The Danish Language: A Story of Dragons, Fairy Tales, and . . . Bluetooth?

[@storylearning]

Interested in teaching English or another language online? Get my free ebook 👉🏼 bit.ly/free_ebook_teach_english_online

[@georginatoland]

The first Scandinavian language I ever heard as a child was Danish, so it has always sounded right to me. I hope to learn the written language someday and read Hans Christian Anderson’s works in his original language. ❤

[@georginatoland]

Solvang, California ❤

[@amerikanskdansker8771]

Dansk er det dejligste sprog i verden!Tusind tak Olly, jeg har ventede meget langt tid for dig til lave en video om Dansk! 🇩🇰🇩🇰🇩🇰

[@natashacallis2736]

Er dansk dit modersmål?

[@amerikanskdansker8771]

@@natashacallis2736 Nej, jeg er Amerikaner, Dansk er min andet sprog! 😀🇩🇰

[@natashacallis2736]

@@amerikanskdansker8771 fedt! Mit modersmål er også engelsk, jeg taler også tysk og lærer fransk og dansk.

[@natashacallis2736]

Jeg ventede eller jeg har ventet* i stedet for jeg har ventede

[@ulrikhgsbro6833]

"Jeg har ventet meget længe på, at du skulle lave en video om dansk" er den korrekte formulering.

[@wmhfanatic]

Language Simp has been featured in an Olly Richards video, this is truly a historic moment

[@handybanana2274]

"Why is the D so soft?"

[@kingkal81]

Please do a video on Dutch. You said it's one of the easiest languages to learn for English speakers.

[@joalexsg9741]

I love learning different languages, even not having time enough for them, especially at this late in life. I heard a beautiful Danish dialect with a cover of Auld Lang Syne and wish it were taught online but I guess this will never happen. Danish is truly beautiful. I confess I only try learning a bit of mainstream Danish now as an intellectual exercise to boost my brain, I've long given up mastering it: the lack of congruence between the pronounced words and their written forms makes it even harder for me than that crazy 'd', not to mention the younger generations speak so fast it becomes totally unfeasible to my ageing neurons.😱😵‍💫 Thanks for the vid!

[@dorteweber3682]

That would have been Steen Steensen Blicher's translation into West Jutlandic, "Skuld gammel wenskaw rejn forgo" It was a stroke of genius - Robert Burns' poem was written in Scots, then about to be demoted to a dialect of English. The west Jutland dialext was similarly ridiculed by the denizens of the capiltal. nothing has changed...

[@Aidan_Au]

Thanks Olly for doing a video on both Norwegian and Danish. Let's do Swedish and Finnish next.

[@corinna007]

Yes, please. I've been wanting a video on Finnish for months, if not longer.

[@poetzschc]

Jeg er tysker og da jeg var 16 år gammel ville jeg lære mig et sprog, som mange tysker ikke kunde tale. Jeg købte en parlør med en grammofonskive og begyndte med dansk. Senere flyttede jeg til Hamburg. Her er der en dansk kirke og der mødte jeg mange dansker der arbejdede i Hamburg. Det var en meget sjovt tid. Jeg kan godt lide denne typisk danske humor. Desværre har jeg i mellemtiden tabt kontakten med mine danske venner .

[@Patrikch100]

I Just love how danish sounds❤️❤️❤️

[@feralworm]

Having moved from Canada to Denmark nearly 9 years ago, I really appreciate the in-depth nature of this dive into the Danish language. I have become fluent-ish in the language, but it does sometimes mess with the other two languages in my repertoire, namely French and English. For example, I continue to understand French when spoken or read, but when I attempt an entire phrase in French, it quickly becomes a strange Danish-French hybrid. In another case (working in a shop), I told someone in English "That have we there over" which is English words directly applying the Danish inversion grammatical structure... As far as the numbers structure, from an entertainment standpoint I enjoy explaining it (to Danes and non-Danes alike), but from a practical standpoint of learning the language, it's potentially best to just memorize and let go of the why! I have, however, learned to accomodate Norwegians and Swedes by telling them item prices in their less-confusing number systems instead of in Danish!

[@lovfro]

The Danish number system is pretty close to the French, though. We just indicate when we are halfway to the next multiplier of 20, while in French, it is indicated that ten is added to the last multiplier of 20.

[@icelandicforforeigners]

The Danish vowels are very complex, which makes it a fun adventure for foreigners. I've even spoken with linguistically trained Danes who have difficulty distinguishing between different vowels until you point out minimal pairs. Thankfully, apart from the "soft D," the consonants aren't terribly difficult for English speakers.

[@kristianemilpaludan1653]

Good video, and very detailed! For the nerdy nerds who are interested, here are some additions from a native speaker: I do think he makes Danish less phonetic than it actually is. I would say it's about as phonetic as English, where there are some general rules, but a lot of exceptions. And endings of words don't disappear! They are reduced, but still important, like the silent endings in French, they influence the pronunciation of vowels and consonants before them. E.g. The last e is often unpronounced, but it changes the length and stress of the last vowel before it, and contrary to popular belief, you can also often hear from the intonation and stress whether something is one long word or two separate words, and whether something is a name or a noun. Thats how every Dane can easily distinguish between Emma Gad, Emma gad, Emma Gade, and Emmagade in speech :) But the differences are very subtle. In the example in 21:57 you can hear the difference between vejen and Vejen, since the latter one is a name, it has a different stress than the conjugated noun. The only word that is truly irregular here from Danish pronunciation rules is "det" (meaning "it") where the t is not pronounced (this is by the way also common in Swedish and Norwegian), and "der" which in her dialect is pronounced more like "dar", but in other dialects is pronounced regularly like "er". You can easily find a sentence with more irregular spellings though. Especially loanwords are not following the general patterns, but it can be difficult to know whether something is a loanword. tagetage is a famous example, where most Danes look at the word and read tage-tage which would be pronounced "tayetaye" but it is actually a compound of tag and etage where the latter is a french loanword. Thus the pronunciation should be taow-étasche, where "aow" was my attempt at spelling out the sound "owl but without the l" -Notice how taye changed to taow now, because the e is no longer present in the first compound, and how the second g is now pronounced differently to closer resemble how a g is pronounced in french. Norwegian bokmål has taken away many of these irregular spellings to match modern pronunciation (of Norwegian of course), so etage is for instance spelt etasje in bokmål. So actually Norwegian spelling also matches Danish pronunciation a little better than Danish spelling in many cases. D and h are however regularly completely silent and are only there for etymological reasons. In modern danish, d after a consonant is almost always silent but acts as if there were two of the first consonant instead (so ld and ll are the same and nd is the sames as nn). Hv is just pronounced as v in insular Danish but in some Jutlandic dialects v is pronounced like w and I think some even keep the h sound non-silent so "hvad" is pronounced "hwa". (in general Danish is naturally non-phonetic when it comes to the other dialects). Lastly I think it is important to know that the dialects without stød have pitch accents (like Swedish and Norwegian) instead to differentiate words. I don't think that is easier to learn than stød unless you come from a language with pitch, but it might sound prettier haha

[@veradokic861]

Thank you for making a video on danish

[@storylearning]

Thank you for watching it :)

[@NobleDraKolnsbbg]

@@storylearning 11:20

[@NobleDraKolnsbbg]

@@storylearning 21:08

[@thedorian1]

These language profile videos are my favorite! Olly, is there a chance you could do one on Hungarian? And thank you for these!

[@lorenskauppi4196]

Very interesting! As a Swedish person I can often understand Norwegian, but not danish. Though written danish is a lot easier. The text is pretty similar to Swedish.

[@yarathofficial404]

When will you make intermediate level short stories in Brazilian Portuguese? I love your short stories! I read your beginners level already and want the intermediate whenever you make them

[@kathryndavies7367]

I enjoy these videos , they are really interesting. 😊 Thank you. It would be good if there was a video on Welsh as well :D. Never seen you talk about Welsh.

[@kurtwaldheim4048]

Since you wonder about paper, they actually used wax tablets. Many have been found, so it was a common way of writing temporary text.

[@natashacallis2736]

Tak fordi du har lavet en video om det danske sprog! Jeg har lært dansk i 8 måneder og jeg synes det er et dejligt og smukt sprog og jeg kan rigtigt godt lide dansk! 🇩🇰 kan du ikke lave en video om svensk?

[@ulrikhgsbro6833]

Thank you for this video. As a Dane I find it quite interesting.

[@HSLSKD]

Thank you for this video , I wanted one talking about the Danish language . And sorry again for my English , I don't use it very often here - Can you recommend some books .

[@srenjensen3817]

At the 13:18 timestamp, the statue is of H.C. Ørsted, a different person, but perhaps the most impressive Dane ever.

[@kotgarfield]

Great video! I'd love to see one on Finnish ;)

[@tmhc72_gtg22c]

I have long thought that Danish is the foreign language that sounds the most like English (or American English) or that it sounds somewhere between English and Dutch. After studying Swedish a bit, I find that I can understand a lot of written Danish. (The level of difficulty of trying to read Danish after studying Swedish may be comparable to trying to read Afrikaans after studying Dutch.) Norwegian seems very roughly to me to be like written Danish with Swedish pronunciation.

[@Bjowolf2]

You forgot to mention that the West Germanic Old English ( Anglo-Saxon) language was completely transformed and simplified significantly during the clash and later fusion with the North Germanic Old Norse of the Danish and Norwegian Viking settlers in N. & E. England plus parts of Scotland, which over time became some sort of a Germanic creole language ( with a lot of French & Latin words added on top of it over time ) as it transitioned into the remarkably different Middle English ), which even today has many deep similarities with basic Danish & Scandinavian vocabulary and its grammatical structure, still making English a fairly language for Danes to learn, since we by magic already "know" many bits and pieces in advance. Simple sentences written in Danish will even often look like some sort of weird older, but still quite understandable Pseudo English because of these deep links. ME also used to have this inversion between subject and verb in certain cases, as far as I know ( before the peculiar modern use of "do" became common some time in the 15th century - possibly as an influence from the Welsh language ). So it was circa: ME What (hwat!) seek(est) thou here? D Hvad søg-er du (thu) her [heir]? ( N& S søker / sökar) ME Now have we come (for) to see you / thee. ( or Early Modern E. ( Shakespeare, Richard the Third ): "Now IS the winter of our discontent ... " ) D Nu er [air] (are) / har [hAr] (haver) vi [ve] kommet for at se dig ( orig. "thik"! ). Check out Langfocus' brilliant video called "Viking Influence on the English Language", if you want a more detailed explanation.

[@Gert-DK]

As an example he uses: "Aldrig har jeg set noget så mærkeligt". You can also do it like this: "Jeg har aldrig set noget så mærkeligt". It's the same. I think in English too.

[@arngrimandersen5690]

I make Rune one a lot of thing today , one wood , stone , in iron , like knife , animal horn , skin , and so , it is great to do that in year 2024

[@emillundqvist8126]

As a dane from southern jutland, I could understand Ida. I don't use the dialect myself though. And I would totally understand if someone who didn't grow up with parents speaking the dialect wouldn't be able to understand it.

[@emillundqvist8126]

Also at 20:36 that was an example of a "soft D", not a silent D. The soft D is arguably one of the hardest things for foreigners to learn.

[@samuraialfredo]

Language Simp was the highlight of this video. 🤩

[@emelywindthomsen1761]

The video is Amazing. I do however have one issue and that is that you use people from Germany with pretty thick German accents to show what Danish sounds like.

[@rickybuhl3176]

Narhval - Nar being a fool. Perfect.

[@martinpoulsen6564]

It's a soft D In bad, and not silent - unless you're on the island Funen (Fyn), where they don't exist in the language, or dialect if you will, hence can be considered silent. But nowhere else. Everywhere else is a soft D, as you said, resembling the th sound in English.

[@kahnfatman]

As a native Vietnamese speaker I feel challenged when some language dares to claim the throne of having many vowels. In Vietnamese we have 11 single letter vowels A, Ă, Â, E, Ê, I/Y, O, Ô, Ơ, U, Ư 32 diphthongs: AI, AO, AU, ÂU, AY , ÂY ,EO, ÊU, IA, IÊ/YÊ, IU, OA, OĂ, OE, OI, ÔI, ƠI, OO, ÔÔ, UA,UĂ, UÂ, ƯA, UÊ, UI, ƯI, UO, UÔ, UƠ, ƯƠ, ƯU, UY. and 13 triphthongs : IÊU/YÊU, OAI, OAO, OAY, OEO, UAO, UÂY, UÔI, ƯƠI, ƯƠU, UYA, UYÊ, UYU. Altogether 56 vowels -- and we don't claim the throne here. Anyways, have fun with your lips -- and tongues and throats because it is a phonetic language!!!!

[@boesvig2258]

I have to correct some of the subtext translation here. "Grød" has a wider meaning than "porridge", and "rødgrød med fløde" is definitely NOT "red porridge with cream". There’s no cereal in it. If you want an English equivalent to "rødgrød", it’s almost like a simplified version of a red berry trifle.

[@lDanielHolm]

There's absolutely cereal in the _traditional_ recipe for rødgrød. It was made with groats or grit, which are made up of grains. Nowadays it's often made with different thickening agents (most commonly potato starch), but that's where the original name came from, and often cereals are still used -- semolina flour comes to mind.

[@boesvig2258]

@@lDanielHolm Google "porridge" and "rødgrød" and look at the pictures. That should be enough to convince you that "porridge" is a very poor translation. You might be technically correct in a "well, AAACKSHUALLY..." sense, but that doesn't change the fact that "grød" and "porridge" aren't 1-to-1 translations of eachother. Besides, I've been through about twenty recipes now, for "traditionel" or "gammeldags" rødgrød, and while they do obviously contain a very small amount of potato or corn flour for thickening, I haven't found any that are cereal based. Feel free to back up your claim.

[@lDanielHolm]

​@@boesvig2258 Corn _is a cereal._ The Danish word 'korn' is translated to either 'corn' or 'cereal'. They're the same thing. Even if you're using it in the American sense, meaning maize, maize is also a cereal grain. 'Porridge' and 'grød' absolutely do refer to precisely the same thing. The earliest versions of rødgrød was very different to the modern dessert. It was literally any kind of porridge that was red in color. Here's a recipe from 1710: Rød Grød, 1710 Tag et half pund Riismeel / og halfanden pot rød Viin / tver det der udi med Sucker / Cardemomme / Caneel og smaaskaaren Suckat / lad det kaage indtil det bliver jævn tyck / tag saa Mandeler for 4. Skilling / stød dem smaa og tver dem der iblant / og lad det koge der med / og om du vilt / kand du vel komme det i Steen-Former / eller kand du komme det i et Fad / og gif Wiin / Sucker / reven Citron-Skaller derover / eller strøe over med smaa Staffer / Sucker / alle slags hvilcke du vilt. - Anna Wigant: En Høy-Fornemme Madames Kaage-Bog, København 1710 This one is based on rice flour and red wine, mixed with sugar, cinnamon, cardamom, almonds, and lemon zest. You can read up on the history of rødgrød here, if you can read Danish: madamsif.dk/2022/05/13/roedgroed-en-liden-historie/

[@boesvig2258]

​@@lDanielHolm I'm sorry, but you're simply wrong. Let's take it slow, one point at a time. 1. "Corn is a cereal." Yes, obviously. But it's just as obvious that "rødgrød" isn't cereal-based just because you can optionally use a little corn flour to thicken it. 2. "'Porridge' and 'grød' absolutely do refer to precisely the same thing.2 This is the central argument. And no, it doesn't refer to precisely the same thing. "PORRIDGE" is "a dish consisting of oatmeal or another meal or cereal boiled in water or milk", according to Oxford Languages. Definitions in Collins, Longman, Cambridge, and Merriam-Webster dictionaries don't differ significantly. "GRØD" has two meanings (disregarding the figurative ones) according to ordnet.dk: A) "varm madret tilberedt af fx gryn eller mel, der koges med mælk eller vand" [My translation: Hot dish made from cereal or flour boiled in milk or water]; and B) "madret tilberedt af frugt eller bær, der koges med vand og evt. tilsættes sukker og jævning" [My translation: Dish made from fruit or berries boiled in water, optionally with sugar and/or thickening added]. "Rødgrød" falls under this second definition. And "porridge" doesn't have this secondary meaning. Therefore, "rødgrød" is NOT "porridge". 3. "The earliest versions of rødgrød was very different to the modern dessert." Key point being "very different". The "rødgrød" we know today dates back to the late 1800s, and its main ingredient is berries. Well done for digging up an old recipe for at completely different dish that happens to share the same name. But that doesn't change the fact that "rødgrød", as it is most commonly used today, can't be translated to "porridge".

[@lDanielHolm]

@boesvig2258 That's a secondary definition, not a separate one - note the numbering. Porridge is still the correct translation for grød, but I will grant that it isn't the most fitting in every case. That said, my particular objection to this specific case is that you said it doesn't contain cereal, when it absolutely can do just that.

[@micca9559]

I feel sorry for people who have to learn my language. Never thought about how hard it is till i met my husband who is not danish. Our pronunciation of words are crazy and nothing makes sense.

[@tommyvictorbuch6960]

Det var sateme en ordentlig omgang om det danske sprog.

[@SvensssonboiMapping]

2:36 That's the United Kingdom not England!

[@jmwild22]

🙄

[@icelandicshtuff7750]

Hi, when you talk about silent D you actually mean the soft D. This is really difficult for English speakers as the sound doesn't exist in English. We often perceive it as L but if you speak it like that it sounds wrong to Danish people. The tongue touches the back of the bottom teeth and does not touch the roof of the mouth. The silent D is where the D is literally not pronounced at all, as in the name Anders (sounds like Anners). The hard D is obvious, like in Danmark. Historically the soft D is descended from the "th" sound ð, and that's how it's phonetically notated in Danish dictionaries.

[@Bjowolf2]

Yes, the soft d (ð)in Danish similar to the -th in English as in "with", but without sticking the tip of your tongue out 😂 - but just letting it rest up against your lower front teeth instead.

[@WalesTheTrueBritons]

Danish, and Scandinavian myths in general come from the Cimbri Tribe. Who were “Celtic”. Cymry, Cimbri, Cumbrians, Cimmerians. All originally the same people!

[@corinna007]

Still waiting for a video on Finnish. 😅 But as far as the Scandinavian languages, I think I'd like to learn Icelandic and Swedish or Norwegian.

[@lDanielHolm]

Southern Jutlandic is mostly incomprehensible even to Danes, yeah. I come from Funen and I could not understand a single word the first time through. Even after carefully listening to it, I can only get, like, half.

[@ole7146]

Æ tøs do ska slaw ud æ lyttelapper😂 Glædelig jul

[@lDanielHolm]

@@ole7146 Glædelig jul :P

[@Daniel-qr3ng]

Now I just need a video about the Portuguese language 😊

[@tumarfa]

The leprechauns failed to pillage the cabbage kingdom before the bomber blimps arrived.

[@kritiskblick]

The best way to learn Dansk is going to Sweden JK... Swedish is a bid complex but not that advanced like Danish :v

[@shawnhapney8784]

Only thing I can say is: I believe Scandinavian people are extremely intelligent.

[@sulegonen5612]

It s like cold water

[@KyotoMelody]

And….. a story of quantum theory as well. 😊

[@lba2746]

1) English is derived from Norwegian. The grammar is the same. 2) Danish is spoken as written. The rules of pronunciation follow the Danish rules of pronunciation. 3) The Danish intonation emphasizes the first syllable in the word. English the third syllable in longer words, or the last.. Guess English rules of pronunciation do not apply in French or italian either?

[@angiespicture]

Sweds don't understan Danish unless you come from the south parts of Sweden. Most of them gets Norwegian and the Norwegians seem to have no problem whit Danish or Swedish. So Norway wins😀

[@ole7146]

Well, I come from east Jutland - Denmark, and I've meet many Sweds over the years that didn't have any major problems understanding me.

[@angiespicture]

Good for you🙂@@ole7146

[@MeatballYaro2]

Dutch with an American accent? But Dutch is German with an American accent! ...I t a l l m a k e s s e n s e n o w

[@kevinkurani2961]

are you going to make an albanian episode pls???

[@anthrogal78]

During our recent Scandinavian trip, My husband thought Danish (and Norwegian and Swedish) sounded like Russian (or another Slavic language). The first time I heard Danish after learning Norwegian on and off for a year, I was like “Oh heck no! I’m sticking with Norwegian” 😂 I absolutely did not like the sound of Danish and much prefer Norwegian, and Swedish. (Sorry Danes). Now reading Danish words (with my little bit of Norwegian knowledge) was much easier, though I’m sure I said it with a Norwegian accent.

[@klausolekristiansen2960]

You don't need to understand where the numbers come from, you just have to learn the words. Just like in English. You can not just say twoty, threety, fourty, fivety in English either. Standard Danish is not all based on Copenhagen dialexts. The island dialects have, or had, three genders. The standard two gender system is the east Jutlandish way.

[@gorgioarmanioso151]

It is an exageration of nordicism when it is stated that they were "migthy " they only really conquered almost empty islands Iceland, greenland and the faroese islands and yes for a while the british isles when every one was killing each other... NEVer have i heard the same hype on the Turkish tribes that conquered halv of Europe or the Mongols...

[@veronicajensen7690]

the Turkish didn't conquer half of Europe although they did conquer quite a bit , Denmark once ruled England, Norway, Greenland, Iceland, Faroe Islands, the Virgin Islands and a picee of Africa , I would say that is a bit- do you realize how tiny Denmark is ? , the Vikings also funded Normandy and Russia , it sounds like you should learn a bit more , that said this is not a competition on who was the biggest power, that more like the British empire, Russian empire and Mongolian Empire, the reason many find Norse Vikings interesting is that they spread all over and a lot of people have some of the dna

[@gorgioarmanioso151]

@@veronicajensen7690 I think you are exagerating when stating "the vikings" as they did not even see themselves as the same people (despite that they where right) like danish and swedish was the same language ca year 1000.. Then Greenland, Iceland were founded by Norwegian Vikings ( Not Danes) Denmark had a shitty small colony on Africa and an Island of the Caribbean. Russia or the Kievan Rus started with a dynasty of Swedish princes(so yes u have a point), but they were established there so that the slavic tribes did not slaughter each other, there was never a mighty swedish army colonizing them hence why they speak Ukrainian and Russian over there and not swedish or Danish... Now about the Turks you seem to ignore a lot, they were tribes coming from Mongolia, they subjugated the Persians, they created the empire of Khazan, their descendants formed the Ottoman Empire, that ruled over the whole middle east and large portions of Africa, they even Conquered the Balcans and were only stopped in Wien (vienna austria) .... Silly comparison don't you think so ... And it was not even the first time Remember Attila the HUn.... Gengish Khan ? The great Khan was so great that today even muslim countries adopted the word for king despite the word not coming from any arabic- speaking territory....

[@Jacob-ui6br]

Its a soft D, not a silent D!

[@NightwatchRebel]

i like that you included "perkerdansk" among dialects in modern Denmark 😂

[@ole7146]

And the Norwegians officially call it "kebab Norsk", which made me smile a bit when I first noticed it.

[@Pfsif]

Never met a Dane in the US.

[@ellenstergaardgravesen1011]

If you met anyone whose surname ends with "...sen" they are probably of either Danish or Norwegian descent.

[@Bjowolf2]

We are there under cover 😂

[@PowerOni]

14:54 this can’t be danish… i refuse to belive it xD

[@ellenstergaardgravesen1011]

Oh yes that's how they talk in Southern Jutland. What I got from it in plain danish: "...når man ikke kender nogen, jeg frøs mine tæer og havde ondt i maven. Det er altid..."

[@PowerOni]

@@ellenstergaardgravesen1011 ahh... i see... maybe...

[@gris186]

The Danes really only became Christians for trade and peace reasons. The Crusades were taking off right about the end of the Viking era and by that time nobody wanted to challenge these Christian extremist so it was a very good idea to become "Christians" in order to avoid conflict. Christianity however didn't actually play a big part of people´s lives and it took quite some time to actually Christianize the Danes. In many places people did not accept Christianity for hundreds of years and those who did were often somewhat omnism in their beliefs having both the Asatru and Christianity mixed up in one big puddle. In fact people still used völvas in parts of Denmark to seek guidance for as late as the 1800´s but with time these female seers transcended into priests. Till this day Christianity isn't a big thing either as a religion in Denmark but functions as a cultural thing with about 3/4 of the Danish population being a member of the State Church but with a low percentage of these actually believing in God and a very low number practicing Christianity actively. Quite interesting

[@arngrimandersen5690]

The Brite , think the viking time startet in 788 , then ther was attakt , but no we was viking in year 500 , it is os funny , the world is not centert on England , or US ,

[@andreasneumann-pw1zw]

I rather learn swedish 😅