East Germanic (Gothic)

East Germanic or Gothic is an extinct language descended from Proto-Germanic (PrGmc), constituting one of the first order branches of Germanic alongside West Germanic (WGmc) and North Germanic (NGmc), according to the traditional classification. It seems to have been spoken around the south of the Baltic during the first half of the first millennium AD, and the speakers were chiefly divided into West Goths (Visigoths) and East Goths (Ostrogoths). The language is known to us mainly through manuscripts (written in a derivative of the Greek alphabet, with some runic letters) preserving parts of a translation of the Bible into West Gothic, made by Bishop Ulfila in the 4th century. A form of Gothic seems to have survived in the Crimea until the sixteenth century, from which a few words are preserved.

The main phonological innovations of Gothic were:

Merger of PrGmc short /i/ and /e/ as /i/ eg. Goth widuwo:, Old High German (OHG) wituwa, Latin vidua "widow"; Goth qiman, OHG queman, Lat veni:re "to come"
Development of new short /o/ (written au') and /e/ (written ai') from /u/ and /i/ respectively before /r h hw/ (and in a few other places): the so-called "breaking" eg. Goth lai'hwum, OHG liwum "we left"; Goth sau'hts, OHG suht "sickness"
In these ways a new 5-vowel system developed for the short vowels to parallel that in the long vowels, where PrGmc /ae:/ and /e:/ seem to have merged as /e:/ eg. Goth mena, OHG ma:no, Old Norse (ON) ma:ni "moon"; Goth her, Old English (OE) he:r
Short unstressed vowels in final syllables were lost, with the exception of -u after short syllables eg. Goth wulfs, Proto-Norse wulfaR
Strengthening of PrGmc /jj/ to /ddj/ and PrGmc /ww/ to /ggw/ (a similar change happened in NGmc) eg. Goth waddjus, ON veggr, OE wae:g (where g represents the palatal semivowel) "wall"; Goth triggws, ON tryggr (acc. sg. masc. tryggvan), OE tri:ewe "true"
Development of PrGmc voiced fricatives to voiced stops eg. Goth wau'rd, ON ordh "word"

Grammatically, the 7 strong verb classes survived into Gothic, having undergone the regular vowel changes outlined above (note that the Gothic spelling ei represents the pure long vowel i:):

eg.
Class Present          Past             Participle
I     ei (< Gmc i:)    ai (< Gmc ai)    i (< Gmc zero+i)
 eg.  greipan          graip            gripans       "to grasp"
II    iu (< Gmc eu)    au (< Gmc au)    u (< Gmc u)
 eg.  niutan           naut             nutans        "to enjoy"
III   i/ai'+l/r/m/n    a+l/r/m/n        u/au'+l/r/m/n
      (<Gmc e+l/r/m/n) (<Gmc a+l/r/m/n) (<Gmc u+l/r/m/n)
 eg.  bindan           band             bundans       "to tie"
      wai'rpan         warp             wau'rpans     "to throw"
etc.

The 7th class of strong verbs preserved reduplication in the past tense eg. haitan, hai'hait, haitans "to name".

The Lord's Prayer

atta unsar thu in himinam, weihnai namo thein. qimai thiudinassus theins. wairthai wilja theins, swe in himina jah ana airthai. hlaif unsarana thana sinteinan gif uns himma daga. jah aflet uns thatei skulans sijaima, swaswe jah weis afletam thaim skulam unsaraim. jah ni briggais uns in fraistubnjai, ak lausei uns af thamma ubilin; unte theina ist thiudangardi jah mahts jah wulthus in aiwins. amen.

"Our father, you in the heavens, may your name become holy. May your reign come. May your will happen, as in heaven, also upon earth. Give daily bread to us this day. And forgive us for what we may be guilty of, just as we also forgive our debtors. And may you not bring us into temptation, but release us from evil; since yours is the kingdom and strength and splendour for ever. Amen."

References

Krause, W. 1953. Handbuch des Gotischen. C H Beck'sche Verlagsbuchhandlung: Munich.