Faroese language

History

Around 900 AD, the language spoken in the Faroes was Old Norse, which Norse settlers had brought with them during the time of the settlement of Faroe Islands (landnám) that began in 825. However, many of the settlers were not from Scandinavia, but descendants of Norse settlers in the Irish Sea region. In addition, women from Norse-occupied Ireland, the Norse–Gaelic Isles, Orkney, and Shetland often married native Scandinavian men before settling in the Faroe Islands and Iceland. As a result, the Middle Irish language has had some influence on both Faroese and Icelandic.

There is speculation about Gaelic language place names in the Faroes: for example, the names of Mykines, Stóra Dímun, Lítla Dímun and Argir have been hypothesized to contain Celtic roots. Other examples of early-introduced words of Celtic origin are: /blaðak (buttermilk), cf. Middle Irish ; drunnur (tail-piece of an animal), cf. Middle Irish dronn; (head, headhair), cf. Middle Irish ; (hand, paw), cf. Middle Irish ; (bull), cf. Middle Irish ; and (pasture in the outfield), cf. Middle Irish áirge.

Between the 9th and the 15th centuries, a distinct Faroese language evolved, although it was probably still mutually intelligible with Old West Norse, and remained similar to the Norn language of Orkney and Shetland during Norn's earlier phase.

Faroese ceased to be a written language after the Danish–Norwegian Reformation of the early 16th century, with Danish replacing Faroese as the language of administration and education. The islanders continued to use the language in ballads, folktales, and everyday life. This maintained a rich spoken tradition, but for 300 years the language was not used in written form.

In 1823, the Danish Bible Society published a diglot of the Gospel of Matthew, with Faroese on the left and Danish on the right.

Venceslaus Ulricus Hammershaimb and the Icelandic grammarian and politician Jón Sigurðsson published a written standard for Modern Faroese in 1854, which still exists. They set a standard for the orthography of the language, based on its Old Norse roots and similar to that of Icelandic. The main purpose of this was for the spelling to represent the diverse dialects of Faroese in equal measure. Additionally, it had the advantages of being etymologically clear and keeping the kinship with the Icelandic written language. The actual pronunciation, however, often differs considerably from the written rendering. The letter ð, for example, has no specific phoneme attached to it.

Jakob Jakobsen devised a rival system of orthography, based on his wish for a phonetic spelling, but this system was never taken up by the speakers.

In 1908, Scripture Gift Mission published the Gospel of John in Faroese.

In 1937, Faroese replaced Danish as the official school language, in 1938, as the church language, and in 1948, as the national language by the Home Rule Act of the Faroe Islands. The first complete translation of the Bible was completed in 1948.

Up until the 1980s, public radio broadcasts were primarily conducted in Norwegian and Danish. This helps to explain why older generations can speak Norwegian in addition to Danish and Faroese. Faroese broadcasts quickly replaced earlier programs and now all radio content is transmitted in the language, alongside all local newspapers. Today, Danish is considered a foreign language, although around 5% of residents on the Faroes learn it as a first language. Both Danish and English are obligatory at the primary and secondary school levels, with fluency in English becoming increasingly valued particularly among the younger generations. Films and television are frequently shown in English with Danish subtitles.

In 2017, the tourist board Visit Faroe Islands launched a website entitled Faroe Islands Translate. Text can be entered in thirteen languages, including English, Chinese, Russian, Japanese, French, Spanish, and Portuguese. Instead of an instant machine translation being given, the text goes to a volunteer who will provide a live video translation, or else a recorded one later. The aim of this project was to get Faroese featured on Google Translate.

Old Faroese

Old Faroese (miðaldarføroyskt, ca. mid-14th to mid-16th centuries) is a form of Old Norse spoken in medieval times in the Faroe Islands. The most crucial aspects of the development of Faroese are diphthongisation and palatalisation.

There is not enough data available to establish an accurate chronology of Faroese, but a rough one may be developed through comparison to the chronologies of Old Icelandic and Old Norwegian. In the 12th/13th centuries, á and ǫ́ merged as ; later on at the beginning of the 14th century, delabialization took place: y, øy, au ; í and ý merged in addition to i and y, but in the case of í and ý, it appears that labialisation took place instead as is documented by later development to . Further, the language underwent a palatalisation of k, g and sk before Old Norse e, i, y, ø, au . Before the palatalisation é and ǽ merged as and approximately in the same period epenthetic u is inserted into word-final and clusters.

A massive quantity shift also operated in Middle Faroese. In the case of skerping, it took place after delabialization but before loss of post-vocalic ð and g . The shift of hv to , the deletion of in (remaining) word-initial –sonorant clusters (hr, hl, hn r, l, n), and the dissolution of þ (þ t; þ h in demonstrative pronouns and adverbs) appeared before the end of the 13th century. Another undated change is the merger of ǫ, ø and ǿ into ; pre-nasal ǫ, ǫ́ o, ó. enk, eng probably became eing, eink in the 14th century; the development of a to before ng, nk appeared after the palatalisation of k, g, and sk had been completed, such a change is quite a recent development, as well as change Cve Cvø.

Dialects

]] Faroese is a highly variable language with many dialects actively used across the islands’ approximately 120 communities. While the dialect of Tórshavn is the most prominent due to the city's outstanding size, there is no official spoken standard variety and little evidence that the Tórshavn dialect has developed prestige status. Faroese speech communities are tightly knit and the use of dialectal speech is widely encouraged.

The study of Faroese dialectology began hundreds of years ago, with the scholar Lucas Debes noting a north–south distinction as early as 1673. In the 18th century linguist Jens Christian Svabo made further distinctions, such as identifying the Tórshavn dialect, though his categorization lacked thorough justification. In 1891 Venceslaus Ulricus Hammershaimb would write a more definitive study of the language's variation, noting distinguishing characteristics of the north–south divide such as the northern aspiration of unvoiced plosives after long vowels and the pronunciation of as in most of the north compared to in the south.

The most recent and detailed classification by Hjalmar P. Petersen divides the language into four major varieties including North-Western Faroese, Central Faroese, Northern Faroese, and Southern Faroese. Additional sub-dialects of particular islands and villages have also been identified. Most of the analysis by Petersen and earlier authors is based on phonological evidence.

The southern variety of Faroese is very distinct, possibly due to geographic distance exacerbated by the lack of underwater tunnels which have connected most other islands north of Sandur. The dialect of these islands is characterized by a unique form of certain personal pronouns, alongside phonological features such as the intervocalic voicing of non-geminate stops. The fortis consonants , , and are aspirated following long vowels.

The central dialect area centered around Suðurstreymoy features a merging of and in unstressed ending syllables. The fortis consonants are neither aspirated nor weakened. The island of Nólsoy is a notable transitional area due to its unique realization of long as and short as compared to the and found in Tórshavn and elsewhere.

The northern dialect is characterized by weakened fortis consonants and a monophthongal pronunciation of in ending syllables, i.e., . The realization of as dominates in this region, although small parts of the central and northwestern regions use this pronunciation as well.

The northwestern dialect features aspirated fortis consonants after long vowels. The and vowels remain unmerged in unstressed ending syllables. Long is pronounced and short is pronounced .

Alphabet

Main article: Faroese orthography

The Faroese alphabet consists of 29 letters derived from the Latin script:

Phonology

Main article: Faroese phonology

Vowels

As with most other Germanic languages, Faroese has a large number of vowels, with 26 in total. Vowel distribution is similar to other North Germanic languages in that short vowels appear in closed syllables (those ending in consonant clusters or long consonants) and long vowels appear in open syllables.

Faroese shares with Icelandic and Danish the feature of maintaining a contrast between stops based exclusively on aspiration, not voicing. Geminated stops may be pre-aspirated in intervocalic and word-final position. Intervocalically the aspirated consonants become pre-aspirated unless followed by a closed vowel. In clusters, the preaspiration merges with a preceding nasal or apical approximant, rendering them voiceless.

Consonants

(Non-phonemic phones are between parentheses)

There are several phonological processes involved in Faroese, including:

• Nasals generally assume the place of articulation and laryngeal settings of following consonants.
• Velar stops palatalize to postalveolar affricates before and
• becomes before voiceless consonants
• becomes after and before
• becomes retroflex before consonants in consonant clusters, yielding the allophones while itself becomes , example: is realized as .
• Pre-occlusion of original to and to .
• Pre-aspiration of original voiceless stops after non-high long vowels and diphthongs or when a voiceless stop is followed by . All long voiceless stops are pre-aspirated when doubled or in clusters .

Grammar

Main article: Faroese grammar

Faroese grammar is related and very similar to that of modern Icelandic and Old Norse. Faroese is an inflected language with three grammatical genders and four cases: nominative, accusative, dative and genitive.

Example text

SUB:Subjunctive mood IMP:Imperative mood PRS:Present tense PST:Past tense 2PS:second person, singular 3PS:third person, singular DF:Definite IDF:Indefinite N:Nominative case A:Accusative case D:Dative case G:Genitive case MA:Masculine gender FE:Feminine gender NT:Neuter gender CMPA:Comparative SPER:Superlative

Universal Declaration of Human Rights

The following is a sample text of Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The first line is the orthographic version; the second is the International Phonetic Alphabet transcription; the third is the gloss. A recording is available on the UDHR audio project's website.

| {Grein 1:} Øll menniskju eru fødd fræls og jøvn til virðingar og mannarættindi. Tey hava skil og samvitsku og eiga {at fara} hvørt um annað í bróðuranda. | {ˈfɪsːt-a ˈkɹaiːn-∅ } ˈʔœtˑl ˈmɛnːɪʃ-ʊ (ʔ)ɛɹ-ʊ ˌfœtˑ-∅ {ˈfɹalːs-∅ ()} ʔɔ {ˈjœuːn } tʰɪl {ˈviːɹ.ɪŋk-aɹ ()} ʔɔ {ˈman(ː)a.ˌɹaʰtːɪnt-ɪ } tʰɛi ‿(h)av-a {ˈʃiːl ()} ʔɔ {ˌsaɱː‿.vɪsk-ˈʊˑ } ʔɔ ˈʔaiː-(a)‿ {a(t) faɹ-a ()} ˈkʰvœɻ̊ː-ʈ ʊm ˌanːa-∅ (ʔ)ʊi ˈpɹɔuːvʊɹ.ˌanːt-a | {First-FE.N.SG article-N.SG.IDF :} All\NT.N.PL human-N.PL.IDF be\IND.PRS-3PL born-NT.N.PL free-NT.N.PL and equal\NT.N.PL {in terms of} respec.t-G.IDF and {human.rights-A.IDF .} They\N have-IND.PRS.3PL reason-A.IDF and con.science-A.IDF and ought-IND.PRS.3PL {to behave-INF} each-A.SG around (an)other-MA.A.SG in {brother.hood-A.SG.IDF .} | 1 article: All humans are born free and equal in terms of respect and rights. They [all] have conscience and reason and ought to behave brotherly each around another.}}

Lord's Prayer

The following is a sample text of the Lord's Prayer in Faroese. The first line is the orthographic version; the second is the International Phonetic Alphabet transcription; the third is the gloss. A recording posted under the @teknmal767 channel is available on YouTube, it contains two performances of the prayer spoken and signed.

| Faðir vár, Tú, sum ert í Himli. Heilagt verði navn Títt. Komi ríki Títt. Verði vilji Tín, sum í Himli, so á jørð. Gev okkum {í dag} okkara dagliga breyð. Og fyrigev okkum syndir okkara, {so sum} vit eisini fyrigeva teimum, ið móti okkum synda. [Og] Leið okkum ikki í fre[i]stingar, men frels okkum frá {tí illa}. Tí at [T]ítt er ríkið, valdið og heiðurin um allar ævir. Amen. | ˈfɛaː-jɪɹ {ˈvɔaːɹ-∅ } ˈtʰʉuː sʊm ˌ(ʔ)ɛɻ̊ː-ʈ ʊi {ˈhɪmːl-ɪ } {ˈhaiːlaʰ-t ()} (ˈ)ve(ː)ɹ-ɪ ˌnauːn-∅ {ˈtʰʊi-ʰtː } ˈkʰoːm-ɪ ˌɹʊiːt͡ʃ-ɪ {ˈtʰʊi-ʰtː } ˈveːɹ-ɪ ˌvɪlːj-ɪ {ˈtʰʊiːn-∅ } sʊm ʊi {ˈhɪmːl-ɪ ()} so ʔɔa {ˈjøːɹ-∅ } ˈt͡ʃeːv-∅ ɔʰkˑ-ʊn ʊiˈtɛaː ɔʰkˑ-aɹa ˌtak.lij-a {ˈpɹɛiː-∅ } ʔɔ ˈfiˑɹɪ.ˌt͡ʃeːv-∅ ɔʰkˑ-ʊn ˈsɪnːt-ɪɹ {ɔʰkˑ-aɹa } {soˑ sʊɱ‿} ˈviˑt-∅ ˈʔaiːsɪnɪ ˈfiˑɹɪ.ˌt͡ʃɛv-a {ˈtʰaiː-mʊn } ʔʊi ˈmœuːtɪ ɔʰkˑ-ʊn {ˈsɪnːt-a } ʔɔ ˈlaiː-∅ ɔʰkˑ-ʊn ɪʰt͡ʃˑ‿ ʊi {ˈfɹaisːt.ɪŋk-aɹ } mɛn ˈfɹɛɬːs-∅ ɔʰkˑ-ʊn ˌfɹɔaː {tʰʊiˈʔɪtˑla } tʰʊi at ˈtʰʊi-ʰtː ɛɹ-∅ {‿ˈʊiːt͡ʃ-ɪ } {ˈvalːt-ɪ ()} ʔɔ {ˈhaiː-(ʊ)ɹɪn } ʔʊm ˈʔatˑl-aɹ {ˈʔɛaːv-ɪɹ } ˈʔamːˌɛn | Father-N.SG.IDF our-N.SG you\N.SG REL be\PRS.IND-2PS in {Heaven-D.SG.IDF .} Holy-NT.N become-SUB.PRS.3PS name-N.IDF {Your-NT.N.SG .} Come-SUB.PRS.3PS reign-N.IDF {Your-NT.N.SG .} Be-SUB.PRS.3PS will-N.IDF {Your-MA.N.SG ,} as:CONJ in Heaven-D.SG.IDF as:ADV on {earth-D.SG.IDF .} Give-IMP.2PS us-D.PL today our daily-FE.A.SG {bread-A.SG.IDF .} And forgive-IMP.2PS us-D.PL sin-A.PL.IDF {our ,} {just as} we-N also forgive-IND.PRS.3PS those-D.PL REL against us-D.PL {sin-INF .} And lead-IMP.2PS us-D.PL not into {temptation-A.PL.IDF ,} but deliver-IMP.2PS us-D.PL from {evil [lit: it\D.SG badly] .} For:CONJ to you-NT.A.SG be\PRS.IND-3PS {realm-N.SG.DF ,} power-N.SG.DF and glory-N.SG.DF through all-A.PL {eternity-A.PL.IDF .} {Amen .} | Our Father, You, who stand in Heaven. Hallowed be Your name, may Your kingdom come, may Your will be done, on earth as [is] in Heaven. Give us today our daily bread. And forgive us our offenses, just as we also forgive those who offended us. And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For Yours is the realm, the power and the glory forever. Amen.}}

References

Footnotes

Citations

References

1. Sandøy, H., Frå tre dialektar til tre språk. In: Gunnstein Akselberg og Edit Bugge (red.), Vestnordisk språkkontakt gjennom 1200 år. Tórshavn, Fróðskapur, 2011, pp. 19-38. [http://folk.uib.no/hnohs/Publikasjonar/Sandoy,%201410,%20Fraa%20tre%20dialektar%20til%20tre%20spraak.pdf]
2. {{Cite OED. Faroese
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7. Chr. Matras. Greinaval – málfrøðigreinir. FØROYA FRÓÐSKAPARFELAG 2000
8. "The Faroese Language". [[University of Valencia]].
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10. "Jakob Jakobsen (1864-1918)".
11. Jensen, Jan. (2022-12-01). "Reconfiguring Hell: Urgency and Salvation in the Faroe Islands". Social Anthropology/Anthropologie Sociale.
12. Mitchinson, John. (2012). "Danish in the Faroe Islands: a post-colonial perspective". University College London.
13. Leonard, Stephen Pax. (March 2016). "A "High-Intimacy" Language in the Atlantic: Radio and Purism in the Faroe Islands". Journal of Anthropological Research.
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18. Petersen, Hjalmar P.. (December 2023). ["The Change of ''þ'' to ''h'' in Faroese"](https://setur.fo/uploads/tx_tcpublications/Petersen_HP_The_Change_of_%C3%BE_to_h.pdf}}{{dead link).
19. According to Hjalmar Petersen in: Tórður Jóansson: ''English loanwords in Faroese''. Tórshavn: Fannir 1997, S. 45 (in red: later corrections, 21. July 2008). In green: corrections of German Wikipedia article [[:de:Färöische Sprache]]
20. (June 2018). "Attitudes to variation in spoken Faroese". Journal of Sociolinguistics.
21. Jacobsen, Jógvan í Lon. (2023). "Faroese Dialect Classifications". Dialectologia.
22. Petersen, Hjalmar Páll. (2022). "Evidence for the modification of dialect classification of modern Faroese". European Journal of Scandinavian Studies.
23. Knooihuizen, Remco. (May 2014). "Variation in Faroese and the development of a spoken standard: In search of corpus evidence". Nordic Journal of Linguistics.
24. Árnason, Kristján. (2011). "The Phonology of Icelandic and Faroese". Oxford University Press.
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27. "Faðir vár".
28. (19 December 2021). "Faðir vár".