Limburgish

Limburgish, or Limburgian or Limburgic (Dutch: Limburgs, German: Limburgisch, French: Limbourgeois) is a group of Franconian varieties, spoken in the Limburg and Rhineland regions, near the common Dutch/Belgian/German border. The area in which it is spoken roughly fits within a wide circle from Venlo to Düsseldorf to Aachen to Maastricht to Hasselt and back to Venlo . Limburgish is recognised as a regional language (Dutch: streektaal) in the Netherlands and as such it receives moderate protection under chapter 2 of the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages.

In Germany it is common to consider the Limburgish varieties as belonging to the Low Franconian languages; in The Netherlands and Belgium however all these are seen as West Central German, part of High German. This difference is caused by a difference in definition: the linguists of the Low Countries define a Low Saxon-Low Franconian variety as one that has not taken part in the first three phases of the High German consonant shift at all.

Limburgish is spoken by approximately 1,600,000 people in the Low Countries and by many hundreds of thousands in Germany, depending on definition. The varieties of Limburgish spoken within Flemish (Belgium) territory are more influenced by French than those spoken on Dutch and German soil.

Unlike most European languages, Limburgish is a tonal language having two tones. Other European languages known to be marginally tonal are Lithuanian, Slovenian, Swedish, Norwegian and the Yugoslav languages, Serbian, Bosnian and Croatian.

Limburgish also shows signs of a possible Celtic substrate which is indicated by a larger number of words that have Celtic origins in Limburgish than in other West Germanic dialects. The area originally was inhabited by Celtic tribes.

Subdivisions of the Limburgish language

Noordnederlimburgs (ik-Limburgs) around Venlo and Roermond in the Netherlands is the form of Limburgish, which has features of the Zuid-Gelders dialect. Centraal-Limburgs is a concept used in Germany, which includes the area around Maastricht, Sittard and the Belgian Genk and stretches further North. Ostlimburgisch is a concept used in Germany to describe the linguistic situation in Belgium around Eupen, including Welkenraedt, Lontzen and Moresnet, in the Netherlands between Kerkrade and Brunssum and a large area in Germany around Heinsberg, Viersen, Mönchengladbach and Krefeld. An area close to Westphalia is considered as being the area where Bergisch is spoken. This area is limited roughly by a line Düsseldorf-Mettmann-Solingen-Remscheid.

Oost-Limburgs is the form of Limburgish spoken in an area from Belgian Voeren south of Maastricht in the Netherlands to the German border.

Wes-Limburgs is the variety of Limburgish spoken around Hasselt, Veldeke and Tongeren in Belgium. It includes areas in Dutch Limburg and Dutch Brabant. The border of West-Limburgs and Oost-Limburgs starts few south of the area between the villages of 's-Gravenvoeren and Sint-Martens-Voeren in the Belgian municipality of Voeren.

Opperlimburgs is spoken around Kerkrade and Vaals in the Netherlands, Aachen in Germany and Raeren and Eynatten in Belgium, in Germany considered as Ripuarian, not always as Limburgish. If tonality is to be taken as to define this variety, it stretches several dozen km into Germany. It is consensus to class it as belonging to High German varieties.

Phonology

The phonology below is based on the variety of West-Limburgs spoken in Hasselt.

Consonants

	Bilabial		Labiodental		Alveolar		Postalveolar		Palatal		Velar		Glottal
Stop	p	b			t	d					k
Nasal		m				n						ŋ
Trill						r
Fricative			f	v	s	z	ʃ				x	ɣ	h
Affricate								dʒ
Approximant		β̞								j
Lateral approximant						l

Vowels

Monophthongs

	Front	Central	Back
Close	i iː y yː		u uː
Near-close	ɪ
Close-mid	eː ø øː		oː
Mid		ə	ɔ
Open-mid	ɛ ɛː œ œː œ̃ː		ɔː ɔ̃ː
Near-open	æ æ̃ː
Open	aː		ɑ ɑː ɑ̃ː

/ə/ only occurs in unstressed syllables. /oː/ occurs only in loanwords from Standard Dutch or from English. The nasalised vowels /œ̃ː æ̃ː ɑ̃ː ɔ̃ː/ only in loanwords from French.

/øː œː uː/ are realised as [øə œə uə] before alveolar consonants.

Diphthongs

The diphthongs /iə øɪ eɪ uɪ ɔɪ aɪ ou/ occur, as well as combinations of /uː ɔː ɑː/ + /j/. /aɪ/ only occurs in French loanwords and interjections.

/ou/ is realized as [oə]] before alveolar consonants, and /eɪ/ is realized as [eə] or [ejə] before

Tone

Limburgish distinguishes two tones on stressed syllables, traditionally known as stoottoon ("push tone") and sleeptoon ("dragging tone"). Different words can be distinguished by tone alone, as well as different forms of a single word. For example, [daːx] with sleeptoon is "day", while [daːx] with stoottoon is "days".

References

• Grootaers, L. (1930). Klankleer van het Hasselt dialect. Leuven: de Vlaamsche Drukkerij. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help) Template:Nl icon
• Gussenhoven, C. (1999). "The dialect of Maastricht". Journal of the International Phonetic Association. 29: 155–166. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help) Template:En icon
• Gussenhoven, C. (1999). "The phonology of tone and intonation in the Dutch dialect of Venlo". Journal of Linguistics. 35: 99–135. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help) Template:En icon
• Peters, Jörg (2006). "The dialect of Hasselt". Journal of the International Phonetic Association. 36 (1): 117–124. Template:En icon
• Staelens, X. (1989). Dieksjneèèr van 't (H)essels. Nederlands-Hasselts Woordenboek. Hasselt: de Langeman. Template:Nl icon

External links

• On Limburgian Tones (in Dutch)
• map of dialects spoken in Dutch Limburg
• Advice of recognition of the Limburgish as regional language (in Dutch)
• Limburgian Dictionary from Webster's Dictionary - the Rosetta Edition