WI West Germanic languages stay mutually intelligible?

The argument itself is based on a countersense : the idea that there would have been a common language.

This is just a myth : there was no pre-Babel society where the germans would have spoken the same language. Same for antic italians. Or antic gauls.

The germans themselves did not call themselves germans, as well as the gauls did not call themselves gauls. It is a foreigner's point of view to call them globally gauls or germans.

The germans were not the only population living in "Germany". Different tribes or smaller different groups of people migrated and mixed themselves with pre-german populations.

It was just impossible to have initially a common language since there never was. Just having common elements of language or close elements of language is very different from having once had the same language.

I didn't ask for the presupposition of a common language, but rather just mutual intelligibility.
 
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