phonology Phonology is the branch of linguistics that studies how languages or dialects systematically organize their sounds or, for sign languages, their constituent parts of signs. The term can also refer specifically to the sound or sign system of a ...

, barytonesis, or ''recessive accent'', is the shift of accent from the last or following syllable to any non-final or preceding syllable of the stem, as in John Donne's poetic line: ''but éxtreme sense hath made them desperate'', the Balto-Slavic Pedersen's law and Aeolic Greek barytonesis. The opposite, the accent shift to the last syllable is called oxytonesis.

References

External links

* Sound laws Figures of speech Phonology Stress (linguistics) {{phonology-stub