Medieval dialects resulting of the fragmentation of old Germanic (sense 1), some of which have turned into the current Germanic languages.
Germances
Germani
People of the Antiquity, of Indo-European origin, that inhabited northern Europe, and from the 5th century began the invasion and destruction of the Roman Empire. The same as ancient Germans or early Germans.
Germania
1. In a narrow sense, region inhabited in the Antiquity by the Germanic people; 2. Set of the countries and/or peoples who speak Germanic languages.
Germanic
1. n. See Proto-Germanic. 2. adj. Belonging to the ancient Germans, or Germani; 3. adj. Belonging to Germanic languages and peoples.
Germanic languages
Languages descended from ancient Germanic (sense 1) or Proto-Germanic. Amongst the main ones are English, Dutch, German, Danish, Swedish, Norwegian and Icelandic.
Glottal
Consonant pronounced in the region of glottis, as [h], for example.
Grammar
Set formed by the morphology and syntax of a language; set of the operating rules of a language.
Grapheme
Letter or sequence of letters of the Latin alphabet representing a given phoneme according to the spelling rules of the language in question. For example, c and ss are graphemes of phoneme /s/.
Hereditary
See Inherited.
Heritage
Direct transmission of a word from a predecessor language (called parent language) to its successor (daughter language). For example, horse is a heritage from Germanic *hursaz and, therefore, is considered a vernacular word.
Horizontal symmetry
See Symmetry.
Indo-European
1. n. Hypothetical language that would have been spoken in the region of Caucasus about 5,000 years BC and given birth to the Indo-European languages; 2. adj. Belonging to the Indo-European language or people, or to its descendant languages.