nd and 3d persons of the present, since voiceless t and st automatically force the preceding consonant (compare the sound of the letter d in English lived and liked). 2) If the stem ends with a voiceless consonant (ch, f, jch, k, kj, p, hard s, sch, t) that consonant devoices the d, sd, d, den endings of the past tense (into t, st, t, ten) for the same reason. 3) If the stem ends with two consonants, the second one being a nasal
Nasal consonant
A nasal consonant is a type of consonant produced with a lowered velum in the mouth, allowing air to escape freely through the nose. Examples of nasal consonants in English are and , in words such as nose and mouth.- Definition :...
or lateral
Lateral consonant
A lateral is an el-like consonant, in which airstream proceeds along the sides of the tongue, but is blocked by the tongue from going through the middle of the mouth....
, a schwa
Schwa
In linguistics, specifically phonetics and phonology, schwa can mean the following:*An unstressed and toneless neutral vowel sound in some languages, often but not necessarily a mid-central vowel...
e is inserted to ease pronunciation. 4) Verbs with a diphthong
Diphthong
A diphthong , also known as a gliding vowel, refers to two adjacent vowel sounds occurring within the same syllable. Technically, a diphthong is a vowel with two different targets: That is, the tongue moves during the pronunciation of the vowel...
and r have a special treatment; the r is dropped before endings are attached, and the st/sd of the second person is replaced by scht/zhd.
Examples of a regular verbs: spälen (to play), lachen (to laugh), läwen (to live), odmen (to breathe) and roaren (to cry). The first one follows strictly the basic pattern, the others show the various adjustments needed as described above.
If the inverted word order is used, the -en ending of the plural wie, jie (but not see) form is dropped, and a root-only form, identical to the 1st person singular, is used.
| ekj | du | hee, see, daut | wie, jie, see | ____ wie, jie | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| spälen, to play | |||||
| present | späl | spälst | spält | spälen | späl |
| past | späld | spälsd | späld | spälden | späld |
| imperative | - | späl (du) | - | spält (jie) | |
| lachen, to laugh | |||||
| present | lach | lachst | lacht | lachen | lach |
| past | lacht | lachst | lacht | lachten | lacht |
| imperative | - | lach (du) | - | lacht (jie) | |
| läwen, to live | |||||
| present | läw | läfst | läft | läwen | läw |
| past | läwd | läwsd | läwd | läwden | läwd |
| imperative | - | läw (du) | - | läft (jie) | |
| odmen, to breathe | |||||
| present | odem | odemst | odemt | odmen | odem |
| past | odemd | odemsd | odemd | odemden | odemd |
| imperative | - | odem (du) | - | odemt (jie) | |
| roaren, to cry | |||||
| present | roa | roascht | roat | roaren | roa |
| past | road | roazhd | road | roaden | road |
| imperative | - | roa (du) | - | roat (jie) | |
Strong verbs
As in English and Dutch, some verbs have a vowel change in past tense and past participle. As in German, some verbs might have a vowel change in second and third person of the singular in present tense as well. A few verbs that are strong in German are weak in Plautdietsch, but many German weak verbs are strong in Plautdietsch, however, when compared with Dutch and English, those are strong, too.| ekj | du | hee, see, daut | wie, jie, see | ____ wie, jie | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| finjen, to find | |||||
| present | finj | finjst | finjt | finjen | finj |
| past | funk | fungst | funk | fungen | fung |
| Imperative | finj (du) | finjt (jie) | |||
| sieekjen, to seek | |||||
| present | sieekj | sieekjst | sieekjt | sieekjen | sieekj |
| past | socht | sochst | socht | sochten | socht |
| Imperative | sieekj (du) | sieekjt (jie) | |||
| sajen, to say | |||||
| present | saj | sajchst | sajcht | sajen | saj |
| past | säd | sätst | säd | säden | säd |
| Imperative | saj (du) | sajcht (jie) | |||
| jäwen, to give | |||||
| present | jäw | jefst | jeft | jäwen | jäw |
| past | jeef | jeefst | jeef | jeewen | jeew |
| Imperative | jeff (du) | jäft (jie) | |||
| schriewen, to write | |||||
| present | schriew | schrifst | schrift | schriewen | schriew |
| past | schreef | schreefst | schreef | schreewen | schreew |
| Imperative | schriew (du) | schrieft (jie) | |||
| moaken, to make | |||||
| present | moak | moakst | moakt | moaken | |
| past | müak | müakst | müak | müaken | |
| Imperative | moak{dü} | moakt{jie} | |||
GENERALITIES: Vowel changes in present tense are somewhat predictable: long ie and u change into short i; long ä/o change into e or a; diphthongs äa and oa are simplified to a.
The first and third person of the past tense are identical (as in weak verbs).
With only a few exceptions (like the verb sajen), all voiced consonants are devoiced in the three persons of the singular past, the nasal ng and nj are retained in second person, but devoiced in first and third person.
The past tense has the same vowel through all persons.
If there is a vowel change from ä to e or a in the present tense, that feature is retained in the singular imperative.
The plural form for wie/jie in the inverted word order keep the final consonant voiced.
Auxiliary, modal and anomalous verbs
A small groups of verbs are more irregular: the auxiliaries sennen and haben, the modal verbs, and a few verbs that originally where monosyllabic and with time a -nen ending has evolved:| ekj | du | hee, see, daut | wie, jie, see | ____ wie, jie | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| sennen, to be | |||||
| present | sie (senn) | best | es | sent | sent |
| past | wia | wieescht | wia | wieren | wia |
| Imperative | sie (du) | siet (jie) | |||
| haben, to have | |||||
| present | hab | hast | haft | haben | hab |
| past | haud | hautst | haud | hauden | haud |
| Imperative | hab (du) | habt (jie) | |||
| kjennen, can, to be able | |||||
| present | kaun | kau(n)st | kaun | kjennen | kjenn |
| past | kunn | ku(n)st | kunn | kunnen | kunn |
| Imperative | - | - | |||
| stonen, to stand | |||||
| present | sto | steist | steit | stonen | sto |
| past | stunt | stuntst | stunt | stunden | stund |
| Imperative | sto (du) | stot (jie) | |||
Participles
The present participle, formed of the infinitive plus a -t ending, is not often used. It appears in idiomatic expressions like aunhoolent bliewen (to persist), and in a few adjective forms, which have to be inflected for number, gender and case, the -t is voiced into -d: koaken, koakendet Wota (to boil, boiling water).The past participle of weak verbs is formed with je- plus the stem of the verb plus -t. A voiced consonant is devoiced to go along with t, the inserted e between double consonant is retained, the r after a long vowel is dropped. For the weak verbs given above the past participles are: jespält, jelacht, jejäft, jeodemt, jeroat.
The past participle for strong and anomalous verbs is hard to predict, they could be formed in five or six different ways:
- some are like the weak verbs: jejäft, jesajcht (given, said);
- others are formed of je- plus infinitive: jestonen (stood);
- some, including modal verbs, of je- plus first person past tense: jehaut; jesocht, jekunt (had, sought, been able);
- others of je- plus plural past: jefungen (found);
- Those with an ee or oo in past tense are simplified to ä/o: jeschräwen, jedonen (written, done)
- the past participle of sennen is jewast (been)
Adjectives are frequently made from the past participle by attaching an adjective inflection ending and voicing the final t; if the preceding consonant is voiced, with -en participles the e is dropped:
(to draw, drawn, a drawn picture)
koaken, jekoakt, eene jekoakte Ieedschock (to boil, boiled, a boiled potato)
stälen, jestolen, een jestolna Hunt (to steal, stolen, a stolen dog)
Compound tenses
Except for the present and simple past, all other tenses are constructed with the aid of the auxiliary verbs sennen, haben, woaren:| ekj | du | hee, see, daut | wie, jie, see | ____ wie, jie | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Perfect | hab jespält | hast jespält | haft jespält | haben jespält | hab wie jespält |
| Pluscuamperfect | haud jespält | haudst jespält | haud jespält | hauden jespält | haud wie jespält |
| Future | woa spälen | woascht spälen | woat spälen | woaren spälen | woa wie spälen |
| Conditional | wudd spälen | wurscht spälen | wudd spälen | wudden spälen | wudd wie spälen |
| Future II | woa jespält haben | woascht jespält haben | woat jespält haben | woaren jespält haben | woa wie jespält haben |
Some intransitive verbs take sennen instead of haben as auxiliary verbs if they: 1) indicate a motion from one place to another, or 2) indicate a change of condition, or 3) the verbs sennen (to be) and bliewen (to keep being, to remain). Example: ekj sie jekomen, ekj sie oolt jeworden, ekj sie jewast (I have come, I have become old, I have been).
Expressions relating to future plans
In some communitites of Plautdietsch speakers, the religious prohibition of James 4:13-14 is interpreted to proscribe the simple use of the first person in talking about future plans or efforts. In such communities it is considered proper to use a softening introductory phrase such as "Ekj proove," (I try, or will try, or alternately I will want to) to avoid giving offense.Adjectives
Mennonite Low GermanLow German
Low German or Low Saxon is an Ingvaeonic West Germanic language spoken mainly in northern Germany and the eastern part of the Netherlands...
also shows a rich inflectional system in its adjectives. Although once even richer, simplification has done its work here too, leaving Mennonite Low German
Low German
Low German or Low Saxon is an Ingvaeonic West Germanic language spoken mainly in northern Germany and the eastern part of the Netherlands...
with only three genders: feminine
Grammatical gender
Grammatical gender is defined linguistically as a system of classes of nouns which trigger specific types of inflections in associated words, such as adjectives, verbs and others. For a system of noun classes to be a gender system, every noun must belong to one of the classes and there should be...
, masculine and neuter, and two comparison degrees: Comparative
Comparative
In grammar, the comparative is the form of an adjective or adverb which denotes the degree or grade by which a person, thing, or other entity has a property or quality greater or less in extent than that of another, and is used in this context with a subordinating conjunction, such as than,...
and Superlative
Superlative
In grammar, the superlative is the form of an adjective that indicates that the person or thing modified has the quality of the adjective to a degree greater than that of anything it is being compared to in a given context. English superlatives are typically formed with the suffix -est In...
.
| Predicate | Masculine | Fem/Pl/Weak Neuter | Strong Neuter** | Objective*** | |
| Positive | woam | woama | woame | woamet | woamen |
| Comparative | woama | woamra | woamre | woamret | woamren |
| Superlative | woamst- | woamsta | woamste | woamstet | woamsten |
The plural of all genders is identical to the feminine singular.
Strong and weak neuter declension
Declension
In linguistics, declension is the inflection of nouns, pronouns, adjectives, and articles to indicate number , case , and gender...
: after the definite article daut or the demonstratives daut and dit (neuter form of that, this) the t is dropped and a form identical to the feminine and plural is used. In other situations, as with indefinite articles, possessive adjectives or without article, the strong form is used.
The objective is used only in the masculine singular. However, if a preposition-article compound is used with a neuter noun, then the objective would be used. Example: em grooten Hus, but: en daut groote Hus, en een grootet Hus.
There is no predicate form for the superlative, a preposition-article compound with the objective or weak neuter is used: aum woamsten, or: oppet woamste, or newly just the neuter form without preposition: daut woamste: Zemorjes es et woam, opp Meddach woat et woama, no Meddach es et aum woamsten/ oppet woamste/ daut woamste (in the morning it is warm, at noon it is getting warmer, after noon it is the warmest)
The predicate form is used in predicate sentences for all genders: De Maun es oolt, de Fru es oolt, daut Hus es oolt (the man is old, the woman is old, the house is old)
Prepositions
Plautdietsch preposition inventory is rich. Some of the most common:- aun, on, in: de Klock henjt aun de Waunt (the clock is hanging on the wall)
- äwa, over, about
- besied, beside, next to
- bie, by, at
- bowa, over
- buta, except, besides
- derch, through
- en, in
- fa, for
- hinja,
- hinjaraun (placed at the end)
- jäajen, against
- mank, among
- met, with
- no, to, after
- onen, without
- opp, on
- to, to
- tweschen, between
- unja, under
- ver
- von
Numerals
| 0-9 | 0 null | 1 eent | 2 twee | 3 dree | 4 vea | 5 fiew | 6 sas | 7 säwen | 8 acht | 9 näajen |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 10-19 | 10 tieen | 11 alf | 12 twalf | 13 drettieen | 14 vieetieen | 15 feftieen | 16 sastieen | 17 säwentieen | 18 achttieen | 19 näajentieen |
| 20-90 | 0 null | 10 tieen | 20 twintich | 30 dartich | 40 vieetich | 50 feftich | 60 zastich | 70 zäwentich | 80 tachentich | 90 näajentich |
| 0-99 | 0 null | 11 alw | 22 twee un twintich | 33 dree un dartich | 44 vea un vieetich | 55 fiew un feftich | 66 sas un zastich | 77 säwen un zäwentich | 88 acht un tachentich | 99 näajen un näajentich |
| ordinal | 1st ieeschta | 2d tweeda | 3d dredda | 4th vieeda | 5th fefta | 6th sasta | 7th säwenda | 8th achta | 9th näajenda | |
| partitive | 1/2 haulf, de Halft | 1/3 een Dreddel | 1/4 een Vieedel | 1/5 een Feftel | 1/6 een Sastel | 1/7 een Säwendel | 1/8 een Achtel | 1/9 een Näajendel |
Observation: the numeral eent (one) is declined like the indefinite article (masculine een [objective eenen], feminine eene, neuter een) or a demonstrative or possessive pronoun (eena [objective eenen], eene, eent for the respective genders); when counting, the neuter pronoun form eent is used.
Instead of fiew, alw, twalw, some speakers say fief, alf, twalf (5, 11, 12).
The ordinal for 11th and 12th are: alfta, twalfta; from 13-19 use the ordinal + da: drettieenda (13th) ; from 20-99 use the ordinal + sta: fiew un twintichsta (25th). All ordinal numbers are declined like an adjective, the forms given here are masculine nominative.
The partitive numbers for 1/10, 1/11, 1/12 are een Tieedel, een Alftel, een Twalftel, for 13-19 add -del to the ordinal number, for 20-99 add -stel.
Syntax
Mennonite Low German shows similarity with High German in the word order. The basic word order is subject–verb–object as in English. Indirect objects precede direct objects as in English John gives Mary a present. But that is where similarities end. A dependent verb, i.e. an infinitive or past participle comes at the end of the sentence where in English it would be placed immediately after the main verb, as shown in the following:Mennonite Low German word order: Jehaun haft dän Desch jemoakt (John has the table made).
English word order: John has made the table.
Mennonite Low German, like High German has been referred to as verb-second (V2) word order
V2 word order
In syntax, verb-second word order is the rule in some languages that the second constituent of declarative main clauses is always a verb, while this is not necessarily the case in other types of clauses.- V2 effect :...
. In embedded clauses, words relating to time or space, can be placed at the sentence's beginning, but then the subject has to move after the main verb to keep that verb in second position. This pattern is demonstrated here:
Mennonite Low German word order: Nu sie ekj schaftich. More Examples: Dan jeef de Kjennich seine Deena eenen Befäl. (Then the king gave his servants an order)
Also, effects tend to be placed last in the sentence. Example: En daut Kuffel wia soo väl Wota, daut et äwarand (In the cup, there was so much water, that it overflowed).
Mennonite Low German has syntactic patterns not found in High German, or at least not as often, such as the repetition of a subject, by a pronoun.
Example: Mien Hoot dee haft dree Akjen. My hat it has three corners.
Questions, orders and exclamations have a verb first word order: Hast du daut oole Hus aun de fefte Gauss jeseenen? (Have you seen the old house on fifth street?). All questions are arranged like this. There is no auxiliary verb to form questions. If there is a question word, that word precedes the verb: Wua es dien Voda jebuaren (Where is your father born?). As in English, when using verbs in the imperative mood, it is not necessary to specify the person addressed, but it can be added for emphasis: Brinj (du) mie emol dän Homa (Please, (you,) bring the hammer to me). The word emol is frequently asked to soften the order as a word for please. Example of an exclamation: Es daut vondoag oba kolt! (Is it cold today!).
Dependent clauses
As in High German, in dependent clauses, the verb goes at the end:
Ekj well morjen miene Mutta besieekjen, wan ekj Tiet hab. (I want to visit my mother, if I have time). Observe the construction of: if I have time.
However, when a dependent clause has an infinitive or past participle, this rule is no longer strictly applied; there is a strong tendency to move the finite (main) verb before the infinitive or participle, the direct object (or even a long circumstantial complement):
Example: German word order requires a sentence structure like: Hee fruach mie, auf ekj miene Mutta jistren daut Jelt jejäft haud. (Translation: He asked me if I had given the money yesterday to my mother.) Even though this sounds right and perfectly understandable, most speakers would rearrange these same words as follows: Hee fruach mie, auf ekj miene Mutta jistren haud daut Jelt jejäft. Another example: Hee sajcht, daut sien Brooda jrod no de Staut jefoaren es/ Hee sajcht, daut sien Brooda jrod es no de Staut jefoaren (He says that his brother has just gone to the city). Observe: the verb precedes a prepositional phrase, but an adverb is still placed before it.
Text sample
The Lord's PrayerLord's Prayer
The Lord's Prayer is a central prayer in Christianity. In the New Testament of the Christian Bible, it appears in two forms: in the Gospel of Matthew as part of the discourse on ostentation in the Sermon on the Mount, and in the Gospel of Luke, which records Jesus being approached by "one of his...
in Plautdietsch, another form of Low German and Dutch.
| Plautdietsch | Low German | Dutch |
|---|---|---|
| Ons Voda em Himmel, | Uns Vader, die is in Himmel. | Onze Vader, die in de hemel zijt, |
| lot dien Nome jeheilicht woare; | Heiliget is dien Naam. | Uw naam worde geheiligd. |
| lot dien Rikjdom kome; | Dien Riek sall komen. | Uw (konink)rijk kome. |
| lot dien Welle jedone woare, | Dien Will doch doon, | Uw wil geschiede, |
| uck hia oppe Ead, soo aus em Himmel; | up Welt as dat is in Himmel. | op aarde zoals in de hemel. |
| jeff ons Dach fe Dach daut Broot, daut ons fehlt; | Gäv uns dis Dag uns dagliks Brod. | Geef ons heden ons dagelijks brood, |
| en vejeff ons onse Schult, | Un vergäv uns uns Schuld, | en vergeef ons onze schuld, |
| soo aus wie den vejewe, dee sich jeajen ons veschuldicht ha; | as wi vergäven uns Schuldners. | zoals ook wij vergeven onze schuldenaars / zoals ook wij aan anderen hun schuld vergeven; |
| en brinj ons nich en Vesekjunk nenn, | Un bring uns nich in Versuchung | En leid ons niet in verzoeking / in bekoring, |
| oba rad ons von Beeset. | Aber spaar uns van de Übel. | maar verlos ons van de boze / het kwade. |
| wiels die jehet daut Rikj, | Denn dien is dat Riek | Want van U is het koninkrijk, |
| en dee Krauft en dee Harlichtjeit en Eewichtjeit. | un de Kraft un de Herrlichkeit in Ewigkeit! | en de kracht en de heerlijkheid in eeuwigheid. |
See also
- Russian Mennonite (speakers of Plautdietsch all around the globe)
- East Low GermanEast Low GermanEast Low German is a group of Low German dialects, including various varieties known as Pomeranian and Prussian, spoken in Northeast Germany as well as by minorities in present northern Poland. Together with West Low German, it constitutes Low German...
- Low PrussianLow PrussianLow Prussian , sometimes known simply as Prussian , is a dialect of East Low German that developed in East Prussia. Low Prussian was spoken in East and West Prussia and Danzig up to 1945. It developed on a Baltic substrate through the influx of Dutch and Low German speaking immigrants...
- Plautdietsch-FreundePlautdietsch-FreundePlautdietsch-Freunde is a Germany-based non-profit organization with the goal of documenting, nurturing, and promoting the Plautdietsch language. Speakers of Plautdietsch who emigrated from Western Prussia through Southern Russia , and who now live in Germany, Canada, Paraguay, and other parts of...
(Germany based NGO, world wide documentation and promotion of Plautdietsch) - Living in A Perfect WorldLiving in a Perfect WorldLiving in A Perfect World is a 2006 feature-length documentary film by National Geographic Channel International about the Russian Mennonite people between Chihuahua Desert and the Bolivian forest....
(National Geographic documentary) - Silent LightSilent Light- External links :* * at the 2007 Toronto International Film Festival* - External links :* * at the 2007 Toronto International Film Festival* - External links :* * at the 2007 Toronto International Film Festival*...
, film by Carlos Reygadas - Alexanderwohl Mennonite ChurchAlexanderwohl Mennonite ChurchThe Alexanderwohl Mennonite Church of Goessel, Kansas is a congregation affiliated with the Mennonite Church USA. The congregation has a continuous history dating from 16th century Europe.-Background:...
, a Low German Mennonite Church, in Goessel, KansasGoessel, KansasGoessel is a city in Marion County, Kansas, United States. It was named after Captain Kurt von Goessel who went down with his ship, the Elbe, in the English Channel after it was rammed. As of the 2010 census, the city population was 539....
, USA - Pennsylvania DutchPennsylvania DutchPennsylvania Dutch refers to immigrants and their descendants from southwestern Germany and Switzerland who settled in Pennsylvania in the 17th and 18th centuries...
- Hutterite GermanHutterite GermanHutterite German is an Upper German dialect of the Austro-Bavarian variety of the German language, which is spoken by Hutterite communities in Canada and the United States...
(like Dutch, not closely related linguistically, but also used primarily by a religious group)
External links
- Plautdietsch Podcast (Radio) und Video (PlautCast)
- Was ist Plautdietsch (in German)
- Plautdietsch-Freunde e.V. (Germany based NGO, world wide documentation and promotion of Plautdietsch)
- Opplautdietsch.de - Plautdietsch Radio e.V. Detmold, Germany
- Plautdietsch.ca - written and audio resources
- Dialect Literature and Speech, Low German from the Global Anabaptist Mennonite Encyclopedia
- Pennsylvania German vs Plautdietsch among Mennonites
- Plautdietsch online Dictionary and grammar guide
- Plautdietsch lexicon with English-Plautdietsch index and category tree (thesaurus)
- German to Plautdietsch, Plautdietsch to German and Russian to Plautdietsch online Dictionary (Author Waldemar Penner)
- Peter Wiens - a German Plautdietsch blogger
- Plautdietsch course (project)