History of German

The earliest testimonies of Old High German are from scattered Elder Futhark inscriptions, especially in Alemannic, from the 6th century, the earliest glosses (Abrogans) date to the 8th and the oldest coherent texts (the Hildebrandslied, the Muspilli and the Merseburg Incantations) to the 9th century.

When the Protestant reformer Martin Luther translated the Bible into High German (the New Testament was published in 1522; the Old Testament was published in parts and completed in 1534)[1] he based his translation mainly on this already developed language, which was the most widely understood language at this time.

When Christ says 'ex abundantia cordis os loquitur,' I would translate, if I followed the papists, aus dem Überflusz des Herzens redet der Mund.

No, the mother in the home and the plain man would say, Wesz das Herz voll ist, des gehet der Mund über.

[1] The publication of Luther's Bible was a decisive moment in the spread of literacy in early modern Germany,[1] and promoted the development of non-local forms of language and exposed all speakers to forms of German from outside their own area.

It took until the middle of the 18th century to create a standard that was widely accepted, thus ending the period of Early New High German.

After the end of the Hanseatic League in the 17th century, Low German was marginalized to the status of local dialects.

It is closely related to Old Anglo-Frisian (Old Frisian, Old English), partially participating in the Ingvaeonic nasal spirant law.

German was the language of commerce and government in the Habsburg Empire, which encompassed a large area of Central and Eastern Europe.

At this time, people in urban northern Germany, who spoke dialects very different from Standard German, learnt it almost as a foreign language and tried to pronounce it as close to the spelling as possible.

The first dictionary of the Brothers Grimm, which was issued in 16 parts between 1852 and 1860, remains the most comprehensive guide to the lexicon of the German language.

After 1945, one-third of all German researchers and teachers had to be laid off because they were tainted by their involvement with the Third Reich; another third had already been expelled or killed by the Nazi regime; and another third were simply too old.