In German linguistics, the Benrath line (German: Benrather Linie) is the maken-machen isogloss. The German language (de ''Deutsch'') is a West Germanic language and one of the world's major languages. An isogloss is the geographical boundary or delineation of a certain linguistic feature e It is traditionally used to distinguish the High German varieties from the other West Germanic languages. The High German languages (in German, Hochdeutsch) are any of the varieties of standard German, Luxembourgish and The West Germanic languages constitute the largest of the three traditional branches of the Germanic family of Languages and include languages such as English The Line runs from Benrath (part of Düsseldorf) and Aachen to eastern Germany near Frankfurt an der Oder in the area of Berlin and Dessau. Düsseldorf (ˈdʏsəldɔɐf is the capital city of the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia. ( Ripuarian: Oche, Dutch: Aken, Spanish: Aquisgrán, Italian: Aquisgrana, French, Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany ( ˈbʊndəsʁepuˌbliːk ˈdɔʏtʃlant is a Country in Central Europe. Frankfurt (Oder is a City in Brandenburg, Germany, located on the Oder River on the German- Polish border directly opposite the Berlin is the capital city and one of sixteen states of Germany. Dessau is a town in Germany on the junction of the rivers Mulde and Elbe, in the Bundesland (Federal State of Saxony-Anhalt

High German subdivides into Upper German (green) and Central German (blue), and is distinguished from Low German (yellow). The main isoglosses, the Benrath and Speyer lines are marked in black. In German linguistics the Speyer line, Main line ( Main river or Germersheim line is an Isogloss separating the dialects to the

The High German consonant shift (3rd to 9th centuries AD), in the first three phases of which the Low German dialects did not participate, affected the Southern varieties of the West Germanic dialect continuum; the Low German dialects did not participate in the first three phases (core group) of this shift. In Historical linguistics, the High German consonant shift or second Germanic consonant shift was a phonological development ( Sound change) which took place The West Germanic languages constitute the largest of the three traditional branches of the Germanic family of Languages and include languages such as English A dialect continuum is a range of Dialects spoken across a large geographical area differing only slightly between areas that are geographically close and gradually decreasing The impact of the High German consonant shift increases gradually to the South.

The Benrath line does not mark the northernmost effect of the High German consonant shift, since the Uerdingen line, the ik-ich isogloss, lies slightly further north; and some of the peripheral changes associated with the shift did affect Low German. The Uerdingen Line is the Isogloss within West Germanic languages that separates dialects which preserve the - k sound at the end of a word (north of the

External links

• Varieties of German
• Maps of the Benrath line