Preimerian

Description

Preimerian (pòmòrsczi jãzëk) is a Slavic Language of Lekhitic group, spoken in Preymarn (120.000 in Venedic Przemarz, 80.000 in Duchy of Preimern of HRE and 40.000 in Danzig/Gdańczyk), mostly along the coast.

Basically, some linguists see Preimarian to be divided between Slovincian and Kashubian, spoken in Preimern or Przemarz/Danzig respectively. Officially, they are recognised also as two separate languages, although in fact they are not. The differences are artificial due to the orthography and level of germanisation or romanisation, respectively. The name Slovincian (Slowinzisch) was introduced by Alexander Hilferding, who fought for emancipation of Preimerian in Preimern. Most of the scholars believe that Slovincians is only a Lutheran Preimerian and Kashubian a Catholic one. Nevertheless, the name Slowinzisch prevails today in official literature in Preimern and Kaszubyk in Venedic sources.

Origin

The Preimerians' grandfathers came probably to their area some 1500 years ago, but might have resided in that region even much earlier than that, as part of the large tribe of Slavic Preimerians. Following its forced Christianization by Veneds and later conquest by Germans, the Western Preimerian ruling classes gradually became more germanised, whereas the Eastern more romanised. Similarly to Mecklenburg, it was decided that German would not be forced in the Church in Preimeria instead of the native languages, so the language is well preserved in both parts.

As soon as in 1586, the Lutheran priest Simon Krofej translated small catechism into Preimerian and thus introduced literary language. Later, in 18th cc, Michal Mostnik Pontanus aka Michael Brüggeman worked out the grammar and German-Preimerian dictionary.

Actual situation

After the unification of Germany in 1871, the Preimerian language was gradually replaced by Low German. The same process, though much slower, took place for Catholic Preimerians. After the GW2, Preimarians started to have much better environment for cultural growth, which resulted in preservation of the language and its use among the population of both Preimerns.

Indo-European Languages
Balto-Slavic Languages
Slavic Languages							Baltic Languages
West Slavic			South Slavic		East Slavic	North Slavic	West Baltic	East Baltic
Sorbian (Lusatian)	Lekhitic	Old Czech	Western Subgroup	Eastern Subgroup
Upper Sorbian Lower Sorbian	Preimerian Polabian	Old Czech ↓ Czech	Slovene (aka Old Croatian) Croatian Serbian (Sanjaki)	Old Church Slavonic † ↓ Bulgarian	Russian Belarussian Ukrainian Ruthenian (Rusyn)	Nassian Skuodian Vozgian Izhorian	Prussian Curonian	Latvian Lithuanian Sudovian