An Italian cellist’s journey into Serbian Language — Lesson 11

Phonetic transformations (Part 2)

Welcome back!

After an intense lesson on the assimilation based on sonority transformation, here we come with a new challenge. The concept of this new transformation is, perhaps, simpler than the other one, but has the complicating factor of requiring other transformations to take effect. Let’s dive deep in.

Assimilation based on the place of articulation

This second transformation is, already in its name, an attempt to make pronunciation easier. When the place where our tongue articulates the letter differs between adjacent consonants, then something had to happen in the evolution of a language to make its pronunciation more fluid. In Serbian, this transformation is called Једначење сугласника по месту творбе, which literally means “equalisation of consonants by place of formation” (IT: assimilazione in base al luogo di articolazione). You can read about it directly in Serbian here.

It occurs in two main cases:

1. The dental consonants с and з become ш and ж when they are found in front of the palatal consonants ч, ђ, ж, ш, њ, ћ, љ, ј, џ.
2. The н becomes м in front of б and п (this is very similar to what happens in Italian)

This transformation often occurs after another transformation. I will signal when that happens, even if we have not yet covered that specific transformation.

Assimilation of the С and З

The passive past participle

This transformation occurs with the passive past participle, which is built by removing the infinitive’s suffix and adding the suffix -ен, ена, ено; -ени, ене, -ена. There is a catch, though: in origin, this suffix had a ј in front, effectively being -јен, јена, …. This causes the iodisation (in Serbian јотовање) first and our assimilation second.

The verb смислити (EN: to invent, IT: inventare) becomes смишљен in the passive past participle. But how did it get there? Let’s remove the infinitive’s suffix first (1) to get смисл-. To this, we add the suffix (ј)ен, getting смислјен (2). Л + ј become љ through the iodisation (3), giving us смисљен. Finally, the с in front of the љ becomes ш (4), resulting in смишљен (EN: invented, IT: inventato).

Another example: частити means to honour somebody (IT: onorare). Here are the steps needed to bring us to the past participle form of чашћен:

1. Част-
2. Частјен > тј become ћ
3. Часћен > с in front of ћ becomes ш
4. Чашћен

In some cases, the iodisation doesn’t happen with the consonantal group ст. Nevertheless, the с still becomes ш. For example, the verb пустити (EN: to leave sb./sth.; IT: lasciare) simply becomes пуштен, instead of пушћен.

Collective nouns

The suffix -је is often used to create a collective noun from its basic version. If this triggers the iodisation, then also the assimilation comes into play. There are several interesting examples here:

1. Лист (EN: leaf; IT: foglia) becomes лишће (EN: foliage; IT: fogliame) through the following passages: лист-је > тј = ћ > лисће > с = ш > лишће
2. Гвозд (EN: iron; IT: ferro) becomes гвожђе (EN: scrap iron; IT: ferraglia) through the iodisation (гвозд-је > гвозђе) and the subsequent assimilation з > ж.
3. Звезда (EN: star, IT: stella) becomes сазвежђе (EN: constellation; IT: costellazione) through the addition of the prefix саз, the falling of the final а, the iodisation of the д & ј, and finally the assimilation of the з into ж.
4. Грозд (EN: bunch, cluster (of fruit); IT: grappolo) becomes грозђе (EN: grapes; IT: uva) through iodisation and assimilation.

Nouns & adjectives derived from verbs

There are some nouns and adjectives that are directly derived from verbs, such as ношња (EN: ethnic dress; IT: vestito etnico) that comes from носити (EN: to bring; IT: portare). This example removes the infinitive suffix -ити, then adds the suffix -ња, which causes the assimilation of the с into ш.

Another example is the verb пазити (EN: to pay attention; IT: prestare attenzione); if we remove the infinitive suffix, and we add the suffix -љив, we get пазљив which, through assimilation, becomes пажљив (EN: careful; IT: attento).

Masculine nouns ending in -ац

In the declination of a word, the vocative singular case often offers food for thought. When the nominative masculine singular form of a noun ends in -ац, the ц is subjected to the first palatalisation when it comes in contact with the vocative suffix -e. The “mobile A” (непостојано А, literally “the unsteady A”) then falls, bringing two consonants in contact and thus causing an assimilation.

This example is the one I found the most interesting:

1. Стаклорезац (EN: glassmaker; IT: vetraio) is in the masculine nominative singular form.
2. Adding the -e suffix of the vocative singular shapes, it into стаклорезаце
3. The -ц in front of the -e undergoes the first palatalisation and becomes -ч: стаклорезаче
4. The A now falls, leaving стаклорезче.
5. Now get ready: the з in front of the ч becomes ж, giving стаклорежче
6. The ж is a voiced consonant and, in front of the unvoiced ч, must become unvoiced as well, giving the final form of стаклорешче.

This was quite convoluted, but I love that one can find a logical path behind these rules.

Diminutives

Diminutives in Serbian are formed by adding the suffix -ица or -чић to a noun after removing the declination suffix. In the first case, the assimilation based on the place of articulation happens after the first palatalisation:

1. Свеска (EN: notebook; IT: quaderno), in its nominative singular form
2. The -a suffix falls, and we add the -ица suffix, getting свескица
3. Following the first palatalisation, the к becomes ч, resulting in свесчица
4. Finally, the assimilation based on the place of articulation transforms the с in front of the ч into ш: свешчица (EN: small notebook; IT: quadernino)

Nouns ending in a consonant (usually masculine), like образ (EN: cheek; IT: guancia), tend to use the -чић suffix instead of -ица.

1. Образ becomes образчић
2. Thanks to the assimilation based on the place of articulation, the з becomes ж, resulting in ображчић.
3. Ж being a voiced consonant, it cannot stay unaltered in front of the unvoiced ч, so it will be changed for its unvoiced equivalent: ш. The result will thus be: обрашчић (EN: small cheek; IT: guancina) after the assimilation based on the sonority.

Prefixes causing sonority assimilation

Some prefixes bring in contact consonants that don’t like to stay close together. Here we get into some uncharted territory, the difference between perfective and imperfective verbs, which we will not cover now to avoid an excessive burden. Let’s say that “reading something” and “completing (the act of) reading something” uses two different forms of the verb “to read” in Serbian: читати (EN: to read; IT: leggere) and ишчитати (EN: to complete the reading; IT: finire di leggere). But how did we get there?

1. Let’s add the prefix -из in front of читати: изчитати
2. Based on their sonority, the з needs to change into с: исчитати
3. Finally, based on the articulation, the с needs to change into ш: ишчитати.

Instrumental case

There are certain feminine nouns ending in consonant, such as част (EN: honour; IT: onore), страст (EN: passion; IT: passione), and радост (EN: joy; IT: gioia). The ending of the instrumental case is -ју, which causes iodisation with the closing -т. We saw before how т+ј when close together become ћ, giving us, respectively: часћу, страсћу, and радосћу. The с before the ћ, though, needs to change into ш because of the assimilation based on the place of articulation, resulting in: чашћу (EN: with honour; IT: con onore), страшћу (EN: with passion; IT: con passione), and радошћу (EN: with joy; IT: con gioia).

Assimilation of the Н into М

This transformation is similar to what already happens in Italian and possibly also in other languages: when the N is in front of B, it becomes an M. In Serbian, this occurs when two suffixes are added to the word: -бен and -баћ.

Adding -бен to the word одбрана (EN: defence; IT: difesa), it goes through одбранбен (after removing the case ending -a) to become одбрамбен (EN: defensive; IT: difensivo).

Adding -баћ to the word зелен (EN: green; IT: verde), instead, goes through зеленбаћ to become зелембаћ (EN: green lizard; IT: ramarro).

Exceptions

There are very few exceptions to these rules: the с and з do not change when they are the final consonants of the prefix in front of љ and њ. For example: изљуштити (EN: completing the act of peeling a fruit; IT: finire di sbucciare) or изљубити (EN: completing a kiss; IT: finire di baciare). Likewise, the н doesn’t become an м when it is found at the end of a prefix of a compound word, for example једанпут (EN: once; IT: una volta), which is made of један (EN: one; IT: uno) and пут (EN: time; IT: volta, though literally this can also mean road/strada).

Summary

Today we looked at a quite complex topic, so let’s try to summarise what we have learned:

• The с and з become ш and ж in front of these consonants: ч, ђ, ж, ш, њ, ћ, љ, ј, џ.
• This happens with:
  
  • the passive past participle
  • collective nouns
  • nouns and adjectives derived from verbs
  • certain masculine nouns
  • diminutives
  • other transformations
  • the instrumental cases of feminine nouns
• The н becomes м before the consonant б.

Bottom Line

That’s it for today, and I hope you enjoyed it.

In the next lesson, we will tackle the first palatalisation, which we briefly saw in action already today. Stay tuned!

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See you soon for another lesson!