History of Proto-Slavic

See also: Proto-Slavic and History of the Slavic languages end of the Common Slavic period. For later developments, see History of the Slavic languages.
The history of Proto-Slavic is the linguistic history of
the Proto-Slavic language, the hypothetical ancestor of
the modern-day Slavic languages, as it developed from
the ancestral Proto-Balto-Slavic language (c. 1500 BC),
which is the parent language of the Balto-Slavic languages (both the Slavic and Baltic languages, e.g. Latvian
and Lithuanian). The rst 2,000 years or so consist of
the pre-Slavic era, a long period during which none of
the later dialectal dierences between Slavic languages
had yet happened. The last stage in which the language
remained without internal dierences that later characterize dierent Slavic languages can be dated around 500
AD and is sometimes termed Proto-Slavic proper or Early
Proto-Slavic. Following this is the Common Slavic period (c. 5001000 AD), during which the rst dialectal dierences appeared but the entire Slavic-speaking
area continued to function as a single language, with
sound changes tending to spread throughout the entire
area. By around 1000 AD, the area had broken up into
separate East Slavic, West Slavic and South Slavic languages, and in the following centuries it broke up further into the various modern Slavic languages of which
the following are extant: Belarusian, Russian, Rusyn and
Ukrainian in the East; Czech, Slovak, Polish, Kashubian
and the Sorbian languages in the West, and Bulgarian,
Macedonian, Serbo-Croatian and Slovenian in the South.

1 Introduction
Proto-Slavic is descended from Proto-Balto-Slavic (the
ancestor of the Balto-Slavic languages). This language in
turn is descended from Proto-Indo-European, the parent
language of the vast majority of European languages (including English, German, Spanish, French, etc.). ProtoSlavic gradually evolved into the various Slavic languages
during the latter half of the rst millennium AD, concurrent with the explosive growth of the Slavic-speaking
area. There is no scholarly consensus concerning either
the number of stages involved in the development of the
language (its periodization) or the terms used to describe
them. For consistency and convenience, this article and
the Proto-Slavic article adopt the following scheme:
1. Pre-Slavic (c. 1500 BC 300 AD): A long period of gradual development. The most signicant
phonological developments during this period involved the prosodic system, e.g. tonal and other
register distinctions on syllables.
2. Proto-Slavic proper or Early Common Slavic (c. 300
600 AD): The early, uniform stage of Common
Slavic, a period of rapid phonological change. There
are no dialectal distinctions reconstructible from this
period.

The period from the early centuries AD to the end of the

Common Slavic period around 1000 AD was a time of
rapid change, concurrent with the explosive growth of the
Slavic-speaking area. By the end of this period, most of
the features of the modern Slavic languages had been established. The rst historical documentation of the Slavic
languages is found in isolated names and words in Greek
documents starting in the 6th century AD, when Slavicspeaking tribes rst came in contact with the Greekspeaking Byzantine Empire. The rst continuous texts
date from the late 9th century AD and were written in
Old Church Slavonicbased on the Slavic dialect used
in the region of Thessaloniki in Greek Macedoniaas
part of the Christianization of the Slavs by Saints Cyril
and Methodius and their followers. Because these texts
were written during the Common Slavic period, the language they document is close to the ancestral Proto-Slavic
language and is still presenting enough unity, therefore it
is critically important to the linguistic reconstruction of
Slavic-language history.

3. Middle Common Slavic (c. 600 800 AD): The

stage with the earliest identiable dialectal distinctions. Rapid phonological change continued, although with the massive expansion of the Slavicspeaking area. Although some dialectal variation
did exist, most sound changes were still uniform
and consistent in their application. By the end of
this stage, the vowel and consonant phonemes of the
language were largely the same as those still found
in the modern languages. For this reason, reconstructed Proto-Slavic forms commonly found in
scholarly works and etymological dictionaries normally correspond to this period.
4. Late Common Slavic (c. 800 1000 AD, although
perhaps through c. 1150 AD in Kievan Rus, in the
far northeast): The last stage in which the whole
Slavic-speaking area still functioned as a single language, with sound changes normally propagating

This article covers historical developments up through the

1

2 ORIGIN

throughout the entire area, although often with sig- similarities that are unique to these languages.[3] Apart
nicant dialectal variation in the details.
from a proposed genetic relationship (PIE forming a
Germano-Balto-Slavic sub-branch),[4] the similarities are
Slavic scholars dier widely in both the terminology and likely due to continuous contacts, whereby common loan
zones
periodization of these developments. Some scholars do words spread through the communities in the forest
[3]
at
an
early
time
of
their
linguistic
development.
not use the term Common Slavic at all. For some others, the Common Slavic period comes after Proto-Slavic
rather than including it. Some scholars (e.g. Frederik
Kortlandt) divide the Common Slavic period into ve or
more stages, while others use as few as two (an early, uniform stage and a late, dialectally dierentiated stage).

Origin

Similarly, Balto-Slavic and Indo-Iranian might have

formed some kind of continuum from the north-west to
the south-east given that they share both satemization and
the Ruki sound law.[3] On the other hand genetic studies have shown that Slavs and North Indians share much
larger amounts of the R1a haplogroup associated to the
spread of Indo-European languages, than most Germanic
populations. The Balto-Slavic - Indo-Iranian link might
thus be a result of a large part of common ancestry,
between Eastern Europeans and Indo-Iranians. BaltoSlavic then expanded along the forest zone, replacing earlier centum dialects, such as Pre-Proto-Germanic.[5] This
might explain the presence of a few prehistoric centum
adstratal lexemes.[6]

2.2 Pre-Slavic

Area of Balto-Slavic dialect continuum (purple) with proposed

material cultures correlating to speakers of Balto-Slavic in the
Bronze Age (white). Red dots = archaic Slavic hydronyms

2.1

Proto-Balto-Slavic

The most favoured model, the Kurgan hypothesis, currently places the Urheimat of the Proto-Indo-European
people in the Pontic steppe, represented archaeologically
by the 5th millennium BCE Sredny Stog culture.[1] From
here, various daughter dialects dispersed radially in several waves between c. 4400 BCE and 3000 BCE.[1] The
phonological changes which set Balto-Slavic apart from
other Indo-European languages probably lasted from c.
3000 to 1000 BCE, a period known as common ProtoBalto-Slavic.[2] Kortlandt (1990) links the earliest stages
of Balto-Slavic development with the Middle Dnieper
culture which connects the Corded Ware and Yamna cultures. Kurganists connect the latter two cultures with
the so-called Northwest (IE) group[3] and the Iranianspeaking steppe nomads, respectively. This ts with
the linguistic evidence in that Balto-Slavic appears to
have had close contacts with Indo-Iranian and ProtoGermanic.

A pre-Slavic period began c. 1500 to 1000 BCE, whereby

certain phonological changes and linguistic contacts did
not disperse evenly through all Balto-Slavic dialects. The
development into Proto-Slavic probably occurred along
the southern periphery of the Proto-Balto-Slavic continuum. The most archaic Slavic hydronyms are found here,
along the middle Dnieper, Pripet and upper Dniester
rivers. This agrees well with the fact that inherited Common Slavic vocabulary does not include detailed terminology for physical surface features peculiar of the mountains or the steppe, nor any relating to the sea, to coastal
features, littoral ora or fauna, or salt water shes. On
the other hand, it does include well-developed terminology for inland bodies of water (lakes, river, swamps) and
kinds of forest (deciduous and coniferous), for the trees,
plants, animals and birds indigenous to the temperate forest zone, and for the sh native to its waters.[7] Indeed,
Trubachev argues that this location fostered contacts between speakers of Pre-Proto-Slavic with the cultural innovations which emanated from central Europe and the
steppe.[8] Although language groups cannot be straightforwardly equated with archaeological cultures, the emergence of a Pre-Proto-Slavic linguistic community corresponds temporally and geographically with the Komarov
and Chernoles cultures (Novotna, Blazek). Both linguists and archaeologists therefore often locate the Slavic
Urheimat specically within this area.

In proto-historical times, the Slavic homeland experienced intrusions of foreign elements. Beginning from
c. 500 BCE to 200 CE, the Scythians and then the
Sarmatians expanded their control into the forest steppe.
A few Eastern Iranian loan words, especially relating to
An association between Balto-Slavic and Germanic has religious and cultural practices, have been seen as evibeen proposed on the basis of lexical and morphological dence of cultural inuences.[9] Subsequently, loan words

2.3

Proto-Slavic and Common Slavic (c. 4001000 AD)

2.3 Proto-Slavic and Common Slavic (c.

4001000 AD)
Beginning around 500 AD, the Slavic speakers rapidly
expanded in all directions from a homeland in eastern
Poland and western Ukraine. As it expanded throughout
eastern Europe, it obliterated whatever remained of easternmost Celtic, Avar, Venetic, possibly Dacian, as well
as many other Balto-Slavic dialects,[21] and the Slav ethnonym spread out considerably. By the eighth century
AD, Proto-Slavic is believed to have been spoken uniformly from Thessaloniki to Novgorod.

Historical distribution of the Slavic languages. The larger shaded

area is the Prague-Penkov-Kolochin complex of cultures of the
sixth to seventh centuries, likely corresponding to the spread of
Slavic-speaking tribes of the time. The smaller shaded area indicates the core area of Slavic river names (after Mallory & Adams
(1997:524).

of Germanic origin also appear. This is connected to the

movement of east Germanic groups into the Vistula basin,
and subsequently to the middle Dnieper basin, associated
with the appearance of the Przeworsk and Chernyakhov
cultures, respectively.
Despite these developments, Slavic remained conservative and was still typologically very similar to other BaltoSlavic dialects.[10] Even into the Common Era, the various Balto-Slavic dialects formed a dialect continuum
stretching from the Vistula to the Don and Oka basins,
and from the Baltic and upper Volga to southern Russia
and northern Ukraine.[11] Exactly when Slavs began to
identify as a distinct ethno-cultural unit remains a subject of debate. For example, Kobylinski (2005) links
the phenomenon to the Zarubinets culture 200 BCE to
200 CE,[12] Vlodymyr Baran places Slavic ethnogenesis
within the Chernyakov era,[13] while Curta[14] places it
in the Danube basin in the sixth century CE. It is likely
that linguistic anity played an important role in dening
group identity for the Slavs.[15] The term Slav is proposed
to be an autonym referring to people who (use the words
to) speak.
Another important aspect of this period is that the Iranian
dialects of the Scythians and Sarmatians had a considerable impact on the Slavic vocabulary, during the extensive contacts between the aforementioned languages and
(early) Proto-Slavic for about a millennium,[16] and the
eventual absorption and assimilation (e.g. Slavicisation)
of the Iranian-speaking Scythians, Sarmatians, and Alans
in Eastern Europe by the Proto-Slavic population of the
region.[17][18][19][20]

What caused the rapid expansion of Slavic remains a topic

of discussion. Traditional theories link its spread to a
demographic expansion of Slavs migrating radially from
their Urheimat,[22] whereas more processual theories attempt to modify the picture by introducing concepts such
as elite dominance and language shifts..[23] Literary
and archaeological evidence suggests that eastern European barbaricum in the 6th century was linguistically and
culturally diverse,[24][25] somewhat going against the idea
of a large demographic expansion of an ethnically homogeneous Slavic people. Instead, Proto-Slavic might have
been lingua franca among the various barbarian ethnicities that emerged in the Danubian, Carpathian and steppe
regions of Europe after the fall of the Hun Empire,[26]
such as the Sklaveni, Antes, and Avars. Cultural contacts
between emerging societal elites might have led to the
language of one agricultural community spread(ing) to
other agricultural societies.[15] This has been substantiated archaeologically, seen by the development of networks which spread of Slavic bulae, artifacts representing social status and group identity.[27] Horace Lunt
argues that only as a lingua franca could Slavic have remained mutually intelligible over vast areas of Europe,
and that its disintegration into dierent dialects occurred
after the collapse of the Avar khanate.[28] However, even
proponents of this theory concede that it fails to explain
how Slavic spread to the Baltic and western Russia, areas
which had no historical connection with the Avar Empire.
Whatever the case, Johanna Nichols points out that the
expansion of Slavic was not just a linguistic phenomenon,
but the expansion of an ethnic identity.[15]
Due to incompletely understood sociocultural factors, a
number of sound changes occurred that uniformly affected all later dialects even well after the Slavic-speaking
area had become dialectally dierentiated, for at least
four or ve centuries after the initial Slavic dispersion.
This makes it dicult to identify a single point at which
Proto-Slavic broke up into regional dialects. As a result, it is customary to speak of a Common Slavic period during which sound changes spread across the entire
Slavic-speaking area, but not necessarily with uniform results. The Early Common Slavic period, from roughly
400 to 600 AD, can be identied as Proto-Slavic proper.
The onomastic evidence and glosses of Slavic words in
foreign-language texts show no detectable regional dif-

3 NOTATION

ferences during this period.

2. Early Middle Slavic ( Early Common Slavic)

During the Middle Common Slavic period, from perhaps

3. Late Middle Slavic ( Middle Common Slavic)
600 to 800 AD, some dialectal dierences existed, espe4. Young Proto-Slavic ( rst part of Late Common
cially in peripheral dialects, but most sound changes still
Slavic)
occurred uniformly. (For example, the Old Novgorod dialect did not exhibit the second palatalization of velars
5. Late Proto-Slavic ( second part of Late Common
while all the other Slavic dialects did.) Reconstructed
Slavic)
Proto-Slavic forms are normally from this period. It
is thought that the distinction of long and short vowels
6. Disintegrating Slavic (widespread post-Commonby quality, normally reected in Proto-Slavic reconSlavic developments, e.g. loss of nasalization)
structed forms, occurred during this time: Greek transcriptions from the 5th and 6th centuries AD still indicate
The rst regressive palatalization of velars (see below)
Common Slavic *o as a.
may well have operated during Early Common Slavic
During the Late Common Slavic period, from c. 800 to and is thought by Arnot Lemprecht to have specically
1000 AD, conceptual sound changes (e.g. the conver- operated during the 5th century AD. The progressive
sion of TORT sequences into open syllables and the devel- palatalization of velars, if it is older, can predate this
opment of the neoacute accent) still occurred across the only by 200300 years at most, since it post-dates Protoentire Slavic area, but often in dialectally dierentiated Germanic borrowings into Slavic, which are generally
ways. In addition, migrations of Uralic and Romance agreed to have occurred no earlier than the 2nd century
speaking peoples into modern Hungary and Romania AD. The monophthongization of /au/, /ai/ is thought to
created geographic separations between Slavic dialects. have occurred near the end of Early Common Slavic or
Written documents of the ninth, tenth and eleventh cen- beginning of Middle Common Slavic (c. 600 AD), and
turies demonstrate some local features. For example, the the second regressive palatalization of velars not long afFreising monuments show a dialect which contains some terwards. This implies that, until around the time of the
phonetic and lexical elements peculiar to Slovenian di- earliest Slavic expansion, Slavic was a conservative lanalects (e.g. rhotacism, the word krilatec). Signicant guage not so dierent from the various attested Baltic lancontinuous Slavic-language texts exist from this period, guages.
beginning with the extant Old Church Slavonic (OCS)
texts, composed in the 9th century but copied in the 10th
century. The end of the Common Slavic period is usu- 2.4 First written Slavic languages
ally reckoned with the loss of weak yers, which occurred
in Bulgaria c. 950 AD but did not reach Russia until c. In the second half of the ninth century, the Slavic di1150 AD. This is clearly revealed in the texts themselves: alect spoken north of Thessaloniki, in the hinterlands of
During the century or so between the composition and Macedonia, became the basis for the rst written Slavic
copying of the OCS texts, the weak yers disappeared as language, created by the brothers Cyril and Methodius
vowels, and as a result, the texts show marked instability who translated portions of the Bible and other church
in their representation. (The main exception is the Codex books. The language they recorded is known as Old
Zographensis, copied just before yer loss.) On the other Church Slavonic. Old Church Slavonic is not identical to
hand, the Old East Slavic texts represent the weak yers Proto-Slavic, having been recorded at least two centuries
with almost complete etymological delity until nearly after the breakup of Proto-Slavic, and it shows features
that clearly distinguish it from Proto-Slavic. However, it
two centuries later.
is still reasonably close, and the mutual intelligibility beThe terminology of these periods is not consistent. For tween Old Church Slavonic and other Slavic dialects of
example, Schenker speaks only of Early Proto-Slavonic those days was proved by Cyril and Methodius mission
(= Early Common Slavic, the period of entirely uniform to Great Moravia and Pannonia. There, their early South
developments) and Late Proto-Slavonic (= Middle and Slavic dialect used for the translations was clearly underLate Common Slavic), with the latter period beginning standable to the local population which spoke an early
with the second regressive palatalization, due to the dif- West Slavic dialect.
fering outcomes of pre-Proto-Slavic *x.[29] (Note that
some authors, e.g. Kortlandt, place the beginning of dialectal developments later by postulating an outcome *
of the second regressive palatalization, which only later 3 Notation
developed into *s or *.[30] ) Kortlandts chronology, on
the other hand, includes six stages after the Balto-Slavic Main article: Proto-Balto-Slavic language Notation
period:[31]

1. Early Slavic ( pre-Proto-Slavic)

See Proto-Balto-Slavic language#Notation for much

more detail on the uses of the most commonly encountered diacritics for indicating prosody (, , , , , a,

3.4

Other prosodic diacritics

, ) and various other phonetic distinctions (, , , , ,

etc.) in dierent Balto-Slavic languages.

3.1

Vowel notation

Two dierent and conicting systems for denoting vowels are commonly in use in Indo-European and BaltoSlavic linguistics on one hand, and Slavic linguistics on
the other. In the rst, vowel length is consistently distinguished with a macron above the letter, while in the latter
it is not clearly indicated. The following table explains
these dierences:
For consistency, all discussions of sounds up to (but
not including) Middle Common Slavic use the common Balto-Slavic notation of vowels, while discussions
of Middle and Late Common Slavic (the phonology and
grammar sections) and later dialects use the Slavic notation.

3.2

Other vowel and consonant diacritics

Other marks used within Balto-Slavic and Slavic linguistics are:

The haek on consonants ( ), indicating a hushing quality [t ], as in English kitchen, mission,
vision.
Various strongly palatal(ized) consonants (a more
hissing quality) usually indicated by an acute accent ( ) or a haek ( ).
The ogonek ( ), indicating vowel nasalization (in
modern standard Lithuanian this is historic only).

3.3

Prosodic notation

5
Short falling (): This indicates the Balto-Slavic
short accent. In Late Common Slavic, this accent
was lengthened in monosyllables (see preceding entry).
Neoacute (): This indicates the Late Common
Slavic neoacute accent, which was pronounced as a
rising accent, usually long but short when occurring
on some syllable types in certain languages. This results from retraction of the accent, i.e. the Middle
Common Slavic accent fell on the following syllable
(usually specically a weak yer).

3.4 Other prosodic diacritics

There are unfortunately multiple competing systems used
to indicate prosody in dierent Balto-Slavic languages
(see Proto-Balto-Slavic language#Notation for more details). The most important for this article are:
1. Three-way system of Proto-Slavic, Proto-BaltoSlavic, modern Lithuanian: Acute tone () vs. circumex tone ( or ) vs. short accent ().
2. Four-way Serbo-Croatian system, also used in
Slovenian and often in Slavic reconstructions: long
rising (), short rising (), long falling (), short
falling (). In the Chakavian dialect and other archaic dialects, the long rising accent is notated with
a tilde (), indicating its normal origin in the Late
Common Slavic neoacute accent (see above).
3. Length only, as in Czech and Slovak: long () vs.
short (a).
4. Stress only, as in Russian, Ukrainian and Bulgarian:
stressed () vs. unstressed (a).

4 Historical development up to
Proto-Slavic

For Middle and Late Common Slavic, the following

marks are used to indicate prosodic distinctions, based
on the standard notation in Serbo-Croatian:
See also: Proto-Slavic and Proto-Balto-Slavic language
Long rising (): This indicates the Balto-Slavic
acute accent in Middle Common Slavic only.

4.1 Split from Indo-European

Short rising (): This indicates the Balto-Slavic

acute accent in Late Common Slavic, where it was Proto-Balto-Slavic has the satem sound changes wherein
Proto-Indo-European (PIE) palatovelar consonants beshortened.
came aricate or fricative consonants pronounced closer
Long falling (): This normally indicates the Balto- to the front of the mouth, conventionally indicated as *
Slavic circumex accent. In Late Common Slavic, and *. These became simple dental fricatives *s and *z
it also indicates originally short (falling) accent that in Proto-Slavic:
was lengthened in monosyllables. This secondary
circumex occurs only on the short vowels e, o, ,
* * *s
in an open syllable (i.e. when not forming part of
a liquid diphthong).
* * *z

HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT UP TO PROTO-SLAVIC

* * *z
This sound change was incomplete, in that all Baltic and
Slavic languages have instances where PIE palatovelars
appear as *k and *g, often in doublets (i.e. etymologically
related words, where one has a sound descended from *k
or *g and the other has a sound descended from * or *).
Other satem sound changes are delabialization of labiovelar consonants before rounded vowels[32] and the ruki
sound law, which shifted *s to * after *r, *u, *k or
*i. In Proto-Slavic, this sound was shifted backwards to
become *x, although it was often shifted forward again Eastern Europe in the 3rd century CE:
by one of the three sound laws causing palatalization of Chernyakhov culture
Przeworsk culture
velars.[33]
In the Balto-Slavic period, nal *t and *d were lost.[34]

Wielbark Culture (associated with the Goths)

a Baltic culture (Aesti/Yotvingian?)
Debczyn culture
Roman Empire

Also present in Balto-Slavic were the diphthongs *ei and

*ai as well as liquid diphthongs *ul, *il, *ur, *ir, the latter
set deriving from syllabic liquids;[35] the vocalic element
merged with *u after labiovelar stops and with *i everywhere else, and the remaining labiovelars subsequently vzdati).[43] This entailed no actual phonetic change, but
lost their labialization.[36]
simply a reinterpretation of syllable boundaries, and was
Around this time, the PIE aspirated consonants merged possible only when the entire cluster could begin a syllable or word (as in *nj, *zd, *stv, but not *nt, *rd,
with voiced ones:[37]
*pn). In other cases, syllable-nal obstruents were either
deleted (e.g. OCS sn sleep < PIE *supnos); diph *b *b
thongs were monophthongized; nasal consonants in the
syllable coda were reduced to nasalization of the preced *d *d
ing vowel (* and *); and liquid diphthongs were elimi *g *g
nated by metathesis (e.g. *or *ro), epenthesis (e.g. *or
*oro), or conversion to syllabic sonorants (e.g. *ur
Once it split o, the Proto-Slavic period probably en- *).[44][45]
compassed a period of stability lasting 2000 years with
Another tendency arose in the Common Slavic period
only several centuries of rapid change before and durwherein successive segmental phonemes in a syllable asing the breakup of Slavic linguistic unity that came about
similated articulatory features (primarily place of articdue to Slavic migrations in the early sixth century.[38][39]
ulation).[46] This is called syllable synharmony or inAs such, the chronology of changes including the three
trasyllabic harmony. Thus syllables (rather than just
palatalizations and ending with the change of * to *a in
the consonant or the vowel) were distinguished as eicertain contexts denes the Common Slavic period.
ther soft (palatal) or hard (non-palatal). This led to
Long * and * raised to * and * before a nal sonorant, consonants developing palatalized allophones in syllables
and sonorants following a long vowel were deleted.[40] containing front vowels, resulting in the rst regressive
Proto-Slavic shared the common Balto-Slavic merging of palatalization.[47] It also led to the fronting of back vow*o with *a. However, while long * and * remained dis- els after /j/.
tinct in Baltic, they merged in Slavic, so that early Slavic
After these changes, a CV syllable structure (that is, one
did not possess the sounds *o or *.[41][42]
of segments ordered from lower to higher sonority) arose
and the syllable became a basic structural unit of the language.
4.2 Changes in syllable structure
A tendency for rising sonority in a syllable (arrangement
of phonemes in a syllable from lower to higher sonority)
marks the beginning of the Common Slavic period. One
aspect of this, generally referred to as the Law of Open
Syllables, led to a gradual elimination of closed syllables. When possible, syllable-nal consonants were resyllabied into the following syllable. For example, *kunje-mou to him became *ku-nje-mou (OCS kemu),
and *vuz-d-ti to give back became *vu-zd-ti (OCS

4.3 Nasalization
Syllable-nal nasals *m and *n (i.e. when not directly followed by a vowel) coalesced with a previous vowel, causing it to become nasalized:[31][48]
Note that in Balto-Slavic studies, the ogonek diacritic is
normally used to indicate nasalization (, , , etc.) rather
than the IPA-standard tilde (/ / etc.). The tilde is

4.5

Iotation

instead used to indicate a particular type of tone on the rst palatalization. One example is *elm, from earlier
vowel. (Which tone is indicated varies depending on the *xelm, from Germanic *helmaz.
language in question. See the notation section above.)
The nasal element of *im, *in, *um, *un is lost word- 4.5 Iotation
nally in inectional endings, and therefore does not
cause nasalization.
In a process called iotation or yodization, *j merged with
a previous consonant (unless it was labial), and those conExamples showing these developments:
sonants acquired a palatal articulation. Compare English
The nasalization of * was eventually lost. However,
yod-coalescence. This change probably did not occur towhen * followed a palatal consonant such as /j/ (indigether
with the rst regressive palatalization, but somecated generically as *J), it was fronted to *, which prewhat
later,
and it remained productive well into the Late
served its nasalization much longer. This new * did
Common Slavic period.
not originally merge with the result of nasalizing original *im/*in, as shown in the table. Instead, it evolved
*tj *
in Common Slavic times to a high-mid nasal vowel * ,
higher than the low-mid vowel *. In South Slavic, these
*dj *
two vowels merged as *. Elsewhere, however, * was
denasalized, merging with *, while * was generally low *stj * ( presumably )
ered to * (often reected as ja). Common Slavic *des *zdj * ( presumably d)
tyj ko the tenth horse (accusative)" appears as destyj
kon in Old Church Slavonic and desete konje in Serbo *sj *
Croatian (South Slavic), but as dest kon in modern
Czech and dziesite konie in Polish (West Slavic), and as
*zj *
(desjatyje koni) in Russian (East Slavic).
*lj /l/
Note that Polish normally preserves nasal vowels, but it
does not have a nasal vowel in the accusative plural end *nj /n/
ing, while it retains it in the stem of tenth.
*rj /r/
Nasalization also occurred before a nasal consonant,
whenever a vowel was followed by two nasals. However,
in this case, several later dialects denasalized the vowel at The combinations *gt and *kt merged into * in Protoan early date. Both pomnti and pomnti remember Slavic times and show outcomes identical to * in all lan(from earlier *pa-men-nant?) are found in Old Church guages. This combination occurred in a few lexical items
Slavonic. The common word *jm name can be traced (*di daughter < *dkti, *no night < *nokt), but
back to earlier *inmen with denasalization, from a PIE also occurred in innitives of verbs with stems ending in
zero grade alternant *hn hmn-.
-g and -k, which would have originally ended in *-gti and
*-kti. This accounts for the irregular innitive ending
some verbs such as Polish mc, Russian from Proto4.4 First regressive palatalization
Slavic *moi < *mog-ti, where normally these languages
have innitives in - and - respectively.
Main article: Slavic rst palatalization
In the case of the palatal consonants that had resulted
from the rst regressive palatalization, the *j simply disAs an extension of the system of syllable synharmony, appeared without altering the preceding consonant:
velar consonants were palatalized to postalveolar consonants before front vowels (*i, *, *e, *) and before
*j * [t]
*j:[49][50]
*(d)j *(d) []
*k * [t]
*j * []
*g *d [d] * []
*j * [t]
*x * []
*sk * [t]
*zg *d [d]

*dj *d [d]

In both East and South Slavic, labial consonants (*m, *b,

This was the rst regressive palatalization. Although *g *p, *v) were also aected by iotation, acquiring a lateral
palatalized to an aricate, this soon lenited to a frica- o-glide /l/:
tive (but *d was retained).[51] Some Germanic loanwords were borrowed early enough to be aected by the
*mj m

4
*bj b
*pj p
*vj v

Many researchers believe that this change actually occurred throughout Proto-Slavic and was later 'reversed' in
West Slavic and in most dialects of the Eastern subgroup
of South Slavic languages (Macedonian and Bulgarian,
and the transitional Torlakian dialect) by analogy with
related word forms lacking the lateral. The Codex
Suprasliensis, for example, has < *zemja (i.e. an
intrusive * where East and South Slavic languages have
*); compare:
*zemja ( *zema) *zemja
Bulgarian: [zmja]
Macedonian: [zmja]
Polish: ziemia [mja]
Torlakian: zemja [zmja]
Some Northern Macedonian dialects, however, acquired
an *n (e.g. [zma] < *zemja).
A few words with etymological initial *bj- and *pj- are
reected as *b- and *p- even in West Slavic:

HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT UP TO PROTO-SLAVIC

*J *J ( *J )
Towards the end of the Late Common Slavic period, an
opposing change happened, in which long *J was backed
to *J. This change is normally identied with the end of
the tendency for syllabic synharmony.
Vowel fronting clearly preceded monophthongization, in
that the outputs *Jei, *Jeu were later aected by monophthongization just as original *ei, *eu were. However,
there is no guarantee that vowel fronting followed the progressive palatalization despite the fact that the output of
the latter process was aected by vowel fronting. The
reason is that the rule triggering vowel fronting may well
have operated as a surface lter, i.e. a rule that remained
part of the grammar for an extended period of time, operating automatically on any new palatal consonants as they
were produced.[54]
Vowel fronting did not operate on the low nasal vowel *
(later *), cf. Old Church Slavonic znaj I know. However, it did operate on the high nasal vowel *, leading to
alternations, e.g. Old Church Slavonic accusative plural
raby slaves (< *- ) vs. ko horses (< *-j < *-j ).
See the section on nasalization for more discussion.

4.7 Prothesis

During the Common Slavic period, prothetic glides were

inserted before words that began with vowels, consistent
*pvti to spit < PIE *(s)pieHu-, cf. Lithuanian with the tendency for rising sonority within a syllable. *v
spjuti.[52]
was inserted before rounded vowels (*u, *), *j before
*bust to watch, to perk up (1sg. *bud ) < PIE unrounded vowels (*e, , *i, *). Not all vowels show
equal treatment in this respect, however. High vowels
*beud.[53]
generally have prothesis without exception in all Slavic
languages, as do *e and *:

4.6

Vowel fronting

*i- *jiSyllabic synharmony also worked in reverse, and caused

*- *jthe palatal articulation of a consonant to inuence a following vowel, turning it from a back vowel into a front
*u- *wu- *vuvowel. There were two sources for this process. The rst
*- *w- *w- vwas a preceding *j or a consonant that had undergone iotation. The second was the progressive palatalization (see
*e- *jebelow), which produced new palatal consonants before
back vowels. The result of this fronting was as follows
*- *j(with J acting as a cover symbol for any consonant with a
palatal articulation):
The development for *ji- and *j- is somewhat uncertain.
The glide *j may have retained allophonic status in that
case, and is not found in many of the later Slavic lan *Ja *Je
guages.
*J *J
Prothesis generally did not apply to short *a (which devel *Ju *Ji
oped into *o or nasal *), although some East Slavic dialects seem to have developed it regardless. There seems
*J *J
to have been some uncertainty concerning the interpretation of long * as a rounded or unrounded vowel. Prothe *Jai *Jei ( *J)
sis seems to have applied intermittently to it; when it does
*Jau *Jeu ( *J)
apply *- *j- is frequent, but *- *v- is also found.

4.10

Progressive palatalization

4.8

Monophthongization and other vowel In noun declension, the second regressive palatalization
originally gured in two important Slavic stem types:
changes

* lost its labialization[55] (possibly [] or [], represented hereafter as <y>, as in modern Polish), but not
before prothesis occurred, as prothesis of *v before unrounded *y seems unlikely. This was closely followed
by the monophthongization of diphthongs in all environments, in accordance with the law of open syllables.[56]
Following this change, short *a acquired non-distinctive
rounding (probably [] in rst instance), and is denoted
as *o from this point onwards.

o-stems (masculine and neuter consonant-stems) and astems (feminine and masculine vowel-stems). This rule
operated in the o-stem masculine paradigm in three
places: before nominative plural and both singular and
plural locative axes.[59]

4.10 Progressive palatalization

An additional palatalization of velar consonants occurred

in Common Slavic times, formerly known as the third
palatalization but now more commonly termed the pro * * y
gressive palatalization due to uncertainty over when exactly it occurred. Unlike the other two, it was triggered
*au *
by a preceding vowel, in particular a preceding *i or *,
*eu *(j) (the *j applied iotation to the preceding with or without an intervening *n.[29] Furthermore, it
was probably disallowed before consonants and the high
consonant, when possible)
back vowels *y, *.[60] The outcomes are exactly the
*ei *
same as for the second regressive palatalization, i.e. alveolar rather than palatoalveolar aricates, including the
*ai * or
East/West split in the outcome of palatalized *x:
*a *o
k *c ([ts])
^ In many common grammatical forms such as the nom g *dz ( *z in most dialects)
inative plural of o-stems (Schenker 2002:89), the second person imperative (Schenker 2002:103), in the sec x * *s/*
ond singular of athematic verbs and in the dative singular
of the clitic personal pronouns, *ai became * (Schenker Examples:
2002:90).

4.9

Second regressive palatalization

Main article: Slavic second palatalization

*atiku(s) father (nom. sg.) *aticu(s) (with

vowel fronting) Late Common Slavic *otc
Proto-Germanic *kuningaz king Early Common Slavic *kuningu(s) Late Common Slavic
*kndz

Proto-Slavic had acquired front vowels, (possibly an

*vixu(s) all *v *v (West), *vs (East
open front vowel [][57] ) and sometimes , from the earand South)
lier change of *ai to */. This resulted in new sequences
of velars followed by front vowels, where they did not occur before. Additionally, some new loanwords also had There is signicant debate over when this palatalization
took place and the exact contexts in which the change
such sequences.
was phonologically regular.[61] The traditional view is that
However, Proto-Slavic was still operating under the sys- this palatalization took place just after the second retem of syllabic synharmony. Therefore, the language un- gressive palatalization (hence its traditional designation
derwent the second regressive palatalization, in which ve- as the third palatalization), or alternatively that the two
lar consonants preceding the new (secondary) phonemes occurred essentially simultaneously. This is based on
* and *, as well as *i and *e in new loanwords, were the similarity of the development to the second regrespalatalized.[49][50][58] As with the progressive palataliza- sive palatalization and examples like *atike father (voc.
tion, these became palatovelar. Soon after, palatovelar sg.) *ote (not *otce) that appear to show that
consonants from both the progressive palatalization and the rst regressive palatalization preceded the progressive
the second regressive palatalization became sibilants:
palatalization.[62]
*c ([ts])
*dz *z
x * *s/*

A dissenting view places the progressive palatalization

before one or both regressive palatalizations. This dates
back to Pedersen (1905) and was continued more recently
by Channon (1972) and Lunt (1981). Lunts chronology
places the progressive palatalization rst of the three, in

10

HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT UP TO PROTO-SLAVIC

the process explaining both the occurrence of *ote and types of pitch accent. (Vowel length is normally considthe identity of the outcomes of the progressive and second ered a separate topic from accent, but in the Slavic lanregressive palatalizations:[63]
guages in particular, the two are closely related, and are
usually treated together.) Not surprisingly, the historical
1. Progressive palatalization: *k > * (presumably a development of accent in the Slavic languages is complex
and was one of the last areas to be clearly understood.
palatal stop) after *i(n) and *j
Even now, there is not complete consensus.
2. First regressive palatalization: *k/* > * before
The Balto-Slavic languages inherited from PIE a free,
front vowels
mobile pitch accent:
3. Fronting of back vowels after palatal consonants
4. Monophthongization of diphthongs
5. Second regressive palatalization: *k/* > *c before
front vowels
(similarly for *g and possibly *x)
Signicant complications to all theories are posed by
the Old Novgorod dialect, known particularly since the
1950s, which has no application of the second regressive
palatalization and only partial application of the progressive palatalization (to *k and sometimes *g, but not to
*x).

1. There was (at most) a single accented syllable per

word, distinguished by higher pitch (as in modern
Japanese) rather than greater dynamic stress (as in
English).
2. The accent was free in that it could occur on any
syllable, and was phonemic (i.e. its position could
not be automatically predicted).
3. The accent was mobile in that its position could potentially vary among closely related words within a
single paradigm.

More recent scholars have continued to argue in favor of An additional register distinction arose in Balto-Slavic
the traditional chronology,[64][65][66] and there is clearly times on certain types of syllables, between acute and
circumex. Eventually, this distinction was manifested
still no consensus.
as dierent types of pitch accent, with cognate words
The three palatalizations must have taken place between in Latvian, Old Prussian, Slovenian and Serbo-Croatian
the 2nd and 9th century AD. The earlier date is the ear- showing a distinction between rising (acute) vs. falling
liest likely date for Slavic contact with Germanic tribes (circumex) tones, with the terms based on the names
(such as the migrating Goths), because loanwords from of corresponding contour tones in Ancient Greek. (Note
Germanic (such as *kndz king mentioned above) that Lithuanian also preserves the same tonal distincare aected by all three palatalizations.[67] On the other tion, but has switched the nature of the tones, so that the
hand, loan words in the early historic period (c. 9th cen- Lithuanian acute is a falling accent while the Lithuanian
tury) are generally not aected by the palatalizations. For circumex is rising.) This distinction cannot be maniexample, the name of the Varangians, from Old Norse fested on certain syllables containing a short vowel; rather
Vringi, appears in Old East Slavic as varg, it occurs on any of the following syllable types:
with no evidence of the progressive palatalization (had
it followed the full development as king did, the re1. Those containing a long vowel.
sult would have been **vardz instead). The progressive palatalization also aected vowel fronting; it created
2. Those containing a normal diphthong, e.g. *ai or
palatal consonants before back vowels, which were then
*au.
fronted. This does not necessarily guarantee a certain ordering of the changes, however, as explained above in the
3. Those containing a sonorant diphthong, e.g. *ar
vowel fronting section.
*al *am *an not directly followed by a vowel.
In Proto-Balto-Slavic, however, the distinction between
acute vs. circumex could occur on all syllables (or at
least, all syllables of the appropriate type), and is unlikely
See also: Proto-Slavic accent
to have been a tonal distinction, but rather the presence
of some feature (in acute syllables) vs. its absence (in circumex syllables). This is based on various sound laws
where the accent was drawn onto (or in some cases pre4.11.1 Balto-Slavic
vented from moving away from) acute syllables, but not
The Baltic languages, as well as conservative Slavic lan- circumex syllables. The nature of the acute feature itguages like Serbo-Croatian, have a complex accentual self is unclear; it has variously been reconstructed as addisystem with short and long vowels in all syllables, a free tional vowel length, the presence of a glottal stop, creaky
pitch accent that can fall on any syllable, and multiple voice, etc.

4.11 Accentual developments

4.11

Accentual developments

The acute feature is thought to stem largely either from

PIE syllables containing a laryngeal consonant in the
coda, or from vowels lengthened during Balto-Slavic
times, e.g. through Winters law. There is some dispute over whether all long vowels in early Balto-Slavic
eventually developed an acute marking. The traditional
theory holds this, suggesting that the acute vs. circumex distinction was originally simply a length distinction
in the nuclear vowel (hence, early on, all long vowels
were acute, and only diphthongs could be distinguished
as acute vs. circumex). However, Frederik Kortlandt,
and other researchers following him, maintain that the
acute feature directly continues a PIE laryngeal, and that
(e.g.) the PIE distinction between original *eh and original long * is reected as acute vs. circumex, respectively. These researchers often refer to the acute feature
as laryngealization.
Numerous changes ultimately led to a system in ProtoSlavic where only accented syllables contained an acute
vs. circumex distinction, and this was marked by pitch
contours, i.e. rising (acute) vs. falling (circumex). Frequently, the position and/or nature of the accent had
changed due to numerous sound laws. At this time, this
distinction could occur on the following syllable types:
Those containing the long vowels *a * *i *u *y.
Those containing the nasal vowels * *.
Those containing a liquid diphthong.

11
Early Slavic *sndu(s) court of law, trial > Middle Common Slavic *s d > MCS *sd (by Dybos
law) > Late Common Slavic *s d (= *s d) >
akavian (Vrgara) sd (G sg sd), Russian sud (G
sg sud).
The neoacute is often written with a tilde, as in LCS
*s d. The pronunciation is as a rising vowel, long if
the vowel was originally long, short if the vowel was originally a short strong yer or , and either long or short on
original short e or o, depending on dialect (see above).
Retraction resulting in a neoacute accent also occurred in
certain other morphological circumstances:
1. In the present tense of verbs in *-iti, e.g.:
MCS *nos(t) he carries > *nsi(t) > Russian nsit
2. From a vowel immediately preceded by an original
*j:
PSl. *venzj(ti) he ties > MCS *v(t) >
LCS *v e(t) > Russian v'et
MCS *volj will > *vol' > LCS *vl'a >
Russian dial. vlja[68][69]
4.11.3 Common Slavic prosodic changes

Per Kortlandt (2011), the following prosodic changes

Note that all of the above syllable types correspond to happened in the Common Slavic period, following the
syllable types that could take register distinctions in late period where quality and quantity were correlated. At
this point, the former acute register in long syllables (reBalto-Slavic times (i.e. long vowels or diphthongs).
sulting from Proto-Indo-European laryngeals and certain
For more details, see Proto-Balto-Slavic.
other developments) had been lost (becoming circumex)
except in all syllables that were either accented or directly
following the accent. The acute had also been lost in
4.11.2 Ivi's law and the neoacute accent
stressed syllables in the mobile paradigm (class C) as a
result of Meillets law.
See also: Ivi's law
Note that some of these laws, e.g. Van Wijks law, are
The most important accentual change in Common Slavic controversial.
occurred near the end of the period. During the Late
1. Development of tone: Stressed acute syllables, and
Common Slavic period, the short vowels * * (known as
all nal open syllables, were pronounced with rising
yers) developed into strong and weak variants accordtone. Other stressed syllables were pronounced with
ing to Havlks law. The weak variants could no longer
falling tone.
carry an accent; as a result, if an accent had previously
occurred on such a vowel, it was retracted onto the previ2. Separation of quality and quantity, along with shortous vowel (Ivi's law), which gained a new type of rising
ening of all pretonic vowels (vowels in syllables beaccent, termed the neoacute. In the northern dialects (but
fore the accent), which became short but maintained
not in Serbo-Croatian, Slovenian, or southern Slovakian
their quality. In general, later pretonic long syllables
dialects), short e and o gaining the neoacute were auto(as in class B) were accented at this time, becoming
matically lengthened. (This was one of many Common
pretonic as a result of Dybos law.
Slavic developments that disrupted the original distribution of short and long vowels and resulted in all vowels
3. Loss of the acute register in immediately post-tonic
coming in both short and long variants.)
syllables, along with vowel shortening. This led to a
Example:

phonemic distinction in such syllables between short

12

6 NOTES
and long vowels with the same quality (the latter reformer acute-register syllables when followed by a
ecting circumex register). This is seen, for exlong syllable or internal yer.
ample, in the i stems, where short *-i in the dative
singular is opposed to long *- in the genitive and These developments are complex, but together they exlocative singular. (Reected later on as accentual plain:
dierences in the root syllable, due to Stangs law.)

4. Van Wijks law: Lengthening of vowels (except for

yers and nasal vowels) following palatal consonants.
This led to the increased occurrence of long vowels in the endings of j and jo stems in class A, and
corresponding dierences in the position of the accent in class B. Some of these long vowels were later
shortened by analogy, especially in endings that were
unstressed in the mobile paradigm. (Note that this
law is not accepted by all scholars.)
5. Contractions of vowels across /j/ in post-tonic syllables in some languages (especially Czech), producing a single long vowel. This only occurred when
both vowels being contracted were unstressed, and
did not occur at all in Russian.
6. Ivi's law: Retraction of the accent from weak yers,
leading to neoacute accent in the newly accented syllables.
7. Dybos law: In non-mobile paradigms, non-acute
syllables lost the accent to the following syllable.
This created class B as distinct from class A. Formerly accented long syllables remained long, resulting pre-tonic length in class B. Newly stressed long
vowels gained falling tone (which was then lost due
to Stangs law, below).

1. The dierence between class A and class B, and the

fact that class A reects former acute register in the
root. (Dybos law produced class B accent.)
2. The occurrence of pre-tonic length in SerboCroatian in class B. (These syllables used to be
stressed long syllables, before Dybos law.)
3. The occurrence of length, or indication of former
length (e.g. due to Slovene neo-circumex accent),
in the nal syllables of class A j and jo stems, but
not the corresponding and o stems. (Due to Van
Wijks law.)
4. The occurrence of neoacute accent in certain class
A j stems. (These used to be class B, but the accent
was retracted through a combination of Van Wijks
law and Stangs law.)
5. The occurrence of neoacute accent in the plural of
certain class B jo stems, reected especially in Russian. (Same basic explanation as previous.)
6. The pattern of retracted (neoacute) accent in class B,
occurring sometimes when a weak yer used to follow
(Ivi's law) but also in certain other cases (Stangs
law).

8. Lengthening of short falling syllables (i.e. Balto- These can be seen in the various paradigms.
Slavic short syllables) in words that will be monosyllabic after loss of weak yers.
9. Loss of the acute register in stressed syllables, producing a short rising tone. (The acute register had
already been lost elsewhere.)
10. Stangs law: Retraction of the stress from long
falling syllables, producing neoacute accent. The
syllables losing the stress became shortened. Most
such syllables had retrieved the stress as a result of
Dybos law, and had many had become long due to
Van Wijks law (in j and jo stems).
11. Analogical changes that smoothed out some of the
complicated patterns produced by Stangs law. This
in particular led to consistent neoacute root stress in
j stems, and neoacute root stress in the plural of jo
stems.
12. Eventual loss of length in nal syllables in most
languages. However, the former long vowels are
reected to some extent in Slovene and SerboCroatian, and more directly by the neo-circumex
accent in Slovene, which developed early on from

5 See also
Proto-Slavic

History of the Slavic languages

Proto-Balto-Slavic
Old Church Slavonic
Slavic languages
Balto-Slavic languages
Proto-Slavic accent
Slavic liquid metathesis and pleophony

6 Notes
[1] Kortlandt (1990:134)
[2] Andersen (2003:46)

13

[3] Mallory & Adams (2006:78)

[4] Mallory & Adams (2006:73)
[5] Nichols (1999:245)
[6] Andersen (2003:72)
[7] Andersen (1998:415416)
[8] Andersen (2003:49, 50)
[9] Andersen (2003:48)
[10] Matasovi (2008:114)
[11] Andersen (2003:49)
[12] Kobylinski (2005:529)

[24] Teodor (2005:243): "...the 'Romance population' looks

barbarian and the 'barbarians Roman... Ambiguity takes
over the historiography of the problem...
[25] Curta (2001:344): "...contemporary sources attest the use
of more than one language by individuals who their authors viewed as Antes or Sclavenes.
[26] Curta (2004:146): "...a language already used in the 500s
for cross-cultural communication in the lower Danube
area...
[27] Curta (2001:342): Such dress accessories point to
long-distance relations with communities in Mazuria and
Crimea . . . it is possible that these dress accessories
served as markers of social identity, which served as
markers of social status for newly emerging elites.
[28] Curta (2004:146)

[13] cited in Curta (2001:284): "...fourth century sites in that

area of the Chernyakhov culture, in which Baran believed
the early Slavic culture originated...

[29] Schenker (2002:73)

[14] Curta (2001:325-250)

[31] Kortlandt (1994)

[15] Nichols (1999:240)

[32] Kortlandt (1994:93)

[16] The Journal of Indo-European Studies, Number 1-2 (original from the University of California) Vol. 21 Journal of
Indo-European Studies, 1993, digitalized in 2007. p 180

[33] Schenker (2002:6566)

[17] Brzezinski, Richard; Mielczarek, Mariusz (2002). The

Sarmatians, 600 BC-AD 450. Osprey Publishing. p. 39.
(..) Indeed, it is now accepted that the Sarmatians merged
in with pre-Slavic populations.

[35] Schenker (2002:64)

[18] Adams, Douglas Q. (1997). Encyclopedia of IndoEuropean Culture. Taylor & Francis. p. 523. (..) In their
Ukrainian and Polish homeland the Slavs were intermixed
and at times overlain by Germanic speakers (the Goths)
and by Iranian speakers (Scythians, Sarmatians, Alans) in
a shifting array of tribal and national congurations.

[38] Van Wijk (1956:2127)

[19] Atkinson, Dorothy; Dallin, Alexander; Warshofsky

Lapidus, Gail, eds. (1977). Women in Russia. Stanford
University Press. p. 3. (..) Ancient accounts link the
Amazons with the Scythians and the Sarmatians, who successively dominated the south of Russia for a millennium
extending back to the seventh century B.C. The descendants of these peoples were absorbed by the Slavs who
came to be known as Russians.

[42] Lightner (1972:130)

[20] Slovene Studies 911. Society for Slovene Studies. 1987.

p. 36. (..) For example, the ancient Scythians, Sarmatians
(amongst others), and many other attested but now extinct
peoples were assimilated in the course of history by ProtoSlavs.

[47] Bethin (1998:13)

[30] Kortlandt (1994:101)

[34] Kortlandt (1994:94)

[36] Kortlandt (1994:95)

[37] Schenker (2002:65)

[39] Lehr-Spawiski (1957:255256)

[40] Kortlandt (1994:97)
[41] Schenker (2002:66)

[43] Schenker (2002:68).

[44] Bethin (1998:12)
[45] Schenker (2002:74).
[46] Channon (1972:11)

[48] Derksen (2008)

[49] Thomason (1976:372)
[50] Channon (1972:9)

[21] Nichols (1999:243)

[22] E.g. Andersen (1998:417): During the rst few centuries
of our era, Slavs begin to expand their territory. In the
east they move northward, inltrating the Baltic-speaking
areas...founding colonies.. and assimilation of local populations...
[23] Nichols (1999:241)

[51] Kortlandt (1994:99)

[52] Derksen (2008:402)
[53] Derksen (2008:46)
[54] Kortlandt (1994:910)
[55] Schenker (2002:72)

14

[56] Channon (1972:44)

[57] Schenker (2002:79)
[58] Schenker (2002:71)
[59] Thomason (1976:373)
[60] Vermeer (2000:8)
[61] Vermeer (2000:6)
[62] Channon (1972:12)
[63] As simplied by Schenker (1995:91).
[64] Vermeer (2000)
[65] Kortlandt (1984)
[66] Kortlandt (1989)
[67] Channon (1972:34)
[68] indicates a high-mid stressed /o/ stemming from a formerly lengthened vowel, caused by either an acute or neoacute accent.
[69] Bethin (1998:130)

References

In English
Andersen, Henning (1998), Slavic, in Ramat,
Anna Giacalone, The Indo-European Languages,
London and New York: Routledge, ISBN 978-0415-06449-1
Andersen, Henning (2003), Slavic and the IndoEuropean Migrations, Language contacts in prehistory: studies in stratigraphy, John Benjamins Publishing Company, ISBN 1-58811-379-5
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16

8 TEXT AND IMAGE SOURCES, CONTRIBUTORS, AND LICENSES

Text and image sources, contributors, and licenses

8.1

Text

History of Proto-Slavic Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Proto-Slavic?oldid=717899135 Contributors: Benwing, Florian Blaschke, GregorB, BD2412, JorisvS, Raoul NK, Cloudz679, R'n'B, Wikitiki89, AnomieBOT, Trappist the monk, Woodlot, Frietjes,
LouisAragon and Anonymous: 11

8.2

Images

File:Balto-Slavic_lng.png Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a1/Balto-Slavic_lng.png License: CC BY 3.0

Contributors: The Indo-European Languages, A G Ramat, P Ramat. Taylor & Francis, 1998. ISBN 041506449X. Archaeological cultures (labeled in white): From Trzciniec - Komarow - Sosnica. A Culture Cycle from the Early and Middle Bronze Age. Jan Dobrowski.
Archaeologia Polonia. XVI, 1975 Original artist: Hxseek (Hxseek) Last edited by en:User:No such user
File:Edit-clear.svg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/f2/Edit-clear.svg License: Public domain Contributors: The
Tango! Desktop Project. Original artist:
The people from the Tango! project. And according to the meta-data in the le, specically: Andreas Nilsson, and Jakub Steiner (although
minimally).
File:Przeworsk_Chernyakhov.png Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8d/Przeworsk_Chernyakhov.png License: CC-BY-SA-3.0 Contributors: ? Original artist: ?
File:Slavic_distribution_origin.png Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3e/Slavic_distribution_origin.png License: CC-BY-SA-3.0 Contributors: ? Original artist: ?
File:Wiki_letter_w_cropped.svg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1c/Wiki_letter_w_cropped.svg License:
CC-BY-SA-3.0 Contributors: This le was derived from Wiki letter w.svg: <a href='//commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:
Wiki_letter_w.svg' class='image'><img alt='Wiki letter w.svg' src='https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/6c/Wiki_
letter_w.svg/50px-Wiki_letter_w.svg.png' width='50' height='50' srcset='https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/6c/
Wiki_letter_w.svg/75px-Wiki_letter_w.svg.png 1.5x, https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/6c/Wiki_letter_w.svg/
100px-Wiki_letter_w.svg.png 2x' data-le-width='44' data-le-height='44' /></a>
Original artist: Derivative work by Thumperward

8.3

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