Information about Tsakonian Language

Tsakonian (Τσακωνικά Tsakōniká)
Spoken in:	Greece
Region:	Eastern Peloponnese around Mount Parnon
Total speakers:	300-2,000 fluent
Ranking:
Genetic classification:
Official status
Official language of:
Regulated by:
Language codes
ISO 639-1
ISO 639-2	ine
SIL
See also: Language – List of languages

Tsakonian, Tzakonian or Tsakonic (Greek Τσακωνικά) is a dialect of modern Greek spoken in the Tsakonian region of the Peloponnese, Greece. It is a descendant of Doric Greek and is named after its speakers, the 'Tsakonians', which is held to be an alteration of 'Laconians' - although Tsakonians themselves did not traditionally use this ethnonym.

Classification

History of the Greek language (see also: Greek alphabet)

Proto-Greek (c. 2000 BC)

Mycenaean (c. 1600–1100 BC)

Ancient Greek (c. 800–300 BC) Dialects: Aeolic, Arcadocypriot, Attic-Ionic, Doric, Pamphylian; Homeric Greek. Possible dialect: Macedonian.

Koine Greek (from c. 300 BC)

Medieval Greek (c. 330–1453)

Modern Greek (from 1453) Dialects: Cappadocian, Cretan, Cypriot, Demotic, Griko, Katharevousa, Pontic, Tsakonian, Yevanic

Tsakonian is a dialect of the Indo-European Greek language, now widely agreed to be descended from the Doric branch. Although it is often classified as a dialect of Modern Greek, it can be regarded as a separate Hellenic language, since all other extant Greek varieties are Attic in origin. According to Dr. Nick Nicholas, Greek scholars prefer to use the term διάλεκτος (dialect) for varieties mutually intelligible and unintelligible with Greek, while using ιδίωμα (idiom) for intermediate varieties (The Story of Pu, p. 482). Professor Athanasios Costakis (a native Tsakonian) calls it a dialect, while calling its varieties "idioms."

Geographic distribution

Tsakonian is found today in a group of mountain towns and villages slightly inland from the Argolic Gulf, although it was once spoken farther to the south and west as well as on the coasts of Laconia (ancient Sparta).

Official status

Tsakonian has no official status. Prayers and liturgies of the Greek Orthodox Church have been translated into Tsakonian, but the ancient Koine of the traditional church services is usually used as in other locations in Greece.

Dialects

Tsakonian is divided by scholars into three dialects or idioms, Northern Tsakonian, Southern Tsakonian and Propontis Tsakonian.

According to the Ethnologue, Tsakonian has less than 70% lexical similarity with Demotic Greek. However lexicostatistical surveys on which this is based take their conclusions from the Swadesh list and similar vocabulary comparisons rather than from the language's entire lexicon.

Another difference between Tsakonian and the common Demotic Greek dialect is its verb system - Tsakonian preserves different archaic forms, such as participial periphrasis for the present tense. Certain complementisers and other adverbial features present in the standard Modern Greek dialect are absent from Tsakonian, with the exception of the Modern που (pu) relativiser, which takes the form πη (p^hi) in Tsakonian (note: the traditional Tsakonian orthography uses the digraph πφ + η, giving πφη). Noun morphology is broadly similar to Standard Modern Greek, although Tsakonian tends to drop the nominative "s" from masculine nouns, thus Tsakonian ο τσχίφτα for Standard o τρίφτης (o tshifta/o triftis; "grater", Costakis:67). The Propontis idiom was much more heavily influenced by the modern Thracian dialect and although there were significant grammatical differences, in terms of vocabulary it was much closer to Standard Modern Greek. Compare the Northern and Southern word for water, ύο (io, derived from Ancient Greek ὓδωρ) to Propontic νερέ and Standard νερό (nere, nero).

However, there has always been contact with Koine Greek speakers and the language was not entirely unaffected by the neighboring Greek dialects. Additionally, there are some lexical borrowings from Arvanitic and Turkish. The core vocabulary remains recognizably Doric, though experts disagree on the extent to which other true Doricisms can be found. There are only a few hundred, mainly elderly true native speakers alive, although there are a great many more who can speak the language less than fluently.

Geographical barriers to travel and communication kept the Tsakonians relatively isolated from the rest of Greece until the 19th century, although there was some trade between the coastal towns. The rise of mass education and improved travel beginning after the Greek War of Independence meant that fluent Tsakonian speakers were no longer as isolated from the rest of Greece and there began a rapid decline from an estimated figure of some 200,000 fluent speakers to the present fluent core estimated in the hundreds.

Derived languages

There are no creole dialects described in the literature, although as noted above, the Propontis dialect is much closer to the standard dialect of Greek than are the other two, and all dialects have been in constant contact with the standard. The northern dialect which in the mid-twentieth century was retreating much faster than its southern cousin, reportedly had a greater affinity to Demotic Greek. An indeterminate number of persons speak Tsakonian less-than fluently, so it is possible that some degree of creolization has taken place.

Since the introduction of electricity to all villages in Tsakonia by the 1970s, the Greek mass media can reach the most remote of areas and profoundly affect the speech of younger speakers. Some efforts to revive the language by teaching it in local schools seem not to have had much success. Standard Modern Greek is the official language of government, commerce and education, and it appears inevitable that the continued modernization of Tsakonia will lead to the language's disappearance sometime this century.

Sounds

Vowels

Consonants

Tsakonian in some words preserves the pre-classical Greek w-sound, represented in some Ancient Greek texts by the digamma. In Tsakonian, this sound has become a fricative v.

Prosody

Phonotactics

Writing system

Traditionally, Tsakonian used the standard Greek alphabet, along with digraphs to represent certain sounds which either do not occur in Demotic Greek, or which do not commonly occur in combination with the same sounds as they do in Tsakonian. For example, the "sh" sound, which does not occur in standard Greek, does in Tsakonian, and is spelled "σχ" (much like German sch). Another sound recalls Polish rz. Prof. Costakis invented an orthography using dots, spiritus asper, and caron for use in his works, which has been used in his grammar and several other works. This is more like the Czech usage of haceks (such as š). Lastly, palatalized n and l can be written double, like in Spanish (ñ was originally nn).

Representing Tsakonian sounds. Sources: Nicholas, Houpis, Costakis
Digraphs	Costakis	IPA
σ?	σ̌	ʃ
τσ?	σ̓	ʨ
ρ?	ρ?	rʒ
τθ	τ̒	tʰ
κχ	κ̒	kʰ
πf	π̒	pʰ
τζ	(Κ) τζ ̌ - τζ & τρζ ̌ – τρζ (Λ) τζ ̌ - τ?	(K) ts, trʒ (L) ts ʤ
ν?	ν̇	ɲ
λλ	λ̣	ʎ
*Note: (K) is for the northern dialect of Kastanitsa & Sitaina, (Λ) and (L) for the southern which is spoken around Leonidio.

Examples

English	Tsakonian (Greek alphabet)	Tsakonian (Latin alphabet)	Tsakonian (IPA)
Where is my room?	Κιά έννι ο όντα μι;	Ciá éñi o óda mi?	/cɑ ˈɛˌɲi ɔ ˈɔˌdɑ mi/
Where is the beach?	Κιά έννι το περιγιάλλι;	Ciá éñi to perigiálli?	/cɑ ˈɛˌɲi tɔ ˌpɛɾiˈʝɑʎi/
Where is the bar?	Κιά έννι το μπαρ;	Ciá éñi to bar?	/cɑ ˈɛˌɲi tɔ baɾ/
Don't touch me there!	Μη' μ' αντζίχερε όρπα!	Mē' m'adzíchere órpa!	/mi m aˈʣiçɛˌɾɛ ˈɔɾˌpɑ/

See also

• Tsakonia
• Tsakonian people

External links

External links

• Brief Description - Ethnologue
• Linguistic Lineage
• Tsakonian Bibliography
• The Lord's Prayer in Tsakonian (text sample)
• Church Service in Tsakonian (RealAudio)

Sources

• Costakis, Athanasios (Thanasis) P. (1951). Συντομή Γραμματική της Τσακωνικής Διαλέκτου (Brief Grammar of the Tsakonian Dialect). Athens: Institut Français d'Athènes. 
• Nicholas, Nick (unpublished). "[n/a A Critical Lexicostatistical Examination of Ancient and Modern Greek and Tsakonian]". Second Draft.
• Nicholas, Nick (1999). "The Story of pu: The grammaticalisation in space and time of a Modern Greek complementiser". Final.