Examples of old German Scripts

My thanks Sandy for reposting this. Do you know anything about the History of these scripts...why the changes for example? Why the difference in the letters compared to English? We all know about the similar words between English and German. Then there is the French influences in English, the “ou” for example in colour or humour which our American cousins tease us about. In my opinion, all Ben Franklin did in reforming “American” was to eliminate the French influence from the King’s English! Fortunately, “The Crown” has forgiven the American rebels and we have close family ties between CN, UK, and USA! 😀😀 I always tease James about how he is more CN than me due to his Québécois ancestry and I am more American because my family originates in NJ/Long Island during the late 1600’s.
 
I can try to explain Brian, but please consider that I am not a linguist :)

The German language has special sounds that cannot be represented well with the Latin alphabet. Nowadays, this is actually only possible with phonetic transcription. People who learn German always wonder why the "s" is sometimes pronounced like this and sometimes like that. The German writing is much clearer and leaves no questions unanswered, because there are different ways of writing the "s".
The many different scripts, there was also the Fraktur script, can possibly be explained by the many small German states that existed up until the 19th century. Each country had its own preferences and these were also shaped by their proximity to various European empires in the east and west.
Ironically, it was the Nazis who finally introduced the Latin alphabet to Germany. As you know, they have emphasized "Germanness" everywhere, but they have given up the German script and adapted it to the world.
 
b.loree said:
My thanks Sandy for reposting this. Do you know anything about the History of these scripts...why the changes for example? Why the difference in the letters compared to English? We all know about the similar words between English and German. Then there is the French influences in English, the “ou” for example in colour or humour which our American cousins tease us about. In my opinion, all Ben Franklin did in reforming “American” was to eliminate the French influence from the King’s English! Fortunately, “The Crown” has forgiven the American rebels and we have close family ties between CN, UK, and USA! 😀😀 I always tease James about how he is more CN than me due to his Québécois ancestry and I am more American because my family originates in NJ/Long Island during the late 1600’s.
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It's interesting how the ancestors of many of us up here came through New York - New Amsterdam. If something called the revolution hadn't happened we could well have many more of us still in the US. Doing family history it's always interesting to see how many went back and forth between supporting the British one day, Patriots the next and then back to the British. My wife has an ancestor in her family tree (a Westbroeck) who fought with Captain Joseph Brant (First nations), who our hometown of Brantford is named after.
 
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