Cvetka's Slovenian Theory Thread

[cvetkakocj@rogers.com]

In other words, where PO represent intitial two letters, like POT (path, road) and POT (sweat, perspiration) the vowel O is long, but slightly differently pronounced.

Again, only in in some dialects, such as Ljubljana and Gorenjska. Over here, both are quite assuredly /pɔt/, and the same goes for Styria / Štajerska, and in the Gorica dialect, both are /puat/ or /puǝt/. In the Carinthia / Koroška dialect, they are distinct, but it retains the nasal vowels, so there, it's /pǫt/ and /poːːːːːːː:t/.

Hi, there,
I am glad you are having a second look at Slovenian theory, and I appreciate your corrections of your previous statements.
Let me get to your last statements:
1. At the time of my youth, the dialect in Lower Carniola was well preserved because there were no compulsory schools until the end of the 19th century in my village (Brusnice, Gaberje). Also, the Vlachs on the other side of Gorjanci provided the buffer for peasants to stay on their side. The word LJUDJE was declined as follows: ldje/aldje, ldi /aldi, ldjem/ldjem, ldi/aldi, prldjeh/peraldjeh, zldmi/zaldmi. There were some peasant phrases where the word LJUDJE was pronounced as LUDI, like 'kulker ludi, tulko čudi'. The old people in Suha Krajina also used the word LDJE/ALDJE.

2. It is true that the suffix -or is not Slavic, however we must not forget that the Slavic lands in central Europe were mostly Germanized after the expulsion of Methodius' Slavonic priests. The liturgy was Latin so it would be reasonable to expect that the foreign writer would  use the Latin suffixes to Slovenian words to form nouns, if there was no Slovenian word for them. Because of the akanje, some -or suffixes remained in Slovenian language as -ar. In the linguistic 'clean-up' in subsequent centuries, Latin and other suffixes were changed to Slavic, like SVEČAR to SVETNIK or SVEČENIK.

   


3. DY – DEJ – DAY –DY is one of the most complicated by-glyph in the VM because of its great frequency. This is also one of the reasons why the entropy does not work (too many dy-byglyphs). It is true that DAL and DEJ are spelled with a vowel in all Slovenian documents, however the author of the VM did not see Freising Manuscript, nor Stična Codex, so he was writing the words as he heard them. He used the y for initial and final letters as a substitute for the OCS half-sounds yat and yer, for which two different letters existed, so that the sounds they capture were i, j, ij, ei, ai, ji. When Latin letters began to be used for Glagolitic letters, the semi-vowels were left unwritten, so that DY could be pronounced as dej, daj, di (which of course complicates Slovenian translation). On top of that, the foreign writers also had difficulty distinguishing between T and D sounds, so that DY in the VM also stands for -TY suffix in many words, but not exclusively.
In my dialect, we had the distinction how the e is pronounced in dam or in daj (where aj is pronounced as diphthong).
The clue that my explanation of DY is correct could be found in the way some imperatives of combined words were pronounced, not just in different dialects, but in the same dialect, different from person to person.
POGLED + DAJ – pogledaj – look!
POGLED + DEJ – pogledej – look!
POGLED +DY – pogledi!  - look!
POGLED + I – pogledi (n. Pl.)
POGLED + I - poglej!

POVED + DAJ – povedaj – tell!
POVED + DEJ – povedej – tell!
POVED + DY – povedi – tell
POVEJ – tell!


G – H controversy: At the time Ottokar was Bohemian king, he extended his kingdom all the way to the Adriatic coast, which means that Slovenians were under Czech rule and cultural influence. The Mainhardiners with the seat in Gorz had most direct cultural connection with Czecks, which could be the reason why the dialect retained h for g sounds. At some point, this pronunciation must have been in Štajerska as well, otherwise POHORJE would be called POGORJE. The use of vernacular languages was promoted also by Emperor Charles from Luxembourg/Premyslid dynasty in the 14th century. The author of the VM could have been influenced by the Czech monks in Jurklošter.
After careful analysis, I noticed that g is often left out, like in CHEAR (ČEGAR), or K is used for G (POKAN – POGAN), or 9-shaped y might have been used (like in Czech ).

4. It is also worth remembering that the dialects were not as localized as they are today, and that mixture of Croatian Glagolitic influence, most prominent in Koper, extended to Dolenjska as well by the Glagolitic priests, so that the VM is the mixture of peasant Slovenian pronunciation and in some words, particularly for religious terminology, the OCS, and Glagolitic influences of the coastal 'Schiavone' language are noted.
Your assumption' that the older the document, the less reduced the sound would be' is based on the assumption that the OCS had a lot of vowels. This is true, but when the scribes began to use Latin letters instead of Glagolitic or Cyrillic, they left out short vowels and semi-vowels in in many Slavic languages. The subsequent insertion of the vowels resulted in the spelling confusion and in dialects, which mostly differ by the way the vowels are pronounced.
Aa for POT (path, road) and POT (sweat, perspiration) – In our dialect, the pronunciation of these two words was all over the place. There are only a few such words in the VM, that is why I am not that concerned. However, the prefix PO is important, because it causes most headaches to the VM researchers. I noticed that by the 16th century, many Slovenian  PO- prefixes were changed to PRE- or PR-  which would reduce the PO by glyph and improve entropy.

5. Ghibelline merlons – The question is not even settled if the picture the researchers believe to be a castle, is actually a castle, and if the strange pattern is an allusion to the Ghibelline merlons. The trapezoid roofs with two-pronged metal poles on top of the towers is indicative of the alpine style, such as the roofs on Žiška kartusia or on the Celjski grad. 

By the way, let me also clarify my statement that the PAN was a Venetic deity. Your correction that he was the Greek deity is correct according to the Wikipedia, however, if you dig farther into the history, you can find that Pan was a deity of Venetic (Pelagonian) -Pelasgians settled from the Balkans in Greece before the Greece came into existence. He was depicted as a wild white man with goats’ legs. He was one of the oldest, pre-Olympian gods.
In Egypt, the sign for the Capricorn was depicted as a white or a brown goat with fish tail.