Old Danish

English

Proper noun

Old Danish

1. Old East Norse dialect (also sometimes considered a separate language, several other names are used as well) as spoken from the 9th to 11th centuries in Denmark
   • 2013, Ekkehard Konig, Johan van der Auwera, The Germanic Languages, Routledge, →ISBN, page 6:

     The history of the Danish language falls into three major periods: Old Danish (c. 800—c.1100), corresponding roughly to the Viking Age; Middle Danish (c.1100— c.1525), corresponding to the Middle Ages; and Modern Danish (after c.1525), the period after the Reformation and up to modern times.

   • 2010, Concise Encyclopedia of Languages of the World, Elsevier, →ISBN, page 279:

     Historically, the Danish language may be divided into three periods: Old Danish (c. 800–1100) spans the Viking Age, Middle Danish (c. 1100–1500) was the language of the late Middle Ages, and Modern Danish covers the time from around the Reformation (and the first translation of the Bible) to the present.

   • 1839, Joseph Bosworth, Scandinavian Literature: With Short Chronological Specimens of the Old Danish, Icelandic, Norwegian, Swedish, and a Notice of the Dalecarlian and Ferroe Dialects, page 9:

     A specimen of Old Danish of the 10th century, being the Runic inscriptions at Jellinge in Jutland, on the tumulus of king Gorm the Old, and his consort Thyre, as interpreted by Professor Finn Magnusen.

   • 2007, Nete Schmidt, Beginner's Danish, Hippocrene Books, →ISBN, page 2:

     Around 1100-1200 AD, Danish became a distinctive language with a distinctive pronunciation. The period from 800-1100 AD is called Old Danish or Runic Danish, as our knowledge of the language is primarily based on runic inscriptions.

2. Middle Danish
   • 2016, Ditlev Tamm, Helle Vogt, The Danish Medieval Laws: the laws of Scania, Zealand and Jutland, Routledge, →ISBN:

     In preparation for creating a dictionary of Old Danish (Gammeldansk Ordbog), [The Danish Society for Language and Literature] has begun to compile a comprehensive database (Gammeldansk Seddelsamling).

   • 2015, Cordelia Heß, Jonathan Adams, Fear and Loathing in the North: Jews and Muslims in Medieval Scandinavia and the Baltic Region, Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG, →ISBN:

     There are several texts in East Norse – Old Swedish (fornsvenska, c. 1225–1526) and Old Danish (gammeldansk, c. 1100–1515) – that mention or describe Muslims and their religion.

Synonyms

• (9th to 11th centuries): Runic Danish, Runic Swedish, Old East Norse

Coordinate terms

• Middle Danish
• Modern Danish

Translations

9th to 11th centuries

• Danish: olddansk n, runedansk n
• French: vieux danois (fr) m

Middle Danish — see Middle Danish

Further reading

• History of Danish on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

See also

• Wiktionary’s coverage of Old Danish terms