Low Franconian

Low Franconian is a special group of languages and dialects studied by experts in history and language. It includes many old and modern forms of speech that are very close to the Dutch language. These languages and dialects are mainly spoken in several places around the world.

Most people who speak Low Franconian live in the Netherlands, the northern part of Belgium called Flanders, a region called Nord in France, and western Germany near the Lower Rhine. You can also find these languages spoken in faraway places like Suriname, South Africa, and Namibia. This group of languages helps us understand how people in these areas talk and share their history.

Terminology

Low Franconian is a group of languages and dialects related to the Dutch language. It is used by experts to describe these languages, but people who speak them don’t call themselves “Low Franconian.”

Sometimes, Low Franconian is grouped with Low Saxon, also called Low German. This grouping isn’t based on shared language changes but because these languages did not go through a certain sound change called the High German consonant shift. The name “Franconian” was created by a German expert named Wilhelm Braune. He split Franconian languages into groups based on whether they went through this sound change.

Origins

Main article: Frankish language

Even though it is called "Franconian," most of the languages in this group are not very closely related to the old language spoken by the Franks. This is because later influences from other German languages changed them a lot. However, the Low Franconian languages are different. They are considered the closest living relatives to the old Frankish language.

Scholars use old versions of Dutch and some words borrowed into old French to learn about the Frankish language. Old Low Franconian is really just another name for Old Dutch. It split into two main groups: one spoken in areas like Flanders and Holland, and the other in places like Limburg and the Rhineland. The first group is the direct ancestor of today’s Dutch language.

Modern classification

Low Franconian includes several language groups spoken in parts of the Netherlands, Belgium, France, and Germany.

One group is West Low Franconian, found north of a special language line. This includes types like Brabantish, West Flemish, East Flemish, Zeelandic, and Hollandic.

The other group is South Low Franconian, often called Limburgish. This group shares some special sounds with other nearby languages.

Area loss

Until the Early Modern Period, people speaking Low Franconian used Middle Dutch or Early Modern Dutch for writing and official matters. In the 19th century, big changes happened in the area of French Flanders. The French government encouraged people to use French instead, a process called Francisation.

In the Lower Rhine area, local Low Franconian languages were used until the 17th century but later replaced by standard German. Even in places like Upper Guelders and Cleves, which later became part of Prussia, Dutch was replaced by German for official use. Though people still speak Low Franconian varieties there today, many now also use local German dialects because of easier travel and more media. In Brussels, which used to speak Dutch, most people now speak French, even though the area is officially bilingual.