Within the Indo-European language tree, Dutch is grouped within the <answer>Germanic</answer> languages, which means it shares a common ancestor with languages such as English, German, and Scandinavian languages. All <answer>Germanic</answer> languages are united by subjection to the sound shifts of Grimm's law and Verner's law which originated in the Proto-<answer>Germanic</answer> language and define the basic differentiating features from other Indo-European languages. This assumed to have originated in approximately the mid-first millennium BCE in Iron Age northern Europe.
What group of languages have to comply with Grimm's law?
Germanic