East Central German or East Middle German (German: Ostmitteldeutsch) is the eastern Central German language and is part of High German. Present-day Standard German as a High German variant,[1] has actually developed from a compromise of East Central (especially Upper Saxon that was promoted by Johann Christoph Gottsched) and East Franconian German. East Central German dialects are mainly spoken in Central Germany and parts of Brandenburg, and were formerly also spoken in Silesia and Bohemia.

East Central German
East Middle German (German: Ostmitteldeutsch)
Geographic
distribution
Thuringia, Saxony, Berlin, Brandenburg, Silesia
Linguistic classificationIndo-European
Subdivisions
Language codes
Glottologeast2832  (East Middle German)
uppe1400  (Central East Middle German)
German dialects after 1945 and the expulsions of the Germans from their eastern homelands
  Thuringian (17)
  North Upper Saxon (18)
  South Märkisch (19)
  Upper Saxon (20)

Dialects

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East Central German is spoken in large parts of what is today known as the cultural area of Central Germany (Mitteldeutschland).

It comprises according to Glottolog:[2]

Nordobersächsisch-Südmärkisch

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The dialect area of Nordobersächsisch-Südmärkisch lies north of Upper-Saxon and north-western of Silesian, in the south it includes parts of Lusatia and in the north, depending on definition, it can include the region around Berlin. It consists of multiple sub-parts, where the switch to High German (from Low German or Sorbian) occurred at different times and under different conditions.[3][4][5][6]

See also

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References

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  1. ^ "Ethnologue: East Middle German". Retrieved 2010-11-24.
    "Ethnologue: East Middle German". Retrieved 2021-09-27.
  2. ^ Hammarström, Harald; Forke, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin; Bank, Sebastian, eds. (2020). "East Middle German". Glottolog 4.3.
  3. ^ Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin, eds. (2017). "Nordobersächsisch-Südmärkisch". Glottolog 3.0. Jena, Germany: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History.
    But Glottolog lists the following varieties which can be confused:
  4. ^ Peter Wiesinger: Die Einteilung der deutschen Dialekte. In: Dialektologie. Ein Handbuch zur deutschen und allgemeinen Dialektforschung. Herausgegeben von Werner Besch, Ulrich Knoop, Wolfgang Putschke, Herbert Ernst Wiegand. Zweiter Halbband. Volume 1.2 of Handbücher zur Sprach- und Kommunikationswissenschaft (HSK). Walter de Gruyter, Berlin / New York, 1983, p. 807ff., here p. 865ff. (sub-chapter: Das Nordobersächsisch-Südmärkische)
  5. ^ "Dialekt-Karte_neu « atlas-alltagssprache". Atlas zur deutschen Alltagssprache (AdA). Archived from the original on 2021-01-10. Retrieved 2021-02-20. Annotated with: "Abb. 20: Die Gliederung der deutschen Dialekte (Wiesinger)"
  6. ^ Map Deutsche Dialekte: Historische Verteilung by Jost Gippert. A previous version of it was published in: H. Glück (ed.), Metzler Lexikon Sprache, Stuttgart / Weimar, 1993, and later editions.