Danish

Danish is a North Germanic language spoken by around six million people, principally in Denmark and in the region of Southern Schleswig in northern Germany. It is also spoken by 50,000 Danes in the UK, by 5,000 in the US, by 3,000 in Canada, and by smaller groups of Danish speakers in other countries. Danish is closely related to Swedish and Norwegian, and there is considerable mutual intelligibility with these languages. Danish is also, to a lesser extent, mutually intelligible with Icelandic and Faroese. Danish is a descendant of Old Norse, the common language of the Germanic peoples living in Scandinavia during the Viking Era. Danish began to develop in the 9th century, and by the 12th century it had evolved into a fully fledged language. Danish was the first Scandinavian language to develop a writing system, and it is also the first Germanic language to be written with the Latin alphabet. Danish is a very concise language, and is well known for its use of ellipsis. This can often make it difficult for foreigners to understand Danish text. However, Danish is also a very expressive language, and once you get used to the ellipsis, it can be very beautiful and poetic. Danish is a very phonetic language, which means that it is very easy to learn to pronounce Danish words correctly. However, the grammar can be quite challenging, and it can take some time to get used to the different word order. Danish is a very popular language, and is ranked as the 17th most widely spoken language in the world.