The Lesser Polish dialect ( pl, dialekt małopolski) is a cluster of regional varieties of the Polish language around the

Lesser Poland Lesser Poland, often known by its Polish name Małopolska ( la, Polonia Minor), is a historical region situated in southern and south-eastern Poland. Its capital and largest city is Kraków. Throughout centuries, Lesser Poland developed a ...

historical region. The exact area is difficult to delineate due to the expansion of its features and the existence of transitional subdialects. Commonly recognized subdialects of the Lesser Polish dialect include

Podhale Podhale (literally "below the mountain pastures") is Poland's southernmost region, sometimes referred to as the "Polish Highlands". The Podhale is located in the foothills of the Tatra range of the Carpathian mountains. It is the most famous ...

, , Lwów, , , and some others. The southernmost Lesser Polish dialects spoken by the

Gorals The Gorals ( pl, Górale; Goral dialect: ''Górole''; sk, Gorali; Cieszyn Silesia dialect, Cieszyn Silesian: ''Gorole''), also known as the Highlanders (in Poland as the Polish Highlanders) are an indigenous ethnographic or ethnic group primar ...

(Podhale, Żywiec, Orava, Spiš and many others) are collectively called the (

Polish Polish may refer to: * Anything from or related to Poland, a country in Europe * Polish language * Poles Poles,, ; singular masculine: ''Polak'', singular feminine: ''Polka'' or Polish people, are a West Slavic nation and ethnic group, w ...

: ''gwara góralska'') despite being a collection of many similar subdialects. Lesser Polish has the richest literature out of all Polish dialects. There are many books and poems written in the

Kraków Kraków (), or Cracow, is the second-largest and one of the oldest cities in Poland. Situated on the Vistula River in Lesser Poland Voivodeship, the city dates back to the seventh century. Kraków was the official capital of Poland until 1596 ...

and

dialects. The common traits of the Lesser Polish dialect include: *

mazurzenie Mazurzenie () or mazuration is the replacement or merger of Polish's series of postalveolar fricatives and affricates ( written ) into the dentialveolar series (written ). This merger is present in many dialects, but is named for the Masovian ...

"Charakterystyka dialektu małopolskiego"
/ref> * regressive voicing of obstruents, including across word boundaries; e.g.: ''kot leci'' ɔd ˈlɛt͡ɕi(standard Polish: ɔt ˈlɛt͡ɕi * differentiated

nasalisation In phonetics, nasalization (or nasalisation) is the production of a sound while the velum is lowered, so that some air escapes through the nose during the production of the sound by the mouth. An archetypal nasal sound is . In the Internatio ...

(or lack thereof) of /ɔ̃/ and /ɛ̃/ in different parts of the area * merger of stop+fricative consonant clusters into

affricates An affricate is a consonant that begins as a stop and releases as a fricative, generally with the same place of articulation (most often coronal). It is often difficult to decide if a stop and fricative form a single phoneme or a consonant pair ...

; e.g.: ''trzysta'' �t͡ʂɨsta(standard Polish: �tʂɨstaor �t͡ʂʂɨsta * frequent usage of initial syllable stress, also oxytonic stress in

vocative case In grammar, the vocative case ( abbreviated ) is a grammatical case which is used for a noun that identifies a person (animal, object, etc.) being addressed, or occasionally for the noun modifiers (determiners, adjectives, participles, and nume ...

(as opposed to paroxytonic stress common in other varieties of Polish) * frequent usage of grammatical particle "że" in

imperative mood The imperative mood is a grammatical mood that forms a command or request. The imperative mood is used to demand or require that an action be performed. It is usually found only in the present tense, second person. To form the imperative mood, ...

("weźże" vs. "weź" – take)

References

Polish dialects Lesser Poland {{Slavic-lang-stub