Saterland Frisian

Abstract

Saterland Frisian (Sfrs. Seeltersk ) is the only living remnant of Old East Frisian. It is an endangered language, with an estimated number of 2250 speakers (Stellmacher 1998: 27) and is spoken in the municipality of the Saterland (Sfrs. Seelterlound ), which is located in the federal state of Lower Saxony in northwestern Germany.

Full text

ILLUSTRATION OF THE IPA
Saterland Frisian
Jörg Peters
Carl von Ossietzky University Oldenburg
joerg.peters@uni-oldenburg.de
Saterland Frisian (sfrs. Seeltersk
)
is the only living remnant of Old East Frisian. It is an
endangered language, with an estimated number of 2250 speakers (Stellmacher 1998: 27) and
is spoken in the municipality of the Saterland (sfrs. Seelterlound), which is located in the
federal state of Lower Saxony in northwestern Germany.
The municipality of the Saterland consists of the four communities Ramsloh (sfrs.
Romelse), Strücklingen (sfrs. Strukelje), Scharrel (sfrs. Skäddel), and Sedelsberg (sfrs.
Sedelsbíerich). Saterland Frisian comprises three local dialects spoken in Ramsloh, in
Strücklingen, and in Scharrel
and
Sedelsberg (Sjölin 1969, Fort 2015); there is no standard
variety. The dialect of Ramsloh is the most conservative of the three dialects and has
maintained several features of Old East Frisian which are lacking in the dialects of
Strücklingen and Scharrel. Most, if not all, native speakers of Saterland Frisian born before
the 1970s are trilingual, with a hybrid mixture of Münsterland and Emsland Low German as
their second and Northern Standard German as their third language (Fort 2004). Most
younger speakers of Saterland Frisian are bilingual with Northern Standard German as their
second language. General descriptions of Saterland Frisian are available from Siebs (1889,
1901), Sjölin (1969), Kramer (1982), and Fort (2015) (for an overview of older contributions
see Fort 1980: 16ff.). Comprehensive dictionaries are Kramer (1961) and Fort (2015).
The present description is based on the speech of three middle-class trilingual speakers
in their 70s and 80s, two female speakers from Ramsloh and Scharrel, and one male speaker
from Strücklingen. The description of the vowels is enhanced by acoustical analyses of 13
male middle-class trilingual speakers from Ramsloh aged between 52 and 70 (cf.
Schoormann, Heeringa & Peters 2015). The recording of the narrative as well as the
recordings of the examples in the tables and in the running text are taken from the female
speaker from Ramsloh. The orthographic conventions used throughout the text are adopted
from Fort (2015).

2
Consonants
Bilabial
Labiodental
Alveolar Postalveolar
Palatal
Velar Glottal
Plosive
p b
t
d
k
ɡ
(
ʔ)
Nasal
m
n
(
ŋ)
Trill
r
Fricative
f
v
s
z
(
ʃ)
x
(
ɣ
)
h
Approximant
(β̞)
j
Lateral
Approximant
l
Symbols in brackets indicate allophonic variants.
p ̍pʊkjə
‘to knock’
b ̍bukjə
‘to bow’
t ̍taʊ̯jə
‘to rush’
d ̍daʊ̯jə
‘to dew’
k ̍kɔːɐ̯tə
‘card’
ɡ ̍ɡɔːɐ̯tə
‘groats’
m ̍mɛɪ̯də
‘meadows’
n ̍nɛɪ ̯də
‘grace’
r ̍rɔːɡə
‘rye’
f ̍filə
‘rasp’
v ̍vilə
‘while’
s ̍sɔːɡə
‘saw’
z ̍zɔːɡə
‘myth’
x ̍ʔɔːxtə
‘eight’
h ̍hɔːɡə
‘dunghill’
j ̍jʊkjə
‘to itch’
l ̍lukjə
‘to succeed’
Younger speakers tend to devoice voiced (lenis) obstruents in syllable-final position and
before voiceless obstruents. Some older speakers realize
/ɡ/
as a velar fricative, which is
voiced
in all positions except before voiceless consonants and in word-final position
.
[ʔ]
is
restricted to the beginning of stressed syllables without an onset consonant and often is
missing from connected speech.
Postvocalic
/n/
is velarized before tautomorphemic
/ɡ/
and
/k/
(compare
monomorphemic
[ˈsɪ l
̩
]
Singel ‘fencing’,
[ slɛŋkə]
Slänke ‘rut’, and
[slɔːŋk] sloank ‘slim’
with bimorphemic
[ˈmɛnkən]
Mänken ‘man
DIM
’).

3
In onset position
/r/
is an alveolar trill. Younger speakers tend to replace the alveolar
trill with the voiced uvular fricative
[ʁ]
. Prevocalic
/r/
may be preceded by
/p/
,
/b/
,
/t/
,
/d/
,
/k/
,
/ɡ/
,
/f/
, and
/v/
. After a vowel in word-final position and before a consonant it is
[ɐ]
([bɔ ɐ̯]
boar ‘cash
ADJ
’,
[bɔːɐ̯st]
Boarst ‘fissure’).
The labiodental fricative
/v/
tends to become devoiced in word-final position and
before voiceless consonants.
It
may be preceded by
/d/
,
/t/
,
/k/
,
and
/s/
in the onset (
[dvo ]
‘to do’,
[tvo ]
‘two’,
[kvoːt]
‘bad’,
[ˈsvoːdə]
‘crust’). The voiced bilabial approximant
[β̞]
is
an allophonic variant of
/v/
, which occurs in intervocalic position after
[u]
(see sec.
Diphthongs).
The alveolar fricative
/s/
becomes voiced word-medially before
/j/
, after
/l/
and
/r/,
and in intervocalic position if the preceding vowel is long. Before
/p/
,
/m/
,
/n/
,
/l/
,
/t/
, and
/v/
,
/s/
tends to become palatalized in younger speakers, resulting in
[sʲ] or [ʃ] (e.g. [ˈsʲpitə]
‘spades’,
[ˈʃmiːdə]
‘smithy’
, [ˈʃnidə]
‘to cut’,
[ˈʃlitə]
‘to wear out’,
[ˈʃte tə]
‘to push’,
[ˈʃvɪtə]
‘to sweat’). The phoneme sequence
/sj/
likewise tends to become reduced to
[sʲ] or [ʃ]
(e.g.
,
/sjoːdə/ [ˈsʲoːdə]
‘to boil’,
/sjʊnɡə/ [ˈʃʊŋə]
‘to sing’). Word-initially,
/sk/
is realized as
[sk]
,
[sx]
,
[ʃk]
,
[ʃx]
, or
[ʃ]
(cf. Tröster 1997: 17). Word-finally,
[sk]
is in free variation with
[ʃk]
.
The voiced alveolar fricative
/z/
is rare and tends to become devoiced in word-final
position. Some speakers do not use the voiced alveolar fricative in any position. The fricative
/x/
is restricted to word-medial and word-final position. It is usually a velar fricative but in
some speakers palatal variants can be observed after front vowels and uvular variants after
low back vowels, as in Northern Standard German (cf. Kohler 1990). The glottal fricative
/h/
is restricted to morpheme-initial prevocalic position.
The palatal approximant
/j/
is restricted to prevocalic position, where it may be
preceded intra-morphemically by
/b/
,
/t/
,
/d/
,
/k/
,
/ɡ/
,
/f/
,
/s/
,
/m/
,
/n/
, and
/l/
(e.g.,
[ˈbjoːdə]
‘to offer’,
[tjoː]
‘to pull’,
[ˈdjuːvəl]
‘devil’,
[ˈkjoːzə]
‘to choose’,
[ˈɡjʊxtə]
‘direction’,
[fjuːɐ̯]
‘fire’,
[mjʊks]
‘dung’,
[ˈnjuːɡən]
‘nine’,
[ˈljuːdə]
‘people’; for /sj/ see the

4
previous comments on /s/). Prevocalic
/
may be preceded by

,

,

,

,

, and

(e.g.,

‘disk’,

‘blood’,

‘dress’,

‘equal’,

‘instantly’,

‘lock’).
Saterland Frisian allows complex onsets with up to three consonants

, /flj/,

,

,

,

,

,

,

, e.g.

‘clew’,


‘language’,

‘to split’,

‘to shine’,

‘to stink’,
 !
‘to write’,

‘to shoot’,
 "
‘slave’, and
#
‘bad’. The consonant clusters
$%

krj

are often realized as [tj] and [kj], respectively (e.g.,
 #&
‘funnel’,
 
‘to creep’
'(
Inflected verb forms may contain codas with up to four consonants after
a short vowel and after

(/
)
/,
%
,

,

,
%
,

, e.g.
"*)
‘writhe

2
SG
.
PRS
’,
*%+
‘bind

2
SG
.
PRS
’,

‘stink

2
SG
.
PST
’,
,-
‘help

2
SG
.
PRS
’,
-%
‘hold for

2
SG
.
PRS
’,
)-
‘milk 2
SG
.
PRS
’).
Vowels
Monophthongs
Saterland Frisian has 10 short and 10 long monophthongs. In addition, the vowel system of
Saterland Frisian includes [ə], which is restricted to unstressed syllables, such as the weak
form ze ‘they’ included in the examples below.
Short vowels Long vowels






.

*

/

0



-

$



/

1

2



0


-




$


5
The close vowels can be divided into three classes: short lax vowels (
ɪ
ʏ
ʊ/
), short tense
vowels (
/i
y
u/
), and long tense vowels (
/iː
yː
uː/
). The mid vowels comprise short lax
vowels (
/ɛ
œ
ɔ/
), long lax vowels (
/ɛː
œː
ɔː/
), and long tense vowels (
/eː
øː
oː/
). The open
vowels
/a/
and
/aː/
differ mainly in duration. Scharrel speakers replace
/aː/
with
/a/
before
tautosyllabic alveolar plosives.
ɪ ˈlɪnən
‘linen
ADJ
’
i ˈlinə
‘string’
iː ˈliːnə
‘backrest’
ʏ ˈjʏptə
‘depth’
y ˈpytə
‘bags’
yː ˈdyːvəl
‘devil’
ʊ fʊl
‘full’
u ful
‘foul
ADJ
’
uː fuːl
‘many’
ɛ ˈdɛkə
‘to cover’
ɛː ˈdɛːkə
‘cover’
eː ˈbreːkə
‘breaks’
œ ˈmœlkə
‘to milk’
œː ˈmœːɡə
‘taste’
øː ˈsøːɡjə
‘to lactate’
ɔ ˈlɔdɐjə
‘to laze’
ɔː ˈlɔːdə
‘drawer’
oː ˈkloːdə
‘dresses’
a ˈtakə
‘branch’
aː ˈtaːɡjə
‘to annoy’
ə zə
‘they’
The close front rounded vowel /yː/ is largely restricted to loans from Low German. The close
tense vowels
/i
y
u/
are shorter than
/iː
yː
uː/
but usually a bit longer and more peripheral
than the lax vowels
/ɪ ʏ
ʊ/
(cf. Heeringa, Peters & Schoormann 2014). There is some
disagreement about the distribution of long and short tense vowels (cf. Fort 1971) and the
distinction is on retreat. Whereas there are still a few older speakers who have preserved the
opposition between short and long tense vowels, most younger and middle-aged speakers
replace the short tense with long tense vowels, which results in binary oppositions between
short lax
/ɪ
ʏ
ʊ/
and long tense
/iː
yː
uː/
, as in Northern Standard German (see Tröster 1996,
1997, Schoormann et al. 2015).
Figure 1 shows mean values of monophthongs produced in nonce words of the form
/hVt/
recorded from 13 male speakers of Ramsloh Saterland Frisian aged between 50 and 75
with three repetitions. To obtain a target vowel the speakers were instructed to read a /hVt/
word with the intended vowel immediately after a rhyming Saterland Frisian word (e.g. Hoot
after sfr. Poot ‘paw’ to elicit /oː/; for further details see Schoormann et al. 2015). As the

6
productions of /
i y u
/ and /
iː yː uː
/ do not differ either by duration or by F1 or F2, we
conclude that the speakers have merged the short and long close tense vowels.
Figure 1. Mean formant frequencies at 50% of vowel duration of short (left panel) and long
monophthongs (right panel) in
/hVt/
words of Ramsloh Saterland Frisian (after Schoormann
et al. 2015). Ellipses indicate one standard deviation. Formant extraction was carried out
using the acoustical analysis software P
RAAT
(Boersma & Weenink 2015).
Diphthongs
Saterland Frisian has seven phonemic diphthongs, all of which are falling and closing:
/oi̯/
,
/ɛi̯/
,
/œi̯/
,
/ɔi̯/
,
/ai̯/
,
/ɔu̯/
, and
/au̯/
(cf. Bussmann (2004: 82) who, however, omits /oi
̯/).
The first part of the diphthongs may be lengthened but there are no durational contrasts
between the phonemic diphthongs. The diphthong
/ɔi̯/
is realised as
[ɔːi̯]
except before
tautomorphemic voiceless plosive (e.g.
[brɔːi̯t]
‘scald 3
SG
.
PST
’ with heteromorphemic
/t/
vs.
[ˈflɔi̯tjə]
‘to pipe’ with tautomorphemic
/t/
; cf. Bussmann 2004: 76f., 80f.). The diphthongs
may end with a more centralized vowel. This is especially true for
/ai̯/, /au̯/, and /ɔi ̯/,
which may be realized as [a ], [a ], and [
respectively (see formant values in Figure 2
below). As the location of the final part of these diphthongs in the F1-F2 space is variable we
assume that they are diphthongs which end with a tense vowel but may be realized with
14 12 10 8 6
7
6
5
4
3
2
a
ɛ
ɪ
i
ɔ
œ
ʊ
ʏ
u
y
a
ɛ
ɪ
i
ɔ
œ
ʊ
ʏ
u
y
14 12 10 8 6
7
6
5
4
3
2
aː
ɛː
eː
iː
ɔː
œː
oː
øː
uː
yː
aː
ɛː
eː
iː
ɔː
œː
oː
øː
uː
yː
F1 (Bark)
F2 (Bark) F2 (Bark)
F1 (Bark)

7
different degrees of undershoot (cf. Fort 2015 and Bussmann 2004).
T
he second part of
/œi̯/
,
/oi̯/
, and
/ɔi̯/
may be both centralized and rounded, resulting in
[oʏ̯],
[
œʏ̯], and
[
ɔʏ̯]
.
oi̯
noːi̯t
‘never’
ɛi̯
nɛi̯
‘new’
œi̯
mœi̯dsk
‘vain’
ɔi̯ kɔːi ̯
‘key’
ai̯ naːi̯
‘near’
ɔu̯ nɔu̯st
‘knag’
au̯ naːu̯
‘accurate’
The diphthong /
yi̯
/, which Fort (2015) finds in a single word, Sküüi ‘meat juice’, was
unknown to our speakers. Fort’s (2015) [
uːi
], which is attested for [
truːi̯jə
] ‘to threaten’, is an
allophonic variant of /
uː
/ before /
j
/.
Saterland Frisian has five additional diphthongs,
[ɪu̯]
,
[iu̯]
,
[iːu̯]
,
[eːu̯]
, and
[ɛu̯]
, which
are allophones of the phoneme sequences
/ɪv/
,
/iv/
,
/iːv/
,
/eːv/
, and
/ɛv/
, respectively.
When
/v/
occurs in intervocalic position, the diphthong is followed by a voiced bilabial
approximant
[β̞]
.
Phonemic Allophonic
/iːv/ ˈbliːvən [iːu̯] ˈbliːu̯β̞ən
‘stayed’
/iv/ griuv [iu̯] ɡriu̯
‘advantage’
ˈ
gliuv
ə
ˈɡliu̯β̞ə
‘cleft’
/ɪv/ ˈkɪvə [ɪu̯] ˈkɪu̯β̞ə
‘chin’
/eːv/ ˈleːvə [eːu̯] ˈleːu̯β̞ə
‘to believe’
/ɛv/ hɛv [ɛu̯] hɛu̯
‘hit 3
SG
.
PST
’
oi̯
œi̯
ɔ
u̯
ɔ
i̯
ɛi
au̯
ai̯

8
ˈhɛvən
ˈhɛu̯β̞ən
‘hit
PP
’
Just as the distinction between /iː/, /i/, and /ɪ/ is under pressure, there is a tendency to merge
/iːv/, /iv/, and /ɪv/. Table 2 lists the vowel+/v/ sequences that were found to be merged in at
least one of the three local dialects by Schoormann et al. (2015).
Table 2. Mergers of vowel+/v/ sequences.
/
ɪv
/
-
/
iv
/
Ramsloh, Strücklingen, Scharrel
/
iv
/
-
/
i
ːv
/
Ramsloh
/
ɪv
/
-
/
i
ːv
/
Ramsloh, Strücklingen
According to Fort (2015: XV) there is an additional diphthong [ɛːu
̯] in the pronoun sääuwen
‘self’, which is a variant of the säärm, and which our speakers did no longer use.
Figure 2 shows mean values for the phonemic diphthongs (left panel) and allophonic
realizations of vowel+
/v/
sequences (right panel) in
/hVt/
words, which were elicited by
using rhyming dialect words and recorded two times from the 13 Ramsloh speakers (see
section of monophthongs).
F2 (Bark)
F2 (Bark)
F1 (Bark)

9
Figure 2. Mean formant frequencies (in Hz) of Ramsloh diphthongs in 
hVt
/ words
measured at 20%, 50%, and 80% of diphthong duration (beginning, center and end of arrow).
Left panel: phonemic diphthongs. Right panel: allophonic variants of /
iːv
/, /
iv
/, /
ɪv
/, /
eːv
/, and
/
ɛv
/.
Word stress and intonation
The distribution of primary word stress in Saterland Frisian can be characterized with
reference to the phonological word as defined by Wiese (2000) for Standard German.
Specifically, a phonological word in Saterland Frisian can consist of one of the following: (i)
a lexical stem, which may be extended by (a) prefixes with a reduced vowel, (b) the prefix
/bi/
, or (c) suffixes that begin with a vowel; (ii) a prefix with a full vowel (except
/bi/)
; (iii)
a suffix that has a full vowel and begins with a consonant. Morphological words comprise
one or more phonological words. In morphological words comprising a single phonological
word the primary word stress falls on the last stressed syllable. If they comprise more than
one phonological word, the primary word stress falls on the last stressed syllable of the first
phonological word. An illustration of how stress works in Saterland Frisian complex words is
given below. Phonological words are in parentheses. Stressed syllables are underlined. Note
that the rules do also apply to loans like /zəˈlɔːt/ and /ˌeləˈfant/.
Words Morphemes Phonological words Meaning
/ˈtumə/ tumə (tumə)
‘thumb’
/zəˈlɔːt/ zəlɔːt (zəlɔːt)
‘salad’
/biˈprɔːljə/ bi+prɔːl+jə (biprɔːljə)
‘to praise’
/ˈutˌdrɪŋkə/ ut+drɪŋk+ə (ut)(drɪŋkə)
‘to drink up’
/ˈdɪskdɔu̯k/ dɪsk+dɔu̯k (dɪsk)(dɔu̯k)
‘tablecloth’
/ˌeːləˈfant/ eːləfant (eləfant)
‘elephant’
Fort (2015) lists a number of compounds which apparently are loans from Northern Standard
German (nsg.) but have a different stress pattern than their German cognates, such as sfrs.
ˌäärmˈzoalig vs. nsg. ˈarmˌselig ‘miserable’, sfrs. ˌlichtˈfäidig vs. nsg. ˈleichtˌfertig

10
‘careless’, and sfr. ˌstjúurˈfräi vs. nsg. ˈsteuerˌfrei ‘tax-free’. The deviating stress patterns of
the Saterland Frisian words may result from treating the German loans as non-compounds
consisting of a single phonological word whose last stressed syllable attracts the primary
word stress.
Saterland Frisian shares most if not all intonation contours with Northern Standard
German (see Fort 1995: 527, Peters 2008; for Northern Standard German see Grice,
Baumann & Benzmüller 2005 and Peters 2014). In today’s language, there is no clear
indication of a word accent distinction between gestossener Ton (‘push tone’) and
geschliffener Ton (‘dragging tone’), as assumed by Siebs (1889) for the Saterland Frisian of
his time.
Transcription of recorded passage
The passage was recorded from the female speaker from Ramsloh who distinguishes between
short and long tense close vowels (cf. Heeringa et al. 2014). The symbols
[ǀ] and [‖]
are used
to mark minor and major intonational phrases.
Phonemic transcription
di ˈnɔu̯dəˌviːnd ʊn ju ˈsʊnə ‖ ˈɪnsən ˈstreːdən sɪk di ˈnɔu̯dəˌviːnd ǀ ʊn ju ˈsʊnə ǀ vɛl fɔn do beː ǀ
vɛɪ̯l di ˈstɛːrkərə vaːs ‖ as aːn ˈvɔndərsˌmɔn ǀ di ɪn aːn ˈvoːrmən ˈmɔːntəl ˈpakəd vaːs ǀ dɛn vai̯
lɔːŋs koːm ‖ jo ˈvudən ˈeːnɪç ǀ dɛt di fɔr dɛn ˈstɛːrkərə ˈjɛɪ ̯ldə skul ǀ di dɛn ˈvɔndərsˌmɔn tvɪŋt ǀ
sɪn ˈmɔːntəl ˈuttɔˌlukən ‖ di ˈnɔu̯dəˌviːnd ˈblɔːzədə mɛt ˈalə ˈkrɔːzjə ǀ ˈɔːvər ˈumso moːr hi
ˈblɔːzədə ǀ ˈumso ˈfɛːstər ˈpakədə sɪk di ˈvɔndərsˌmɔn ǀ ɪn sɪn ˈmɔːntəl in ‖ ˈɛntə̝lk ˈrɔː.tə di
ˈnɔu̯dəˌviːnd dɛn kamp ap ‖ nu ˈmɔːkədə ju ˈsʊnə mɛd ˈhirə ˈfryntəlkə ˈstrɔːlən ǀ ju lʊft voːrm
‖ ʊn al ˈɛtər mɪn ˈɔːɡənˌblɪkə ǀ loːk di ˈvɔndərsˌmɔn ǀ sɪn ˈmɔːntəl ut ‖ do ˈmɔːstə di
ˈnɔu̯dəˌviːnd ˈtɔu̯ˌreːkə ǀ dɛt ju ˈsʊnə fɔn hɪm beː ǀ di ˈstɛːrkərə vaːs ‖
Allophonic transcription
di ˈnɔu̯dəˌvi ndʱ ʔʊ̞n ju ˈsʊ̞nə̟ ˈʔɪnsn̩ ˈʃtre dn̩ sɪk˺ di ˈnɔu̯də.ˌvi ndʰ ǀ ʔʊ̞n ju ˈsʊ̞nə̟ ǀ vɛl fɔ̝n do
be ǀ vɛl di ˈʃtɛɐ̯krə̟ vaˑs ʔas ʔa n ˈvɔndɐ̝sˌmɔ̞n ǀ di ʔɪn a̰ n ˈvo̞ ɐ̯mˑ ˈmɔ nɾl̩ pakət˺ vaˑs ǀ dɛn
va i̯ lɔ ŋs ko m ju ˈvudn̩ ˈʔe nɪç ǀ d̥ɛt˺ d̥i fɔ dɛn ˈʃtɛ ɐ̯krə̟ ˈjɛɪ̯ldə skuˑl ǀ d̥i dɛn ˈvɔndɐ̝sˌmɔn

11
tʰvɪŋt ǀ sɪn ˈmɔ nɾl̩ ˈʔut˺tɔˌluʔŋ̇ di ˈnɔu̯dəˌvi n ˈblɔ zədə mɛ̰ ˈʔa̰lə ˈkrɔ zə ǀ ˈʔa vɔ̜ ˈʔumso mo̞ ɐ
hi ˈblɔ zə̟də̟ ǀ ˈʔumso ˈfε̝stɐ ˈpakədə sɪk˺ di ˈv̥andəsˌmɔ̞n ǀ ʔɪn sɪn ˈmɔ nʔl ̩ ʔin ˈɛntə̝lk‿ˈrɔ tə di
ˈnɔu̯dəˌvi nd̥˺ dɛn kamp ʔap
ɸ
nu ˈmɔ kədə ju ˈsʊnə mɛ ‿ˈiə̯ɹə ˈfryˑntəlkə ˈʃtrɔ lən ǀ ju lʊft vo
ɐ̯m ʔʊn a̰l ˈʔɛtɐ̝ mɪn ˈʔɔ ɡŋ̩ˌblɪkə ǀ lo k̚ di ˈvɔ̞ndɐsˌmɔ̞n ǀ sɪn ˈmɔ nɾl̩ ʔutʰ do ˈmɔ̞ɐ̯stə di
ˈnɔu̯dəˌvi nd̥˺ ˈtʰɔu̯ˌre kə ǀ dɛt ju ˈsʊnə fɔn hɪm be ǀ di ˈʃtɛɐ̯kərə vaˑs
Orthographic version
Die Noudewíend un ju Sunne
Insen streden sik die Noudewíend un ju Sunne, wäl fon do bee wäil die Stäärkere waas, as ʼn
Wondersmon, die in ʼn woormen Moantel pakked waas, dän Wai loangs koom. Jo wuden
enig, dät die foar dän Stäärkere jäilde skuul, die dän Wondersmon twingt, sin Moantel
uuttouluuken. Die Noudewíend bloazede mäd alle Kroazje, oaver jee moor hie bloazede,
uumso fääster pakkede sik die Wondersmon in sin Moantel ien. Äntelk roate die Noudewíend
dän Kamp ap. Nu moakede ju Sunne mäd hiere früüntelke Stroale ju Luft woorm, un al ätter
min Oogenblikke look die Wondersmon sin Moantel uut. Do moaste die Noudewíend
toureke, dät ju Sunne fon him bee die Stäärkere waas.
Acknowledgements
The research reported in this paper has been funded by the German Research Foundation
(DFG), grant number PE 793/2-1. I thank Marron C. Fort, Wilbert J. Heeringa, and Heike E.
Schoorman for their support and I am grateful to all consultants, in particular to Gretchen
Grosser, Conrad Niemeyer, and the late Adelheid Pörschke, for giving me their time and best
efforts.
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