1/3. Faroese language story ("O, móðurmál")

[@aaln1aaln132]

Help the international audience with subtitles please. Lovely cinemtography

[@stevebloodymckenna]

I wish I could understand this. I am really interested in the Faroese language and its hard to find anything on the language on the internet. (i have been learning Norwegian for the past year so I know that móðurmál is a cognate of morsmål (mothertongue). looks interesting though.

[@Rovarin]

The documentary basically explains the history of the Faroese language. What I can remember from common knowledge about Faroese: It broke off (or developed) from West Norse around 1100 or 1200 (can't remember, maybe 1300). Archaic Faroese written language may have been used until the Reformation, when the language of the Dano-Norwegian Realms became Danish. The Faroese language survived as a spoken language and in the late 1700s and early to mid 1800s it was widely perceived by the few learned Faroese to be a dying language. Around 1850 V. U. Hammershaimb published his Faroese Orthography which served as a basis of the Modern Faroese Written Language (which is like Nynorsk a constructed language).

[@stevebloodymckenna]

Thank you for the imformation.

[@Rovarin]

There are a few samples of early (archaic) written Faroese/West Norse at the Norwegian wikisite Heimskringla(dot)no. Search for 'Brot úr gomlum føroyskum lögskipanum og skjalsbrövum'. The samples are taken from A. C. Evensen's Lesibók (Faroese reader) from 1911. They might be interesting if you are able to read West Norse or Old Norse).

[@stevebloodymckenna]

I can't read Old Norse. If its in Faroese, which is somewhat similar to Nynorsk I might be able to understand a little bit. I can read Nynorsk decently. And I've taken a look at Faroese before and can recognise a lot of similar words to Norwegian.

[@Rovarin]

Then I may suggest finding some of Arne Torp's videos (I don't think he has a channel here, but some of his videos are here). One of them features a conversation in Norwegian spoken around the 1400s... sounds a bit like a mix between Icelandic, Faroese and Norwegian to me. Arne Torp has also made some videos on spoken ProtoNorse (constructed) and Norse(two videos featuring the same stanzas from Atlakviðja (part of the Nordic variant of the Nibelungenlied)). and JacksonCrawford (youtuber) has an excellent channel on the Norse Language.

[@Nekotaku_TV]

Faroese is so interesting. It’s so hard to define if you don’t really know how it evolved. But as a Swede it’s very hard to understand and then suddenly a whole sentence is like Swedish. And it’s not that similar to Icelandic, it’s really like a it’s own distinct language along with Danish and Swedish/Norwegian. (Norwegian and Swedish are too similar to compare like that)

[@Oddn7751]

As a speaker of a relatively conservative dialect of Western Norwegian(you would probably have problems understanding me), I'd say it's a lot closer to Norwegian than Icelandic, kind of like an extreme Western dialect with a more Northern Norwegian intonation.

[@dan74695]

@@Oddn7751 R-arne åt færøyskt ljoda òg nordnorskt.

[@sdfopsdmsdofjmp7863]

The pronunciation is exactly like Swedish, and at times it sounds like they are speaking Swedish, but most of the time it just sounds like Swedish gibberish.

[@Farerets]

To me, the pronunciation is more like West Norwegian dialects (Aalesund area), which are quite far from the standard Norwegian, both phonetically and even in terms of vocabulary.

[@jeppahorse]

Sounds abit like a Northern norwegian dialect as well. Those irish-style R's: kzbin.info/www/bejne/g3Kkep2kh7t4maM

[@Rimrock300]

Much here is spoken in danish with a faroese accent, that's possible what you understand well, what you feel sounds similar to Swedish. The 'Swedish gibberish' is part spoken in pure Faroese I guess) Faroese is probably the most similar to a mix between Icelandic and west coast norwegian accent, but naturally people from around the nordic countrys will understand more or less

[@sirkyrxon936]

I'm actually hearing a strange Finnish and Icelandic voice

[@belstar1128]

The vocabulary is very different i can't understand this.

[@lypetersen2255]

Altso eri eg tann einasta sum er føroyingur her?😂

[@markusjoensen1608]

Eg eri eisini Føroyingur, eg skuldi hyggja eftur hesum, tí at læraran segði at eg skuldi.

[@Nekotaku_TV]

Why are you so rare online!? You’re the first person I’ve come across I think.

[@christopherchristianvanlan1809]

Nope men eri noe svenske-halv- oyingur folk. gott nog?

[@Taderbaraeg]

Nei góði

[@nicolas94h]

I can actually understand quite a bit and I'm Danish

[@Farerets]

No wonder, as all Nordic languages (and for that sake German, Dutch, Afrikaans and Frisian) have many common words.

[@nicolas94h]

Farerets But it doesn't quite sound like Faroese

[@Farerets]

No, definitely not!

[@TheKristjan777]

nicolas94h maybe because he was speaking danish aswell 😀

[@bjornerlendur4606]

@@TheKristjan777 so that's why I don't understand, because he's speaking Danish