BBC reports on all-Elfdalian preschool

[Kent Karlsson]

Den 2016-03-21 04:38, "John Cowan" <cowan at mercury.ccil.org> quoted:

> Elfdalian is believed to be the
closest descendant of Old Norse, which was
> spoken by Scandinavians more
than 1,000 years ago.

My understanding is that modern Icelandic is much closer to Old Norse,
going back a millennia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Norse:

"Of the modern languages, Icelandic is the closest to Old Norse. Written
modern Icelandic derives from the Old Norse phonemic writing system.
Contemporary Icelandic-speakers can read Old Norse, which varies slightly
in spelling as well as semantics and word order."

Älvdalian goes back half a millennia (before which it followed the
"surrounding" language). And there no claim to be able to "easily"
read Old Norse texts, just to be able to recognise *some* Icelandic
(but quite a bit more than for, say, Swedish speakers).

/Kent K