Masovian dialect group


The Masovian dialect group, also Mazovian, is a dialect group of the Polish language spoken in Mazovia and historically related regions, in northeastern Poland. It is the most distinct of the Polish dialects and the most expansive.
Mazovian dialects may exhibit such features as mazurzenie, sandhi, and asynchronous palatal pronunciation of labial consonants. Characteristics include:
  • Depalatalization of velars before and palatalization of velars before historical ; e.g. standard Polish rękę, nogę is rendered, respectively instead of, ;
  • sequences realized instead of ;
  • merger of the retroflex series sz, ż, cz, dż into the alveolar s, z, c, dz;
  • > before certain consonants;
  • the Old Polish dual number marker -wa continues to be attached to verbs;
  • Standard Polish and merged with and respectively, in most situations;
  • certain instances of a > e;
  • >
Masovian dialects also contain certain vocabulary that is distinct from the standard Polish language and shares common characteristics with the Kashubian language.

List of dialects

Descended from the language of the Masovians, the dialects are:

Features of the region

Features that can be found in various intensities and distributions in the region include:
  1. Labiovelarization of *telt > tëłt > tołt > tłot *pelti > płoc
  2. *TorT > TroT
  3. *ľ̥ > l̥ except in Pľ̥T́PK
  4. remaining *ľ̥ in Pľ̥T́PK > ‘el: ḿelli, hard *l̥ > oł, Pľ̥T
  5. w > v/f trój, kfiat, *χw > χv > χf > f fała
  6. mazurzenie: š ž č ǯ > s z c ʒ: scekać, niedźwiedź
  7. Simplification of resulting clusters containing labials: ołóš́, źara, niasto
  8. śř, źř > śr, źr, środa, źrėbåk
  9. penultimate stress
  10. Loss aje> ā, grai̯e > grā
  11. preference for pochylone ȯ
  12. ir > ėr, sėrce
  13. *y > i, sin, dim, dwa ribi
  14. Fronting of Old Polish short ă, even softening velars, pråvdä, ḱäńå täg vołå, sometimes merging with e
  15. # a > ä > e in some Old Polish texts
  16. # i̯a- > i̯ä- > i̯e-: i̯epko
  17. # ra- > rä- > re-: reno
  18. # -ar- > -är- > -er-: umer, derń
  19. # frequent and common *ěT > ä > e: osierze
  20. # ăN > äN > śäno
  21. á > a: dobra trawä
  22. loss of the phonemically short nasal in short syllables into a front, middle nasal between a and e, indifferent to the width of the opening of ą̈: zą̈bi, sometimes going to ą or ę, or sometimes denazalisation in unstressed codas or before sibilants
  23. lost of the phonemically long nasal vowel ą̄ > ǫ and in regions touching Małopolska > ų, with frequent denasalization as above
  24. -išče > -isko
  25. spread of -isty, -asty
  26. replacement of -’ev in soft stems with -’ov in the 16th century, and occasional hypercorrection to adding -’ev after hard stems: synev́i
  27. establishment of od before vowels and liquids, od okna, odnaleźć in the 15th century
  28. loss via analogy of mobile e: do Suvȧłk
  29. spread of -ywać
  30. replacement of neuter nouns ending in -ę with -ak: ćelȧk
  31. replacement of -eć infinitives with -ić/-yć: lezyć
  32. replacement of the superlative nȧ- with nai̯-
  33. establishment of voiced z before vowels and liquids: zleźć, z ńim
  34. replacement of the locative plural -’eχ with -aχ in the middle of the 16th century
  35. mixing of the dative endings -ov́i with -u > -ov́u: bratoźu, χłopakoɣ́u, wołoju
  36. replacement of the genitive singular soft-stem ending -’e with -i: z źäńi
  37. replacement of the nominative/accusative neuter ending -ē < *-ьje with -ĕ with declensions from *-jo-: zboze
  38. replacement of the genitive/locative adjective/pronoun plural ending -iχ with -ėχ
  39. sporadic use of adjective/pronoun endings for some nouns
  40. replacement of neuter/feminine dv́e with dva: dva krovi, dva okna
  41. replacement of the ending -i for numerals from 5-10 with -u: z dvu, seśću, or ṕę̇ćuχ
  42. replacement of ā < *ěja in preterite forms with the reflex of *ě by analogy: mńāł, mńăłă, mńeli
  43. loss of -ui̯e, -ovać in some verbs: kupać, zlatać
  44. loss of the dual with the dual form -ta replacing the second person plural: ńeśeta, ńeśta with -će being used for formal forms: ńeśeće
  45. in some subdialects spread of the first person dual -va in the present: ńeśeva
  46. in some subdialects replacement of the first person imperative -m with -my: ńeśmi or more often with -va: ńeźva, and occasional contamination of the two with -ma: neśma
  47. in the first person compound past > -eśḿ > -m: nosiłem/uśatem
  48. first person past: ńeślism > neśliśmy, and also replacement with the dual: bẏliźva or -śma: nośiliśma
  49. merger of masculine personal with masculine animal endings by spread of -y and -e
  50. # regional replacement of -li with -ły: spałi
  51. # regional replacement of -ły with -li: spali