Bad Frisian and bad Low German: Interference in the writings of a medieval West Frisian

Abstract

Frisian was the language spoken in the coastal districts between the Rhine and the Weser well into the High Middle Ages. Its retreat from the north-eastern end was caused by the growing dominance of Low German, the Hanseatic language. Whereas the external history of the demise of Frisian as a written language has been well described, little work has been done on a description and analysis of the process itself. Study of a short Low German text written by a bilingual, native Frisian reveals many traces of Frisian interference, but it is difficult to detect a system in these forms. The only certain conclusion to be drawn on both the author's Frisian and Low German is that he represents a case of a 'semilingual' or 'balanced' bilingual, having an equal knowledge of these two (closely related) languages without being fully competent in them.