Slavic liquid metathesis and pleophony

Last updated July 06, 2024

The Slavic liquid metathesis refers to the phenomenon of metathesis of liquid consonants in the Common Slavic period in the South Slavic and West Slavic area. The closely related corresponding phenomenon of pleophony (also known as polnoglasie or full vocalization) occurred in parallel in the East Slavic languages.

The change has been dated to the second half of the 8th century, before any Slavic languages were recorded in writing. Therefore, the change itself cannot be observed, but it can be inferred by comparing words in different Slavic languages. Evidence of the earlier state of affairs is also preserved in loanwords into and from Early Slavic as well as in cognates in other Indo-European languages, particularly Baltic languages.

Background

Environments of eliminated liquid codas
Traditional	Schenker	Holzer
oRT	ăRC	aRC
TeRT	CĕRC	CeRC
ToRT	CăRC	CaRC
TьRT	CĭRC	CiRC
TъRT	CŭRC	CuRC

During the Common Slavic period, a tendency, known as the law of open syllables, led to a series of changes that eliminated closed syllables. By the Old Church Slavonic period, every syllable, without exception, ended in a vowel. Such changes included:

monophthongization of diphthongs,
loss of word-final consonants (PSl *vьlkъ < PBSl *wilkás < PIE *wĺ̥kʷos),
simplification of some medial consonant clusters (OCS tonǫti < *topnǫti), and
formation of the nasal vowels *ǫ < *am/*an and *ę < *em/*en.

The change discussed here is part of this process, and it involved the liquid consonants, grouped under the cover symbol R, *l or *r in a coda position, in environments that are traditionally designated as in the table on the right. The application of the law of open syllables in such environments had different results in different Slavic dialects, and it is some of the earliest evidence for differentiation into the multitude of Slavic languages.

In some, it is the metathesis of a sequence of liquid consonants followed by a vowel, and in others, it is an insertion of another vowel. In most cases, the effect was to eliminate the syllable-final consonants *l and *r so that the law of open syllables was maintained.

Reflexes in Slavic languages

oRT

Metathesis then occurred in all Slavic dialects. In South Slavic dialects (Slovene, Serbo-Croatian, Macedonian, Bulgarian) as well in Czech and Slovak, the metathesized vowel was lengthened as well.

In East Slavic and the Lechitic branch of West Slavic, the outcome was dependent upon the Proto-Slavic accent: in acuted syllables, the output was the same as in South Slavic and Czech-Slovak, but on circumflexed syllables, the metathesized vowel did not lengthen.

Area	Acuted syllable		Circumflexed syllable
Area	Traditional	Schenker/Holzer	Traditional	Schenker/Holzer
South Slavic, Czech and Slovak	CS oRT > CS raT	PSl. aRC > PSl.* RāC > CS RaC	CS oRT > CS raT	PSl. aRC > PSl.* RāC > CS RaC
North Slavic	CS oRT > CS raT	PSl. aRC > PSl.* RāC > CS RaC	CS oRT > CS roT	PSl. aRC > PSl.* RaC > CS RoC

PSl. = Proto-Slavic proper, the stage before both the loss of distinctive vowel length and the change *a > *o

CS = Common Slavic, Late Proto-Slavic, the last reconstructable ancestor of all Slavic languages

Compare the following reflexes:

Accent	Proto-Slavic reconstruction	South Slavic, Czech and Slovak							North Slavic
Accent	Proto-Slavic reconstruction	OCS	Slovene	Serbo-Croatian	Bulgarian	Macedonian	Czech	Slovak	Russian	Belarusian	Ukrainian	Polish	Low. Sorbian	Upp. Sorbian
Acute	PSl. ardla > CS őrdlo "plough"	ralo	rálo	rȁlo / ра̏ло	ра́ло (rálo)	рало (ralo)	rádlo	radlo	ра́ло (rálo)	ра́ла (rála)	ра́ло (rálo)	radło	radło	radło
Circumflex	PSl. arstu > CS ȍrstъ "growth"	rastŭ	rȃst	rȃst / ра̑ст	ръст (răst)	раст (rast)	růst	rast	рост (rost)	рост (rost)	ріст (rist)	wzrost		róst

If the syllable was not acuted, the metathesis in West and East Slavic occurred without the lengthening so EPSl. *a retains its short quantity and yields /o/; compare EPSl. *ȃlkъtь ‘elbow’ > Serbo-Croatian lȃkat but Czech loket .

TeRT and ToRT

Word-medially, on the other hand, there were three primary outcomes:

In Czech, Slovak and South Slavic, the metathesis occurred with lengthening: Proto-Slavic (PS) CeRC CaRC > CRēC CRāC > Common Slavic (CS) CRěC CRaC.
In the rest of West Slavic, the metathesis occurred but without lengthening: PS CeRC CaRC > CReC CRaC > CS CReC CRoC.
In East Slavic, a vowel was inserted to break up the RC sequence (pleophony): PS CeRC CaRC > CeReC CaRaC > CS CeReC CoRoC.

As a result of dialect-specific changes occurring before and after the cluster resolution (metathesis/pleophony), the outcomes in various languages are diverse and complex. For example, in North-West Lechitic (northern Kashubian, Slovincian, Pomeranian and Polabian) and East Slavic, *CalC and *CelC merged into *CalC prior to cluster resolution:

In Polish and Sorbian, the metathesis occurred without lengthening: Polish brzeg, mleko, groch, młot as opposed to OCS brěgъ, mlěko, Slovene gràh, OCS mlatъ.
In North-West Lechitic, *CalC and *CelC yielded ClŭC (Polabian glåvă ‘head’, å < ъ), *CerC > CreC (without lengthening, as in Polish) while in *CarC, ar becomes ŭr, just like word-initially under acute (Polabian råmą ‘arm’ < *rъmę < *armę), but it did not undergo the metathesis. Compare Polabian porsą, Slovene prasè and Pomerian gard (often in toponymics like Białogard) to OCS gradъ (note that unchanged ar in *gardŭ would have yielded or in Pomeranian).
In Czech and Slovak, word-medial metathesis occurred with lengthening just like in South Slavic: Czech mlat, hrách, Polish młot, groch with an /o/.
The East Slavic languages have pleophonic *CarC > CoroC, *CerC > CereC and *CalC/*CelC > ColoC: Russian górod, béreg, mólot, molokó.

TьRT and TъRT

Complete and incomplete metathesis

If the liquid metathesis is complete only if it occurred with the corresponding vowel lengthening, the metathesis occurred completely in South Slavic and partially in Slovak and in non-word-initial position in the whole Czecho-Slovak area. The complete metathesis has been operational in all Slavic languages for acuted syllables. For word-initial non-acuted syllables, there was no lengthening except in South Slavic and, partially, Slovak.

As mentioned, the complete metathesis occurred in South Slavic, in Czech and Slovak and in Polish and Sorbian, without lengthening. In North-West Lechitic, the metathesis did not occur even for *CarC syllables. In East Slavic, pleophony yielded *CVRC > CVRVC. The reflex of *l in North-West Lechitic and East Slavic is always "hard".

First and second metathesis

Since the reflexes of acuted word-initial *ar- and *al- are the same in all Slavic dialects, they must have changed before the syllables ending with a liquid, which have different reflexes.^[1] One can thus distinguish the first and the second metathesis of liquids.

Dating

From Slavic evidence alone, the change cannot be dated precisely because no Slavic languages had yet committed to writing. However, words may have been documented from contemporary non-Slavic languages, and words may also have been borrowed into Slavic from other languages. That makes it possible to narrow down the time that the change occurred.

The liquid metathesis occurred in the Common Slavic era. It took place after or was still productive until the end of the 8th century. The name of Charlemagne, who died in 814, underwent the change:

Old High German Karl^{[note 1]} > PSl. *karl′u^{[note 2]} > Common Slavic *korl′ь > Russian koról′, Polish król, Slovak kráľ, Serbo-Croatian krȃlj

On the other hand, the change had already been completed in the earliest Old Church Slavonic documents. That implies that the change was completed, at least in the dialects of Bulgaria and of Macedonia, in no later than the 9th century, when the documents were written. There are, however, some attested unmetathised words in OCS such as ал(ъ)дии, a doublet of the metathised ладии.

There are also glosses of Slavic words in foreign-language sources. Earlier sources show no effect of liquid metathesis, such as when the late-8th-century Greek chronicler Theophanes the Confessor writes Slavic names as Ἀρδάγαστος (Ardágastos) and Δαργαμηρός (Dargamērós). Old Church Slavonic versions of the names, with the metathesis applied, would be Radogostъ and Dragoměrъ . Liquid metathesis is also seen in various borrowings preserved in toponymics; Latin Arba > Serbo-Croatian Rȃb , Latin Albōna > Serbo-Croatian Làbīn , Latin Scardōna > Serbo-Croatian Skràdīn etc.

Interpretation

It has been suggested^[2] that East Slavic preserved the actual state of affairs, that the vowel was inserted in Common Slavic and that it was only subsequently lost in all dialects except in East Slavic, preceding the liquid. The exact development would thus be in Serbo-Croatian and Bulgarian as follows:

PSl. *bardā 'beard' > *Common Slavic *bar^adā (*bor^oda) > *b^aradā (*b^oroda) SCr. bráda, Blg. bradá.

Notes

↑ Karl is not only a proper noun but also a common noun and then means "adult male". It is a normalised form, based on the Old East Franconian dialect. The common noun is also attested as charal in Old Upper German, with an epenthetic vowel, for example in the Old Alemannic rendering of the Rule of Saint Benedict. That may be the origin of the intrusive vowel in Carolus, the Latinised version of the name, but the Slavic process seems to be unconnected.
↑ The rendering of OHG l as PSl. *l′ is regular; the reason is that PSl. plain *l was dark, while OHG l was a normal [l], which was identified with the PSl. palatalised liquid *l′.

Related Research Articles

The Slavic languages, also known as the Slavonic languages, are Indo-European languages spoken primarily by the Slavic peoples and their descendants. They are thought to descend from a proto-language called Proto-Slavic, spoken during the Early Middle Ages, which in turn is thought to have descended from the earlier Proto-Balto-Slavic language, linking the Slavic languages to the Baltic languages in a Balto-Slavic group within the Indo-European family.

Old Church Slavonic or Old Slavonic is the first Slavic literary language.

The Lechiticlanguages are a language subgroup consisting of Polish and several other languages and dialects that were once spoken in the area that is now Poland and eastern Germany. It is one of the branches of the larger West Slavic subgroup; the other branches of this subgroup are the Czech–Slovak languages and the Sorbian languages.

The Polabian language, also known as Drevanian–Polabian language, Drevanian language, and Lüneburg Wendish language, is a West Slavic language that was spoken by the Polabian Slavs in present-day northeastern Germany around the Elbe. It was spoken approximately until the rise to power of Prussia in the mid-18th century – when it was superseded by Low German – in the areas of Pomoré, central (Mittelmark) part of Branibor (Brandenburg) and eastern Saxony-Anhalt, as well as in eastern parts of Wendland and Dravänia (Schleswig-Holstein), Ostholstein and Lauenburg). Polabian was also relatively long spoken in and around the cities of Bukovéc (Lübeck), Starigard (Oldenburg) and Trava (Hamburg). The very poorly attested Slavic dialects of Rügen seemed to have had more in common with Polabian than with Pomeranian varieties. In the south, it bordered on the Sorbian language area in Lusatia.

Metathesis is the transposition of sounds or syllables in a word or of words in a sentence. Most commonly, it refers to the interchange of two or more contiguous segments or syllables, known as adjacent metathesis or local metathesis:

Yat or jat is the thirty-second letter of the old Cyrillic alphabet. It is usually romanized as E with a haček: Ě ě.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">West Slavic languages</span> Subdivision of the Slavic language group

The West Slavic languages are a subdivision of the Slavic language group. They include Polish, Czech, Slovak, Kashubian, Silesian, Upper Sorbian and Lower Sorbian. The languages have traditionally been spoken across a mostly continuous region encompassing the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Poland, the westernmost regions of Ukraine and Belarus, and a bit of eastern Lithuania. In addition, there are several language islands such as the Sorbian areas in Lusatia in Germany, and Slovak areas in Hungary and elsewhere.

The history of the Slavic languages stretches over 3000 years, from the point at which the ancestral Proto-Balto-Slavic language broke up into the modern-day Slavic languages which are today natively spoken in Eastern, Central and Southeastern Europe as well as parts of North Asia and Central Asia.

Proto-Balto-Slavic is a reconstructed hypothetical proto-language descending from Proto-Indo-European (PIE). From Proto-Balto-Slavic, the later Balto-Slavic languages are thought to have developed, composed of the Baltic and Slavic sub-branches, and including modern Lithuanian, Polish, Russian and Serbo-Croatian, among others.

In a purely dialectological sense, Slovene dialects are the regionally diverse varieties that evolved from old Slovene, a South Slavic language of which the standardized modern version is Standard Slovene. This also includes several dialects in Croatia, most notably the so-called Western Goran dialect, which is actually Kostel dialect. In reality, speakers in Croatia self-identify themselves as speaking Croatian, which is a result of a ten centuries old country border passing through the dialects since the Francia. In addition, two dialects situated in Slovene did not evolve from Slovene. The Čičarija dialect is a Chakavian dialect and parts of White Carniola were populated by Serbs during the Turkish invasion and therefore Shtokavian is spoken there.

Winter's law, named after Werner Winter, who postulated it in 1978, is a proposed sound law operating on Balto-Slavic short vowels */e/, */o/, */a/, */i/ and */u/ according to which they lengthen before unaspirated voiced stops, and that syllable gains rising, acute accent.

The Slavic first palatalization is a Proto-Slavic sound change that manifested as regressive palatalization of inherited Balto-Slavic velar consonants.

The Slavic second palatalization is a Proto-Slavic sound change that manifested as a regressive palatalization of inherited Balto-Slavic velar consonants that occurred after the first and before the third Slavic palatalizations.

Osthoff's law is an Indo-European sound law which states that long vowels shorten when followed by a resonant, followed in turn by another consonant. It is named after German Indo-Europeanist Hermann Osthoff, who first formulated it.

Proto-Slavic is the unattested, reconstructed proto-language of all Slavic languages. It represents Slavic speech approximately from the 2nd millennium BC through the 6th century AD. As with most other proto-languages, no attested writings have been found; scholars have reconstructed the language by applying the comparative method to all the attested Slavic languages and by taking into account other Indo-European languages.

Proto-Slavic accent is the accentual system of Proto-Slavic and is closely related to the accentual system of some Baltic languages with which it shares many common innovations that occurred in the Proto-Balto-Slavic period. Deeper, it inherits from the Proto-Indo-European accent. In modern languages the prototypical accent is reflected in various ways, some preserving the Proto-Slavic situation to a greater degree than others.

The Proto-Slavic language, the hypothetical ancestor of the modern-day Slavic languages, developed from the ancestral Proto-Balto-Slavic language, which is the parent language of the Balto-Slavic languages. The first 2,000 years or so consist of the pre-Slavic era, a long period during which none of the later dialectal differences between Slavic languages had yet emerged. The last stage in which the language remained without internal differences that later characterize different Slavic languages can be dated around AD 500 and is sometimes termed Proto-Slavic proper or Early Common Slavic. Following this is the Common Slavic period, during which the first dialectal differences appeared but the entire Slavic-speaking area continued to function as a single language, with sound changes tending to spread throughout the entire area. By around 1000, the area had broken up into separate East Slavic, West Slavic and South Slavic languages, and in the following centuries it broke up further into the various modern Slavic languages of which the following are extant: Belarusian, Russian, Rusyn and Ukrainian in the East; Czech, Slovak, Polish, Kashubian and the Sorbian languages in the West, and Bulgarian, Macedonian, Serbo-Croatian and Slovenian in the South.

In linguistics, metatony refers to the change of nature of accent, usually within the same syllable. When the accent also changes its syllable, the process is called metataxis. Metataxis can also be analyzed as a combination of accent movement and metatony. The term is usually used when referring to accentual developments in the history of Baltic and Slavic languages which exhibited numerous such developments, representing the accentual equivalent of sound change.

The West Lechitic dialects are a group of extinct Lechitic dialects, used by the Slavic peoples of Pomerania, Margraviate of Brandenburg, Mecklenburg and the lands on the lower and middle Elbe. At the same time, the dialects of Central Pomerania and Gdańsk Pomerania are usually considered transitional between West Lechitic and East Lechitic and are called the Middle Lechitic dialect group.

The Marcho-Magdeburgian dialect, Old March and Magdeburg dialect is an extinct Slavic Lechitic dialect spoken by Slavic tribes living in the Old March and around Magdeburg. Linguistically, the dialect was particularly related to the Drevani language used until the 18th century in Wendland and belonged to the West Lechitic dialects.

References

↑ Holzer 2007:55-56
↑ Matasović 2008:150