Starovlah language

From KneeQuickie

The Starovlah language is an a posteriori Slavonic artlang used in a fictional alternative history of Stari Vlah, a region in the present-day Serbia. It relies on another conlang and an alternative history, Novegradian, developed by Maknas.

The history of Starovlah began in the 18th century, when a large number of immigrants from Novegrad arrived in Stari Vlah, being offered land by the Starovlah Orthodox Church in change for their assistance in rebellions against the Ottoman Turkish dominance over Stari Vlah. Novegradian immigrants brought their North Slavonic dialect, which was exposed to significant South Slavonic influences, and over the time they’ve also left the original and accepted the local Starovlah ethnonym and identity. The standardization process for the Starovlah language out of the spoken vernacular started in the second half of the 18th century, and the modern Starovlah literary language was introduced in Starovlah literature by the beginning of the 20th century.

Phonology

Starovlah has preserved the Proto-Slavonic vowel yat (æ), inherited from Novegradian, unlike the surrounding South Slavonic dialects, which have lost this sound.

The phonemes /x/ and /ʣ/, which are lost in the surrounding South Slavonic dialects, also originate from Novegradian, while the South Slavonic phoneme /ʋ/ has entered the language in place of the original North Slavonic /β/ or /w/, and the Novegradian /ɣ/ has changed to /j/ in all positions.

Moreover, the whole new set of soft palatal consonants was introduced from the aboriginal South Slavonic dialect, including /ɕ/ and /ʑ/ (in place of Novegradian [sʲ] and [zʲ]), /ʨ/ and /ʥ/ (for Novegradian [tʲ] and [dʲ], but also occurs in loanwords from the neighbouring Bosnian language), as well as /ʎ/ and /ɲ/ (in place of Novegradian [lʲ] and [nʲ]). These sounds occur in the process of consonant palatalization, in places where Novegradian has palatalized allophones and Starovlah uses the separate soft palatal phonemes.

Under the influence of the aboriginal South Slavonic dialect, all /l/’s have become velarized (ɫ), and the phoneme /x/ is mostly lost in the spoken dialects of the Starovlah language, often being replaced by the sounds [j] or [w] between vowels, thus creating the diphthongs [aw], [uw], [uj] etc., but is preserved in the written standard language.

In the dialects and spoken Starovlah, the vowel /i/ is often reduced in weak position to schwa or a similar sound, which often results in syllabic /r/’s, /ɫ/’s, and /n/’s if these occur near the reduced vowel.

All /ɫ/’s in coda position are vocalized to [w]’s when word final and [o]’s when not word final, under the influence of the surrounding dialects of the original Central South Slavonic (Štokavian) substratum.

Proto-Slavonic affricate /ʧ/ was lost in Novegradian, usually being replaced with /ʦ/. This feature is kept in Starovlah as well, although /ʧ/ again appears in words and expressions from the neighbouring South Slavonic dialects, which have preserved the Proto-Slavonic sound /ʧ/.

Accentuation

Novegradian stress has been replaced with the Western South Slavonic pitch accent. There are three pitch accents in Starovlah, two of which have falling tone and one of which has rising tone. The rising accent is always long, while the falling accents are one long and one short. The long accents are realized by pitch change within the long vowel; the short one is realized by the pitch difference from the subsequent syllable. The original Novegradian stress became one of the Starovlah falling accents, either long or short, while the Starovlah long rising accent appeared later. Monosyllabic words always have a falling tone, while in polysyllabic words the falling tone may occur only on the first syllable. Final syllables are never stressed, and the proclitics always have the short falling accent.

Sound changes

• regressive consonant assimilation

voiced consonants before voiceless obstruents undergone devoicing, and vice versa

consonants assimilate by place of articulation: /zʥ/ > [ʒʥ], /nk/ > [ŋk] etc.

• terminal devoicing

voiced obstruents at the end of a word become voiceless

• palatalisation and iotation

the following changes occur before front vowels and /j/:

/t/ > /ʨ/ (tʲ)

/d/ > /ʥ/ (dʲ)

/s/ > /ɕ/ (sʲ, ʃʲ)

/z/ > /ʑ/ (zʲ, ʒʲ)

/ʦ/ > /ʨ/ (ʦʲ)

/ʣ/ > /ʥ/ (ʣʲ)

/n/ > /ɲ/ (nʲ)

/ɫ/ > /ʎ/ (ɫʲ, lʲ)

/k/ before /e/ > /ʧ/

/g/ before /e/ > /ʒ/

/x/ before /e/ > /ʃ/

/k/ before /i/ > /ʦ/

/g/ before /i/ > /z/

/x/ before /i/ > /s/

/ʦ/ before /i/ > /ʧ/

• vowel assimilation and elision

(usually preceded by vocalization, /aɫ/ >) [ao] > [o:]

in dialects and spoken Starovlah, when a word which ends in a vowel is followed by a word which begins with a vowel, the first vowel is usually elided