NORWEGIAN LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE (NonwAy, ante). The great Teutonic stem divides at about the time of the invasion into four dialects; but whether these dialects antedate the year 500 A.D. is very doubtful. The Gothic of Ulfilas is,undoubt edly, the oldest; but the Saxon follows not long after. The high German, by the testimony of charters, only begins after the battle of Totbiac (Zuelpich). The Norwegian, if by this we understand the lzlend.Nka tanga (Icelandic), though at most of the 12th c. represents a dialect at least 100 years earlier, and allows us to supply missing Gothic forms better than any other. Perhaps its great changes may be referred to the 8th c.; and they are greater than those of either Saxon, or high German. They are: (a) great contraction and assiiiiilation; (b) dropping of ease-endings; (c) dropping of prefixes; Man harriionions system of vowels, but accomplished by umlaut and reflex, more like Saxon than German; (e) assimilation of vowels; (J) the sufAxed article; (g) w before r, 1, and u is dropped; (is) j initial dropped ; (z) w is vocalized. The real test is 'the introduction of new terms. as georwa, Scotch gar, and - /aka, take, replace. thriwa, do, and vim_ma, niman, Ang. Sax. Also, at, ok, replace, ettu, ekend6, to, and. About 1120 A.u. Hied Thorodd, the grammarian; and in his time certain changes had already taken place in a contraction winch involved the loss of n final in verbs and in weak nouns. He specifies vo...els, short, as in father; a 10'17 (an) as in hull; to short, as in man; ce long, as in were: e stmt. as in red; e long, as in they; i short, as in it; i long, as in sweet; o short, as ill not; long, a; in row; u short, as in foot; u long, as in y short, as in tine (French), lune chen (German), y long, as in duke. nieuw (Dutch); ce short, as in hurt; te long, as in earth; eo short., as in send (French); eo long, as in boy. Three diphthongs— and ey—all with a distinct sound fur each letter as above. Every vowel could be nasalized. B, p, ni, k, .1, 1, and d as in English; c and g always hard; s always sharp; 7' always trilled; f initial, f; f medial and final, v initial, a; a medial, 2C; I= Eng ish y; a initial, elsewhere, cat. There was a sign for ng, hr, ho, Id, our ulien =haven. Double consonants kept separate, and, after the discontinuance of nasal vow els, dkr=ualitr; lac; I t.
s.mr. vowel and d=fiti; short vowel and A: or g= nk, ng. It) short the rule seems to be pronunciation clear, and rather slow; words and phrases cut as short as possible. Accent on first, if not, on root syllable. Quantity entirely by accent. At the end of the 13th c. ensued a change of prommeiation and spelling; and in the 16th c a whole new series of changes in pronunciatioa, making the language like modern Euglish—spelled, not pronounced. The MS. was the Lombard;
that is, Anglo-Saxon or Irish, gradually as with us, to Gothic. Modification of words bud been accomplished in vowels by (a) umlaut, as in Gothic, and more in Saxon; (b) reflation by i=y, and z=zo from the next syllable. As in English these changes had been tAken advantage of to show difference of meaning, as falia, to fa 1, and felh, to fell. This also liquidizes—the commonest si=n of the language—all broad vowels, when a corresponding termination has dropped. Fjarr, Eng. far, fjoda•, feather, etc. Changes in consonants are (a) assindlation: np=pp, ham) (hap.); nA:=7&-drikka (drink) nt or lalt=1t, vettr (winter); nth=nn—sannr (south); ith=ll—gull (gold); rd (:(1)=c1d odd (point); ra (za)=an—rann (house) ran (sack); nu). (dnr)=c111r—lidlir (finds). (b) Inflection: 1r (W=11.—,ganiall (old); nr (02)=11n—stein» (stone); (ice): catel =d-cl-taedda (fed); dItt=11 gott (good). Alone of all Indo-European languages (skuce the formation of case), it suffixes the article, and that to both noun and article, and the independent adjective has best preserved the old forms. There is a strong declension of nouns, r taking the place of s and a weak declension, but German u dropped already. Compaiison much as in English: illy verri (worse); verstr (worst). Numerals between Saxon and Danish. Pronouns: ek (I), did (thou); hann (lie), lion (she); vit (we two) tilt (ye two); ver (we); tier (ye); their (they, men); thaer (they,wornen); than (they, things). Verbs have two tenses, present and past, other vy help verbs, as in Engdsn and tour moods—indicative, subjunctive, imperative, and infinitive. Strong and weak verbs as in German and Saxon, and, as in English, the strong are becoming weak. It has a peculiar form. The reflexive is formed by adding z to verb, or sek as a pronoun. Adverbs vary between English and German Adjectives are formed for the most part with terminals not found in English. The grammar is particularly noticeable for what may be called close contact in the parts of a sentence, for impersonal. mid reciprocal verbs, fur prepositional verbs, with a different meaning as in English and Russian, and the use of thud dative of near definition. Of the earliest works Heims-Kringla still shows traces of poetic arrangement; hut the language can only be judged by Kormak's saga, rather antiquated. and by Laxdaela, and IN iala, the latter heroic in brevity and pithiness. The poetry, though formed on some extinct model, which must have served for all the early memory, rhymes of the Indo-European races, having the additional advantage of alliteration, and later of rhyme, seldom it rises to the height of Eirik Blood-Axe's death-song; and for the most part it is a mere convolution of stereotyped allusions and forced alliterations.