The author analyses the processes that, in the passage from the Frühneuhochdeutsch and the Neuhochdeutsch phase, stand at the basis of the fixation of German as a written language and of its normalisation of a standard language. The emancipation from the supremacy of Latin is here described in its diachronic and diatopic aspects, with a special attention to the links between the growing independence of German and the formation of a national culture. The importance of Martin Luther's translation of the Bible is put in relation with the overstepping of regional varieties/vernaculars, and with the fixation of a common language characterised by a high level of diastratic prevalence.
