Middle Low German
- noun
- Specialized
:
bajo alemán medio
- The Middle Low German language played a crucial role in the trade of the Hanseatic League.
Examples
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Many manuscripts from the 14th century are written in Middle Low German.
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The Middle Low German language was predominantly used in northern Germany during the medieval period.
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Linguists study the vocabulary of Middle Low German to trace the evolution of modern northern German dialects.
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The term Middle Low German refers to a historical language.
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Many texts were written in Middle Low German during the medieval period.
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Linguists study the vocabulary of Middle Low German to trace the evolution of modern northern German dialects.
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Many manuscripts from the 14th century are written in Middle Low German.
Surface Forms
Morphology
The phrase combines 'Middle' (an intermediate historical stage) with 'Low German' (a named variety of German), so the meaning — the historical/middle-period form of the Low German language — is directly derivable from the parts. The 'Middle + language' pattern is cross-linguistically common (e.g., Middle English), so learners who know the constituents can infer the temporal-linguistic sense. Even though 'Low' is capitalized as part of a proper name, its function as a regional/varietal label makes the overall sense predictable.
Etymology
Middle Low German comes from three simple parts: Middle, Low, and German. Here Middle means the 'Middle Ages' (about 1100 to 1500), Low points to the flat northern lands, and German shows it is a form of the German language, so the name means the form of 'Low German' used in that time.
