Χρονικά των Τσακώνων – Τόμος ΚΓ(1) – Μορφολογικά χαρακτηριστικά των Τσακωνικών της Προποντίδας

The geographical area of Propontis in North-West Asia Minor (near Gönen, Turkey) was inhabited by Tsakonian colonists from the 18th to the 20th century. Their mother tongue was thought of as a subgroup of the Tsakonian dialect (subdivided further in Northern and Southern Tsakonian, spoken in the Greek mainland, in the Peloponnese) named after the area, namely Propontis Tsakonian, and displayed some of the most typical characteristics of the group (e.g. the preservation of Doric ā as [a] and not [i], the periphrastic formation of the present and imperfect indicative etc. (cf. Deffner 1881; Pernot 1934; Costakis, 1951)). Two geographical communities were identified in the area of Propontis: Vatika and Havoutsi (today Misakça and Havutça). The population of this dialectal enclave was estimated at approximately 500 inhabitants in total. Speakers of Propontis Tsakonian had been in contact with their neighbours, i.e. speakers of the Thraco-Bithynian dialect and Turkish till 1924 when, following the exchange of populations, they were forced to settle in several parts of Greece (cf. Costakis 1951). In the light of the historical circumstances under which this specific subgroup of Tsakonian evolved, this
presentation sets to investigate some of the most typical morphological innovations occurring in Propontis Tsakonian emphasizing:

a. The organization of its nominal system

In Propontis Tsakonian a very strong tendency is observed towards the minimization of the operative inflectional classes realized mainly in the plural sub-paradigm. Although this general tendency is observable in other Modern Greek dialects (cf. Ralli et al. 2003), in Propontis Tsakonian it seems to have followed a divergent path. Namely, two one-value plural subparadigms seem to emerge: the first one in –e for the formation of the plural of all masculine and feminine nouns (e.g. vraxo.SG vraxon-e.PL ‘rock’ muza.SG muz-e.PL ‘fly’) and the second one in –a for the formation of all different subgroups of neuter nouns (e.g. vune.SG (<-o) vun-a ‘mountain’, kavʝi.SG kavʝi-a ‘kid’). b. The formation of comparative constructions While in Peloponnesian Tsakonian, the formation of comparatives is realized morphologically with the addition of the suffix -uter(e) which conveys the meaning more to the predicative word (e.g. kotʃine > kotʃinutere ‘more red’) in Propontis Tsakonian comparison is realized mainly analytically with the use of the marker koma in the graded form plus a prepositional phrase (e.g koma psile po tio ‘taller than you’).

c. The suffixational process of evaluation (diminution and augmentation)

While a variety of suffixes are attested in Tsakonian for the realization of augmentation (among others –ona e.g. tsixla > tsixlona ‘big wagtail’, -eʃa e.g. xura > xureʃa ‘big field’, -ara e.g. uθi > uθara ‘big snake’), in Propontis Tsakonian no such formations are traced.

The investigation of the above mentioned phenomena aspires to widen our knowledge on variation and change in the variety of Propontis Tsakonian in comparison the Peloponnesian one (both northern and southern) in the light of the different (both intra- and extra-linguistic) circumstances under which this specific subvariety evolved.