Differences in the South Dialects

DIFFERENCES IN THE SOUTH DIALECTS

OF MACEDONIAN LANGUAGE

Jadranka ANGELOVSKA

University “Sf. Kiril and Metodius” Skopie, Macedonia

Macedonian language is placed in the central part of the Balcanian Peninsula. It reaches the river Vardar and Struma and the south part of the river Mesta.

From the west side the border is with R. Albania and goes to the south-west till the Lake Ohrid and Prespa.

On the south side Macedonian language has border with the greek language, from the mountine Gramos till the river Mesta in Trakia. Macedonian language is spoken on the line Gramos-Ber-Solun (Thesaloniki).

On the east side Macedonian language has border with Bulgarian language. On this part there is natural border, it’s the mountine Despat-Rila.

On the nord side Macedonian language has border with Serbian language and the natural border is the mountine Koziak-Ruen-Skopska Crna Gora-Shar Planina-Korab.

Nowdays, these are the borders of the Macedonian spoken territory.

In the past, Macedonian Slavic population had reached spoken territory deeper in the west and south more than these borders which exist now. Lot of historical sources speak that the Slavic population was living in the South and Middle Albania, and on the South of Epir, Tesalia and the Nord Aegean Coust. Big part from the toponimes in these regions are Slavic. On the Macedonian-greek language region, actually in the Aegean part of Macedonia live mixed population – Macedonians and Greeks. We can hear Macedonian language spoken in the city Kostur, Lerin, Voden. In the registration of the population in the 1951 on this territory were living 250 000 Macedonians.

Genetically, Macedonian language takes part of the South Slavic languages together with Bulgarian, Serbian, Croatian and Slovenian. Lot of characteristics from balcanian non-slavic languages (Aromanian, Albanian and Greek) entered in Macedonian and Bulgarian lexic. All these languages today make the Balcanian Language League.

In the Macedonian language areal there are three biger groups of dialects: West, South-east and Nord.

South-east dialects take big territory. Starting with the city Veles, Probishtip and goes south till Bogoslovetz. The dialects from the city Shtip till Strumitza also make big group of dialects and after them goes to Tikvesh, Mariovo and Maleshevo-Pirin.

There is another big group of dialects which is placed in the south group starting with the city Kailar, Voden, Pazar, Solun, Serez, Drama, Gotze Delchev (Nevrokop).

Also there are dialects of this group which goes on the line of the mountain Belasitza and Koziuv and the south part of the river Vardar near to the city Demir Kapia.

The main characteristics which split these dialects from the central zone of the Macedonian language are the reflex of the nasal *??? [on] which changed the form to /ă/:

ex.: рăка, пăт (hand, road);

and the vocals *r, *l - /ăp, pă/, /ăл, лă/;

ex.: прăсти, срăце, вăлна, слăнце (fingers, heart, wool, sun).

But, the biggest characteristic of the south dialects today is the reduction of the non-accent vocals which historically had appeared very early in the middle age (XIII century). Also the elision as the last result of the reduction which is caused from the fast way of speaking.

The open vocals /a, е, и / in these dialects are like closed vocals [a, e, o] and in the other local dialects they are totally neutralized with their paired closer fonems:

/ e / > / и /; / о / > / y /; /a/ > / ă /;

ex.: елен илен (stag); пекол пикол (hell); гуштер > гуштир (green lizard); голем > гулим (big); човек чувик (man)

богат > бугат (rich);

разбој > рăзбој (loom); работа > рăбота (work).

In some cases the reduced vocals are totally lost:

ex.: полето пол’ту, пол’то (field);

детето де’тто (child);

нивата ниф’та (field);

жената жен’та (woman);

работата рабо’тта (work).

The contact with the Greek and Aromanian language made lot of influences in the west and south dialects. In this case there is influence the most in the adjectives and pronouns, specially the difference between the gender male and neuter. Very often we can see the influence in the conjunction forms with the verb “to have/don’t have’’ and the verb “be + partition n+t’’. The evolution of the preposition -on- to a personal substantive.

ex.: Го виде на де’тто. (He saw on the child.)

The lexic in these dialects is full of Greek and Turkish words. From the other side we can see lot of words from the Oldslavic language which remained only in these dialects.

When we speak about the accent we can make two subgroups: dialects from Solun and Voden; and dialects from Serez and Lagadin.

In Solun and Voden there is paradigmatic accent.

ex.: уфч’ар – уфч’ари – уфч’арите,

(shepherd – shepherds – the shepherds).

The conjugation of the present tense has the following model:

in the standard language:

ex.: викум, викиш, вике (to say); викам, викаш, вика;

берум, бериш, бере (gathering); берам, береш, бере;

носум, носиш, носе (to ware); носам, носиш, носи.

In the dialects of Serez and Lagadin, in which group are the dialects from Drama and Gotze Delchev too, still we can see the moving accent:

ex.: ж’ена – ж’ени: жен’ата – жен’ите

(woman-woman, plural form: the woman-the woman, plural form)

There is double accent too:

ex.: ц’ариц’ата, л’обуд’ата, гл’асув’ете (the queen, the swan, the voices)

The dialects of Kostur and Korcha have stable accent.

Here we can see lot of nasal arhaic characteristics:

ex.: грăнди, зăмби (breasts, teeth).

On the place of the oldslavic * tj, *dj are the consonant groups /шч/, /жџ/:

еx.: свешча, чужџо (candle, to another one)

The article is kept from the oldslavic language:

ex.: човекат’ого, човекут’ому (to a men)

In this reagion there are new balcanic characteristics as loosing the preposition in, and using the preposition on for expressing two objects:

ex.: Го виде на човеко. (he saw on the man);

Му рече на човеко. (he told on the man).

The form -l of the participle is lost and with this has lost all the compus forms and were replaced with the verb – to have – and – to be. Typical form for these dialects are the substantives ending with -тје:

еx.: женетје (the women)

and the plural form of neuter ending with -нишча:

ex.: поленишча, морјенишча;

(the fields, the seas)

The region of Korcha has only two villages which characterized their stable accent. This is in the village Boboshtitza and Drenoveni.

The nasal *[on] from the oldslavic language became in -a-:

ex.: рака, замби, гранди (hand, tooth, chests).

In the place of *r > ар: парсти (fingers);

*l > ал: вална, салѕа (wool, tear);

*h > j: рекој, рекојме (I said, we said).

The region of Kostur:

ex.: * ??? ăн, ăш: рăка (hand);

*r > ăр: грăнди, пăрсти (chests, fingers);

*l > ăл: вăлна (wool).

In the conclusion for the Macedonian dialects we can say that they are kept pretty good. The clearest dialects we can hear in the region under Greece and the Macedonian parts in Albania. In R. Macedonia in the postbelic period , specially in the last two decades there is a process of unification. Generations who finished Macedonian schools know the literature standard language, even their syntax and lexic remained.

The biggest dialects differences are in the south and west periphery, on the border with the Albanian, Greek and Vlah (Aromanian) language.

The process of the dialect differentiate in Macedonia started with the first innovations which are from XI century till now.

The basic contours in Macedonian dialects nowdays, we can also realized them in the period of XIII and XIV century. The evolution of lot of processes started deep in the past and some of them are still continuing, they are still not finished. And we are not sure if they will end because the language is live and the processes are always here around all of us and in us.

REFERENCES

Vidoeski, Bozidar, Dialects in Macedonian language, book 1, Editura Macedonian Academy of Sciences and Arts, Skopje, 1998. (Vidoeski 1998)

Vidoeski, Bozidar, Dialect differences in macedonian language, Editura Macedonian Academy of Sciences and Arts, Skopje, 1984.

Vidoeski, Bozidar, Geographic terminology in the dialects of Macedonian language, Editura Macedonian Academy of Sciences and Arts, Skopje, 1999.

Koneski, Blaze, Two articles for the history of the Macedonian language, Editura Faculty od Filozofy, Skopje, 1949.

Topolinjska, Zuzanna, Macedonian dialects in the Aegean part of Macedonia, book 1, Syntax, vol. II, Editura Macedonian Academy of Sciences and Arts, Skopje, 1997.

ABSTRACT

The dialects in every language are very important because they are the soul of the language; if they don’t exist, it means that language doesn’t exist either. The South Macedonian dialects represent a part of the other dialects. Their characteristics as the Old Slavic * ??? > a, ă; *r >ap, ăр; *l> ăл, ал, are the proof for the differentiation of Macedonian language from the Old Slavic language and also the proof for the existing Macedonian minority in the region of Aegean part of Macedonia who are still speaking this dialect nowadays.

Key words: Macedonian dialects, differences, typical characteristics