I would object to two points made in Leo Connolly’s posting. The statement
was made that Proto-Slavic pitch was preserved as "a four pitch system in
Serbo-Croatian and Slovenian." In the first place, neither SC nor Sln.
have four pitches. At most, there are two pitches in SC, which can be
combined with long or short vowel quantity, creating four possibilities.
Secondly, standard SC’s two pitches do not reflect ANY Protoslavic pitch!
The rising is simply a retraction of non-initial stress, while the falling
represents stress on an initial syllable. Only some Chakavian and
Kajkavian dialects directly reflect Protoslavic pitch distinctions as
pitch. And this is only the distinction of Neo-Acute vs. Circumflex, as
in sud (‘court’, rising) vs. sud (‘vessel’, falling). This applies to
standard (conservative) Slovene, which also has only two pitches, but
can reflect the above pitch distinction of Protoslavic.
Ronald Feldstein
In article <C116H1….@usenet.ucs.indiana.edu>, felds…@silver.ucs.indiana.edu (Ronald F. Feldstein) writes:
> I would object to two points made in Leo Connolly’s posting. The statement
> was made that Proto-Slavic pitch was preserved as "a four pitch system in
> Serbo-Croatian and Slovenian." In the first place, neither SC nor Sln.
> have four pitches.
I didn’t mean to imply that Proto-Slavic had four such phenomena, since
(though no expert, as you have sure surely noticed) I realize that the
four-way mess in SC is the result of stress retraction. Sorry I didn’t
make that clearer. I was rushing.
> At most, there are two pitches in SC, which can be
> combined with long or short vowel quantity, creating four possibilities.
> Secondly, standard SC’s two pitches do not reflect ANY Protoslavic pitch!
> The rising is simply a retraction of non-initial stress, while the falling
> represents stress on an initial syllable.
Aren’t we being just a bit picky here? The manuals list four "accents",
which involve both pitch contour (secondary) *and* length (reflecting a
Slavic pitch distinction). My point was that the Lithuanian pitch distinc-
tion is often said to be related to that of Proto-Slavic, which has its
clearest supersegmental reflexes in the four-"accent" system of these
South Slavic tongues. This seems likely, while a connection to the
supposed (but non-existent) PIE pitch distinctions and to those of
Ancient Greek is excluded. I accept your phonetic analysis of modern
South Slavic, but the point was historical development.
> Only some Chakavian and
> Kajkavian dialects directly reflect Protoslavic pitch distinctions as
> pitch. And this is only the distinction of Neo-Acute vs. Circumflex, as
> in sud (‘court’, rising) vs. sud (‘vessel’, falling). This applies to
> standard (conservative) Slovene, which also has only two pitches, but
> can reflect the above pitch distinction of Protoslavic.
–Leo Connolly