The Skopje-Veles dialect ( mk, Скопско-велешки дијалект, ) is a member of the central subgroup of the Western group of

dialects The term dialect (from Latin , , from the Ancient Greek word , 'discourse', from , 'through' and , 'I speak') can refer to either of two distinctly different types of linguistic phenomena: One usage refers to a variety of a language that is a ...

of Macedonian. The dialect is spoken by a larger group of people in the cities

Skopje Skopje ( , , ; mk, Скопје ; sq, Shkup) is the capital and largest city of North Macedonia. It is the country's political, cultural, economic, and academic centre. The territory of Skopje has been inhabited since at least 4000 BC; r ...

and Veles and in the surrounding villages: Volkovo, Katlanovo,

Petrovec Petrovec ( mk, ) is a village in the municipality of Petrovec, North Macedonia and situated about 15 km southeast of the national capital Skopje. It is the seat of the Petrovec municipality. Though rather small, the village is known through ...

and Čaška among others. This dialect is of historical importance for Macedonian because it is considered by many to be a

prestige dialect Prestige refers to a good reputation or high esteem; in earlier usage, ''prestige'' meant "showiness". (19th c.) Prestige may also refer to: Arts, entertainment and media Films * ''Prestige'' (film), a 1932 American film directed by Tay Garnett ...

. On August 2, 1945, the Skopje-Veles dialect, together with the other dialects of the central group was officially regulated as a basis of standard Macedonian. Many Macedonian writers and linguists were writing on this dialect and considered it to be standard Macedonian. One of them was

Krste Petkov Misirkov Krste Petkov Misirkov ( bg, Кръсте (Кръстьо) Петков Мисирков; mk, Крсте Петков Мисирков, ; 18 November 1874 – 26 July 1926) was a philologist, journalist, historian and ethnographer from the regio ...

and in his book ''For Macedonian affairs'' wrote that this dialect should be standard Macedonian. He has been writing on Skopje-Veles dialect and on

Prilep-Bitola dialect The Prilep-Bitola dialect ( mk, Прилепско-битолски дијалект, ''Prilepsko-bitolski dijalekt'') is a member of the central subgroup of the western group of dialects of Macedonian. This dialect is spoken in much of the Pel ...

Internal migration Internal migration or domestic migration is human migration within a country. Internal migration tends to be travel for education and for economic improvement or because of a natural disaster or civil disturbance, though a study based on the full ...

to the capital

in the 1950s and 1960s led to the development of a new, urban

slang Slang is vocabulary (words, phrases, and linguistic usages) of an informal register, common in spoken conversation but avoided in formal writing. It also sometimes refers to the language generally exclusive to the members of particular in-gro ...

where newly arrived people attempted to incorporate elements of the Skopje-Veles dialect into their own speech, often confusing local elements with those from

Serbo-Croatian Serbo-Croatian () – also called Serbo-Croat (), Serbo-Croat-Bosnian (SCB), Bosnian-Croatian-Serbian (BCS), and Bosnian-Croatian-Montenegrin-Serbian (BCMS) – is a South Slavic language and the primary language of Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia and ...

Language contact Language contact occurs when speakers of two or more languages or varieties interact and influence each other. The study of language contact is called contact linguistics. When speakers of different languages interact closely, it is typical for th ...

with Serbo-Croatian, then a more prestigious language in

SFR Yugoslavia The Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, commonly referred to as SFR Yugoslavia or simply as Yugoslavia, was a country in Central and Southeast Europe. It emerged in 1945, following World War II, and lasted until 1992, with the breakup of Yug ...

, also reached its height during this period. This

variety Variety may refer to: Arts and entertainment Entertainment formats * Variety (radio) * Variety show, in theater and television Films * ''Variety'' (1925 film), a German silent film directed by Ewald Andre Dupont * ''Variety'' (1935 film), ...

has been described as a "

creolized A creole language, or simply creole, is a stable natural language that develops from the simplifying and mixing of different languages into a new one within a fairly brief period of time: often, a pidgin evolved into a full-fledged language. ...

form of Serbian" (cf. also Surzhyk in Ukraine,

Trasianka Trasianka ( be, трасянка, ) refers to a mixed form of speech in which Belarusian and Russian elements and structures alternate arbitrarily.Hentschel, Gerd Belarusian and Russian in the Mixed Speech of Belarus. In Besters-Dilger, J. et a ...

in Belarus) and is distinct from the 'authentic' Skopje-Veles dialect.

Phonological characteristics

*use of instead of the archaic : () > (; 'fear'); *emphasis mostly on the antepenultimate syllable in Veles, and less in Skopje; *use of the hard (palatal) l; *use of intervocal : (; 'man'); *use of the hard sound њ (nj) (in the other dialects of the central group this sound is soft); *use of the letter ќ and ѓ (in the others dialects of the central group the cluster јќ and јѓ is found): () – (; 'house').

Morphological characteristics

*use of the preposition во (vo) or в (v); *use of the grammatical construction have + past participle: (; 'I have worked'); *use of three articles.

Examples of the Skopje-Veles dialect

The poem "A voice from Macedonia" by

Kole Nedelkovski Kole Nedelkovski ( Bulgarian and mk, Коле Неделковски) was a Macedonian revolutionary and poet,Macedonian language Macedonian (; , , ) is an Eastern South Slavic language. It is part of the Indo-European language family, and is one of the Slavic languages, which are part of a larger Balto-Slavic branch. Spoken as a first language by around two million ...

Macedonian dialects The dialects of Macedonian comprise the Slavic dialects spoken in the Republic of North Macedonia as well as some varieties spoken in the wider geographic region of Macedonia. They are part of the dialect continuum of South Slavic languages that ...

{{Macedonian dialects Dialects of the Macedonian language