Re: Fransk Dansk-Norse Dictionary

Paul Bennett wrote:

> quoting Andreas Johansson:
>
>> Quoting Scotto Hlad:
>>
>>> A while back, I picked up a dictionary at a flea market. It is
>>> Fransk
>>> Dansk-Norse. While I understand that it translates between French
>>> and
>>> Danish-Norwegian, I'm not sure what Danish-Norwegian is. Could it
>>> be another
>>> name for Bokmal or Nynorsk?
>>
>> It would refer to Bokmål (also known in English as Dano-Norwegian).
>
> Doesn't Dano-Norwegian refer to Riksmål?
I don't know if there's a widespread English term, but Dano-Norwegian
could be applied either to Riksmål or Bokmål, though Riksmål has a
stronger Danish flavour.

> AIUI, wasn't that the "classical" dialect of Danish used by the
> educated urbanites in Norway pre-Bokmål, as opposed to the
> "vulgate" Norwegian dialects that were koinized into Nynorsk?
Not exactly. Before the 18th century there weren't any strict
standards for writing in the Dano-Norwegian kingdom, and basically
everyone wrote the same language with a local flavour, but leaning
towards Danish as most of the education took place in Denmark, plus
most of the most important official documents came from Denmark.

Then the Danish grammarians standardised the language and it was
taught in Norway, too. Any norwegianisms were frowned upon. After
1814 however an interest in developing a national writing standard
emerged, and Riksmål and Nynorsk were the first attempts. Bokmål is a
20th century invention, used by more than 80%. Today the Bokmål
standard gives you a choice between the Norwegian and Danish forms in
numerous cases. Many Danish forms are eliminated. But some common
Norwegian forms still are left out, for example the vowel-ending
perfects.

A rough and quick history of Norwegian writing. Bizarre but
interesting stuff, in my opinion.

LEF