A tall order, Harald -- Czech
vowel quantity is a fairly complex affair :). Length is indeed sometimes due to
contraction, as in adjectival inflections (e.g. masculine gen.sg. -ého <
*-aego < *-a-jego, feminine nom.sg. -á < *-aa < *a-ja, or neuter
nom.sg. -é < *-oe < *-o-je). It may also reflect Proto-Slavic accents,
namely vowels carrying the so-called common Slavic neo-acute (an ictus
retracted to an originally pretonic syllable). Long vowels also appear
under the "old" (Balto-Slavic) acute -- however, this happens only in the
first syllable of originally disyllabic words.
To predict this, you may compare the
Russian stress pattern and the Serbian/Croatian tonal accent in cognate words.
For example, the old acute on the first syllable of a word of the
shape *CóRCa is reflected in Russian as CoRóCa (stress on the second
vowel), and in Serbian/Croatian as CRa"Ca (<"> = short falling tone); the
Czech counterpart is CRáCa (with long [a:]):
PSl.
Rus. S/Cr. Cz.
*kórva
koróva kra"va kráva
'cow'
*bérza
berëza bre"za br^íza
'birch'
S/Cr. <"> corresponds to Czech length
also in ma"slo 'fat, oil' : máslo 'butter', etc.
Czech vowels could also be lengthened (as
in Old Polish) if originally followed by a voiced consonant plus a dropped yer
(weak vowel). This compensatory lengthening is visible in paradigmatic
alternations like vu*z : vozu 'wagon [nom. : gen.] (<u*> = <u> with
a small circle over it, pronounced [u:] < lengthened *o) or sníh : sne^hu
'snow' ([i:] < lengthened *e^). In both cases the nom.sg. originally ended in
*-U.
To confuse foreigners, Czech feminines with
a long root vowel show a reverse change -- vowel shortening in closed syllables
(e.g. <kráva>, see above, yields gen.pl. <krav> and diminutive
<kravka>).
The above is only the tip of a veritable
iceberg. Czech has several regular synchronic processes that make long (or
short) vowels appear in specific morphological environments (iterative verbs,
comparative adjectives and adverbs, infinitives with or without prefixes, etc.),
as well as rhythmic laws, regulating e.g. vowel length in prefixes:
To give just one example, length occurs in
diminutives in -ek (vlak 'train' : vlác^ek; roh 'horn' : ru*z^ek; telefon :
telefónek [a recent loan, with a recent type of alternation]; zub 'tooth' :
zoubek [with <u/ou> from the Proto-Slavic nasal vowel *o~]). In
colloquial Prague Czech the same happens in hypocoristically truncated roots,
e.g. prófa 'prof' (<-- profesor).
Hope it helps a little. Maybe our Czech
friends can tell you more (and correct my inevitable mistakes :))
Piotr
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Wednesday, December 12, 2001 7:26 AM
Subject: [tied] Czech long vowels
Are there any rules for predicting (from polish, russian,
proto-slavic or so) where there is to be a long vowel in the corresponding Czech
word. I can spot some straght off, like the -ie neuter words and -ej fem. decl.
ending are obviously contracted and thus motivating the long i and e
respectively. But to be sure there are more rules ...