In the districts from MOre to Telemark, statutes have been promulgated in Landsmaal. Two hundred district authorities have asked that the central administration and the Government officials use Landsmaal when writing to them. Since 1894 the Storting has voted a few laws in Norwegian.
The official orthography of the names of towns, districts, es tates and other localities is now in course of revision in order to do away with the Danicized forms and establish an orthography corresponding with their national origin and pronunciation.
Dialect differences are not great enough to prevent intercourse between people of different provinces. Some dialects exhibit strongly marked peculiarities, e.g., that of Setesdal with its diphthongization of old long vowels and its characteristic vo cabulary. The country dialects are eastern, western and north ern, with many transitional forms especially in the coast dis tricts. The vocabulary is not uniform, and some of the dialects have simplified inflection; but the chief differences are due to the varying development of sounds. The eastern groups have cacu minal and supradental sounds; the northern and greater part of the country palatalizes nn, 11, dd, gg; eastern and north ern dialects and still others have to a great extent assimilated nd, ld, ng, gn, nib. In eastern dialects rd is mostly pronounced [t] (thick 1), in western [r]. Other assimilations are still more wide-spread, such as rn to [an].
Landsmaal is rooted in old Norse. The principal features of the spoken language are the same ; it has kept up the old diphthongs and to a great extent the old West Scandinavian vocal system of the stem syllables, differing in this respect from Swedish and Danish (the chief ex ceptions being rather important changes in the original short sylla bles, the weakening of sounds in terminations, especially of ad jectives, and a certain number of apocopes).
The vocabulary is extremely rich, especially in the midland, western and TrOndelag dialects, but it varies greatly from coast districts to mountain and forest districts. It has many literary words, frequently compounds or words of a wider mean ing than that given to them in popular speech ; these are some times termed neologisms and are used as substitutes for estab= lished foreign literary and technical terms. While as a spoken and popular language, Landsmaal is more puristic than Swedish and Danish; a number of loan-words come from Old Norse, being borrowed from and through Old English, Old French, and, in the latter period of the Middle Ages, from Low German (the Hanse), and in later times through Danish, from High German. Many
Danish words, especially such as belong to the field of religion, found their way into Norwegian, although their number is smaller than might have been expected.
Norwegian.—School books: K. Brekke, Lcerebok i engelsk, landsmaalsutgaava (English-Norwegian, 2nd ed., 1917) ; L. Heggstad, Norsk grammatik (1914) ; M. Skard, Nynorsk ordbok (2nd ed., 1921 ; orthography). Dictionaries: Ola Raknes, Engelsk-norsk ordbok (English-Norwegian, 1927) ; Ivar Aasen, Norsk Ordbog (reprinted 1918) ; H. Ross, Norsk Ordbog (1895-1913) S. SchjOtt, Norsk ordbok (1914) ; S. SchjOtt, Dansk-norsk ordbog (Dano-Norwegian, reprinted 1926) ; L. Heggstad, Fornorskings-ordbok (2nd ed., 1924 ; Norwego-Danish--Landsmaal). Synonyms: Ivar Aasen, Norsk Maalbunad (5925). Etymology: Torp, Nynorsk etymologisk ordbok (1919) ; Aasen, Norsk Navnebog (reprinted 1912 ; Christian From a linguistic and artistic aspect the literature of ancient Norway is inextricably bound up with Icelandic ; Old Norse litera ture is, therefore, dealt with under Iceland (q.v.) ; yet it should not be forgotten that the psychological features revealed through the so-called Older Edda, as well through the sagas, are so typi cally Norwegian in all essentials that this literature forms the very basis on which the literary fabric of Norway has been raised in the course of centuries.
The literature of the Old Norse language came to an end in the beginning of the 14th century simultaneously with the decline and fall of Norway as a sovereign State with a culture of her own. The chief characteristic of this literature, formed as it was in "an age of axes, an age of swords," is the remarkable fighting spirit by which it is pervaded, and which quite naturally makes it abound in dramatic scenes and striking personalities; at the same time, in poetry as well as in prose, it is imbued by a serene view of life, which reveals a remarkably high moral standard. Another very distinct feature is its decidedly aristocratic leaning, with a pronounced hero-worshipping tendency, as might be ex pected in an age when the king generally appeared surrounded by his faithful chieftains, and frequently with a young poet before him, singing his praises in glowing terms.