Christian era. Since the introduction of Christianity and the beginnings of civilization, more than one of the High-German dialects, as they are called, the dialects of central and southern Germany, had been for a season the subject of literary culture. This was the case with the idioms, in succession, of the Alemannic, Frankish, and Bavarian divisions of the race, between the seventh and the thirteenth centuries; then, for a time, the Swabian dialect gained the preëminence, and in it was produced a rich and noble legendary literature, containing precious memorials of national heroic story, and still studied and valued wherever the German tongue is spoken. Here was a promising beginning for a truly national language, but the conditions of the times were not yet such as to give the movement lasting and assured success. Three centuries later began the grand national upheaval of the Reformation. The writings of Luther, multiplied and armed with a hundred-fold force by the new art of printing, penetrated to all parts of the land, and to nearly all ranks and classes of the people, awakening everywhere a vivid enthusiasm. The language he used was not the local dialect of a district, but one which had already a better claim than any other to the character of a general German language: it was the court and official speech of the principal kingdoms of central and southern Germany, made up of Swabian, Austrian, and other dialectic elements.[1] To a language so accredited, the internal impulse of the religious excitement and the political revolutions accompanying it, and the external influence of the press, which brought its literature, and especially Luther's translation of the Bible, into every reading family, were enough to give a common currency, a general value. It was set before the eyes of the whole nation as the most cultivated form of German speech; it was acknowledged and accepted as the dialect of highest rank, the only fitting organ of communication among the educated and refined. From that time to the present, its influence and power have gone on increasing. It is the vehicle of literature and instruction everywhere. Whatever may be the speech of the lower classes in any section, the
- ↑ See Schleicher, Deutsche Sprache, p. 107 seq.
