Hvordan en gammel kontrakt kan kaste nyt lys over hollændernes skriftsprog på Amager i 1600-tallet

This article investigates the linguistic characteristics of the written language used by the Dutch community on the Danish island of Amager in the 17thcentury. It does so on the basis of a hitherto unexamined text, a contract from 1664 between the minister and the inhabitants of the village of Store Magleby. Until now, the written language used by the Dutch community on Amager in the 17th-century has been viewed as Low German with a minor Dutch component. However, the text analyzed in this article can be more accurately described as Dutch with a minor Low German component. The article will argue that this apparent discrepancy can be explained by viewing the written language of the Dutch community on Amager as a Low German-Dutch continuum whereby each concrete linguistic expression is dictated by the communicative situation: documents for internal use (i.e. use within the Dutch community) are predominantly Dutch, whereas documents for external use (i.e. use outside the Dutch community) are predominantly Low German.