# Dutch/Frisian and English - mutual intelligibility?



## Ayazid

Goedenavond!

It´s well known and admitted fact that a big part of Dutch population are quite good English speakers, however I would like to know if there is any natural mutual intelligibility between these 2 languages, considering that besides Frisian, Dutch is genetically the second closest language to English. Are monolingual speakers of Dutch (I am sure there are still such people in Netherlands/Belgium ) able to some degree understand spoken or written English and vice-versa? And would be 2 monolingual speakers of Dutch and English able to communicate with each other? Another question: Do Dutch learners of English feel that existing similarities between the 2 languages make significantly easier their learning and vice-versa do English speakers learning Dutch feel the same thing in respect to Dutch?

I would also like to ask the same question to speakers of Frisian who visit this forum(well, they are usually also native speakers of Dutch): are monolingual Frisian speakers able to understand spoken and written English?

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P.S.: I have started a similar thread about mutual intelligibility of German and Dutch in German forum, so anybody feel free to post his/her opinion there!


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## JanWillem

I think that the influence of the overwhelming presence of the English language in daily life is so big, that the factor of similarity can't really be estimated. You'd have to test it on my grandmother; the only influence of English she has probably ever noticed was during the liberation in '45


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## Suehil

I learnt Dutch (over thirty years ago) as a second language and found it extraordinarily easy - almost as if I were remembering it instead of learning it.  I had had no previous exposure to Dutch (not a lot of it on British television) so maybe the similarities did play a role.
I have to add that I learn by reading; for a long time after I could read it, I found spoken Dutch totally unintelligible.


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## jeroen94704

> It´s well known and admitted fact that a big part of Dutch population are quite good English speakers


Over time, I've come to disagree with that statement. Sure, most Dutch will be able to do some basic communication in English, but don't expect proper grammar. And when the subject gets a bit more advanced, people quickly run out of vocabulary too. Also, English pronunciation is generally horrible. I find Scandinavian people are generally much more proficient English speakers.



Ayazid said:


> Are monolingual speakers of Dutch able to some degree understand spoken or written English and vice-versa? And would be 2 monolingual speakers of Dutch and English able to communicate with each other?



For the first question, the answer is "almost certainly not", and the second is a definite "No". 

As JanWillem says, English is so prevalent in Dutch society that it is pretty much impossible to find someone who doesn't understand _some_ English. 

Jeroen


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## Espadachin

Vorige jaar bracht ik een beetje tijd in Friesland door, en ik dacht (net zoals sommige andere het waarschijnlijk hebben gedacht) dat als je Engels, Nederlands en Duits kent, kan je ook (min of meer) Fries verstaan.  Ik woonde in een huis met een Friese familie, en vond het erg moeilijk te begrijpen wanneer ze mij in 't Fries praatten.  Misschien is het anders voor jullie geweest, maar voor mij kon ik er niets van maken.  Sommige zinnen klonken net als Engels, andere als Nederlands, maar af en toe was er een zin dat ging mij helemaal over het hoofd!  En geschreven Fries is nog moeilijker!


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## Lopes

Op de Nederlandse publieke omroep zijn wel eens Friese programma's te zien met Nederlandse ondertiteling. Met die ondertiteling is voor mij wel een groot deel van de woorden te herkennen, maar ik betwijfel of ik het zonder ondertiteling ook zou kunnen volgen.


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## paul van heusen

Hi,
     As a generalization, native speakers of Dutch probably have a higher degree of understanding of (written and spoken) English today than native English speakers do of Dutch or Frisian, owing to their greater exposure to English on Dutch t.v., in school, on the Internet, and through conversations with international English speakers while vacationing/ traveling and doing business.  How you measure that level of (assymetrical) intelligibility depends, in part, on how you choose to define "intelligibility" - does it mean understanding a college lecture in the other language (a very high barometer), reading a foreign newspaper (also high), having a light conversation at the cafe, or successfully shopping while on holiday (much less demanding).  It might interest you to skim through a Dutch - English dictionary and see the hundreds of words that are similar in both languages.  Some discussion topics that employ a lot of vocabulary similar in the two languages will be easier, as a result.  You might also like to visit The Netherlands someday - a very beautiful country! - and see for yourself the answer to your good question.


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## Mimi2005

As you´re speaking about mutual intelligibilty between Dutch, Frisian, English and German, I would like to add a historical remark about Dutch and Danish. 
We know from historical sources that Dutch merchants were able to understand Danish quite well at least up untill the 12th en 13th century !Many Dutch traders from for example Hanze-cities like Zwolle, Kampen etc. went to the areas around the Sont. We know they were able to converse with their Danish collegues. These were for the most part not highly educated men and hadn´t learned the language in advance.


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## panjabigator

Is there anyway that I can see a translation (or at least the gist) of what Lopes and Espadachin have written?


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## Espadachin

Sorry, Gator - this one's in English

As for historicity, Frisian and English used to be mutually intelligible.  There are stories of English missionaries (Sts. Boniface and Willibrord, notably) coming to Frisia in the 7th and 8th centuries, and they would be understood perfectly well by the people there.  English (or better, Anglo-Saxon) was originally from Oost-Friesland and south Danmark anyways.


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## panjabigator

Thank you!  I am now very encouraged to add another language on to the list!


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## Frank06

Hi,



Espadachin said:


> As for historicity, Frisian and English used to be mutually intelligible. There are stories of English missionaries (Sts. Boniface and Willibrord, notably) coming to Frisia in the 7th and 8th centuries, and they would be understood perfectly well by the people there. English (or better, Anglo-Saxon) was originally from Oost-Friesland and south Danmark anyways.


 
I am inclined to believe you, but this is very hard to verify, any which way. The first (extensive) texts in Frisian date only from the 13th century (Old(!) Frisian). 
So we don't have any contemporary material that can be used to compare Old-English (Anglo-Saxon, if you want) and, well, Pre-Old-Frisian from the 7th or 8th century.
I am also curious about the stories you mention. Which ones, do you have a reference? And finally, I wonder who wrote what in those stories for which reason.

Groetjes,

Frank


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## Espadachin

Admittedly there aren't texts to compare for Old Frisian/Anglo-Saxon, I'm just going off of what was in Bede's _History of the English Church_ (written 8th century) as well as Letters of St. Boniface. There was another story in the _Life of Wilfred_, an English saint from Northumbria, where he was shipwrecked and landed on the Frisian coast. It said that he had no problem understanding the Frisian, as the language was very close.

I also recall a story about St. Boniface (also originally an Anglo-Saxon) speaking with Frisian pirates near Dokkum (in Fryslan), shortly before they cut his head off.


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## tvdxer

Watching Dutch TV or listening to Dutch music, occasionally a few words or even an entire sentence will pop out as semi-intelligible or intelligible.  For example, the sentence at 00:33 or so in this video is almost perfectly intelligible in English:

"This is McFaith here live from the Catholic Youth Day here in (city name)"

"Youth Day" is difficult for those not familiar with other Germanic languages, but the rest of the sentence is almost completely understandable.


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## HKK

tvdxer said:


> For example, the sentence at 00:33 or so in this video is almost perfectly intelligible in English:
> "This is McFaith here live from the Catholic Youth Day here in (city name)"



I don't know what video you're referring to, but I guess you're saying that sentence, spoken in English, would be intelligible to any speaker of a German language? If so, well, a lot of the words are almost the same in Dutch:

"Dit is _McFaith _hier _live _vanop de Katholieke Jongerendag hier in (naam stad)"

But 'McFaith' and 'youth' wouldn't ring a bell to Dutch speakers with no previous exposure to English, and 'live' only would because it's a loan 

Hope this was relevant.


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## tvdxer

HKK said:


> I don't know what video you're referring to, but I guess you're saying that sentence, spoken in English, would be intelligible to any speaker of a German language? If so, well, a lot of the words are almost the same in Dutch:
> 
> "Dit is _McFaith _hier _live _vanop de Katholieke Jongerendag hier in (naam stad)"
> 
> But 'McFaith' and 'youth' wouldn't ring a bell to Dutch speakers with no previous exposure to English, and 'live' only would because it's a loan
> 
> Hope this was relevant.


 
I'm sorry! I forgot to post the link! (And I really wanted people to check it out and see if they're in agreement with me)

*Please check the Forum rules:*


> *11. Posting audio and video file*
> 
> *You may not post audio or video files or links unless you get moderator approval ahead of time.*
> *All these threads need to say which moderator approved it. *
> *All audio and video files and links that do not have prior approval will be deleted.*
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*This is standard procedure.*
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*Moderator DF*


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## Eumnestes

I think I read somewhere that "Good butter and good cheese/Is good English and good Friese" -- a self-denying statement inasmuch as "Friese" is at best an unfamiliar variant of "Friesic" or "Friesian."  Knowing nothing whatsoever about Friesian, I gather the point of the little rhyme is that the vowel values, etc., are remarkably similar in the two languages.


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## woruldwīdwebcræftig

Frank06 said:


> Hi,
> 
> 
> 
> I am inclined to believe you, but this is very hard to verify, any which way. The first (extensive) texts in Frisian date only from the 13th century (Old(!) Frisian).
> So we don't have any contemporary material that can be used to compare Old-English (Anglo-Saxon, if you want) and, well, Pre-Old-Frisian from the 7th or 8th century.
> I am also curious about the stories you mention. Which ones, do you have a reference? And finally, I wonder who wrote what in those stories for which reason.
> 
> Groetjes,
> 
> Frank



Agreed. The following is an Old Frisian text sample:


 Thet erste bod: minna thinne God fore feder ende moder mith inlekere herta.
Thet other bod: minna thinne euncristena like thi selwm.
Thet thredde bod: fira thene sunnandei end there helche degan.
Thet fiarde bod: minna thine feder end thine moder, hu thu longe libbe.
(... source ...)

In (somewhat awkward) English this could be rendered as:


That ear(lie)st bid ("commandment"): Love thy God 'fore thy father and mother with unbroken heart.
That other bid:  Love thy (fellow) ev'n(gelical-)Christian like thyself.
That third bid: Revere the Sundays and those holy days.
That fourth bid: Love thy father and thy mother, how thou long live(st).
That fifth: That thou have no wit(ness) nay over (any) whore.
That sixth: That thou none man nay slay.
That seventh: That thou nay steal.
That eighth: That thou not-wit(ness) nay forswear, and none false witness nay drive (="to cause to go forward, cause to be put forth")
That ninth: That thou none (of) thy (fellow) ev'n(gelical-)Christian's wives nay covet.
That tenth: That thou none (of) thy (fellow) ev'n(gelical-)Christian's goods nay covet.



The English is awkward mostly because of the double negatives and the lack of indefinite articles in places English-speakers would normally use them. It seems entirely plausible that English and Frisian were mutually intelligible at the time that text was written.


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## Todessprache

Frisian and English both belong to the North See Germanic family which includes loss of nasals with compensatory vowel lengthening, among other things, e.g. *gans> *gas(short vowel)>gas(long vowel).

Low Franconian, whilst related does not share these features, at least not in total: *fimf> *fif (short vowel)> fif(long vowel).

Dutch vijf could well be a loan from Frisian or a Northern variety of Low German (I would have to check). There is also some minor lexical differentiation. 

I think these days all three are not mutally intelligible but clearly at some point in time in history they were just as Spanish and French were when they formed one unit as Proto-West Romance.


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## woruldwīdwebcræftig

(...)
By using Google it is easy to find a ***** where a man speaks Old English and attempts to buy a cow from a Frisian dairy farmer. Draw your own conclusions.


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## berndf

Espadachin said:


> As for historicity, Frisian and English used to be mutually intelligible. There are stories of English missionaries (Sts. Boniface and Willibrord, notably) coming to Frisia in the 7th and 8th centuries, and they would be understood perfectly well by the people there. English (or better, Anglo-Saxon) was originally from Oost-Friesland and south Danmark anyways.


I suppose you really meant Nord-Friesland, not Ost-Friesland.

You are talking of a time here when all West-Germanic dialects from Bavarian in the south-east to Frisian in the north-west and including Old English were still to some degree mutually intelligible.


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## Frank06

Hi,

This paper might be worth reading: 
The Position of Frisian in the Germanic Language Area (pdf) by Charlotte Gooskens and Wilbert Heeringa.

Groetjes,

Frank


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## woruldwīdwebcræftig

Frank06 said:


> Hi,
> 
> This paper might be worth reading:
> The Position of Frisian in the Germanic Language Area (pdf) by Charlotte Gooskens and Wilbert Heeringa.
> 
> Groetjes,
> 
> Frank



I have looked at that paper many times, and have never really felt that that paper was complete. For one thing, they failed to include their translations of the story. It is hard to do any linguistic analysis of the situation without having the data involved. Also, there are many instances where there is more than one way to translate something due to synonyms or near-synonyms in the destination language, and to only have one person to translate into each language could easily introduce considerable bias. In addition, one will notice the above effect quite dramatically even between two English versions of the story, for instance, on the Wikipedia page entitled "The North Wind and the Sun" vs. the first few hits on Google for "The North Wind and the Sun". That the paper does not include their translations makes it impossible to take these factors into account. Finally, they do not include any older forms of any of the languages (for instance Old English) for comparison (which, as with the other issues, one cannot do this oneself because they do not provide their translations of the story). Overall, I am highly disappointed and dissatisfied with that paper.


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## Frank06

woruldwīdwebcræftig said:


> I have looked at that paper many times, and have never really felt that that paper was complete. [rest of the rant snipped]


Did you ever see a 'compelete' paper??? 27 pages...

Anyway, I am sure that you'll find all you need in the bibliography at the end of this 27 p. paper. Though I wouldn't be surprised if you'd find the bibliographical list disappointingly short. 


Frank


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## woruldwīdwebcræftig

Frank06 said:


> Hi,
> 
> This paper might be worth reading: (...link...) by Charlotte Gooskens and Wilbert Heeringa.
> 
> Groetjes,
> 
> Frank





Frank06 said:


> Did you ever see a 'compelete' paper??? 27 pages...
> 
> Anyway, I am sure that you'll find all you need in the bibliography at the end of this 27 p. paper. Though I wouldn't be surprised if you'd find the bibliographical list disappointingly short.
> 
> 
> Frank



Note that in the second-to-last paragraph before the "Conclusions and discussion" part of that paper, it states, "However, all Germanic
languages....show a large linguistic distance to
English....explained by the strong influence from
non-Germanic languages, especially French." I feel that they are not in a position to make such a claim (that is, regarding the reason for the aforementioned "large linguistic distance") since they have not included Old English (or Scots, for that matter.). The problem is that English is the only language included in their material that is descended from Old English, while they include 5 languages which descend from Old Norse (which is roughly the same linguistic time depth of ca. 1000 years before present). In order to be fair, we should compare Icelandic's distance to other Germanic languages WHICH DO NOT DESCEND FROM OLD NORSE. According to their data the nearest of those is German at  68.5 . This is farther than all the languages on their list except Norwegian and Icelandic are from English. Thus, it seems to me that Modern English is linguistically isolated not because of French influence but because of 1) extreme geographical isolation (insularity) and 2) not being "lucky" enough to have other languages (except Scots, which was not included in the paper) descended from the same tongue as it at the 1000-year-level (If you eliminate other Nordic languages, Icelandic is more isolated than English.) 

By my earlier comment of "incompleteness" I meant that they should not claim that French influence was even partly responsible for English's linguistic isolation without including Old English (or Scots) in their material, and without providing the translations of the story they used for analysis.

By the way, I would be interested to know if native Dutch or Frisian speakers really can understand Old English by using their native language or not. (I suspect not)


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## berndf

woruldwīdwebcræftig said:


> By the way, I would be interested to know if native Dutch or Frisian speakers really can understand Old English by using their native language or not. (I suspect not)


I don't speak Dutch but Low German which is probably closer to OE than Dutch and West Frisian but less close than North Frisian.

It is of course hard to tell precisely but I have the impression that my knowledge of High and Low German gives me better access to OE texts than my knowledge of Modern English. Especially the sentence structure is most familiar to me, if I think of an OE texts as some form of Low German.


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## Denis555

There's a misunderstanding, I think. English remains isolated and although it's a Germanic language it's got a HUGE vocabulary from latin. You'll find sometimes more similarities between French and English than English and Dutch.

Of course, Dutch is indeed very close to Afrikaans. 

Well, I lived ten years in the Netherlands and having learned English before didn't help much to master the Dutch language, which is still a goal for me.


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## Hulalessar

woruldwīdwebcræftig said:


> Note that in the second-to-last paragraph before the "Conclusions and discussion" part of that paper, it states, "However, all Germanic languages....show a large linguistic distance to English....explained by the strong influence from non-Germanic languages, especially French."


 
I think we have to ask what the authors mean by "distance" here. If we restrict ourselves to lexicon, two languages may be "close" but still mutually unintelligible. Although words in the two languages may come from common roots they may be subject to semantic and/or phonetic shift.

Whilst the most commonly used words in English may be Germanic, it is also the case that many everyday words are derived from French/Latin - you can hardly sit down to eat without using French/Latin words: _table, chair, plate, cup, fork._ Further, many English and German words are cognates, but have different, if related, meanings. English _deer_ and German _Tier_ are cognates, but the latter means any sort of animal. German _sterben_ means _to die_, whilst English _starve_ has a much more restricted meaning. Many similar examples can be cited. The fact that languages have cognates does not always assist in mutual intelligibility. A more extreme example can be taken from languages derived from Latin. Who would think from looking at them that French _fille_ and Spanish _hija_ were both derived from the same Latin word? On that example alone how "distant" is Spanish from French?


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## Lugubert

For the OP question, my favourite illustration is the set, starting with German, Ich bin gewesen - Ik ben geweest - Ik heb weest - I have been. A geographically very linear transition from Germany to Britain.

Having had English and German in school, and having worked in the Netherlands for a couple of months, and being generally some kind of a language freak, I manage quite well using only Dutch in the Taalgebied, understand almost all of any written Afrikaans texts, and only slightly less from Frisian web sites.


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## woruldwīdwebcræftig

Denis555 said:


> There's a misunderstanding, I think. English remains isolated and although it's a Germanic language it's got a HUGE vocabulary from Latin. You'll find sometimes more similarities between French and English than English and Dutch.
> ...



If you compare a legal document in French, English, and Dutch perhaps English looks superficially more like French than it does Dutch, true. But take something full of everyday words like a love song, poem, or children's story, and I can nearly guarantee you that less than 15% of the words are loanwords (and likely far fewer!). In these cases it is clear that French/Latin cannot be blamed for the mutual unintelligibility of English with Dutch and with Frisian.


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## Jcpas

Ever heard the old phrase...
"Good butter and good cheese is good English and good Fries."


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## ajr1971

I believe the quote is as thus:

English: Bread, butter and green cheese is good English and good Friese.

West Frisian: Brea, bûter, en griene tsiis is goed Ingelsk en goed Frysk.

It's a simplistic comparison, and while the written form looks similar, would an English speaker be able to understand the same sentence when it is spoken in Frisian?


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## sanddanceer

ajr1971 said:


> I believe the quote is as thus:
> 
> English: Bread, butter and green cheese is good English and good Friese.
> 
> West Frisian: Brea, bûter, en griene tsiis is goed Ingelsk en goed Frysk.
> 
> It's a simplistic comparison, and while the written form looks similar, would an English speaker be able to understand the same sentence when it is spoken in Frisian?



It is simple and I think that many English speakers could understand when spoken in Frisian.

But in the question of mutual intelligibility between Dutch/Frisian and English; I as a Northumbrian, have been asked many times whether it is easier for me to understand.  The answer is no.  A similar question is asked in reference to Scandinavian languages and the answer again is ...
*
[... a topic for another thread
Frank, moderator]*


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## Frank06

Hi,

I think there is only one way to really find out: This is the website of Omrop Fryslan, located in Ljouwert (the Netherlands, since I think we're basically talking about Frisian as spoken in the Netherlands). It has live stream and recorded radio and tv programmes. Pick one of the radio programmes, and let us know .
Oh, you'll hear a lot of Dutch too (some of the interviewees only speak Dutch, some of the interviews are in Frisian and in Dutch).

Groetjes,

Frank

PS: I'm born in Belgium, my native language is Dutch as spoken in Flanders, but I fully understand Standard Dutch from the Netherlands. It's hard to give a meaningful percentage, but I think I understand 50/60/70% of the Frisian texts, but it _enormously_ depends upon the topic.


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## sanddanceer

Hi Frank06,

I have now listened to 9 radio transmissions and can in all honestly say that I could not understand very much nor could I with any certainty disinguish the Dutch from Frisian.

In English there is a phrase, 'Double Dutch'.  Not the skipping ropes but the term for something that is totally incromprehensible!!  I am also a member of http://www.lowlands-l.net in which four Frisian dialects are represented.  My own language, Northumbrian, is also represented.  Northumbrian has a much greater etymological and historical connection with Frisian than English.  And if, as a Northumbrian, I cannot comprehend Frisian, then there is even less chance that a _pure English_ speaker will be able to do so.


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## sokol

sanddanceer said:


> I have now listened to 9 radio transmissions and can in all honestly say that I could not understand very much nor could I with any certainty disinguish the Dutch from Frisian.


Very well put - the difficulty is not understanding Frisian at all, what is really difficult is to decide when those guys use Dutch, and when Frisian. 

This from someone who has a different angle than you - German native speaker, good English skills but rather little knowledge about regional English varieties. Dutch I can read to a degree (depending on context I can understand 30%-90% of a text written in Dutch, or with highly specialised topics I might not even understand 30%).
But spoken Dutch, as well as spoken Frisian, is incomprehensible to me, and both languages sound annoyingly similar to my ears.


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## MaxJ

sanddanceer said:


> Hi Frank06,
> 
> I have now listened to 9 radio transmissions and can in all honestly say that I could not understand very much nor could I with any certainty disinguish the Dutch from Frisian.
> 
> In English there is a phrase, 'Double Dutch'. Not the skipping ropes but the term for something that is totally incromprehensible!! I am also a member of http://www.lowlands-l.net in which four Frisian dialects are represented. My own language, Northumbrian, is also represented. Northumbrian has a much greater etymological and historical connection with Frisian than English. And if, as a Northumbrian, I cannot comprehend Frisian, then there is even less chance that a _pure English_ speaker will be able to do so.


Indeed, so this was a good practical example of the not excisting mutual intelligibility between Dutch, Frisian and English. As a Dutchman I can understand some Frisian but not very good so a normal English speaker can't understand anything of it.


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## Hulalessar

I think that that "Lowlands" site gives the misleading impression that the "Lowland" languages are a recognised sub-group of West Germanic. Frisian and all the varieties of West Germanic spoken in the British Isles are a recognised sub-group - "North Sea Germanic" or "Anglo-Frisian" which underwent a sound shift not found in other West Germanic languages.

Frisian on the one side of the North Sea and all the varieties of West Germanic spoken in the British Isles on the other became separated well over a thousand years ago and the former has been influenced by other Germanic languages and the latter by French. It is hardly surprising that they are not mutually intelligible.


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## sanddanceer

True Hulalessar, that English has been influenced greatly by French and Latin (amongst others) but less so with Northumbrian and Scots.  The latter two can trace many of their typical words to an unbroken past; some 1400 years back to Old English/Anglian.  It was this point that I was making, that a Northumbrian or a Scots, would be the best candidates for mutual intelligibility with Dutch/Frisian.  But as a Northumbrian, I do not understand them (written or spoken) and I am uncertain as to when Dutch or Frisian is being spoken.  My conclusion: _pure_ English speakers have less chance (ergo the Englsih phrase 'Double Dutch').


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## Hulalessar

sanddanceer said:


> True Hulalessar, that English has been influenced greatly by French and Latin (amongst others) but less so with Northumbrian and Scots. The latter two can trace many of their typical words to an unbroken past; some 1400 years back to Old English/Anglian. It was this point that I was making, that a Northumbrian or a Scots, would be the best candidates for mutual intelligibility with Dutch/Frisian. But as a Northumbrian, I do not understand them (written or spoken) and I am uncertain as to when Dutch or Frisian is being spoken. My conclusion: _pure_ English speakers have less chance (ergo the Englsih phrase 'Double Dutch').


 
I cannot help feeling that what you are saying is not a lot different from saying that a native English speaker has more chance of understanding Swedish than a native Spanish speaker.


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## berndf

sanddanceer said:


> I have now listened to 9 radio transmissions and can in all honestly say that I could not understand very much nor could I with any certainty disinguish the Dutch from Frisian.


West Frisian sustained centuries of Low-Francionian, i.e. Dutch, influence.

On the web site of the North German radio you find samples of North Frisian. I would be very surprised if you would confuse this Frisian dialect with Dutch. For comparison, you might want to listen to Low German samples from the same region. This dialect is based on Anglo-Saxon; of course influenced by other Saxon and other German dialects.

On the right hand side of this page you find five short stories told in North Frisian.
This Page contains various podcasts in Low German from the region.


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## sanddanceer

Eh, no.  I was actually trying to show with an example, your very own post about closeness and unintelligibility.


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## sanddanceer

Hi Berndf, I will listen to them as soon as the link appears.  It would be interesting to see whether I or anybody else can.

You as a German speaker may hear the difference but German is also closer than Northumbrian/Scots/English and Danish (which I also speak).


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## berndf

sanddanceer said:


> You as a German speaker may hear the difference but German is also closer than Northumbrian/Scots/English and Danish (which I also speak).


For me the difference between North Frisian and Low German is obvious: The former I don't understand, the latter I do. I would be very interested to know how different these dialects sound to you, also in relation to Dutch and West Frisian.

Permission has been granted, the above post contains the links now.


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## Hulalessar

What would be interesting to know is whether a Frisian speaker can make more sense of _Beowulf_ than a native English speaker.


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## Frank06

Hi,



Hulalessar said:


> I think that that "Lowlands" site gives the misleading impression that the "Lowland" languages are a recognised sub-group of West Germanic.



In defense of one of the first message boards I joined (and still one of my favourites), I don't think that list owner R. Hahn ever intended to suggest or to even give the impression that the 'LowLands'-languages are to be seen as subgroup of West-Germanic. 


> LOWLANDS-L does not focus on one specific language                             or culture but on a group of closely related linguistic                             and                             cultural varieties                             (which                             does not include German, North Germanic and Celtic,                             although contacts and comparisons with these and         other languages                             are frequently discussed).


Anyway, more on topic is the list of resources on Frisian to be found here.

Groetjes,

Frank


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## sanddanceer

berndf.
I have just listened to North Frisian and replayed the West Frisian/Dutch again.  North Frisian is clear for me (from Dutch or German) while the West Frisian is still so close to Dutch I cannot hear the difference.  Just to check I asked a Dutch girlfriend to listen as well.  She said the same as me: North Frisian more German West Frisian very close to Dutch.

Hulalessar.
An English speaker can make as much sense of Beowulf in Old English as he can of The Koran in Arabic. None


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## berndf

sanddanceer said:


> She said the same as me: North Frisian more German West Frisian very close to Dutch.


That is the point I was trying to make by posting those samples. The once contiguous Frisian language area has been reduced to isolated islands and each of these isolated dialects sustained heavy influence from the surrounding languages. The way modern Frisian dialects "sound" has therefore little significance for the historic relationship between Old Frisian and Old English.


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## sanddanceer

Yes, I think I would agree.  Both berndf, Hulalessar and myself are saying more or less the same thing; too much _Abstand.  _This comes from the _Ausbausprache_ - _Abstandsprache_                          - _Dachsprache_ framework developed by the linguist                          Heinz Kloss.  The greater the _Abstand _the less mutual intelligibility there is between dialects or languages.

With regard to Beowulf and Frisian, it would be interesting just to see how much _Abstand _there now is.  I heard Beowulf spoken in Old English and sounds a lot closer to (North)Frisian than to English (or Northumbrian/Scots for that matter).


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## berndf

sanddanceer said:


> I heard Beowulf spoken in Old English and sounds a lot closer to (North)Frisian than to English (or Northumbrian/Scots for that matter).


This would be expected as it is the genetically closest relative. The regional dialect of Low German should theoretically be even closer (as it is derived from Anglo-Saxon) but Modern Low German has been too heavily influenced by High German.

But one should take all reconstructions of ancient languages with a grain of salt. Those reconstructions always rely, among other things, on comparisons with related living languages. So, this similarity might be at least in part an artifact of the reconstruction. You never know.


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## Hulalessar

Whilst we may have a fairly good idea of how OE was pronounced we do not of course know what the accent was like and there were no doubt regional variations. Any modern rendering of OE may be influenced by some present day accent, whether English or not.

When I wondered whether any Frisian speaker could make sense of _Beowulf_ I was rather thinking of the text.


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## Taalmsje

I must admit that as a native Dutch speaker I find spoken Frisian still rather difficult to understand. It sounds tantalizingly close to Dutch but somehow I still struggle with it. Probably because I hardly ever hear it or encounter written Fries. It does not sound particularly close to English to me though, more to Dutch (obviously) and Danish.

I took a beginner's course of Old English at university and there were several native English-speaking students. The teacher claimed that the Dutch students would have far less difficulty in understanding the Old English than they would. This was true. I remember the English speaking students were a bit annoyed  

As for Beowulf: I could grasp large parts of it in written form. The text looked oddly familiar, like a mix of Dutch, German and Scandinavian languages, with some English thrown in but not that much.


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## Hulalessar

Languages diverge, converge and merge; borrow and get forgetful; get beaten up and dust themselves down and start all over again. The genetic classification of a language does not always tell you much about what the language is really like.


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## Frank06

Hi,


Hulalessar said:


> Languages diverge, converge and merge; borrow and get forgetful; get beaten up and dust themselves down and start all over again. The genetic classification of a language does not always tell you much about what the language is really like.


That's probably why linguists might start an article on Dutch or Frisian or English with a (one) sentence like "xyz is a Germanic language" and then spend place, ink and paper (or bandwidth) on the things which _really _matter.

Groetjes,

Frank


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## helmet83

Espadachin said:


> Vorige jaar bracht ik een beetje tijd in
> fore year brought I an bit time in
> Friesland door, en ik dacht (net zoals sommige andere het waarschijnlijk
> Frisia through, and I thought (not as some other had probably
> hebben gedacht) dat als je Engels, Nederlands en Duits kent, kan je ook
> had thought) that as you English, Dutch and German knew, can you also
> (min of meer) Fries verstaan. Ik woonde in een huis met een Friese familie,
> (more or less) Frisian understand. I lived in an house with an Frisian family
> en vond het erg moeilijk te begrijpen wanneer ze mij in 't Fries praatten.
> and found it very difficut to understand when they me in Frisian talked.
> Misschien is het anders voor jullie geweest, maar voor mij kon ik er niets
> Maybe is it others for you been, but for me can I them nothing
> van maken. Sommige zinnen klonken net als Engels, andere als Nederlands,
> from make. Some sentences sounded just as English, others as Dutch,
> maar af en toe was er een zin dat ging mij helemaal over het hoofd! En
> but aft and fore was there an sentence that go me wholetime over the head! and
> geschreven Fries is nog moeilijker!
> scribed Frisian is even harder!


 
Ayazid, it's estimated Old English and Frisian became mutually unintelligible around the 12th century, after the Norman invasion and a huge influx of French words into English.

English is generally viewed as the most divergent of all the Germanic languages - it's grammar is much simplified compared to the more conservative continental Germanic languages - in essence it descends from a creole of two similar, archaic german languages which were somehwat mutually intelligible (anglo-saxon and old norse) and french.

I don't speak Dutch - I speak German, but have lived in Holland, and this enables me to understand quite a lot of written and spoken Dutch. I would estimate that a modestly talented linguist who spoke high German could learn Dutch within a month. They are far more similar to each other than English and Dutch.

To give you some idea of the differences, I have quoted some Dutch above from earflier in the thread, and put the direct English word equivalents beneath them, using the Germanic English word wherever one exists (often English has 2 words for the same thin - usually 1 French and 1 Germanic. You will see they are often the same, but because the English word has a slightly different meaning and the grammar differs, the end result would be hard enough to understand if Dutch and English had the same accents and pronounciations! 

Imagine someone speaking that with completely different pronounciations and you get the idea of how intelligible they are - i.e. beyond a few simple phrases such as "Goede Morgen" = "Good Morning" not at all!

I would say some people are instinctive linguists. Those kind of people could probably make a decent fist of holding a very, very simple conversation (exchanging pleasantries, simple directions, food items often have similar names), but nothing more!

Dutch and High German have some mutual intelligibility. A German speaker living in Holland would quickly learn "Dutch sounds" and be able to communicate, and vice versa.
Flemish and Dutch are the same language - it's like American and English.
Afrikaans descends from 17th century Dutch, and Afrikaaners and Dutch people can usually communicate fluently.
The Scandinavian languages in written form are virtually 100% intelligible to each other, although in spoken form Danes can struggle with the other 2 and vice versa, but again, it depends on the Dane and Norwegian/ Swede who're trying to communicate (their talent for language, patience etc.).
Icelandic and Faroese are intelligible in the written form, but not spoken. Both can understand the modern Scandinavian languages in written form, and vice versa.
And English? English is out on a tangent. It descends from a creole which resulted when 3 (the influence of Celtic on English is remarkably small) ethnic groups who colonised the British Isles - the Norse, the Saxons and the French - first began to communicate with one another 1000 years ago!

You can actually see a similar process of simplification occurring in Afrikaans, which has simpler grammar than standard Dutch, probably for the same reason. Similarly to old English, Afrikaans is a communication medium for several unrelated peoples who have colonised South Africa, from descendents of Dutch settlers to native Xhosa to Malays, all of whom speak completely unrelated languages.


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## Hulalessar

helmet83 said:


> English is out on a tangent. It descends from a creole...


 
I think you are going to have to define what you mean by a creole.


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## Frank06

*Hi,

I must say that I also raised more than one eyebrow when reading (once again) that English would be a creole. 


Hulalessar said:



			I think you are going to have to define what you mean by a creole.
		
Click to expand...

This particular issue can be discussed here (Creole, patois, pidgin) or here (Is English a creole?).

I'd also like to point out that the topic of this thread is  Dutch, Frisian and English alleged mutal intelligibility. That excludes German (there are enough threads about Dutch and German). That also exludes a historic overview of the major Germanic languages.

Groetjes,

Frank
Moderator EHL
*


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## helmet83

*Off topic part snipped.
As said before, there is another thread dealing with the question whether or not English is to be considered a creole.
Frank, moderator*

Are Dutch and English mutually intelligible? Intelligibility between the two languages is limited to simple phrases only - greetings, basic directions, some foods etc.


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## MaxJ

helmet83 said:


> often English has 2 words for the same thin - usually 1 French and 1 Germanic.


Same occurs with Dutch, only the "latin" word is more formal, so the Germanic word is used the most.

Examples:
inviteren-uitnodigen(to invite)
absent-afwezig
present-aanwezig

For a better list, see: http://wapedia.mobi/nl/Lijst_van_Romaanse_woorden_in_het_Nederlands_met_een_Germaans_alternatief?p=1

As you can see does English looks like the "latin" side.



helmet83 said:


> "Goede Morgen" = "Good Morning" not at all!


"Goedemorgen" or "Goedenmorgen"


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## Loftiis

sanddanceer said:


> I have now listened to 9 radio transmissions and can in all honestly say that I could not understand very much nor could I with any certainty disinguish the Dutch from Frisian..



I'm aware of the fact this is an old thread but after reading the quote above, I had to made something clear, cause there actually are significant difference between Dutch/Frisian, therefore it must be possible to distinguish these languages .  You just have to know how to listen. 

Some clues:

*The Dutch 'sch' doesn't excist in Frisian. The Frisian 'sk' sounds exactly like the English 'sch'.
*There are no 'ee', 'oo' and 'aa' sounds in Frisian but 'ie' (sounds exactly like the English 'ee'), 'ea', 'oa' and 'ao'.
*The Dutch 'g', if it's the first letter of a word, is made in the back of the throat while the Frisian 'g' sounds more (and sometimes exactly) like the English 'g'

The Dutch song 'Af*sch*eid n*e-*men best*aa*t niet' does have three sounds not existing in Frisian already in only the title. 

I'm not allowed to give url's but search for '_afscheid nemen bestaat niet_' and listen to the first song on your search results. You'll hear a lot of typical Dutch 'sch', 'oo', 'aa' and 'ee'.

Then search the brand new Frisian song '_Fûgels, Die Twa_' and you'll hear a lot of 'ea', 'oa', 'ao' and some 'sk'. 

Hope this made it clear!


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## miyamoto.musashi

They are similar, and very. But this is only manifested as ease of mutual study, their unschooled mutual intelligibility as about zero.


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## Brahim-59

I live in France, next to the Dutch-speaking West-Flemish region of Belgium.
So I heard a lot of talks in Dutch, and it's obvious that this language is quite far from English even though some words are of the same origin.
The English language might be mutually intelligible with the Scots language, but that's all.


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