Yes, Norwegian (along with Swedish and Danish) does have a fairly close connection to German. When I began German in school (at around age 13, iirc), the fact

Yes, Norwegian (along with Swedish and Danish) does have a fairly close connection to German. When I began German in school (at around age 13, iirc), the fact that I had already learned Swedish as a child (due to family roots) gave me a noticeable head start over the rest of the class. Many German words that would have been completely foreign to me as an English speaker were immediately understandable through Swedish.