Balkan sprachbund

Last updated • 16 min readFrom Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia
Languages of the Balkan Sprachbund in the East and South Balkans, Cyprus and Italy Languages of the Balkan Sprachbund in the Balkans, Cyprus and Italy.png
Languages of the Balkan Sprachbund in the East and South Balkans, Cyprus and Italy
Balkan
Geographic
distribution
Balkans
Languages

The Balkan sprachbund or Balkan language area is an ensemble of areal features—similarities in grammar, syntax, vocabulary and phonology—among the languages of the Balkans. Several features are found across these languages though not all apply to every single language. The Balkan sprachbund is a prominent example of the sprachbund concept.

Contents

The languages of the Balkan sprachbund share their similarities despite belonging to various separate language family (genetic) branches. The Slavic, Hellenic, Romance, Albanian and Indo-Aryan branches all belong to the large Indo-European family, and the Turkish language is non-Indo-European.

Some of the languages use these features for their standard language (i.e. those whose homeland lies almost entirely within the region) whilst other populations to whom the land is not a cultural pivot (as they have wider communities outside of it) may still adopt the features for their local register.

While some of these languages may share little vocabulary, their grammars have very extensive similarities; for example:

The reason for these similarities is not a settled question among experts. Genetic commonalities, language contact, and the geopolitical history of the region all seem to be relevant factors, but many disagree over the specifics and degree of these factors.

History

The earliest scholar to notice the similarities between Balkan languages belonging to different families was the Slovenian scholar Jernej Kopitar in 1829. [4] August Schleicher (1850) [5] more explicitly developed the concept of areal relationships as opposed to genetic ones, and Franz Miklosich (1861) [6] studied the relationships of Balkan Slavic and Romance more extensively.

Nikolai Trubetzkoy (1923), [7] Kristian Sandfeld-Jensen (1926), [8] and Gustav Weigand (1925, 1928) [9] developed the theory in the 1920s and 1930s.

In the 1930s, the Romanian linguist Alexandru Graur criticized the notion of “Balkan linguistics,” saying that one can talk about “relationships of borrowings, of influences, but not about Balkan linguistics”. [10]

The term "Balkan language area" was coined by the Romanian linguist Alexandru Rosetti in 1958[ citation needed ], when he claimed that the shared features conferred the Balkan languages a special similarity. Theodor Capidan went further, claiming that the structure of Balkan languages could be reduced to a standard language. Many of the earliest reports on this theory were in German, hence the term "Balkansprachbund" is often used as well.

Languages

1847 ethnographic map 1847 map - Ethnographische Karte des Osmanischen Reichs europaischen Theils und von Griechenland,.jpg
1847 ethnographic map

The languages that share these similarities belong to five distinct branches of the Indo-European languages:

The Finnish linguist Jouko Lindstedt computed in 2000 a "Balkanization factor" which gives each Balkan language a score proportional with the number of features shared in the Balkan language area. [11] The results were:

LanguageScore
Balkan Slavic (Eastern South Slavic)11.5
Albanian10.5
Eastern Romance9.5
Greek9.5
Balkan Romani 7.5

Another language that may have been influenced by the Balkan language union is the Judaeo-Spanish variant that used to be spoken by Sephardi Jews living in the Balkans. The grammatical features shared (especially regarding the tense system) were most likely borrowed from Greek.

Origins

The source of these features as well as the directions have long been debated, and various theories were suggested.

Paleo-Balkan

Early researchers, including Kopitar, believed they must have been inherited from the Paleo-Balkan languages (e.g. Illyrian, Thracian and Dacian) which formed the substrate for modern Balkan languages. But since very little is known about Paleo-Balkan languages, it cannot be determined whether the features were present. The strongest candidate for a shared Paleo-Balkan feature is the postposed article.

Greek

Another theory, advanced by Kristian Sandfeld in 1930, was that these features were an entirely Greek influence, under the presumption that since Greece "always had a superior civilization compared to its neighbours", Greek could not have borrowed its linguistic features from them. However, no ancient dialects of Greek possessed Balkanisms, so that the features shared with other regional languages appear to be post-classical innovations. Also, Greek appears to be only peripheral to the Balkan language area, lacking some important features, such as the postposed article. Nevertheless, several of the features that Greek does share with the other languages (loss of dative, replacement of infinitive by subjunctive constructions, object clitics, formation of future with auxiliary verb "to want") probably originated in Medieval Greek and spread to the other languages through Byzantine influence. [12]

Latin and Romance

The Roman Empire ruled all the Balkans, and local variation of Latin may have left its mark on all languages there, which were later the substrate to Slavic newcomers. This was proposed by Georg Solta. The weak point of this theory is that other Romance languages have few of the features, and there is no proof that the Eastern Romans were isolated for enough time to develop them. An argument for this would be the structural borrowings or "linguistic calques" into Macedonian from Aromanian, which could be explained by Aromanian being a substrate of Macedonian, but this still does not explain the origin of these innovations in Aromanian. The analytic perfect with the auxiliary verb "to have" (which some Balkan languages share with Western European languages), is the only feature whose origin can fairly safely be traced to Latin.[ citation needed ]

Multiple sources

The most commonly accepted theory, advanced by Polish scholar Zbigniew Gołąb, is that the innovations came from different sources and the languages influenced each other: some features can be traced from Latin, Slavic, or Greek languages, whereas others, particularly features that are shared only by Romanian, Albanian, Macedonian and Bulgarian, could be explained by the substratum kept after Romanization (in the case of Romanian) or Slavicization (in the case of Bulgarian). Albanian was influenced by both Latin and Slavic, but it kept many of its original characteristics.

Several arguments favour this theory. First, throughout the turbulent history of the Balkans, many groups of people moved to another place, inhabited by people of another ethnicity. These small groups were usually assimilated quickly and sometimes left marks in the new language they acquired. Second, the use of more than one language was common in the Balkans before the modern age, and a drift in one language would quickly spread to other languages. Third, the dialects that have the most "balkanisms" are those in regions where people had contact with people of many other languages.

Features

Grammatical features

Case system

The number of cases is reduced, several cases being replaced with prepositions, the only exception being Serbo-Croatian. In Bulgarian and Macedonian, on the other hand, this development has actually led to the loss of all cases except the vocative.

A common case system of a Balkan language is:

Syncretism of genitive and dative

In the Balkan languages, the genitive and dative cases (or corresponding prepositional constructions) undergo syncretism.

Example:

LanguageDativeGenitive
EnglishI gave the book to Maria. It is Maria's book.
AlbanianLibrin ia dhashë Marisë.Libri është i Marisë.
AromanianVivlia lju dedu ali Marii.Vivlia easti ali Marii.
BulgarianДадох книгата на Мария
[dadoh knigata na Marija]
Книгата е на Мария
[knigata e na Marija]
RomanianI-am dat cartea Mariei.
colloq. for fem. (oblig. for masc.):
I-am dat cartea lui Marian.
Cartea este a Mariei. (literally, "The book is Maria's.")
     or
Este cartea Mariei. (
"It is Maria's book.")
colloq. for fem. (oblig. for masc.):
Cartea este a lui Marian.
MacedonianЍ ја дадов книгата на Марија.
[ì ja dadov knigata na Marija]
Книгата е на Марија.
[knigata e na Marija]

Greek

Έδωσα το βιβλίο στην Μαρία.
[édhosa to vivlío stin María]
     or
Έδωσα της Μαρίας το βιβλίο.
[édhosa tis Marías to vivlío]
Είναι το βιβλίο της Μαρίας.
[íne to vivlío tis Marías]
Της το έδωσα
[tis to édhosa]
'I gave it to her.'
Είναι το βιβλίο της.
[íne to vivlío tis]
'It is her book.'
Syncretism of locative and directional expressions
language"in Greece""into Greece"
Albaniannë Greqipër/brenda në Greqi
Aromaniantu Gãrtsii; tu Grecutu Gãrtsii; tu Grecu
Bulgarianв Гърция (v Gărcija)в Гърция (v Gărcija)
Greekστην Ελλάδα (stin Elládha)στην Ελλάδα (stin Elládha)
Macedonianво Грција (vo Grcija)во Грција (vo Grcija)
Romanian*în Greciaîn Grecia

Note: In Romanian this is an exception, and it only applies when referring to individual countries, e.g. în Germania, în Franța, etc. The rule is that into translates as ”la” when trying to express destination, e.g. la Atena, la Madrid, la vale, la mare, etc. but even in this case the same preposition is used to express direction and location.

Verb tenses

Future tense

The future tense is formed in an analytic way using an auxiliary verb or particle with the meaning "will, want", referred to as de-volitive, similar to the way the future is formed in English. This feature is present to varying degrees in each language. Decategorization is less advanced in fossilized literary Romanian voi and in Serbo-Croatian ću, ćeš, će, where the future marker is still an inflected auxiliary. In modern Greek, Bulgarian, Macedonian, and Albanian, Aromanian, and spoken Romanian, decategorization and erosion have given rise to an uninflected tense form, where the frozen third-person singular of the verb has turned into an invariable particle followed by the main verb inflected for person (compare Rom 1.sg. voi, 2.sg. vei, 3.sg. va > invariable va > mod. o). [13] Certain Torlakian dialects also have an invariant future tense marker in the form of the proclitic third-person-singular present form of the verb 'to want': će vidim (ће видим) 'I will see', će vidiš (ће видиш) "you will see", će vidi (ће види) 'he/she/it will see'.

LanguageVariantFormationExample: "I'll see"
AlbanianToskdo (invariable) + subjunctiveDo të shoh
Ghegkam (conjugated) + infinitiveKam me pa
Aromanianva / u (inv.) + subjunctiveVa s'vedu / u s'vedu
Greekθα (inv.) + subjunctiveΘα δω / βλέπω (tha dho / vlépo); "I'll see / be seeing"
Bulgarianще (inv.) + present tenseЩе видя (shte vidya)
Macedonianќе (inv.) + present tenseЌе видам (kje vidam)
Serbian(standard Serbian)хтети / hteti (conjugated) + infinitiveЈа ћу видети (видећу) (ja ću videti [videću])
(colloquial Serbian)хтети / hteti (conjugated) + subjunctiveЈа ћу да видим (ja ću da vidim)
Romanian(literary, formal)voi, vei, va, vom, veți, vor + infinitiveVoi vedea
(archaic)va (inv.) + subjunctiveVa să văd
(modern)o (inv.) + subjunctiveO să văd
(colloquial alternative)a avea (conjugated) + subjunctiveAm să văd
Balkan Romani (Erli) [14] ka (inv.) + subjunctiveKa dikhav
Analytic perfect tense

The analytic perfect tense is formed in the Balkan languages with the verb "to have" and, usually, a past passive participle, similarly to the construction found in Germanic and other Romance languages: e.g. Romanian am promis "I have promised", Albanian kam premtuar "I have promised". A somewhat less typical case of this is Greek, where the verb "to have" is followed by the so-called απαρέμφατο ('invariant form', historically the aorist infinitive): έχω υποσχεθεί. However, a completely different construction is used in Bulgarian and Serbo-Croatian, which have inherited from Common Slavic an analytic perfect formed with the verb "to be" and the past active participle: обещал съм, obeštal sǎm (Bul.) / обећао сам, obećao sam (Ser.) - "I have promised" (lit. "I am having-promised"). On the other hand, Macedonian, the third Slavic language in the sprachbund, is like Romanian and Albanian in that it uses quite typical Balkan constructions consisting of the verb to have and a past passive participle (имам ветено, imam veteno = "I have promised"). Macedonian also has a perfect formed with the verb "to be", like Bulgarian and Serbo-Croatian.

Renarrative mood

The so-called renarrative mood is another shared feature of the Balkan languages, including Turkish. It is used for statements that are not based on direct observation or common knowledge, but repeat what was reported by others. For example, Патот бил затворен in Macedonian means "The road was closed (or so I heard)". Speakers who use the indicative mood instead and state "Патот беше затворен" imply thereby that they personally witnessed the road's closure.

Avoidance or loss of infinitive

The use of the infinitive (common in other languages related to some of the Balkan languages, such as Romance and Slavic) is generally replaced with subjunctive constructions, following early Greek innovation.

  • in Bulgarian, Macedonian and Tosk Albanian, the loss of the infinitive is complete
  • in demotic (vernacular) Greek, the loss of the infinitive was complete, whereas in literary Greek ( Katharevousa , abolished in 1976) it was not; the natural fusion of the vernacular with Katharevousa resulted in the creation of the contemporary common Greek (Modern Standard Greek), where the infinitive, when used, is principally used as noun (e.g. λέγειν "speaking, fluency, eloquence", γράφειν "writing", είναι "being", etc.) deriving directly from the ancient Greek infinitive formation. But its substitution by the subjunctive form when the infinitive would be used as a verb is complete. Most of the times, the subjunctive form substitutes the infinitive also in the cases when it would be used as a noun (e.g. το να πας / το να πάει κανείς "to go, the act of going", το να δεις / βλέπεις "to see/be seeing, the act of seeing" instead of the infinitive "βλέπειν", etc.)
  • in Aromanian and Southern Serbo-Croatian dialects, it is almost complete
  • in Gheg Albanian, the infinitive, constructed by the particle "me" plus the past participle, is in full use
  • in standard Romanian (prepositional phrase: a + verb stem) and Serbo-Croatian, the infinitive shares many of its functions with the subjunctive. In these two languages, the infinitive will always be found in dictionaries and language textbooks. However, in Romanian, the inherited infinitive form (-are, -ere, and -ire) is now used only as a verbal noun.
  • Turkish as spoken in Sliven and Šumen has also almost completely lost the infinitive, but not verbal nouns using the same grammatical form. This is clearly due to the influence of the Balkan sprachbund.

For example, "I want to write" in several Balkan languages:

LanguageExampleNotes
AlbanianDua të shkruajas opposed to Gheg me fjet "to sleep" or me hangër "to eat"
AromanianVroi sã sciru / ãngrãpsescu
MacedonianСакам да пишувам [sakam da pišuvam]
BulgarianИскам да пиша [iskam da piša]
Modern GreekΘέλω να γράψω [Thélo na grápso]as opposed to older Greek ἐθέλω γράψαι
RomanianVreau să scriu (with subjunctive)


Vreau a scrie (with infinitive)

The use of the infinitive is preferred in writing in some cases only. In speech it is more commonly used in the northern varieties (Transylvania, Banat, and Moldova) than in Southern varieties (Wallachia) of the language. [15] The most common form is still the form with subjunctive.
Serbo-CroatianŽelim da pišem / Желим да пишемAs opposed to the more literary form: Želim pisati / Желим пиcaти, where pisati / пиcaти is the infinitive. Both forms are grammatically correct in standard Serbian and do not create misunderstandings, although the colloquial one is more commonly used in daily conversation.
Bulgarian Turkishisterim yazayımIn Standard Turkish in Turkey this is yazmak istiyorum where yazmak is the infinitive.
Balkan Romani Mangav te pišinavMany forms of Romani add the ending -a to express the indicative present, while reserving the short form for the subjunctive serving as an infinitive: for example mangava te pišinav. Some varieties outside the Balkans have been influenced by non-Balkan languages and have developed new infinitives by generalizing one of the finite forms (e.g. Slovak Romani varieties may express "I want to write" as kamav te irinel/pisinel — generalized third person singular — or kamav te irinen/pisinen — generalized third person plural).

But here is an example of a relict form, preserved in Bulgarian:

LanguageWithout infinitiveWith relict "infinitive"TranslationNotes
BulgarianНедей да пишеш.Недей писа.Don't write.The first part of the first three examples is the prohibitative element недей ("don't", composed of не, "not", and дей, "do" in the imperative). The second part of the examples, писа, я, зна and да, are relicts of what used to be an infinitive form (писати, ясти, знати and дати respectively). This second syntactic construction is colloquial and more common in the eastern dialects. The forms usually coincide with the past aorist tense of the verb in the third person singular, as in the case of писа; some that don't coincide (for example доща instead of ще дойда "I will come") are highly unusual today, but do occur, above all in older literature.

The last example is found only in some dialects.

Недей да ядеш.Недей яде.Don't eat.
Недей да знаеш.Недей зна.Don't contradict.
Можете ли да ми дадете?Можете ли ми да̀де?Can you give me?
Недей дачетешНедей четеDon't read

Bare subjunctive constructions

Sentences that include only a subjunctive construction can be used to express a wish, a mild command, an intention, or a suggestion.

This example translates in the Balkan languages the phrase "You should go!", using the subjunctive constructions.

LanguageExampleNotes
MacedonianДа (си) одиш!"Оди" [odi] in the imperative is more common, and has the identical meaning.
BulgarianДа си ходиш!"Ходи си!" [ho'di si] is the more common imperative.
Torlakian Да идеш!"Иди!" in the imperative is grammatically correct, and has the identical meaning.
AlbanianTë shkosh!"Shko!" in the imperative is grammatically correct. "Të shkosh" is used in sentence only followed by a modal verbs, ex. in these cases: Ti duhet të shkosh (You should go), Ti mund të shkosh (You can go) etc.
Modern GreekΝα πας!
RomanyTe dža!
RomanianSă te duci!
  • compare with similar Spanish "¡Que te largues!"
  • in Romanian, the "a se duce" (to go) requires a reflexive construction, literally "take yourself (to)"
MeglenianS-ti duts!
AromanianS-ti duts!

Morphology

Postposed article

With the exception of Greek, Serbo-Croatian, and Romani, all languages in the union have their definite article attached to the end of the noun, instead of before it. None of the related languages (like other Romance languages or Slavic languages) share this feature, with the notable exception of the northern Russian dialects, and it is thought to be an innovation created and spread in the Balkans. It is possible that postposed article in Balkan Slavic is the result of influence from Eastern Romance languages (Romanian or Aromanian) during the Middle Ages. [16] However, each language created its own internal articles, so the Romanian articles are related to the articles (and demonstrative pronouns) in Italian, French, etc., whereas the Bulgarian articles are related to demonstrative pronouns in other Slavic languages.

LanguageFeminineMasculine
without

article

with

article

without

article

with

article

Englishwomanthe womanmanthe man
Albaniangruagruajaburrëburri
Aromanianmuljarimuljareabãrbatbãrbatlu
Bulgarianженаженатамъжмъжът
Greekγυναίκαη γυναίκαάντραςο άντρας
Macedonian [17] женаженатамажмажот
Romanianfemeie

muiere

femeia

muierea

bărbatbărbatul
Torlakian женаженатамужмужът
Numeral formation

The Slavic way of composing the numbers between 10 and 20, e.g. "one + on + ten" for eleven, called superessive, is widespread. Greek does not follow this.

LanguageThe word "Eleven"compounds
Albanian"njëmbëdhjetë"një + mbë + dhjetë
Aromanian"unsprãdzatsi", commonly,

"unsprã"

un + sprã + dzatsi
Bulgarian"единадесет" (единайсет also allowed)един + (н)а(д) + десет
Macedonian"единаесет"еде(и)н + (н)а(д) + (д)есет
Romanian "unsprezece" or, more commonly, "unșpe"un + spre + zece < *unu + supre + dece; unu + spre; the latter is more commonly used, even in formal speech.
Serbo-Croatian"jedanaest/једанаест"jedan+ (n)a+ (d)es(e)t/један + (н)а + (д)ес(е)т. This is not the case only with South Slavic languages. This word is formed in the same way in most Slavic languages, e.g. Polish - "jedenaście", Czech - "jedenáct", Slovak - "jedenásť", Russian - "одиннадцать", Ukrainian - "одинадцять", etc.

Albanian has preserved the vigesimal system, which is considered to be an remnant from a Pre-Indo-European language. The number 20 is described njëzet and 40 as dyzet. In some dialects trezet '60' and katërzet '80' still may be used. All other Balkan languages lack at this. [18]

Clitic pronouns

Direct and indirect objects are cross-referenced, or doubled, in the verb phrase by a clitic (weak) pronoun, agreeing with the object in gender, number, and case or case function. This can be found in Romanian, Greek, Bulgarian, Macedonian, and Albanian. In Albanian and Macedonian, this feature shows fully grammaticalized structures and is obligatory with indirect objects and to some extent with definite direct objects; in Bulgarian, however, it is optional and therefore based on discourse. In Greek, the construction contrasts with the clitic-less construction and marks the cross-referenced object as a topic. Southwest Macedonia appears to be the location of innovation.[ dubious discuss ]

For example, "I see George" in Balkan languages:

LanguageExample
Albanian"E shoh Gjergjin"
Aromanian"U- ved Yioryi"
Bulgarian"Гледам го Георги."
Macedonian"Гo гледам Ѓорѓи."
Greek"Τον βλέπω τον Γιώργο"
Romanian"Îl văd pe Gheorghe."

Note: The neutral case in normal (SVO) word order is without a clitic: "Гледам Георги." However, the form with an additional clitic pronoun is also perfectly normal and can be used for emphasis: "Гледам го Георги." And the clitic is obligatory in the case of a topicalized object (with OVS-word order), which serves also as the common colloquial equivalent of a passive construction. "Георги го гледам."

Adjectives

The replacement of synthetic adjectival comparative forms with analytic ones by means of preposed markers is common. These markers are:

  • Bulgarian: по-
  • Macedonian: по (prepended)
  • Albanian:
  • Romanian: mai
  • Modern Greek: πιο (pió)
  • Aromanian: (ca)ma

Macedonian and Modern Greek have retained some of the earlier synthetic forms. In Bulgarian and Macedonian these have become proper adjectives in their own right without the possibility of [further] comparison. This is more evident in Macedonian: виш = "higher, superior", ниж = "lower, inferior". Compare with similar structures in Bulgarian: висш(-(ия(т))/а(та)/о(то)/и(те)) = "(the) higher, (the) superior" (по-висш(-(ия(т))/а(та)/о(то)/и(те)) = "(the) [more] higher, (the) [more] superior"; 'най-висш(-(ия(т))/о(то)/а(та)/и(те))' = "(the) ([most]) highest, supreme"; нисш (also spelled as низш sometimes) = "low, lower, inferior", it can also possess further comparative or superlative as with 'висш' above.

Another common trait of these languages is the lack of suppletive comparative degrees for the adjective "good" and "bad", unlike other Indo-European languages.

Suffixes

Also, some common suffixes can be found in the language area, such as the diminutive suffix of the Slavic languages (Srb. Bul. Mac.) "-ovo" "-ica" that can be found in Albanian, Greek and Romanian.

Vocabulary

Loanwords

Several hundred words are common to the Balkan union languages; the origin of most of them is either Greek, Bulgarian or Turkish, as the Byzantine Empire, the First Bulgarian Empire, the Second Bulgarian Empire and later the Ottoman Empire directly controlled the territory throughout most of its history, strongly influencing its culture and economics.

Albanian, Aromanian, Bulgarian, Greek, Romanian, Serbo-Croatian and Macedonian also share a large number of words of various origins:

SourceSource wordMeaningAlbanianAromanianBulgarianGreekRomanianMacedonianSerbianTurkish
Vulgar Latinmēsatablemësallë ‘dinner table; tablecloth’measãмаса (masa)masăмаса (masa)masa
Thracian romphea,
rumpīa
polearmcolloq. rrufe ‘lightning bolt’roféljadial. руфия (rufiya) ‘thunderbolt’anc. ρομφαία (rhomphaía)colloq. ровја (rovja) and dial. рофја (rofja) ‘thunder’
Ancient Greekκρόμμυον (krómmyon)oniondial. кромид лук (kromid luk)κρεμμύδι (kremmýdhi)кромид (kromid)
Byzantine Greekλιβάδιον (livádion)meadowcolloq. livadhlivadhiливада (livada)λιβάδι (livádhi)livadăливада (livada)livada
ливада (livada)
Byzantine Greekδιδάσκαλος (didáskalos)teacherobs. dhaskal/icëdascalcolloq. даскал (daskal)δάσκαλος (dháskalos)rare dascălcolloq. даскал (daskal)colloq. даскал (daskal)
Byzantine Greekκουτίον
(koutíon)
boxkuticutiiкутия (kutiya)κουτί (koutí)cutieкутија (kutija)kutija
кутија (kutija)
kutu
Slavic *vydra ottervidërvidrãвидра (vidra)βίδρα (vídra)vidrăвидра (vidra)видра (vidra)
Slavic *kosa scythekosëcoasãкоса (kosa)κόσα (kósa)coasăкоса (kosa)коса (kosa)
Turkishboyapaint, colorcolloq. bojëboiбоя (boya)μπογιά (boyá)boiaбоја (boja)boja
боја (boja)
boya

Calques

Apart from the direct loans, there are also many calques that were passed from one Balkan language to another, most of them between Albanian, Macedonian, Bulgarian, Greek, Aromanian and Romanian.

For example, the word "ripen" (as in fruit) is constructed in Albanian, Romanian and (rarely) in Greek (piqem, a (se) coace, ψήνομαι), in Turkish pişmek by a derivation from the word "to bake" (pjek, a coace, ψήνω). [19]

Another example is the wish "(∅/to/for) many years":

LanguageExpressionTransliteration
Greek(medieval)εις έτη πολλάis eti polla; (See the note below.)
(modern)χρόνια πολλάkhronia polla
Latin ad multos annos  
Aromanianti mullts anj 
Romanianla mulți ani 
Albanianpër shumë vjet 
Bulgarianза много годиниza mnogo godini
Macedonianза многу годиниza mnogu godini
Serbianза много годинaza mnogo godina

Note: In Old Church Slavonic [20] and archaic Eastern South Slavic dialects, the term сполай(j) ти (spolaj ti) was commonly used in meaning thank you, derived from the Byzantine Greek εἰς πολλὰ ἔτη (is polla eti). [21] [22]

Idiomatic expressions for "whether one <verb> or not" are formed as "<verb>-not-<verb>". [23] "Whether one wants or not":

Languageexpressiontransliteration
Bulgarianще - не щеshte - ne shte
Greekθέλει δε θέλειtheli de theli
Romanianvrea nu vrea
Turkishister istemez
Serbianхтео - не хтеоhteo - ne hteo
Albaniando - s'do
Macedonianсакал - не сакал / нејќелsakal - ne sakal / nejkjel
Aromanianvrea - nu vrea

This is also present in other Slavic languages, e.g. Polish chcąc nie chcąc.

Phonetics

The proposed phonological features consist of:

This feature[ which? ] also occurs in Greek, but it is lacking in some of the other Balkan languages; the central vowel is found in Romanian, Bulgarian, some dialects of Albanian, and Serbo-Croatian, but not in Greek or Standard Macedonian.

Less widespread features are confined largely to either Romanian or Albanian, or both:

Not all linguists agree there are any phonological features associated with Balkan sprachbund. [24]

See also

Notes

  1. Fielder, Grace E. (1999). "The Origin of Evidentiality in the Balkans: Linguistic Convergence or Conceptual Convergence?". Mediterranean Language Review. 11: 59–89. JSTOR   10.13173/medilangrevi.11.1999.0059.
  2. Victor Friedman (2004). "The Typology of Balkan Evidentiality and Areal Linguistics". In Mišeska Tomić, Olga (ed.). Balkan Syntax and Semantics. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. p. 124.
  3. Aikhenvald, Alexandra Y. (2018) "Evidentiality and language contact" in Aikhenvald, Alexandra Y., (ed.) Oxford Handbook of Evidentiality. Oxford Handbooks in Linguistics. Oxford University Press, Oxford, pp. 148–172.
  4. Kopitar, Jernej K. (1829). "Albanische, walachische und bulgarische Sprache". Jahrbücher der Literatur (Wien). 46: 59–106. ISBN   3-89131-038-2.
  5. August Schleicher, Linguistische Untersuchungen, vol. 2: Die Sprachen Europas in systematischer Übersicht. Bonn: H.B. König, 1850.
  6. Miklosich, F. (1861). "Die slavischen Elemente im Rumunischen". Denkschriften der Kaiserlichen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Philosophisch-historische Classe. 12: 1–70.
  7. Trubetzkoy, N.S. (1923). "Vavilonskaja bašnja i smešenie jazykov". Evrazijskij Vremennik. 3: 107–24.
  8. K. Sandfeld, Balkanfilologien: En oversigt over dens resultater og problemer. Copenhagen: Lunp, 1926; translated into French as Linguistique balkanique: problèmes et résultats. Paris: Champion, 1930.
  9. Weigand, Gustav (1925). "Vorwort, zugleich Programm des Balkan-Archivs". Balkan-Archiv. 1: V–XV.; Gustav Weigand, “Texte zur vergleichenden Syuntax der Balkansprachen”, Balkan Archiv IV (1928): 53-70.
  10. Chase Faucheux, Language Classification and Manipulation in Romania and Moldova, M.A. thesis, Louisiana State University, 2006, quoting André Du Nay, The Origins of the Rumanians: The Early History of the Rumanian Language, 1996.
  11. Lindstedt, J. (2000). "Linguistic Balkanization: Contact-induced change by mutual reinforcement". In D.G. Gilbers; et al. (eds.). Languages in Contact. Studies in Slavic and General Linguistics, 28. Amsterdam; Atlanta, GA: Rodopi. pp. 231–246. ISBN   90-420-1322-2.
  12. Horrocks, Geoffrey (2010). Greek: A History of the Language and its Speakers (2nd ed.). Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell. pp. 227–229.
  13. Bernd Heine & Tania Kuteva, Language Contact and Grammatical Change (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005).
  14. Romani dialects outside of the Balkans generally do not express the future tense in this way. Unlike the avoidance of the infinitive, which had already come to encompass all Romani varieties before many of them were brought out of the Balkans into the rest of Europe, the formation of the future tense with a devolitive particle is apparently a later development, since it is only seen in those dialect groups that have not left the Balkans.
  15. Mădălina Spătaru-Pralea. "Concurența infinitiv-conjunctiv în limba română". Archived from the original on 2011-04-23. Retrieved 2011-06-26.
  16. Theodor Capidan, Raporturile lingvistice slavo-române. I. Influența română asupra limbei bulgare, Dacoromania. Buletinul „Muzeului Limbei Române”, III, Editura Institutului de Arte Grafice „Ardealul”, Cluj-Napoca, 1922-1923, p. 123-124
  17. In Macedonian there are three types of definite articles. In this example the common definite article is given.
  18. Demiraj S. The Origin of the Albanians : Linguistically Investigated. Tirana: Academy of Sciences of Albania; 2006
  19. In Greek, usually in the mediopassive voice, and applicable not only to fruits but other natural products: Babiniotis, Λεξικό της νέας Ελληνικής Γλώσσας (1998), gives the example "φέτος ψήθηκαν νωρίς τα καλαμπόκια".
  20. История на българите с поправки и добавки от самия автор - акад. Константин Иречек (Издателство Наука и изкуство, 1978) под редакцията на проф. Петър Хр. Петров, стр. 459; Виж бел. 2 под линия: Български език. Гръцки чужди думи, вж. Cesty po Bulharsku passim. За сполай-ти= ’s πολλὰ ἔτη. Даничич-Leskien, Jagić, Archiv, 4, стр. 513. Руссиадес, 2, стр. 281. — Е. В. Петухов, Болгарские литературные деятели древнейшей эпохи на русской почве, ЖМНПр, 1893 апрель, стр. 298—322. Климент, Йоан Екзарх, Константин — пълна библиография и ръкописите. — V. Oblak, Zur Würdigung des Altslovenischen, Archiv für slav. Philologie, XV, стр. 367: „das Altslovenische war nicht die Sprache der Slaven Pannoniens, sondern die dialektischen und ethnographischen Verhältnisse waren damals ungefahr wie heutzutage, nur reichte der Kaj-Dialect weiter nach West und Nord”. стр. 369 über крьсть und крижь. Sprache der Tessalonicher Apostol, Sprache ihrer Heimat und Umgebung. Die ersten kirchenslavischen Übersetzungen wohl nicht pannonisch: daför zu wenig pannonisch und zu sehr griechisch.
  21. Според утвърденото мнение бълг. сполай (ти) е възникнало като резултат от декомпозицията на крайната сричка в средногръцкото (eis polla šti), словосъчетание, използувано във византийския императорски двор като формула за вежливост. Виж Сборник в чест на академик Владимир Георгиев: езиковедски проучвания. Сътрудници: Владимир Иванов Георгиев, Кристалина Чолакова, Институт за български език. Изд-во на Българската академия на науките, 1980 г. стр. 173.
  22. Сполај ти! православие.мк, https://pravoslavie.mk/spolaj-ti/ Archived 2019-12-07 at the Wayback Machine "Еден израз во нашиот јазик којшто денес го слушаме сѐ поретко, за разлика од порано, а во иднина веројатно целосно ќе се исфрли од употреба и ќе можеме да го слушнеме само во Македонските народни приказни, е токму: „сполај ти“! Иако многу ретко се користи, сите отприлика знаеме што значи – „благодарам“, „фала“ ".
  23. Winford, Donald (2003). An Introduction to Contact Linguistics. Blackwell Publishing. ISBN   0-631-21251-5.
  24. Friedman, Victor A. (29 March 2017). "Languages of the Balkans".

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bulgarian language</span> South Slavic language

Bulgarian is an Eastern South Slavic language spoken in Southeast Europe, primarily in Bulgaria. It is the language of the Bulgarians.

Infinitive is a linguistics term for certain verb forms existing in many languages, most often used as non-finite verbs. As with many linguistic concepts, there is not a single definition applicable to all languages. The name is derived from Late Latin [modus] infinitivus, a derivative of infinitus meaning "unlimited".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Macedonian language</span> South Slavic language spoken in North Macedonia

Macedonian is an Eastern South Slavic language. It is part of the Indo-European language family, and is one of the Slavic languages, which are part of a larger Balto-Slavic branch. Spoken as a first language by around 1.6 million people, it serves as the official language of North Macedonia. Most speakers can be found in the country and its diaspora, with a smaller number of speakers throughout the transnational region of Macedonia. Macedonian is also a recognized minority language in parts of Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Romania, and Serbia and it is spoken by emigrant communities predominantly in Australia, Canada and the United States.

A sprachbund, also known as a linguistic area, area of linguistic convergence, or diffusion area, is a group of languages that share areal features resulting from geographical proximity and language contact. The languages may be genetically unrelated, or only distantly related, but the sprachbund characteristics might give a false appearance of relatedness.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Substrate in Romanian</span>

The proposed substratal elements in Romanian are mostly lexical items. The process of determining if a word is from the substratum involves comparison to Latin, languages with which Romanian came into contact, or determining if it is an internal construct. If there are no matching results, a comparison to Albanian vocabulary, Thracian remnants or Proto-Indo-European reconstructed words is made.

Aorist verb forms usually express perfective aspect and refer to past events, similar to a preterite. Ancient Greek grammar had the aorist form, and the grammars of other Indo-European languages and languages influenced by the Indo-European grammatical tradition, such as Middle Persian, Sanskrit, Armenian, the South Slavic languages, Georgian, Pontic Greek, and Pashto, also have forms referred to as aorist.

This is a list of languages spoken in regions ruled by Balkan countries. With the exception of several Turkic languages, all of them belong to the Indo-European family. A subset of these languages is notable for forming a well-studied sprachbund, a group of languages that have developed some striking structural similarities over time.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">South Slavic languages</span> Language family

The South Slavic languages are one of three branches of the Slavic languages. There are approximately 30 million speakers, mainly in the Balkans. These are separated geographically from speakers of the other two Slavic branches by a belt of German, Hungarian and Romanian speakers.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Torlakian dialects</span> Group of South Slavic dialects

Torlakian, or Torlak, is a group of transitional South Slavic dialects of southeastern Serbia, Kosovo, northeastern North Macedonia, and northwestern Bulgaria. Torlakian, together with Bulgarian and Macedonian, falls into the Balkan Slavic linguistic area, which is part of the broader Balkan sprachbund. According to UNESCO's list of endangered languages, Torlakian is vulnerable.

The conditional mood is a grammatical mood used in conditional sentences to express a proposition whose validity is dependent on some condition, possibly counterfactual.

Proto-Albanian is the ancestral reconstructed language of Albanian, before the Gheg–Tosk dialectal diversification. Albanoid and other Paleo-Balkan languages had their formative core in the Balkans after the Indo-European migrations in the region. Whether descendants or sister languages of what was called Illyrian by classical sources, Albanian and Messapic, on the basis of shared features and innovations, are grouped together in a common branch in the current phylogenetic classification of the Indo-European language family. The precursor of Albanian can be considered a completely formed independent IE language since at least the first millennium BCE, with the beginning of the early Proto-Albanian phase.

Languages of Yugoslavia are all languages spoken in former Yugoslavia. They are mainly Indo-European languages and dialects, namely dominant South Slavic varieties as well as Albanian, Aromanian, Bulgarian, Czech, German, Italian, Venetian, Balkan Romani, Romanian, Pannonian Rusyn, Slovak and Ukrainian languages. There are also pockets where varieties of non-Indo-European languages, such as those of Hungarian and Turkish, are spoken.

The grammar of Macedonian is, in many respects, similar to that of some other Balkan languages, especially Bulgarian. Macedonian exhibits a number of grammatical features that distinguish it from most other Slavic languages, such as the elimination of case declension, the development of a suffixed definite article, the lack of an infinitival verb, and the constructions with ima/nema formed with the auxiliary "to have", among others.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Languages of North Macedonia</span> Languages spoken in North Macedonia

The official language of North Macedonia is Macedonian, while Albanian has co-official status. Macedonian is spoken by roughly two-thirds of the population natively, and as a second language by much of the rest of the population. Albanian is the largest minority language. There are a further five national minority languages: Turkish, Romani, Serbian, Bosnian, and Aromanian. The Macedonian Sign Language is the country's official sign language.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Albanian language</span> Indo-European language

Albanian is an Indo-European language and the only surviving representative of the Albanoid branch, which belongs to the Paleo-Balkan group. Standard Albanian is the official language of Albania and Kosovo, and a co-official language in North Macedonia and Montenegro, as well as a recognized minority language of Italy, Croatia, Romania and Serbia. It is also spoken in Greece and by the Albanian diaspora, which is generally concentrated in the Americas, Europe and Oceania. Albanian is estimated to have as many as 7.5 million native speakers.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Aromanian language</span> Romance language of the Balkans

The Aromanian language, also known as Vlach or Macedo-Romanian, is an Eastern Romance language, similar to Megleno-Romanian, Istro-Romanian and Romanian, spoken in Southeastern Europe. Its speakers are called Aromanians or Vlachs.

Serbo-Croatian is a South Slavic language that, like most other Slavic languages, has an extensive system of inflection. This article describes exclusively the grammar of the Shtokavian dialect, which is a part of the South Slavic dialect continuum and the basis for the Bosnian, Croatian, Montenegrin, and Serbian standard variants of Serbo-Croatian. "An examination of all the major 'levels' of language shows that BCS is clearly a single language with a single grammatical system."

The Eastern South Slavic dialects form the eastern subgroup of the South Slavic languages. They are spoken mostly in Bulgaria and North Macedonia, and adjacent areas in the neighbouring countries. They form the so-called Balkan Slavic linguistic area, which encompasses the southeastern part of the dialect continuum of South Slavic.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Theodor Capidan</span> Romanian linguist

Theodor Capidan was an Ottoman-born Romanian linguist. An ethnic Aromanian from the Macedonia region, he studied at Leipzig before teaching school at Thessaloniki. Following the creation of Greater Romania at the end of World War I, Capidan followed his friend Sextil Pușcariu to the Transylvanian capital Cluj, where he spent nearly two decades, the most productive part of his career. He then taught in Bucharest for a further ten years and was marginalized late in life under the nascent communist regime. Capidan's major contributions involve studies of the Aromanians and the Megleno-Romanians, as well as their respective languages. His research extended to reciprocal influences between Romanian and the surrounding Slavic languages, the Eastern Romance substratum and the Balkan sprachbund, as well as toponymy. He made a significant contribution to projects for a Romanian-language dictionary and atlas.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Albanian–Eastern Romance linguistic parallels</span> Study of the similarities of the Albanian and Eastern Romance languages

The Albanian–Eastern Romance linguistic parallels are subject of historical and contact linguistic research applied to the Albanian and Eastern Romance languages. It has also been studied to understand the history of Albanian and Eastern Romance speakers. The common phonological, morphological and syntactical features of the two language families have been studied for more than a century. Both are part of the Balkan sprachbund but there are certain elements shared only by Albanian and Eastern Romance languages that descended from Common Romanian. Aside from Latin, and from shared Greek, Slavic and Turkish elements, other characteristics and words are attributed to the Palaeo-Balkan linguistic base. Similarities between Eastern Romance and Albanian are not limited to their common Balkan features and the assumed common lexical items: the two language families share calques and proverbs, and display analogous phonetic changes, some of the latter especially shared between Tosk Albanian and Common Romanian.

References

Further reading

General
Overviews
History
Balkanisms