Unity Within Middle Dutch
Within Middle Dutch, five large groups can be distinguished, all believed to be mutually intelligible:
- West, East Flemish and Zealandic, was spoken in the modern region of West and East Flanders and Zeeland and also in the Département du Nord of what is now France but was then part of the County of Flanders ;
- Brabantian was the language of the area covered by the modern Dutch province of North Brabant and the south of Gelderland; and the Belgian provinces of Flemish Brabant and Antwerp as well as the Brussels capital region;
- Hollandic was mainly used in the present provinces of North and South Holland and parts of Utrecht;
- Limburgish, spoken by the people in the provinces of modern Dutch and Belgian Limburg;
- Low Saxon, spoken in the area of the modern provinces of Gelderland, Overijssel, Drenthe and parts of Groningen.
Limburgish and Low Saxon gradated into Middle High German and Middle Low German, respectively. These two areas border directly the German language area in the narrow sense (i.e., today's Germany). The dialect continuum in this border region was even more fluid in the past than it is today.
Hollandic experienced a slow but steady transition from an Ingvaeonic variant to true Low Franconian, through the influence of the more prestigious Brabantic and Utrecht dialects. Flemish and Brabantic started to diverge in the late Middle Ages.
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