Pomeranian Low German
| East Low German | |
|---|---|
| Ostniederdeutsch | |
| Native to | Germany, Poland, Brazil |
|
Indo-European
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| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-2 | nds |
| ISO 639-3 |
|
| Glottolog | None |
East Low German (German: Ostniederdeutsche Dialekte) is a group of Low German dialects spoken in north-eastern Germany as well as by minorities in northern Poland. Together with West Low German, it constitutes Low German. Before 1945, the dialect was spoken along the entire German Baltic Coast, from Mecklenburg, through Pomerania, West Prussia into certain villages of the East Prussian Klaipėda Region.
East Pomeranian, Central Pomeranian and West Pomeranian should not be confused with the West Slavic Pomeranian language (German: Pomoranisch).
East Low German belongs to the dialect continuum of the continental West Germanic languages. It developed from the older Middle Low German.
In the West it fades into West Low German. The distinction is usually made referring to the plural endings of the verbs: East Low German endings are based on the old first person ending: -e(n), whereas West Low German endings are based on the old second person ending: -(e)t. The categorization of the Low German dialects into an Eastern and a Western group is not made by all linguists.
In the South, it fades into East Central German. The difference is that the East Low German varieties have not been affected by the High German consonant shift. The areas affected by the High German consonant shift are still expanding today, especially the Berlinerisch dialect that is gaining ground on the Brandenburgisch dialect by which it is surrounded.
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Wikipedia