Ivšić's law, also Stang's law or Stang-Ivšić's law, is a
Common Slavic
Proto-Slavic (abbreviated PSl., PS.; also called Common Slavic or Common Slavonic) is the unattested, reconstructed proto-language of all Slavic languages. It represents Slavic speech approximately from the 2nd millennium B.C. through the 6th ...
accent law named after
Stjepan Ivšić
Stjepan Ivšić (; 13 August 1884 – 14 January 1962) was a Croatian linguist, Slavic specialist, and accentologist.
Biography
After finishing primary school in Orahovica, he attended secondary school in Osijek and Požega. At the Faculty of Ph ...
(1911) and
Christian Schweigaard Stang
Christian Schweigaard Stang (15 March 1900 – 2 July 1977) was a Norwegian linguist, Slavicist and Balticist, professor in Balto-Slavic languages at the University of Oslo from 1938 until shortly before his death. He specialized in the study of ...
(1957); the two linguists independently discovered the law in those years.
The law explains the origin of the
Proto-Slavic neoacute accent occurring in the accent paradigm ''b'' as retractive from the following syllable.
Retraction from stressed weak yer
During the Late Common Slavic period, the short vowels *ь and *ъ (known as
yers, also written *ĭ *ŭ) developed into "strong" and "weak" variants according to
Havlík's law. The accented weak variants could no longer carry an accent which was thus retracted onto the preceding syllable. That syllable gained a rising ''neoacute'' accent. It is denoted with a tilde diacritic ⟨◌̃⟩ on historically "long" syllables (*a, *i, *u, *y, *ě, *ę, *ǫ, *VR), and with a grave accent ⟨◌̀⟩ on historically "short" syllables (*e, *o, *ь, *ъ).
In conservative
Serbo-Croatian dialects of
Čakavian
Chakavian or Čakavian (, , , sh-Latn, čakavski proper name: or own name: ''čokovski, čakavski, čekavski'') is a South Slavic regiolect or language spoken primarily by Croats along the Adriatic coast, in the historical regions of Dalmat ...
and Old
Štokavian
Shtokavian or Štokavian (; sh-Latn, štokavski / sh-Cyrl, italics=no, штокавски, ) is the prestige dialect of the pluricentric Serbo-Croatian language and the basis of its Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian and Montenegrin standards. It ...
(e.g.
Slavonian) this neoacute is preserved as a separate tone, distinct from the old acute and circumflex. Ivšić designated the long neoacute in Čakavian with the same circumflex symbol as the
Lithuanian circumflex, due to their phonetic similarity.
Compare:
PSl. *pirstu̍ > Common Slavic *pьrstъ̍ > *pь̃rstъ (
Čakavian
Chakavian or Čakavian (, , , sh-Latn, čakavski proper name: or own name: ''čokovski, čakavski, čekavski'') is a South Slavic regiolect or language spoken primarily by Croats along the Adriatic coast, in the historical regions of Dalmat ...
''pr̃st'', Russian ''perst'',
N pl ''perstý'')
Retraction from medial circumflexed syllables
Retraction also occurred on medial long circumflexed (i.e., non-acuted) syllables; for example, on verbs in *''-iti''. On the basis of the attested forms ''nȍsīte'', ''vrãtite'' Ivšić assumed the earlier forms ''*nosȋte'', ''*vortȋte'', which would also yield the neoacute by retracting the long circumflex accent onto the preceding syllable. This retraction is uncontroversial if the preceding syllable is long; in the case of short preceding syllables, it is generally accepted, but some
[E.g. ] argue that it is analogical to the long neoacute in individual (mostly West Slavic) languages.
Additionally, Ivšić's law explains the acute accent on certain ''jā''-stem nouns such as ''sũša'' (Slavonian Štokavian dialects), ''vȍlja'' (with shortened neoacute).
Borrowings from other languages show that Ivšić's law operated after
Dybo's law, and had the effect of partially reversing it. Compare:
* PSl. *''kȁrlju'' 'king' (originally the name of
Charlemagne
Charlemagne ( , ) or Charles the Great ( la, Carolus Magnus; german: Karl der Große; 2 April 747 – 28 January 814), a member of the Carolingian dynasty, was King of the Franks from 768, King of the Lombards from 774, and the first E ...
) > (Dybo's law) *''karlju̍'' > (Ivšić's law) ''*kãrlju'' > Čakavian ''krãlj''.
Notes
References
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Ivsic's Law
Proto-Slavic language
Sound laws