German is one of the most widely spoken languages today, but what do we know about its origins? While German as a language is different from Latin and later Romance languages, many Indo-European elements of German are very similar to Latin, especially lexically and morphologically. The earliest accounts of the “Germani” were written by Roman military officials such as Julius Caesar and others. These officials had interacted with the Germanic tribes along the Rhine River from 50 BCE–400 CE. Hence, the only early accounts that exist are in Latin, as there was no written German in the Rhine region until around 800 CE. This poses the question how and why did written German develop during the Holy Roman Empire and not earlier during these military campaigns?
This thesis explored the Roman influence on the emergence of German as a written language. The project looked at interactions between the Germanic tribes and Romans described by Roman texts about Germania. It is also supported by archaeological data from around the 5th century CE and a review of recent relevant theories of language development. This paper discusses linguistic characteristics of Latin and how it is relevant to the formation of the German language.
Written German developed during the creation of a complex social and political system: the Holy Roman Empire evolving from the Germanic Tribes consisting of complex chiefdoms. Major findings from this research includes key influences from the Romans such as religious, political and linguistic traits like the adoption of Christianity, the political structure of the emperor and use of rhyming and different case structures in early texts.
Author: Ellie Timmons
Faculty Advisor: Dr. John M. Jeep, GRAMELAC
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