How many people and how many languages! The linguistic diversity of the world, if you think about it, is amazing. According to rough estimates of linguistic scientists in the world there are about seven thousand varieties. And these are only well-known, described and officially recognized. And how many more can be unknown and unexplored languages? But even among those studied, there are those that you don’t often hear about. For example, Faroese language. We bet that a considerable proportion of our readers have not heard of him before.
Where do they speak Faroese?
The answer to this question is simple. The Faroese language is spoken on islands whose name is similar to the name of the language. And these are the Faroe Islands, lying in the northern part of the Atlantic Ocean, between Scotland (Shetland Islands) and Iceland. This territory is part of the Kingdom of Denmark, but since 1948 it has been autonomous and has made almost all state decisions independently, except for defense, justice, police, common currency and foreign policy.
They speak the Faroese language and in Denmark itself. There, this language is adopted as the language of a national minority. However, one cannot say that it is rarely used.
That is, the Faroe Islands, like Denmark itself, are the main place for the distribution of the language. When the question is asked in which country the Faroese language is most widely spoken, this does not mean at all that it is spoken only there. Communicate on it in other European countries, due to long-standing contacts and a mixture of peoples. In addition, do not forget that we live in an age of multi-ethnicity and multiculturalism. This means that you can also hear the Faroese language in countries that are very far from the original area of its distribution. Say in the United States of America or in Canada.
What kind of language is Faroese? Where did he come from?
The Faroese language belongs to the North Germanic group and is part of the Indo-European language family. Along with the Norwegian, Icelandic and extinct Norse languages, it comes from the ancient Pan-Norse language, which is also called Old Norse. This protolanguage was common in the Middle Ages on a fairly vast territory.
The Faroese language has preserved many features of the Old Icelandic language. For example, in it, only three vowels can be brief in unstressed position: [a], [i], [u]. Also in the Faroese language there is no hiatus, that is, a transitional sound is always inserted between adjacent vowels, which in linguistics is called "glide".
A characteristic phenomenon for this language is scerping, which means moving forward back vowels and monophthongization of some diphthongs.
The Faroese alphabet consists of twenty nine letters.
In its grammatical structure, the Faroese language belongs to inflected languages. It has three grammatical genders and four cases: nominative, genitive, accusative and dative.
Adjectives in the Faroese language have three degrees of comparison and vary not only by gender, number and case, but also by degree of certainty.
Nouns can be definite and indefinite. The certainty of nouns is expressed by the suffix article.
There are also four auxiliary verbs in this language: at vera (“to be”), at hava (“to have”), at verða (“to become, become”), at blíva (“to be, become”). Verbs in it are divided into eleven conjugation classes.
How many people speak Faroese?
There is an assumption that this is the most spoken language in Europe, which is not threatened with the extinction or disappearance of its direct carriers. The Faroese language is spoken, according to rough estimates, of the order of forty-eight thousand people in the Faroe Islands and about twenty-five thousand people in Denmark and other countries. The number of speakers remains relatively stable from year to year.
Is there literature in the Faroese language?
Of course, literary creation in this language has a place to be. One of the most famous prose writers of the Faroe Islands is Hedin Bru.
His first novel, Lognbrá, was published in 1930, and in 1935 the second part of the novel, entitled Fastatøkur, was released. This work tells the story of a boy who grew up in the Faroe Islands. The work is based on autobiographical facts: the writer himself grew up in a fishing village. From an early age he learned the profession of a fisherman.
Hedin Brue's most famous and cult book was published in 1940. "Feðgar á ferð" is a tense and dramatic story of changes in the peasant milieu that cause generational conflict.
In addition to the actual writing, Hedin Bru is known as a talented translator from European languages to Faroese.