Le Nord : revue internationale des Pays de Nord - 01.06.1941, Blaðsíða 233

THE SCAND. COMMUNITY OF LANGUAGE 227
would of course also be very useful if we could agree on common
Scandinavian signs for the sounds written in Swedish a, d, and ö.
Nor should it prove beyond the range of possibility to establish
similar principles for all the three languages as regards the spelling
of foreign loan-words. On this point, Danish is the most con-
servative, while Norwegian is the most radical, Swedish occupy-
ing a position between the two. Danish writes e. g. Bureau, Bro-
chure, Gravure, Planche, Salon, Fauteuil, Toilet, Douche, In-
terview, Essay, Soiré, Sæson, Terrœn, Race, loyal; Swedish writes
these words hyrd, hroschyr, gravyr, plansch, salong, fatölj, toalett,
dusch, intervju, essa, soaré, sasong, terrang, ras, lojal, while Nor-
wegian writes them hyra, hrosjyre, gravyr, plansje, salong,
fatölje, toalett, dusj, intervju, essay, soaré, sesong, terreng, rase,
lojal. Norwegian has recently, alone of the Scandinavian
languages, introduced spellings like stasjon, mosjon, aksje, gasje,
plansje, sjef, sjalu, sjdför, garasje, etc. On the whole, much might
be gained by the judicious revision of the existing orthographies
on Scandinavian lines. The guiding principle should be that no
unnecessary dissimilarities between the Scandinavian written
languages should be allowed to remain, and above all that fresh
dissimilarities should not be permitted to creep in and to become
a cause of linguistic and cultural isolation.
We now turn to the spoken language. Here the
difficulties in the way of a change on common Scandinavian lines
are far greater. Standard Danish is of course based on the develop-
ment which the common Scandinavian parent language has under-
gone in Denmark, especially in the dialects spoken in Zealand.
Standard Swedish reflects the development of the Central Swedish
regional dialects. This is the principal cause of the divergencies
between the two Standard languages. Both are of course a good
deal different from the original parent source, and here Danish
has moved furthest away. Some of the differences are reflected
in the written language, others are not. Thus Danish p, t, and k
have become h, d, and g, as in Skih ship, grihe catch, Mad food,
hide bite, Tag roof, age drive, whereas Swedish has preserved the
original sounds, as in the corresponding skepp, gripa, mat, hita,
tak, aka. The Danish change appears already in the earliest texts
from about 1300, and on this point there is, of course, no going
back. It should be borne in mind, however, that the written
language is much more conservative than the spoken, so that a