Most people assume that Dutch is the one and only language of the Netherlands—but there’s hardly a country on Earth that speaks only one language natively. Dutch is, of course, the dominant language in the Netherlands, spoken by almost the entire native population of the country. But there’s an important minority language tucked away in the country’s northwest: Frisian.
Frisian is spoken as a native language by around 500,000 people, mostly ethnic Frisians native to the northwest region of the Netherlands. Frisian comes in multiple varieties—most notably West Frisian (spoken in the Netherlands) Saterland Frisian, and North Frisian (both spoken in Germany)—and despite their mutual intelligibility, they’re considered part of a single Frisian language. West Frisian is by far the biggest dialect and is recognized as the second official language of the Netherlands, while Saterland Frisian and North Frisian are recognized as minority languages in Germany. However, in both countries, Frisian is under threat due to the pervasive influence of Dutch and German, which could swallow up the smaller Frisian. At TranslationServices.com, we’re passionate about all languages—so we developed our own Frisian translation team.
You can request a free quote for our Frisian translation services by messaging us today!
Frisian: a close cousin of English
You might not believe it if you heard Frisian, which is mutually unintelligible with English, but Frisian is actually the closest living language group to the Anglic languages, to which English belongs. Frisian speakers reside primarily in the Dutch province of Friesland, as well as the German regions of Saterland and Nordfriesland. The language belongs to the Indo–European language family, like most languages in Europe, and more specifically occupies the Germanic branch, meaning it’s related to English, Dutch, German, and the Scandinavian languages.
Grammatically, Frisian is similar to Dutch. It distinguishes between gender in the definite singular but not in the definite plural or the indefinite singular. Frisian does not use case, the case system of Old Frisian having disappeared over centuries of language evolution. Verbs conjugate for person, number, tense, and mood, with verbs falling into different categories: strong, weak, and irregular. Strong verbs tend to denote past tense by changing vowels, while weak verbs take suffixed endings. The use of diminutives—suffixes that denote smallness or cuteness—is common in Frisian.
Our translators are proud native Frisian speakers passionate about their language—so they’re eager to help with all your translation needs.
What kind of Frisian translation are you looking for?
As part of our mission to bring you the best Frisian translation services possible, we’ve searched far and wide across Friesland to find the foremost Frisian translation experts. Our translators have mastered translation both to and from Frisian in any number of domains, so we’re confident we can accommodate your Frisian translation needs. Even if you need to translate a historical document or tricky Frisian literature (traditional or modern), our Frisian translators have the right skills to help. For those looking to make content aimed at Frisian speakers, we can translate business documents, marketing materials, pedagogical content, books, poems, websites, apps, games, and just about anything else you can think of. Our mission is simply to provide high-quality, reliable Frisian translation services.
Eager to get started with your Frisian translation project? All you need to do is let us know what you’re looking for!