LL-L "Language varieties" 2003.11.15 (06) [E]

[Lowlands-L]

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L O W L A N D S - L * 15.NOV.2003 (06) * ISSN 189-5582 * LCSN 96-4226
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A=Afrikaans Ap=Appalachian B=Brabantish D=Dutch E=English F=Frisian
L=Limburgish LS=Lowlands Saxon (Low German) N=Northumbrian
S=Scots Sh=Shetlandic V=(West)Flemish Z=Zeelandic (Zeêuws)
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From: R. F. Hahn <sassisch at yahoo.com>
Subject: Language varieties

Folks,

I received the following request, and I am passing it along to you and  am
responding via this forum, hoping that someone else can help better than I
can:

<quote>

Mr. Hahn  I have recently found your site.. I have been working on a
project to preserve my ancestors dialect, I can not find a record of it
anywhere.
The people who settled in our area all spoke the same dialect. They came
from Germany through Poland and ended up in Volhynia. I have made a simple
web site in hopes of gathering more info on the dialect where I give
samples. you may see it at...

http://www.geocities.com/thewuschkes/index.html

I would appreciate it is you could check it out and perhaps you may
recognize it.  WE called it Platt and it contains a lot of Dutch words,
German and others.  Hope you will rely.  Elvira Howe nee Wuschke

</quote>

Dear Ms. Wuschke,

I had a look at your site and can only give you a fairly vague response that
may be no news to you, since you seem to know quite a lot already.

The dialect (as also your surname) is an East Pomeranian or West Prussian
one from the area that is now Northern Poland, a dialect that these days is
seriously moribund, more likely extinct.  It clearly has a strong West
Slavonic substrate, most likely a Kashubian one.  (Kashubian is by many
considered East Pomeranian, the surviving part of the Slavonic Pomeranian
language whose western dialects in what is now Germany are extinct.)  The
speakers of those "Platt" dialects were mostly of mixed "German" and
Pomeranian descent, many of them of pure Pomeranian (Kashubian) descent,
having given up their ancestral language for that of the Saxon colonizers.
The dialect shares some features with "Plautdietsch" (Mennonite Lowlands
Saxon), the only surviving dialect (group) of that general area, having
saved itself by emigrating to Ukraine (and farther on) and by being confined
to a close-knit religious community.

Unfortunately, I am not able to completely pinpoint your ancestral dialect,
but I hope someone else on Lowlands-L can.

Best wishes!
__________
Reinhard "Ron" F. Hahn
Administrator, Lowlands-L
http://www.lowlands-l.net

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