GERMAN LANGUAGE HISTORY

Recognising and interpreting the main development stages of the German language and the various forms of its written culture from the first documents until c. 1400 AD.

Beginning, stages and developments of a written culture in the German linguistic area from the first documents to the Late Middle Ages

Students who can attend classes:

- Texts

1) Sandra Bosco Coletsos, Storia della lingua tedesca, Milano, 2006

2) Horst Brunner, Geschichte der deutschen Literatur des Mittelalters im Überblick, Stuttgart, 2005

- Reference grammars

3) Augusto Scaffidi Abbate, Introduzione allo studio dell’antico tedesco e dei suoi documenti letterari, edizione a cura di Elda Morlicchio, Roma 1989;

4) Giorgio Dolfini, Grammatica del medio alto tedesco, Milano, 1989²

- Reference dictionaries:

5) Gerhard Köbler. Althochdeutsches Wörterbuch, http://homepage.uibk.ac.at/~c30310/ahdwbhin.html;

6) Matthias Lexer, Mittelhochdeutsches Handwörterbuch, http://woerterbuchnetz.de/Lexer/

7) (Eventually) supplementary materials

N.B. Grammars and dictionaries are reference works.

- Students who cannot attend classes

Students who cannot attend classes will prepare the exam using texts nos. 1-2 (Bosco Coletsos and Brunner). They have to contact the course teacher at least a month before the exam, in order to choose a topic on which they will write a 10-page paper, including final bibliography (single spacing, 12 points, Times New Roman, justified), to be sent to the teacher at least a week before the exam.