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Ripuarian (Ripoarish or Ripuarisch Platt, literally: "Riverine" or "Riparian Low German") is a West Germanic
West Germanic languages

The West Germanic languages constitute the largest of the three traditional branches of the Germanic languages family of languages and include languages such as English language, Dutch language and Afrikaans, German language, the Frisian languages, as well as Yiddish language....
 dialect group spoken in the Rhineland
Rhineland

The Rhineland is the general name for the land on both sides of the river Rhine in the west of Germany. After the collapse of the First French Empire in the early 19th century, the German-speaking regions at the middle and lower course of the Rhine were annexed to the kingdom of Prussia....
, eastern Belgium
Belgium

* A small German-speaking Community of Belgium exists in eastern Wallonia. Belgium's linguistic diversity and related political and cultural conflicts are reflected in the history of Belgium and a complex Communities and regions of Belgium....
 and southern Dutch Limburg
Limburg (Netherlands)

Limburg is the southern-most of the twelve provinces of the Netherlands of the Netherlands. It is located in the southeastern part of the country and bordered by Belgium to the south and part of the west, Germany to the east, the Dutch province of North Brabant partly to the west, and the province of Gelderland to the north....
 from northwest of Düsseldorf
Düsseldorf

D?sseldorf is the capital city of the Germany state of North Rhine-Westphalia. It is an economic centre of Germany. The city is situated on the River Rhine and has a high population density - the Rhine-Ruhr metropolitan area has over 10 million inhabitants alone....
 and Cologne
Cologne

Cologne is Germany's fourth-largest city , and is the largest city both in the German Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia and within the Rhine-Ruhr, one of the major European metropolitan areas with more than ten million inhabitants....
 to Aachen
Aachen

is a historic spa town in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is the westernmost city of Germany, located along its borders with Belgium and the Netherlands, 65 km west of Cologne....
 in the west, and Waldbröl
Waldbröl

Waldbr?l is a town is in the southern part of the Oberbergischer Kreis , in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is located about 50 kilometers east of Cologne....
 in the east, and also the name of the people (Ripuarian Franks
Ripuarian Franks

The Ripuarian Franks were Franks that lived in along the Rhine River during the Roman Era....
) who spoke it. It belongs to Central Franconian
Central Franconian

Central Franconian is a name for the following set of dialect groups:* Ripuarian Franconian * Moselle Franconian * Luxembourgish language Luxembourgish is often included within Moselle Franconian, but sometimes regarded as a separate group....
 and Rhinelandic
Rhinelandic

Rhinelandic is a term occasionally used for linguistic varieties in Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands, including the Limburgish language, Zuid-Gelders, Moselle Franconian and Ripuarian ....
. The most famous member is Kölsch, the dialect of Cologne.






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Ripuarian (Ripoarish or Ripuarisch Platt, literally: "Riverine" or "Riparian Low German") is a West Germanic
West Germanic languages

The West Germanic languages constitute the largest of the three traditional branches of the Germanic languages family of languages and include languages such as English language, Dutch language and Afrikaans, German language, the Frisian languages, as well as Yiddish language....
 dialect group spoken in the Rhineland
Rhineland

The Rhineland is the general name for the land on both sides of the river Rhine in the west of Germany. After the collapse of the First French Empire in the early 19th century, the German-speaking regions at the middle and lower course of the Rhine were annexed to the kingdom of Prussia....
, eastern Belgium
Belgium

* A small German-speaking Community of Belgium exists in eastern Wallonia. Belgium's linguistic diversity and related political and cultural conflicts are reflected in the history of Belgium and a complex Communities and regions of Belgium....
 and southern Dutch Limburg
Limburg (Netherlands)

Limburg is the southern-most of the twelve provinces of the Netherlands of the Netherlands. It is located in the southeastern part of the country and bordered by Belgium to the south and part of the west, Germany to the east, the Dutch province of North Brabant partly to the west, and the province of Gelderland to the north....
 from northwest of Düsseldorf
Düsseldorf

D?sseldorf is the capital city of the Germany state of North Rhine-Westphalia. It is an economic centre of Germany. The city is situated on the River Rhine and has a high population density - the Rhine-Ruhr metropolitan area has over 10 million inhabitants alone....
 and Cologne
Cologne

Cologne is Germany's fourth-largest city , and is the largest city both in the German Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia and within the Rhine-Ruhr, one of the major European metropolitan areas with more than ten million inhabitants....
 to Aachen
Aachen

is a historic spa town in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is the westernmost city of Germany, located along its borders with Belgium and the Netherlands, 65 km west of Cologne....
 in the west, and Waldbröl
Waldbröl

Waldbr?l is a town is in the southern part of the Oberbergischer Kreis , in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is located about 50 kilometers east of Cologne....
 in the east, and also the name of the people (Ripuarian Franks
Ripuarian Franks

The Ripuarian Franks were Franks that lived in along the Rhine River during the Roman Era....
) who spoke it. It belongs to Central Franconian
Central Franconian

Central Franconian is a name for the following set of dialect groups:* Ripuarian Franconian * Moselle Franconian * Luxembourgish language Luxembourgish is often included within Moselle Franconian, but sometimes regarded as a separate group....
 and Rhinelandic
Rhinelandic

Rhinelandic is a term occasionally used for linguistic varieties in Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands, including the Limburgish language, Zuid-Gelders, Moselle Franconian and Ripuarian ....
. The most famous member is Kölsch, the dialect of Cologne. Dialects belonging to the Ripuarian group almost always call themselves Platt like Öcher Platt (of Aachen
Aachen

is a historic spa town in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is the westernmost city of Germany, located along its borders with Belgium and the Netherlands, 65 km west of Cologne....
) or Eischwiele Platt (of Eschweiler
Eschweiler

Eschweiler is a municipality in the district of Aachen in North Rhine-Westphalia in Germany on the river Inde, near the German-Belgian-Dutch frontier, and approx....
), Bocheser Platt (of Bocholtz
Bocholtz

Bocholtz is a town in the Netherlands province of Limburg . It is a part of the municipality of Simpelveld, and lies about 7 km southwest of Kerkrade....
) or Bönsch Platt
Bönnsch

This article describes the language. For the beer see B?nnsch .B?nnsch is the Ripuarian dialect spoken in Bonn, Germany. B?nnsch is closely related to K?lsch language, but it has a different melody and a slightly different vocabulary....
 (of Bonn
Bonn

Bonn is the 19th largest city in Germany. Located about 20 kilometres south of Cologne on the river Rhine in the Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia, it was the Capital of Germany West Germany from 1949 to 1990 and the official seat of government of united Germany from 1990 to 1999....
). Most of the more than one hundred Ripuarian dialects are bound to one specific village or municipality. Usually there are small distinctive differences between neighboring dialects (which are however easily noticeable to locals), and increasingly bigger ones between the more distant ones. These are described by a set of isogloss
Isogloss

An isogloss is the geographical boundary or delineation of a certain linguistics feature, e.g. the pronunciation of a vowel, the meaning of a word, or use of some syntactic feature....
es called the Rheinischer Fächer in linguistics. The way someone talks, even if not using Ripuarian, often allows them to be traced precisely to a village or city quarter where they learned to speak.

Ripuarian forms a common dialect family called Central Franconian
Central Franconian

Central Franconian is a name for the following set of dialect groups:* Ripuarian Franconian * Moselle Franconian * Luxembourgish language Luxembourgish is often included within Moselle Franconian, but sometimes regarded as a separate group....
 together with the Moselle Franconian in Luxembourg
Luxembourg

Luxembourg , officially the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg , is a small landlocked country in western Europe, bordered by Belgium, France, and Germany....
 and Rhineland-Palatinate
Rhineland-Palatinate

Rhineland-Palatinate is one of the 16 States of Germany of Germany. It has an area of and about four million inhabitants. The capital is Mainz....
. Ripuarian languages thus are part of the west middle continental Germanic language group.

Number of speakers

About a million people speak a Ripuarian dialect, so about one quarter of the inhabitants of the area do, on average. Penetration of Ripuarian in everyday communication varies considerably, as does the percentage of Ripuarian speakers from one place to another. In some places there may be only a few elderly speakers left, while elsewhere almost everyone still speaks Ripuarian in everyday life. Both in the genuine Ripuarian area and far around it, the number of people passively understanding Ripuarian to some extent exceeds the number of active speakers by far. Estimates assume some ten, and up to twenty million.

Influences

These Ripuarian varieties are related to the Moselle Franconian
Moselle Franconian

Moselle Franconian is a group of High German languages dialects spoken in parts of the German states of North Rhine-Westphalia and Rhineland-Palatinate, in the south of the German-speaking Community of Belgium, in the neighbouring...
 languages of Rhineland-Palatinate
Rhineland-Palatinate

Rhineland-Palatinate is one of the 16 States of Germany of Germany. It has an area of and about four million inhabitants. The capital is Mainz....
 in Germany, to the Luxembourgish language in Luxembourg
Luxembourg

Luxembourg , officially the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg , is a small landlocked country in western Europe, bordered by Belgium, France, and Germany....
, to the southeastern Limburgish language in the province of Limburg (Netherlands)
Limburg (Netherlands)

Limburg is the southern-most of the twelve provinces of the Netherlands of the Netherlands. It is located in the southeastern part of the country and bordered by Belgium to the south and part of the west, Germany to the east, the Dutch province of North Brabant partly to the west, and the province of Gelderland to the north....
 in the Netherlands
Netherlands

The Netherlands is a country that is part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. It is a parliamentary democratic constitutional monarchy. The Netherlands is located in North-West Europe, and bordered by the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east....
, and to Low Dietsch
Low Dietsch

Low Dietsch is a term mainly used within the Flemish terminology for the transitional Limburgish?Ripuarian language dialects of a number of towns and villages in the north-east of the Belgian province of Li?ge , such as Gemmenich, Homburg, Montzen and Welkenraedt....
 in the province of Liege
Liège (province)

Li?ge is the easternmost Provinces of regions in Belgium of the Wallonia, in Belgium. It is predominantly French language speaking, with a German language speaking minority living along the eastern border with Germany and Luxembourg....
, Belgium. Most of the historic roots of Ripuarian languages are in Middle High German
Middle High German

Middle High German , abbreviated MHG , is the term used for the period in the history of the German language between 1050 and 1350. It is preceded by Old High German and followed by Early New High German....
, but there were other influences too, such as Latin
Latin

Latin is an Italic language, historically spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. Through the Military history of the Roman Empire, Latin spread throughout the Mediterranean and a large part of Europe....
, Low German
Low German

Low German or Low Saxon is any of the regional language varieties of the West Germanic languages spoken mainly in northern Germany and the eastern part of the Netherlands....
, Dutch
Dutch language

Dutch is a West Germanic languages spoken by over 22 million people as a first language, and about 5 million people as a second language."1% of the EU population claims to speak Dutch well enough in order to have a conversation." Outside the European Union the number of second language speakers of Dutch is very small. Most native...
, French
French language

French is a Romance language spoken around the world by around 80 million people as first language, by 190 million as second language, and by about another 200 million people as an acquired tongue, with significant speakers in 54 countries....
, and Southern Meuse-Rhenish
Southern Meuse-Rhenish

Southeast Limburgish, also to be defined as Southern Meuse-Rhenish, is a subdivision of what recently has been named Meuse-Rhenish. Both terms denote a rather compact grouping of Low Franconian languages varieties, spoken in the Limburg and Lower Rhineland regions, near the common Dutch/Flemish and Dutch/German borders....
 (Limburgish). Several elements of grammar are unique to Ripuarian, existing in no other German language
German language

German is a West Germanic languages, thus related to and classified alongside English language and Dutch language. It is one of the world's world language and the most widely spoken mother tongue in the European Union....
. The Kingdom of Belgium and The Netherlands officially recognise some Ripuarian dialects as minority language
Minority language

A minority language is a language spoken by a minority of the population of a country. Such people are termed linguistic minorities. With a total number of 193 sovereign states recognized internationally and an estimated number of roughly 5,000 to 7,000 List of languages by name spoken worldwide, it follows that the vast majority of la...
s, and the European Union
European Union

The European Union is an economic and political union of 27 European Union member state, located primarily in Europe. It was established by the Treaty of Maastricht on 1 November 1993 upon the foundations of the pre-existing European Economic Community....
 likewise follows.

See also

  • Low Dietsch
    Low Dietsch

    Low Dietsch is a term mainly used within the Flemish terminology for the transitional Limburgish?Ripuarian language dialects of a number of towns and villages in the north-east of the Belgian province of Li?ge , such as Gemmenich, Homburg, Montzen and Welkenraedt....
  • Southern Meuse-Rhenish
    Southern Meuse-Rhenish

    Southeast Limburgish, also to be defined as Southern Meuse-Rhenish, is a subdivision of what recently has been named Meuse-Rhenish. Both terms denote a rather compact grouping of Low Franconian languages varieties, spoken in the Limburg and Lower Rhineland regions, near the common Dutch/Flemish and Dutch/German borders....