Leivu dialect

The Leivu dialect is an extinct dialect of South Estonian that was spoken in North Latvia around the Gauja river by the Gauja Estonians. It became extinct in the year 1988 when the last speaker Anton Bok died. However there are many recordings of the dialect. The Leivu dialect most closely resembles the Hargla sub-dialect of Võro but was influenced by the Latvian language[1] and possibly even Livonian.[2] In the year 1782, the dialect was spoken by thousands of people, in 1849 around 2600 knew the dialect and in 1935 only about 131 knew or spoke it.[3] In 1911, Finnish linguist Heikki Ojansuu went to document the Leivu dialect along with the Ludza and Kraasna dialects.[4]

Leivu
RegionGauja
Extinct1988 by the death of Anton Bok
Language codes
ISO 639-3–
Glottologleiv1235
South Estonian, including Leivu

Characteristics[1]

Due to Latvian influence, the sounds s and z have changed into š and ž. For example: suži ‘wolf’, püššü ‘gun’. There has also been a loss of the consonant /h/ in many words and it is usually replaced by a stød such as in: ra’a ‘money’, vä’ämb ‘less’.

The first syllable was pronounced longer than in other South-Estonian dialects, for example mùnà ‘egg’.

Example of words in Leivu[1]
  • ria = rake
  • püäbä = Sunday
  • vaijõr = maple
  • jaijõ = chilly
  • na’a = skin
  • pä’ä = head
  • jèma = mother
  • eza = father
  • terä = seed, grain
  • tarõ = room

See also

References
  1. Pire Teras (August 2010). "Quantity of Leivu – Estonian language island in contact situation" – via ResearchGate.
  2. Dahl, Östen & Koptjevskaja-Tamm, Maria: The Circum-Baltic Languages: Grammar and typology
  3. Marjo Mela. "Läti eestlased. Ajalugu, keel ja kultuur". Eesti Keele Sihtasutus. Tallinn 2007 lk 33-34
  4. ""Maq Sinnu Sali": The South Estonian Dialect Spoken in Deepest Latvia". 14 November 2016.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.