The Birth and Development of Scandinavian Languages

The birth and development of Scandinavian languages

The Scandinavian languages of this paper are Swedish and Norwegian. Island, Denmark Finland and Baltic states have words that are similar but because of influence from neighbouring countries or no influence their languages have developed differently than Norwegian and Swedish.

A Norwegian can understand Danish and speak own language when communicating. However a Norwegian understands a Swede better. This is because of the Danish connection to Germanic land mass and the influence from them.

Both Norwegian and Swedish are similar and have the origin in the early settlements in the middle of Sweden connecting Norway and Stockholm, Stockholm is the capital of Sweden.

The languages now spoken in Scandinavia developed form the old Norse language. The Norse language do not differ greatly from now what are Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish.

The reign of Viking kingdoms early was concentrated to Norway coast and the archipelago of Stockholm.

With the wide spread crusades of these kingdoms, they keep their language and culture.

The Vikings crossed water and land with their Viking boats and it is believed that they made the search for a paradise called “midgard” where their dead are believed to go after death. Signs of the different kingdoms of Vikings are visible still since Vikings placed rune with runic characters where they settled. Characters like B S T M are similar to runic letters and found in many languages even if pronouncement may differ.

The Vikings spread the old Norse to many countries and made it the most wide spread language during the crusades of Vikings into Europe, Russia Ukraine and other CIS countries.

During the Christianity different Viking kingdoms had influence from the missionaries and the Latin alphabet. At this time the crusades where minimal for the kingdoms of Vikings.

During early middle ages, settlers came from old Germanic and the different kingdoms of the Viking age like the Goths parts of the Svetheods meaning Swedish people. The kingdom of Svenonians “Svearna” where formed. Later the Sweden Kingdom where formed “ Svea rike “.

Later Norway was united by King Harald FairHair in 872 AD. And Christianity around 1030 came to Norway. In about 1100 the manuscripts found indicate a complete change from runic to Latin alphabet in both countries.

The old Norse developed into western Norse in Iceland and Norway and the eastern Norse developed in Denmark and Sweden.

During 1300 the Norwegians made union with Denmark and Danish was the written language in Norway separating Sweden and Norway both in language and culture. The union lasted 400 years. After the union Norway was part of Sweden and started to fight for true independence and became democracy and acting as sovereign nation. Celebrations are made both in Sweden and Norway for the independence. Peace have always preserved in the Nordic countries since the common origin of Norse. Nordic countries