#LinguisticSunday: Adelung’s 1774 dictionary of the ‘High German dialect’

This post was orginally published in the series #LinguisticSunday in July 2020 on twitter and in September 2023 on mastodon and bluesky.

Johann Christoph Adelung’s dictionary “Grammatisch-kritisches Wörterbuch der Hochdeutschen Mundart” (‘Grammatical-critical dictionary of the High German dialect’) from 1774 is one of the oldest German dictionaries. But why does he call High German a “dialect”?

First, let me make it clear: This is indeed a dictionary of Standard German. It is completely intelligible for modern speakers. Here’s a random page from the dictionary, for a speaker of German the hardest part will be to decipher the Gothic script.

Today, the term “Hochdeutsch” ‘High German’ is commonly used for the Standard variety of German. This contrasts with the linguistic usage of the term that includes all dialects that participated in the High German consonant shift (the one responsible for German “Schiff” vs English “ship”).

According to the modern view, Standard German is not a “dialect”. Instead, it is contrasted with *the* dialects – the non-standard, geographically defined varieties of German (e.g. Bavarian, Swabian, Colognian etc.).

Adelung, however, viewed „Hochdeutsch“ as the dialect of one specific group, namely the upper classes of Upper Saxony and Meißen (a town in Saxony), not as the language of the whole German people.

During Adelung’s lifetime there was no such thing as a German national state, present-day Germany was split into a multitude of small states. Only in 1871 the German empire was founded.

Standard German is largely based on the “Meißener Kanzleisprache” (office language of Meißen) used in offices in Meißen and other parts of Saxony. This language was used by Martin Luther for his German translation of the Bible and therefore became extremely influential.

This is why Adelung used this *dialect* of German in his dictionary. In his time, it had already gained a huge amount of prestige, e.g. the most famous poets of this time Goethe and Schiller also wrote in this language.

In short, Adelung’s dictionary reflects a time when there was no German national state with an official German language and therefore, he calls High German a “dialect”. #LinguisticSunday

Learn more about the difference between languages and dialects in my blog post:

Later edition of Adelung’s dictionary online (in German): https://lexika.digitale-sammlungen.de/adelung/online/angebot

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