Päivitetty 1.1.2002  –  Palautteet

Virittäjä-lehti  >  Hakemistot  >  Kirjoitukset ja tiivistelmät: 2/1997 (101)

Marjatta Palander (University of Joensuu; marjatta.palander@joensuu.fi)

CASES OF ANALOGY IN THE TRANSITIONAL DIALECTS OF THE SAVONLINNA DISTRICT

The article concerns the set of transitional dialects found in the Savonlinna district comprising part of the Savo dialects, and the district's nearest neighbouring dialects. Typical of the dialects of the Savonlinna district is an abundant variation in phonological and morphological characteristics. This is a consequence of the competition between the underlying language forms - Karelian and Savo - which has existed in the area at least since the seventeenth century. The variation present has provided the preconditions for the creation of many kinds of analogical formations. The motivating factors in this are:

1. Tendency towards a consistent paradigm. E.g. the change of the vowel combination oa to uu in second and later syllables may have caused a change in the vowel of a stem (1st infinitive takkuu* 'takoa' ['forge'] -> 2nd infinitive inessive takkuissa 'takoessa'; partitive singular soittuu 'soittoa' ['music playing'] -> nominative singular soittu).

2. Pressure from morphological group. E.g. for the verbs tulla ('come'), mennä ('go'), panna ('put'), haista ('smell') and päästä ('get to'), analogical forms of the present potential mood with vowel stems are used (tulenoon, mänenöön). The models for this have been forms of the potential mood for verbs with two-syllable vowel stems (e.g. hakenoon). The ultimate reasons for the change are primary gemination and the tendency towards loss of final -n, which in the verbs tulla, mennä and panna could cause syncretism with the corresponding indicative forms.

3. Influence of stems which resemble each other. E.g. nominative riiht(i) pro riih(i) ('drying barn'); this analogy arises from the influence of stems which are affected by consonant gradation of the combination ht (lehti : lehen ['leaf'] -> veiht(i) 'veitsi' ['knife'] : veihen -> riiht(i) : riihen), which corresponds to the late Proto-Finnic ht or the Savo ts.

4. Interaction of two sandhi phenomena. There is a tendency in the area for both final -n and *-k to be lost, which has meant that certain suffixes ending in -n have turned into suffixes ending in *-k (e.g. illatives ending in -sen, adverbs ending in -ten, -isin). Correspondingly, the suffixes -kin and -kaan/-kään which generally end in *-k can end in -n, which might represent the late return of the final consonant.

5. Contamination. E.g. the oi and ei diphthongs correspond to the ai and äi diphthongs, especially in the 2nd infinitive inessive and instructive forms. The diphthongs represent compromises between the Karelian and Savo forms (Karelian andoas's'a + Savo antaissa -> antoissa 'antaessa' ['while giving']).

In particular, changes in the vowels of second and later syllables have led to contamination between inflection types. On the basis of the -ii that appears in inflection in the singular, the inflection of nominals ending in -ea, -eä, -io, -iö, -ia, -is and -ias has overlapped, which has caused variation in plural forms (e.g. kallioita -> kalleita 'kallioita' ['rocks'], ruumiita -> ruumeita -> ruumioita 'ruumiita' ['bodies']). Analogy is generally taken from high-frequency cases and is applied to low-frequency cases, but exceptionally even the nominative, the most frequently used form in the paradigm, becomes predisposed to analogy.