Dialects of Dekavurian

Last update: 2 April 2007

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By 1312, Dekavurian has developed into many different dialects, some of them mutually incomprehensible. The point at which they started to become differentiated is conventionally taken to be Common Dekavurian (CD hereafter), usually asssumed to exist at about 200-300. This description follows Dekavurian practice in identifying eight main dialects, each associated mainly with the speech of one or more urban centres and containing the related speeches of the surrounding area. The geographical distribution of the dialects is shown in the map below.

For convenience, the names of the main dialects will be abbreviated from now on; thus "N" refers to the northern dialects.

• NW is largely confined to the sparsely-populated regions in the north-west. The most distinctive variants are spoken in the towns of Caldura and, less so, Rouça. There is next to no influence between NW and Machren, despite their geographical proximity; Machren speakers guard their language very closely.
• N is similarly spoken in the sparsely-populated north; its most advanced varieties are found in Socha.
• WC has two principal subvariants, those of the northern shore of Lake Hanna (exemplified by Hannalorra) and those of the southern (especially Surabruge).
• EC is identified, above all, with the speech of Athuncia.
• W, the dialect with the lowest prestige, has been much influenced by Genistien. Only in Tullerin and Tur Kurpen does this variety of Dekavurian have much status.
• SW, which has exerted much influence over Astarien, is probably the least homogenous dialect. Its eastern varieties, notably those of Kirtse and Sünicte, are closer to SE; its western forms closely resemble W. The boundary between SW and W is usually taken to be the line at which the prestige of Dekavurian is lower than that of Liotan.
• SE is the dialect with the highest status, especially the dialect of the capital Valdaborgo. This dialect was also introduced into the Eastern Provinces when they were added to Dekavur in 1053.
• E is confined to the highlands of the province of Mackla, and is the most archaic dialect.

These eight dialects form two readily distinguishable groups. A northern group consists of NW N WC, which have many features in common which set them apart from the other dialects. To these is opposed a southern group consisting of a continuum from W through SW SE to E, in which W and E are best regarded as peripheral. Finally, EC is transitional; it has much in common both with WC and with SE.

Credits

The following books were consulted for specifically Germanic issues:

• Sweet's Anglo-Saxon Primer, ninth edition, revised by Norman Davis (Clarendon Press, Oxford).
• Old English, a historical linguistic companion, by Roger Lass (Cambridge University Press). Highly recommended for those making their first steps into historical linguistics.
• Grammar of the Gothic Language, by Joseph Wright (Clarendon Press, Oxford). My copy of this goes back to 1910.
• Collins Contemporary German Dictionary (Collins). For those occasions when no useful English cognate was available. What is a good Germanic word for "structure", anyway?

For the wider Indo-European context, the following books proved invaluable:

• Chambers Dictionary of Etymology, Robert K. Barnhart (editor) (Chambers).
• A Dictionary of Entomology, G. Gordh (University of Queensland, Australia). There are something like four hundred thousand known species of insect, which is a sizeable vocabulary for any conlang.
• The American Heritage Dictionary of Indo-European Roots, Calvert Watkins (Houghton Mifflin).
• A Dictionary of Selected Synonyms in the Principal Indo-European Langugaes, Carl Darling Buck (University of Chicago Press).