The
Uerdingen Line (named after
Uerdingen by
Georg Wenker) is the
isogloss within
West Germanic languages that separates dialects which preserve the -
k sound at the end of a word (north of the line) from dialects in which the word final -
k has changed to word final -
ch (IPA ) (south of the line). An example is the first person singular pronoun (
I in English): north of the line, this word is
ik, while south of the line the word is
ich. This sound shift is the one that progressed the farthest north among the consonant shifts that characterize High German and Middle German dialects. The line passes through
Belgium, the
Netherlands, and
Germany.