Balkan linguistic union or Balkan sprachbund is a name given to the similarities in grammar, syntax, vocabulary and phonology found in the languages of the Balkans. It is remarkable that while the size of the common vocabulary is relatively small, the grammars of the languages have a high degree of similarity.
History
The earliest scholar to notice the similarities between Balkan languages belonging to different families was the Slovenian scholar Jernej Kopitar in 1829, but only in the 1920s and 1930s the theory was developed, with important contributions Gustav Weigand and Kristian Sandfeld-Jensen (Linguistique balkanique, 1930).
The term "Balkan linguistic union" was coined by the Romanian linguist Alexandru Rosetti in 1958, when he claimed that the shared features conferred the Balkan languages them a special semblance. Theodor Capidan went even further, claiming that the structure of the Balkan languages could be reduced to a standard language.
Opponents of the theory (such as Alexandru Graur ) claimed that the use of the term "Balkan linguistics" is inappropriate and that some of the properties could be explained by independent internal derivations in each language, while for others, it is a mere "lingustic reciprocity", which is not enough for claiming that there is a separate "Balkan linguistics", like there are "Romance linguistics", "Germanic linguistics", etc.
Languages
The languages that share these similarities belong to five distinct branches of the Indo-European languages:
However, not all of these languages have the same number of features shared. That is why they are divided into three groups:
- Albanian, Romanian and Bulgarian have the most properties in common
- Serbian (especially Torlak dialect) and Greek share with the others a lower number of properties
- Turkish - shares mainly vocabulary.
The Finnish linguist Jouko Lindstedt computed in 2000 a "Balkanization factor" which gives each Balkan language a score proportional with the number of features shared in the Balkan linguistic union. The results were:
| Language
| Score
|
| Balkan Slavic
| 11.5
|
| Albanian
| 10.5
|
| Greek, Balkan Romance
| 9.5
|
| Romani (Gypsy)
| 7.5
|
Another language that may have been influenced by the Balkan Language Union is the Judeo-Spanish variant that used to be spoken by Saphardi Jews living in the Balkans. The grammatical features shared (especially regarding the tense system) were most likely borrowed from Greek.
Origins
The source of these features has long been debated, various theories being suggested.
Thracian, Dacian or Illyrian
Since most of these features cannot be found in languages related to those that belong to the linguistic union (such as other Slavic or Romance languages), the early researchers believed they had to be inherited from the ancient indigenous languages (Thracian, Dacian and Illyrian) which formed the substrate for the modern Balkan languages.
However, since there is very little information left about any of these languages, it cannot be said whether the features were present or not.
Greek
Another theory was that they were an entirely Greek influence, the presumption being that since Greece "always had a superior civilization compared to its neighbours", Greek couldn't have borrowed its linguistic features from them. However, no ancient dialects of Greek bear these features and as such, the Balkanisms of Greek appear to be an innovation that occurred in Greek after the Classical period. Also, Greek appears to be only peripherical to the Balkan linguistic union, missing some important features, such as the postponed article.
Latin and Romance
The Roman Empire ruled all the Balkans and it would be possible that a local variation of Latin left its mark on all the languages of the Balkans, which later were the substrate to the Slavic newcomers. The weak point of this theory is that only few of the features can be found in other Romance languages.
An argument for this would be the structural borrowings or "linguistic calques" into Macedonian from Aromanian, which could be explained by Aromanian being a substrate of Macedonian, but this still does not explain what is the origin of these innovations in Aromanian.
Multiple sources
The most popular theory nowadays is that not all the innovations are from the same source and that the influence between the languages was reciprocal: some of these can be traced from Latin, Slavic or Greek languages, while others, particularly the features that are shared only by Romanian, Albanian and Bulgarian, could be explained by the substratum kept after the Romanization (in the case of Romanian) or Slavicization (in the case of Bulgarian). Albanian was influenced by both Latin and Slavic, but it kept much of its original characteristics.
One argument in favour of this "multiple sources" theory is that the turbulent History of the Balkans lead many groups of people throughout its history to move toward another place, inhabited by people of another ethnicity. These small groups were usually assimilated quickly and sometimes they left marks in the new language they acquired. Another idea is that before the modern age, the use of more than one language was common in the Balkans and a drift in one language would quickly spread to other languages.
Features
Grammatical features
Case system
The number of cases is reduced, several cases being replaced with prepositions, the only exception being Serbian.
A common case system of a Balkan language is:
- Nominative
- Accusative (using prepositions)
- Dative / Genitive (merged)
- Vocative
Syncretism of genitive and dative
In the Balkan languages, the genitive and dative cases (or corresponding prepositional constructions) are merged.
Example:
| Language
| Dative
| Genitive
|
| English
| I gave the book to Maria.
| It is Maria's book.
|
| Albanian
| Ia dhashė librin Marisė.
| Ėshtė libri i Marisė.
|
| Bulgarian
| Дадох книгата на Мария
(Dadoh knigata na Mariya)
| Книгата е на Мария;
(Knigata e na Mariya)
|
| Romanian
| I-am dat cartea Mariei.
| Este cartea Mariei.
|
| Greek
| Έδωσα το βιβλίο της Μαρίας.
| Είναι το βιβλίο της Μαρίας.
|
Verb tenses
Future tense formation
The future tense is formed using in an analytic way using an auxiliary verb or particle with the meaning "will", similar to the way the future is formed in English.
| Language
| Variant
| Formation
| Example: "I'll see"
|
| Albanian
|
| "do" (invariant) + subjunctive
|
|
| Aromanian
|
| "va" (invariant) + subjunctive
| Va s-ved.
|
| Bulgarian
|
| "ще" (invariant) + present tense
| Ще видя
|
| Greek
|
|
|
|
| Macedonian
|
|
|
|
| Serbian
|
|
|
|
| Romanian
| (standard)
| "a voi" (conjugated) + infinitive
| Voi vedea
|
| (alternate)
| "o" (invariant) + subj
| O să văd
|
| (archaic)
| "va" (invariant) + subj
| Va să văd
|
Analytic perfect tense formation
The analytic perfect tense is formed in the Balkan languages with the verb "to have". The origin of this language feature could be Latin. However, this does not apply to Bulgarian, where the analytic perfect is formed with the verb "to be" and the past active participle: обещал - "who has promised" (past active participle);
съм - "I am";
обещал съм - "I have promised" (lit. "I am one who has promised"), perfect tense.
Avoidance of infinitive
The use of infinitive (common in other languages related to some of the Balkan languages, such as Romance and Slavic) is generally replaced with subjunctive constructions.
- in Macedonian and Tosk Albanian, the loss of the infinitive is complete
- in Aromanian, Greek, Bulgarian and Southern Serbian dialects, it is almost complete
- in Gheg Albanian and Megleno-Romanian, it is used only in a limited number of expressions
- in standard Romanian, Serbian and Croatian, the infinitive shares many of its functions with the subjuctive
For example, "I want to write" in several Balkan languages:
| Language
| Example
| Notes
|
| Albanian
| "Dua tė shkruaj"
|
|
| Bulgarian
| "Искам да пиша"
|
|
| Modern Greek
| "Θέλω να γράψω"
|
|
| Romanian
| "Vreau să scriu"
| as opposed to "Vreau a scrie", which is also correct, but rarely used.
|
|
| Serbian
| "Želim da pišem"
| as opposed to the form that is common in Croatian: "Želim pisati", where pisati is the infinitive
|
Bare subjunctive constructions
Sentences which include only a subjunctive constructions can be used to express a wish, a mild command, an intention or a suggestion.
This example translates in the Balkan languages the phrase "You should go!", using the subjunctive constructions.
| Language
| Example
| Notes
|
| Macedonian
| Da odiš!
|
|
| Bulgarian
| Da otideš!
|
|
| Serbian
| Da ideš!
|
|
| Albanian
| Tė shkosh!
|
|
| Modern Greek
| Na pas!
|
|
| Romany (Gypsy)
| Te dža!
|
|
| Romanian
| Să te duci!
| in Romanian, the "a se duce" (to go)
requires a reflexive construction
|
| Megleno-Romanian
| S-ti duţ!
|
| Aromanian
| S-ti duts!
|
Morphology
Postponed article
With the exception of Greek, all languages in the union have their definite article attached at the end of the noun, instead of before it. None of the related languages (like other Romance languages or Slavic languages) share this feature and it is thought to be an inovation created and spread in the Balkans.
However, each language created their own internal articles, so the Romanian articles are related to the articles (and demonstrative pronouns) in Italian, French, etc, while the Bulgarian articles are related to demonstrative pronouns in other Slavic languages.
| Language
| Feminine
| Masculine
|
without
article
| with
article
| without
article
| with
article
|
| Albanian
|
|
|
|
|
| Bulgarian
| жена
| жената
| мъж
| мъжът
|
| Romanian
| casă
| casa
| cer
| cerul
|
| Serbian Torlak
|
|
|
|
|
Number formation
The numbers between ten and twenty are composed in a manner similar to Slavic languages (like "one + on + ten" for eleven). Modern Greek does not follow this.
| Language
| The word "Eleven"
| compounds
|
| Albanian
| "njėmbėdhjetė"
| njė + mbė + dhjetė
|
| Bulgarian
| "edinadeset"
| edin + (n)a + deset
|
| Romanian
| "unsprezece"
| un + spre + zece
|
| Serbian
| "jedanaest"
| jedan + (n)a + (d)es(e)t
|
Clitic pronouns
Direct and indirect objects are doubled by a clitic (weak) pronoun. This can be found in Romanian, Greek, Bulgarian, Albanian.
For example, "I see George" in Balkan languages:
| Language
| Example
|
| Albanian
| "shikoj Xhorxhin"
|
| Bulgarian
| "Виждам го Георги."
(coloquial form; see note)
|
| Greek
| "Τον βλέπω το(ν) Γιώργο"
|
| Romanian
| "Īl văd pe George."
|
Note: The neutral case in normal (SVO) word order is without a clitic.
"Виждам Георги."
However, the form with an additional clitic pronoun is also possible in coloquial speech:
"Виждам го Георги."
And the clitic is obligatory in case of a topicalized object (with OVS-word order), which serves also as the common colloquial equivalent of a passive construction.
"Георги го виждам."
Suffixes
Also, some common suffixes can be found in the linguistic area, such as the diminutival suffix of Slavic origin "-ica" that can be found in Albanian, Greek and Romanian.
Vocabulary
Loan words
Several hundreds of words are common to the Balkan union languages, the origin of most of them is either Greek or Turkish language, as the Byzantine Empire and later the Ottoman Empire had a strong influence on the culture and economics of this region.
Albanian, Romanian and Bulgarian also share a good deal of words of various origins:
| Source
| Source word
| meaning
| Albanian
| Bulgarian
| Greek
| Romanian
|
| Latin
| mensa
| table
| -
| маса (masa)
| -
| masă
|
| Thracian/Illyrian
| ?
| donkey
| magar/gomar
| магаре (magare)
| -
| măgar
|
| Slavic
| levada
| meadow
| livadhe
| ливада (livada)
| λιβάδι
| livadă
|
| Greek
| daskalos
| teacher
| dhaskal
| daskal
| daskalos
| dascăl
|
| Turkish
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Calques
Appart from the direct loans, there are also many calques that were passed from one Balkan languages to another, most of them between Albanian, Bulgarian, Greek and Romanian.
For example, the word "ripen" (as in a ripen fruit) is constructed in Albanian, Greek and Romanian by a derivation from the word "to bake". Another example is the wishing "to many years", which can be found in Albanian ("pėr shumė mot"), Bulgarian ("za mnogo godini"), Greek ("kai xronia polla") and Romanian ("la mulţi ani").
Phonetics
A common feature of the "core" Balkanic languages is the occurence of the Schwa /ə/ phoneme. (ė in Albanian; ъ in Bulgarian; ă in Romanian;). In Romanian and Albanian, the schwa is obtained via a phonetic change from unstressed /a/. Another phonetic change found in those two languages is turning unstressed /o/ into /u/.
Examples:
- Latin "casa" → Romanian "casă" → Bulgarian "къща" ("kəshta")
- Latin "camisia" → Romanian "cămaşă" → Albanian "kėmishė"
References
- Batzarov, Zdravko. "Balkan Linguistic Union" (at the Encyclopędia Orbis Latini)
- Du Nay, André. "The Origins of the Rumanians" : Balkan Linguistic Union, 1977
- Grey Thomason, Sarah. "Linguistic areas and language history" (PDF), 1999
- Joseph, Brian D. "Romanian and the Balkans: Some Comparative Perspectives" (PDF), 1999
- Rosetti, Alexandru. "History of the Romanian language" (Istoria limbii romāne), 2 vols., Bucharest, 1965-1969.
- Russu, I. "The Language of the Thraco-Dacians" (Limba Traco-Dacilor), Bucharest, 1967
- Tomić, Olga Mišeska. "The Balkan Sprachbund properties: An introduction to Topics in Balkan Syntax and Semantics" (PDF), 2003
