Languages in Scandinavia

Main articles: North Germanic languages, Sami languages, Baltic-Finnic languages, and Scandoromani

There are two language groups that have coexisted on the Scandinavian peninsula since prehistory—the North Germanic languages (Scandinavian languages) and the Sami languages. The majority languages on the peninsula, Swedish and Norwegian, are today, along with Danish, classified as Continental Scandinavian.

The North Germanic languages of Scandinavia are traditionally divided into an East Scandinavian branch (Danish and Swedish) and a West Scandinavian branch (Norwegian, Icelandic, andFaroese), but because of changes appearing in the languages since 1600, the East Scandinavian and West Scandinavian branches are now usually reconfigured into Insular Scandinavian (ö-nordisk/øy-nordisk) featuring (Icelandic and Faroese)^] and Continental Scandinavian (Skandinavisk), comprising Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish.^[ The modern division is based on the degree of mutual comprehensibility between the languages in the two branches. Note that skandinavisk(a) may also refer to a way of speaking one Scandinavian language in a way intended to be more easily understood by speakers of the other Scandinavian languages.

Apart from Sami and the languages of minority groups speaking a variant of the majority language of a neighboring state, the following minority languages in Scandinavia are protected under theEuropean Charter for Regional or Minority Languages: Yiddish, Romani Chib, Romanes and Romani.