History of Dutch orthography History of Dutch orthography The history of Dutch orthography covers the changes in spelling of Dutch both in the Netherlands itself and in the Dutch-speaking region of Flanders in Belgium. The Dutch spoken between 1150 and 1500 is referred to as Middle Dutch. During this period there was no standardization of grammar. Authors generally wrote in their own dialects. Very often it is possible to tell from the language whether a text comes from Limburg, Brabant, or Holland. There was a lot of variation in the spelling. Words were often written as they were pronounced: "lant" (land), "hi vint" (he
German-speaking Community of Belgium German-speaking Community of Belgium The German-speaking Community of Belgium ( , DG; ; ) or Eastern Belgium (; ; ) is one of the three federal communities of Belgium. Covering an area of within the province of Liège () in Wallonia, it includes nine of the eleven municipalities of East Cantons (). Traditionally speakers of Low Dietsch, Ripuarian and Moselle Franconian varieties, the local population numbers over 75,000—about 0.70% of the national total. Bordering the Netherlands, Germany and Luxembourg, the area has its own parliament and government at Eupen. Although in the Belgian province of Luxembourg many of the inhabitants