Tree of Germanic Languages

Icelandic

Icelandic is the contemporary language of Iceland. It is a very conservative descendent of West Norse. Frequently Old Icelandic (c. 800 BCE - 1500 CE) is referred to as Old Norse. It is the language of the Norse sagas and eddas. It is said that many Icelandic readers are able to read this literature without much difficulty.
Number of Speakers (1988): 250,000

Lombardic

Lombardic was the East Germanic language of the Germanic speaking people who invaded and settled in Italy in the sixth century C. E. It is said that Lombardic participated in the so-called second sound shift which is primarily attested in High German.
Lombardic is extinct.

Middle English

Middle English was the descendent of Old English. English after about 1100 C. E. had changed enough to warrant a different designation. Middle English had about five major dialects, Northern, West Midlands, East Midlands, Southwestern, and Kentish.
Middle English is characterized by the reduction and loss of inflectional endings and the introduction of a large number of words derived first from Latin through Norman or Middle French and subsequently from Middle Dutch. By the late fifteenth century, East Midlands Middle English, the language of London, had acquired enough changes to be designated Early New English, the language of Mallory (Le Morte d'Arthur).

New Danish

New (or Modern Danish) is the contemporary descendent of Old Danish. It is the official language of Denmark.
Number of Speakers (1988): 5 million

New English

New (or Modern) English is the contemporary descendent of Middle English. It is the official language of Australia, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom, It is the standard language of the United States. It is one of the official languages of Canada, India, the United Nations, and many other nations.
New English is characterized by a very large vocabulary, non-phonetic spelling, an almost total lack of inflection (most plurals of nouns are indicated), a syntax almost totally dependent on word order, and a very complicated periphrastic verb system.
Number of speakers (2000): 341 million (first language), circa 3 billion total.