Talk:Lithuanian language

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Contents

[edit] Prevailing attitudes about lexical borrowings

In the article section, "The lexical borrowings in the language" the following phrases are troublesome (from neutrality standpoint):

"However, there are many words which have Lithuanian counterparts, hence they should not be used."

"...many words have recently flooded the language (like dispenseris, hakeris or singlas) and they are not to be tolerated."

Perhaps a discussion about the prevailing attitudes toward recent lexical borrowings could be included instead. Also, are there any official government activities (like those in France or Iceland, for example) to discourage use of these loanwords?

--Theodore Kloba 19:54, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC)

There are no official government activities to discourage use of loanwords.

This article may seem troublesome when you take it out of context and try to analyze "as is". However, it is not. You must understand the problems that arise every day to the Lithuanian language to understand what this means.


In Lithuania, no one thinks that a loan word should not be used only because it is a loan word. But barbarisms certainly should be avoided. English can take new words equally easily from Japanese and German whereas in Lithuanian it would be impossible. Simply to add Lithuanian endings to nouns, verbs etc. is not enough. I think this is what the article means.

On the other hand, I myself think that this article should be re-written and I think I will do that one day.--213.226.138.241 19:31, 19 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I believe the present qualifying statement, "Like with any other language, there is a category of people, known as language purists who strongly oppose foreign influence on their native language. This section presents their point of view;" is a "weasel term." --Theodore Kloba 15:43, Dec 10, 2004 (UTC)

I have completely rewritten this article (which was initially written by me as well) and disposed of all the rubbish in it, which was making other people want to question its point of view. I've tried to write in a completely neutral POV. RokasT 14:29, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Different viewpoints in Lithuanian phonology

Lithuanian population isn't big, Lithuanian language is surrounded mostly by Slavic languages, so influence on phonetic and different tendencies of articulation also exist. Another source of different treatment is usage of different phonologic systems by different scholars, but it's unessential in our case. The treatment of Lithuanian sounds, accepted in Lithuanian schools, mass-media and so on, also exist. For shortening purposes we'll call it official here.

Two points of view with some comments are presented in the table below, the first one according to Dr. A. Girdenis (from: Lietuvių kalbos enciklopedija by Institute of the Lithuanian Language. Vilnius, 1999) and the second one according to Dr. W.R. Schmalstieg (from the site of journal Lituanus, 1982.1.,Vol 28). Lithuanian sounds in the table are denoted by Lithuanian letters, which are normally pronounced as corresponding sounds.

[edit] Consonant table

Sounds (indicated by Lithuanian letters)

Definition according to A. Girdenis

Definition according to W. R. Schmalstieg

Other points of view

Comments

c, č, dz, dž

Affricates (*)

Affricates (*)

Two different sounds (t+s, t+š , d+z, d+ž), which can be divided into different syllables.

Traditionally affricates. However, tendency to separate a stop from a fricative exists in Lithuanian spoken language, especially in unpalatalized variant.

Alveolar sounds

Retracted alveo-palatal sounds

 

Difference of terms, which isn't essential here.

 

Nasal and fricative sounds

Continuant sounds (with voiced, unvoiced and nasal subdivision)

 

Caused by systematic differences.

h

Voiced velar fricative (*)

Voiceless glottal continuant (diff!).

 

Tends to voiced more than to unvoiced in spoken Lithuanian. Officially considered as voiced pair of ch (SAMPA x). See note (2) below.

l

Dental lateral (*).

Lateral

 

 

r

Alveolar trill (*).

Apical trill

 

There is no essential difference, I think.

v

(Voiced) labial spirant (*).

Voiced continuant. (diff!)

 

Pronounciation of v tends to short vowel u (SAMPA u), reduced to consonant (not semivovel as w in SAMPA). Fricative tendencies are rare. See note (3) below.

[edit] Vowel table

Sounds (indicated by Lithuanian letters)

Definition according to A. Girdenis

Definition according to W. R. Schmalstieg

Comments

ę

Low front (+)

Low mid front

There is a tendency to articulate ę as more middle than ą in spoken language. Many scholars keep this tendency inessential. In this case ę is considered low with back pair ą.

[edit] Notes

(1) The point of view, analogous to official one, is marked by (*), by (+) prevalent point of view is marked. By (diff!) an essential difference between A. Girdenis and W. R. Schmalstieg is marked.

(2) Sound h in Lithuanian has its specific history. It wasn't used in spoken Lithuanian till the beginning of XX century. Maybe for this reason Dr. Schmalstieg gives more common pronunciation of Western Indo-European languages? But in reality this sound has been used for more than 70 years (in school, theatre, mass-media), so it has a tradition as other sounds do. Officially it's considered as voiced velar fricative, the voiced pair of voiceless ch. In its pronouncing the tendency to glottal, maybe, exist, but practically there are no tendencies to voiceless.

(3) Sound v in Lithuanian has a difference from languages, where it's fricative. Its tendencies to fricative in Lithuanian are weak. The sound is pronounced as u (SAMPA u), reduced to consonant (not semivowel as SAMPA w). It's considered voiced, but has no voiceless pair ( the same situation as with j, l, n). Its “voicedness” is low and v does not make consonants before them voiced. Dr. Schmalstieg's system doesn't points up this thing. Considering v as continuant may imply fricative. Continued Lithuanian v gives short vowel u (as j gives i in this case).

[edit] Comparison of the official classification with X-SAMPA and SAMPA systems.

Note: For comparing X-SAMPA and SAMPA charts of wiki's articles were used.

[edit] Consonant table

Letter of sound

Official definition of sound

The closest sound in X-SAMPA

The closest sound in SAMPA

Comments

z, ž, h, (s, š, ch)

Voiced (voiceless) fricatives

Voiced (voiceless) fricatives: z, z\, G, (s, s\, x)

Voiced (voiceless) fricatives: z, Z, G, (s, S, x).

 

dz, dž, (c, č)

Voiced (voiceless) affricates

Voiced (voiceless) affricates: ts\ etc.

Voiced (voiceless) affricates: tS etc.

 

b, d, g, (p, t, k)

Voiced (voiceless) plosives

Voiced (voiceless) plosives: b, d, g, (p, t, k)

Voiced (voiceless) stops: b, d, g, (p, t, k)

 

b (p)

Voiced (voiceless) labial plosive

Voiced (voiceless) bilabial plosive: b (p).

Voiced (voiceless) bilabial plosive: b (p).

 

f

Voiceless labial fricative

Voiceless labiodental fricative: f

Voiceless labiodental fricative: f

 

z, dz, (s, c)

Voiced (voiceless) dental

Voiced (voiceless) alveolar: z, dz, (s, ts)

Voiced (voiceless) alveolar: z, dz, (s, ts)

 

ž, dž, (š, č)

Voiced (voiceless) alveolar

Voiced (voiceless) alveopalatal: z\, dz\, (s\, ts\)

Voiced (voiceless) postalveolar Z, dZ, (S, tS)

The better distinction in X-SAMPA (Lithuanian ž (š) differs from more palatal sound in other languages, being closer to z_a (s_a)).

v

Labial spirant

Labial approximant: v\

-

No distinction from v fricative in SAMPA chart

j

Palatal spirant

Palatal approximant: j

-

No distinction from j semivowel in SAMPA chart

m

Labial nasal

Bilabial nasal: m

Bilabial nasal: m

 

n

Dental nasal

Alveolar nasal: n

Alveolar nasal: n

 

l

Dental lateral

Alveolar lateral flap: l\

(alveolar lateral: l)

No distinction between “West-European” and “East-European” articulation of l in SAMPA

r

Alveolar trill

Alveolar trill: r

Alveolar trill: r

 

[edit] Vowel table

Letter of sound

Official definition of sound

The closest sound in X-SAMPA and SAMPA

Comments

i

Short high front unrounded vowel

Lax close front unrounded vowel (short): I

 

į or y

Long high front unrounded vowel

Tense close front unrounded vowel (long): i:

 

ė

Long mid front unrounded vowel

Close-mid front unrounded vowel (long): e:

The short variant of this sound (having no own letter and denoted by letters ė, e or i) is very rare in Lithuanian. It also hasn't a different sign in X-SAMPA (closest to i, but more mid).

e

Short low front unrounded vowel

Open-mid front unrounded vowel (short): E

 

ę

Long low front unrounded vowel

Open front unrounded vowel (long): {:

 

a

Short low back unrounded vowel

Open-mid back unrounded vowel (short): V

 

ą

Long low back unrounded vowel

Open back unrounded vowel (long): A:

 

o

Long mid back rounded vowel

Open-mid back rounded vowel (long): O:

 

o (variant)

Short mid back rounded vowel

Close-mid back rounded vowel (short): o

 

u

Short high back rounded vowel

Lax close back rounded vowel (short): U

 

ų or ū

Long high back rounded vowel

Tense close back rounded vowel (long): u:

 
Linas 08:19, 2004 Mar 14 (UTC)

[edit] Some other phonetic rules in standard Lithuanian

[edit] Diphtongs

Rule

Definition

Examples

Comments

1. Diphtongs.

There are eight diphtongs in Lithuanian: ai, au, ei, (eu), ie, (oi), ui, uo.

 

Diphtongs eu and oi are very rare in the language, and used mostly in borrowings (As 'Europa').

2. Diphtong pronouncing (1).

Pronouncing diphtong, one should pronounce quickly both vowels one after the other. Pronouncing of vowels is the same as in the case of single, short pronouncing is more often.

 

 

3. Diphtong pronouncing (2)

Diphtongs mostly are pronounced lax, as if they were short vowels. There are some positions in standard Lithuanian, when they are pronounced tense.

 

1) The lax pronouncing of diphtongs is more often, then tense.
2) There are certain words and certain morphological members (as suffixes, endings and so on), where respective diphtongs are pronounced tense.
3) The tense pronouncing isn't marked in written form, except in dictionaries.

[edit] Palatalization

Rule

Definition

Examples

Comments

1. All consonants have their palatalized variants.

Every consonant have palatalized and unpalatalized, variants, except j (which is palatalized only).

 

 

2.Before front vowels

If consonant goes directly before front vowel , it's pronounced palatalized.

 

This rule is more or less clear for Slavic speakers. Other language speakers could have problems with it. By the way, 'e' denotes front vowel.

3. Before back vowels

Consonants directly before back vowels may be unpalatalized or palatalized. In this case the palatalized form is labeled by letter i before the back vowel letter.

Rašau (ra s\au, I write) – rašiau (ra s\_jau, I wrote)

1)'i' as palatalization mark is used in some other languages (e. g. Polish) too.
2) Thus, such written forms as 'ia', 'ią', 'io', 'iu' and so on aren't diphtongs. But 'ie' is diphtong.

4. The regressive chain rule of palatalizing.

If consonant goes directly before palatalized one, it is pronounced palatalized.

Smeigsiu (s_jm_jei g_js_ju, I will stab)

 

5. Other situations with palatalizing (1)

Before non-palatalized consonant sometimes (mostly in proper names and borrowings) 'l' may be palatalized and always 'j' is.

Polka (pol_j ka, polka, name of a Chech dance)

However this palatalization of l stays not marked in written form. So it's proposed to use as rare as possible in standard Lithuanian.

6. Other situations with palatalization (2).

In other cases than 2 – 5 consonants are non-palatalized.

 

This rule must be given also as “regressive chain rule of unpalatalizing” with exception of rule nr. 5, and it would sound: If consonant goes directly before unpalatalized one, it is pronounced unpalatalized.
Linas 13:06, 2004 Mar 20 (UTC)

[edit] Notes

I'm a little unsure about the statement "Some linguists have speculated that proto-Baltic languages split from other Indo-European languages before 1000 BCE." Unless I've misunderstood, that seems awfully late - many other distinct Indo-European languages had developed many hundred years before 1000 BC, and even the written records of Mycenaean Greek and Hittite go back well before that date. Is it a typo? --MockTurtle 01:38, 8 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Looking generally, this statement is incorrect. To split isn't true word in this case, and even if it were, we perhaps should speak about other languages splitting from the Baltic proto-language, but not vice versa. The date is very dubious too. A way, in which the Baltic languages developed from the primary proto-Indoeuropean one is still under a dispute, except the fact, that Baltic languages have many archaic features and even modern Lithuanian and Latvian still retain many of them. And, after all, this statement should depend to other article, the one about the Baltic languages.
So, I had to revise it earlier, but it was as if defended with the Some linguists have speculated. Now, I have revised it.
Linas 14:07, 2004 Nov 3 (UTC)

I would like to see some sources quoted in this section. What evidence is being used to make these statements? Perhaps a stronger caveat is also necessary. Indo-European linguistics is not an exact science and the theoretical nature of scholarly opinions ought not to be stated as fact.

Well, generally You are right, we surely must include description of sources. But, I think, it's common practice not to include sources, when a statement is considered as axiom or it is well-known in a certain branch. And there are many such statements in this article. But what concerns other statements, which are more disputed or dubious hypothetic or tending to pseudo scientific approach, this article doesn't contains much of them, and few existing are supplemented by suitable remarks (except, if I didn't overlooked some new in newer revisions).
But when You speak about reliability of Indo-European linguistics, it's, perhaps, question of other article. If You mean something from Lithuanian linguistics, couldn't You type your question here? Being more concrete, this question will be more useful for further article writing too. We have put very few information here, concerning both Indo-European and Lithuanian language. And these sentences reflect prevailing point of view and not one concrete separated speculation. I can give many sources in many languages, but it didn't thought it was necessary, what concerns these few and very common sentences about relations of hypothetic I.-Europ. to Lithuanian.
Linas 18:21, 2005 Mar 21 (UTC)

[edit] Lithuanian online translator?

Does anybody know where I could find an automatic Lithuanian to English translator? Thanks

There is an online dictionary here., but it won't get you very far unless you already know something about the language. I've not yet seen an actual translator (like Babelfish). I once contacted Systran (who "powers" Babelfish) and at the time they were not planning to add Lithuanian to their list. --Theodore Kloba July 8, 2005 16:06 (UTC)

[edit] Examples

The new Examples section ought to be put into a better phonetic transcription, like Wikipedia:Simplified phonetic transcription for Lithuanian. --Theodore Kloba 18:21, July 15, 2005 (UTC)

Yes. And it isn't too incorrect to delete all instances of this transcription at all. I added transcription of wikipedia: simplified_phonetic_transcription_for_Lithuanian, but I still left previous trivial transcription too with few most glaring inequalities revised. If nobody protests, it could be deleted later at all, I think. Linas Lituanus 09:22, July 16, 2005 (UTC)
I hate to be negative, but I would recommend simply removing the samples section altogether. We do have a lot of these in a lot of our language articles, but they are hardly encyclopedic and tend to attract vandalism (often quite witty) and generally misguided edits. My experience is that most editors tend to agree to this. They are usually not particularly helpful to understanding the nature of the language and are usually only useful for tourists.
Examples of minimal pairs in the phonology section is far more helpful to understanding the nature of Lithuanian pronunciation and here I would encourage anyone with the proper equipment to record samples of spoken Lithuanian.
Peter Isotalo 02:16, 9 August 2005 (UTC)
You are really negative, but I wouldn't have started to write these examples myself. :-)). I agree with you, that they could give wrong idea on language. Synthetic languages especially are minimally characterized by such lists of words. Well, I try to regard the user that put these examples, as I try to do with any true user. It's a pity only, that not rare their knowledge are much less regardable than their personalities. Thanks for your note! Linas Lituanus 15:06, August 12, 2005 (UTC)
But don't You think, that we'll go too deep, if we speak about such linguistical subtleties as minimal pairs, especially in this main article (not in e. g. phonetics of Lithuanian Language)? I think, the present list of phonemes is sufficient. The list of phonemes is based on ideas of Lithuanian linguists on what the standard Lithuanian is. I dare to say, that "the standard language" itself means something idealized, some school and radio language. Although it doesn't mean, that the list disagrees with reality, but that reality is much complicated. But it's not good style to make articles too complicated . Linas Lituanus 15:36, August 12, 2005 (UTC)
Yes, you're right about that. Recordings of minimal pairs for all phonemes are unnecessary in the main article, but should rather be used in more detailed description of a Lithuanian phonology (this the commonly accepted standard title). If you want to see just how detailed an article can be in terms of phonetics, however, take a look at Swedish language, an article I helped bring to FA status. Though I believe it's mostly up to the primary contributors of an article to decide how much or how little info they want to have in the main article, I would certainly expect about the same amount as contained in the Swedish article for almost any language article were it nominated as a FAC. Though keeping it under 50k for the sake of the average reader is probably for the better.
Concerning standard languages, you're right that they are often over-idealized. It's mostly a question of the tolerance for deviances in a standard language. Again, see the "Sounds" section of the Swedish article for an example of how this can be handled.
Peter Isotalo 23:59, 12 August 2005 (UTC)
The Swedish language article is excellent one, but making an article like it needs some imput. I'd like to concentrate on Lithuanian grammar, concerning, that absence of this article is more lacking ("Lithuanian grammar" actually exists now, but it's still like a stub.) Speaking about phonemes in Lithuanian, its usefull to imagine our situation at all. Lithuanian language is distinctive enough from its neighbour languages, but its dialects have manifest vestiges of pronouncing of neighbour languages, what is very natural for a little nation. Imagine, what does it mean, to describe all these variations. Additionally there are traditionall four or five (depends on clasifying system) dialects of Lithuanian, with description of any of them, which gradually becames more tradition than actuality. Standard Lithuanian plays a role similar to a role of a big marketplace nowadays: everybody disfavour it, but everybody needs it. I don't think that it's ideal to restrict the description to the standard language only, but this piece of information is most informative, when other language processes (of phonology especially) are even not explored on necessary level. Actually there are some sources and it's possible to say somethng about it, but I don't want to drawn in all this with very possible speculations and semi-knowlege, which replaces real information in such cases. By the way, Lithuanians didn't have any standard spoken language till approx. 1930-ties. When Lithuanian became official in 1919, the standard Lithuanian was planned more as written than spoken. Starting of radio broadcastings in 1927 from Kaunas and other innovations forced to change this point of view. So there is plenty of troubles concerning standard spoken Lithuanian itself even without speaking about the whole language. Although the basics of phonetics are suitably definite now. - It's possible however to describe the traditonal dialects, and, I think, it will be done step by step.
Linas Lituanus 11:52, August 14, 2005 (UTC)
Thank you for the compliment. I am very proud of my additions to the Swedish article and I found the experience of working on it both stimulating and enlightening. Though I was one of the main contributors and the driving force behinds its becoming an FA, it was certainly not a one-man project. Yes, such a comprehensive article does indeed take a lot of time, effort and feedback, but it's far from impossible.
Of course, I don't know much about Lithuanian beforehand except the classification and that its relative conservatism and close similarity to PIE has made it very interesting for Indo-European linguists, but I don't think it has to be that difficult to make broad outlines of phonetic or phonological differences between the various dialects. Broad generalizations, as long as they're referenced, are a must in these circumstances and the most useful to the average reader. What you've described of the language so far seems to me like exactly the kind of information you should be adding to the article. I'll be glad to review your additions to the best of my abilities and help out with copyediting and the likes. Seeing any main language article improve is one of my main objectives here at Wikipedia. If you need help from other wikilinguists, you can always ask for help at Wikipedia:WikiProject Languages and Wikipedia:WikiProject Phonetics. The language template is also a very useful guide as to what should be included in a language article. It has remained more or less stable for at least six months now and covers pretty much any notable and relevant aspect of a language.
Peter Isotalo 13:38, 14 August 2005 (UTC)
I agree with You. We should do this way. But I'm afraid, that the main trouble isn't in it. The main problem is absence of a real scientific description of whole Lithuanian language in a form of summary. I (what's natural, living in Lithuania) have heard many opinions about situation of the language presently, but I haven't seen any scientific text of this kind. It's yet possible to find a descriptions on particular problems of this kind, but not a summary. Our linguists are mostly concentrated on the standard language or on historical development. So it's very easy, to solve our problem, if we restricted ourselves to the standard language only.
I'll try to give few examples on what I say. If we speak about prosody, there's a norm of the standard language, that Lithuanian has mobile pitch stress. But when an average language user hears everyday language, it doesn't seem that, except that it's mobile. But pitch plays some role in the Lithuanian stress, what I can state being more or less a linguist. Though we need a backgrounded source to describe it, but it doesn't exist. Or: Standard language norm says that sounds -r, -l, -m , -n after a vowel are sonorants and could be accented. But we can't see it in everyday language. -r, -l, -m, -n are pronounced as consonants in every position there. And I should to stress, that I speak about the kind of everyday language, that is the closest to the standard Lithuanian and is less affected by foreign languages. And I can give up to 10 such situations, where common usage and standard prescriptions contrast with no resolution in a scientific form. And these are mostly from phonology. That's why I prefer to skip some things. But if we decided to do the full list as in the language template, I advise to confine these questions to the standard language.
Thanks for your idea to contribute in copyediting. I think I could start more intensive job later in autumn.
Linas Lituanus 16:20, August 16, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Translation from English to Lithuanian

Hi i need to know how to spell/write "From Heaven" (as in I'm from heaven) from english to lithuanian. If you could please e-mail me back on kellyjuch@hotmail.com that would be great. Thank you for your time. --Kelly.

Copied from Wikipedia:Reference_desk#Translation_from_english_to_lithuanian - please reply there if you would like to assist this person. ¦ Reisio 22:51, 2005 August 23 (UTC)

[edit] ==

Hi,

There are few mistakes in original article. An example with car is comming should be written "Automobilis atvažiuoja" and "Atvažiuoja automobilis" because "ateina" is used for 'comming by foot' and "atvažiuoja" is used for 'arriving by motor/wheeled wehicle'.

j (jp@seminte.lt)

[edit] Lithuanian words in Esperanto?

Esperanto wikipedia claims that a few Esperanto words were taken from Lithuanian. I was wondering if anyone could confirm these? They are:

  • du "two" (Lithuanian du, but also Italian due)
  • tuj "immediately"
  • ju (comparative "the")

Du seems hard to justify, since it's so close to Romance. But is there anything in Lithuanian that sounds like tuj and means something like "immediately, right away, as soon as", etc.?

Also, the comparative "the" is parallel to German. There's a pair of words, ju ... des, which are used as follows:

Esperanto: Ju pli granda la familio, des malpli grandaj la porcioj.
German: Je größer die Familie, desto kleiner die Portionen.
English: The bigger the family, the smaller the portions.

What would the parallel be in Lithuanian?

Thanks, kwami 00:41, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

Du is not only close to Romance, but other Indoeuropean languages like Greek and Hindi.
Tuj is similar to tuojau, "right away".
--Theodore Kloba 20:30, 17 November 2005 (UTC)
Thanks, Theodore. Any idea how to say 'the more the merrier' in Lithuanian? kwami 22:40, 17 November 2005 (UTC)
Kuo daugiau, tuo laimingesnis but it depends on the context.
To kwami.
Well, perhaps juo (for the question is, among others, about this word, as I see) is slightly old-fashioned, but it is used too for this purpose:
juo daugiau, juo laimingesnis or juo daugiau, tuo laimingesnis are possible as well as kuo daugiau, tuo laimingesnis.
So your sources, that say ju of Esperanto to be taken from Lithuanian may be right. Linas Lituanus 16:47, 19 January 2006 (UTC)
Thank you. Swedish has ju ... dess, which is right on the mark. However, if we compare monosyllabic words with enough languages we're likely to get coincidental similarities, and I believe Zamenhof had a soft spot in his heart for Lithuanian. kwami 20:57, 19 January 2006 (UTC)
As long as I'm here, it's interesting that Latvian repeats the "juo"... "Jo lielāka ģimene, jo mazākas porcijas." PētersV 22:57, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Please check samples

Hello, we have a few Lithuanian samples at Albanian language#How Albanian compares with other languages. Could someone please check if the yare correct? Rex(talk) 23:07, 18 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] connection to dacian language

Anyway, according to the linguists the most likely tree is something like this:

      2500 BC             1000 BC                  1 AD                  300 AD             1500 AD 
-> *(proto-Satem)--->  (proto-Daco-Albanian)-\--> (Dacian dialect)  --> (Daco-Romanian) --> Romanian
                 |                           |--> (another Dac. dialect)  -->           --> Albanian
                 --->  (proto-Baltic)    -\---> (proto-Latvian)     -->                 --> Latvian
                                          |--> (proto-Lithuanian)   -->                 --> Lithuanian

Is this true? -- Bonaparte talk 19:50, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

No, it's garbage. First of all, Satem is not a valid node. As far as we can tell, it was merely an areal feature. Secondly, Dacian is poorly recorded, so we don't know how to classify it. Thirdly, Romanian decends from Latin, not Dacian. Fourthly, the closest family to Baltic is Slavic, not Albanian or Dacian. kwami 00:21, 13 January 2006 (UTC)
And ultimately, it's absolute rubbish to state that Lithuanian (as well as Latvian) emerged 1500 AD. 85.206.208.161 13:32, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Mažas cognates?

Here's one for the experts: Is the Lithuanian word mažas (small) cognate to PIE *meĝ (great), and akin to Latin mega and Sanskrit महा/mahā? The sound changes tell us it could be; the "exact opposite" semantic shift is interesting. --Theodore Kloba 17:21, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

Yes, this raises some really interesting questions. I have thought for myself for some time about this word. We know for sure, that the Lithuanian g became ž in certain positions (but not in all). Therefore, it is possible that mažas < magas. (Speaking of mega, isn't it Greek?). It's mazais in Prussian. Perhaps this word really changed its meaning to exactly opposite of what it originally meant in PIE. At the moment, however, I can't give anymore details on this subject. --85.206.208.161 13:29, 20 February 2006 (UTC)


According to the Ethymological dictionary of Latvian by Konstantins Karulis, latv. "mazs" and lith. "mažas" are derived from pie. *meĝh-. This root used to denotate the size in total opposites. An other example is "magus" (boy) in the Gothic. The development should have been following: ide. *meĝh- : *moĝh- > balt. *maž- > latv. maz-. Also, there are dialectal forms in Latvian: "maģ" - few, a little. So this theory is actually true. - Janis

[edit] The ę and ė Vowels

Why do I find that many times the ę vowel is replaced by the ė vowel? For example isn't the word for week, savaitę, although in the Wikipedia Lithuanian it is spelled savaitė. I am trying to list Indo-European roots with Lithuanian but, I am finding it difficult which vowel the word is as all online dictionaries do not use the ę vowel. Imperial78

They are both correct. Savaitė is nominative case. Savaitę is accusative case. Rule of thumb is that ą, ę, į, and ų are primarily used in declension. Usually, primary forms don't have these characters. Hope, this answers your question. Renata 03:21, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
Thank you so much for your help! Imperial78
Oh, and savaite is also correct. It's instrumental case. Did I mention that Lithunian grammar is crazy hard and complex? :) I hope to see you more often around. Renata 04:50, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Similarities to Latin

Lithuanian is no closer to Latin than it is to other Indo-European languages. As a result, I've tried to write the section to discuss only shared vocabulary. The morphological details which were written there are in no way limited to Latin and Lithuanian--only someone with little or no training in comparative Indo-European linguistics would concoct such an explanation. Furthermore, mention of morphology doesn't belong in a section on lexicon. CRCulver 02:02, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

Well, in a sense, you're right. There have always been attempts to show how Lithuanian grammar is similar to that of Latin. However, Lithuanian is special not because it's similar to Latin but simply because of being archaic. That's all.

Nevertheless, I see you've changed one of the most conservative to one of the more conservative. That was quite surprising to me. Despite the fact I always try to avoid being etnocentric as much as possible, I have to ask you to provide me a list of languages that are the most conservative (since Lithuanian belongs to the more conservative languages). RokasT 13:39, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] false statement

“The earliest-known written Lithuanian text is a hymnal translation from 1545” Is it right that earliest known written text is from 1545? I know there is a written prayer text in ~1503.M.K 12:42, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

I changed headline to false because I found in "Lietuviu kalbos zodynas" this (27pg.) : “First survived text written in Lithuanian language is an prayers of “Teve musu”; “Sveika Marija”; Tikiu I dieva teva”; total 24 lines. These prayers are written by hand in XVIc. first half in a latin book “Traktatas kunigams” which was publish in Strasbourg in 1503 year. Lithuanian text was in last page. Text is rewritten from even older Lithuanian text which not survived. The book “Traktatas kunigams” belonged to Vilnius library. The 1503 text was found in Vilnius University library in 1962y.” So it is clear that date “1545” is false. In one site I found the original looking text of these prayers and it is too say that the text is from book publish in 1503. So original text can’t be a younger then the book in which it was found…. M.K 11:54, 12 May 2006 (UTC) P.S in one site the text is also dating from 1503 to 1525


[edit] Changes to writing system

The text briefly mentions the use of Y but does not otherwise mention the several reforms of the Lithuanian alphabet that occurred during the 20th century. Perhaps someone would like to expand this section?  ProhibitOnions  (T) 07:26, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Pronunciation

Is Lithuanian l plain (IPA [l]) or velarized (IPA [ɫ], as in Slavic languages)?

In fact, I don't know a good source to solve this question. I'll try to do it as I can. -- So I think, the Lithuanian don't make distinction between [l] and [ɫ], and features of pronouncing depend on a speaker. Lithuanians (and I too) don't hear, how these sounds differ at the sense the difference is defined. But we have a palatalized [lj] and a not palatalized [l], that are similar to the previuos pair. So, [lj] approximates to IPA [l], but the not papatalized [l] to IPA [ɫ]. IMHO, taking in general, l is closer to ɫ, but it can depend on its position in word too (as we don't make the distinction between the two l-s). For example, l in diphtongs al, el, il, ul before t, d seems to be more IPA [l] than other positions of l. Linas Lituanus 16:56, 29 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Revert conflicts

There is a great deal of English-language scholarship with regard to the Lithuanian language, and these sources must take precedence over the Polish-language reference that has been inserted into the lead paragraph. Per the site [1], "During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries Ruthenian was the language of the Orthodox and Uniate inhabitants of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth." This statement warrants the inclusion of Ruthenian into the body of the article, and into the PL-LT Commonwealth article, but not into the lead paragraph of this article. Sincerely, Novickas 23:57, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Pronunciation

Are the voiceless stops aspirated or not in Lithuanian? It would improve the article to mention it! Laurelindë 18:17, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

No they aren't. Neither the voiced nor the voiceless steps are aspirated in Lithuanian. They can be palatalized (every consonant, š or ž diferently from neighbour languages is preferently palatalized) or not (every consonant except j). Palatalization is a distinctive feature, and it can be distinctive in morphology too, e. g.: rašau 'I write' — rašiau 'I wrote'.

Your sugestion would better the article, if it were, say, in Phonetics of Lithuanian language or in a similar article. No, we should consider, that the statement, if we included it here, would be fully negative: e. g. Stops in Lithuanian are not aspirated. I think it's possible with more absent features enumerated: Stops in Lithuanian are not aspirated, ..., ... Now, what features could anybody suggest? Linas Lituanus 16:31, 29 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Prussian-Lithuanian is the basis, not the Suvalkija dialect

It may be a much cherished idea that modern Lithuanian originated from the Suvalkija dialect, but Zinkevicius in his History of the Lithuanian language is quite clear about this: the basis of modern Lithuanian is Prussian-Lithuanian.

"The activists used as a model that language of Lithuania Minor which was described in the grammars of the great Lithuanian specialists Schleicher and Kursaitis and was universally adopted by comparative linguistics. This was the language taught at Moscow University by Prof. Filip Fortunatov, whose lectures were attended by many of the activists of the national revival movement. That famous Lithuanian model, in the words of Kazimieras Büga, "the skeleton of the written language", was, for all intents and purposes, used in the periodical and other press in Lithuania Major, but it was somewhat modified and adapted to new requirements. This language is the origin of current Standard Lithuanian. Hence, it developed from the former written Standard language used in Lithuania Minor."

"Essentially this was not a new written language, but a further stage in the development of the written Standard language of Lithuania Minor, which was meant to satisfy the needs of Czarist Lithuania. This is evident from the many correspondences between current Standard Lithuanian and the written language of Lithuania Minor. The latter differed significantly from the Suvalkish dialect of that period, which dialectologists now call the West Aukstaitish Kaunas dialect."

Lutz Szemkus

Is it so easy to create the integrated language from separate dialects? Everybody will answer, that it isn't. It can be always a complicated process of joining and rejecting. Assuming this, we can say, that a point of view is possible, even that the standard Lithuanian is still in development. And it's even more true, that every dialect of Lithuanian and every region of Lithuania has tributed its imput to the standard Lithuanian.

For example, You stress that the dialect of surroundings of Kaunas differs from the former standard / written language of Lithuania Minor. It's so. But these two dialects differ among themselves less than any other dialect of Lithuania with any dialect of Lithuania minor. So, it's quite problematic to say in one sentence, which was the basic, choosing between the Suvalkija dialect and and the written language of Lithuania Minor.

I myself am inclined to agree with You (and thus with prof. Zinkevičius ), but I see some complicated aspects of this problem, that not allow to say it in one sentence.

For example, the first aspect is situation "de jure". When the modern normative grammar was written by Jablonskis with later addings by other linguists, it was stated clearly: Lithuanian was being built on a basis of Suvalkija dialect. This situation "de jure" was never questioned by Lithuanian linguists. So it became even tradition to say, that Suvalkija dialect is the basic. Almost nobody pays attention, that this statment was just a wish at the time, when the first normative grammar was written. So, that it needs to be verified now, when the standard Lithuanian has grown. Zinkevičius did it and his conclusions are clear. Inspite of it, Lithuanian grammars and texbooks hasn't been rewritten according to his conclusions. So, conclusions of Zinkevicius mean, that the written language of Lithuania Minor, being better developed and having more clear written tradition, just superseded the intended Suvalkia dialect as the standard for the language.

So one can name the precedence of the Suvalkija dialect just an urban legend. But this is not exactly so. So, the other aspect is, that the Eastern dialect of Lithuania Minor was not so different from the Suvalkija dialect. But namly this dialect became the basis for the written language of Lithuania Minor. So, many people that speak Suvalkian natively, find the standard Lithuanian as their own language and not as any borrowed dialect from Prussian Lithuania, especially comparing with other dialects of the Lithuanian. This is aproximately true not only for Suvalkija but for Kaunas region too. This question has yet other interesting aspect. Namely, that the spoken Suvalkija dialect in the early 20th century was influenced by the Easten dialect of the Lithuania Minor without any doubt. For example, my grandmother, that was from (eastern not western)Suvalkija, often used some typical sayings from Lithuania Minor (not germanicisms), although she didn't have any direct relations with people of this region. I suppose that people in Suvalkija considered the dialect of Lithuania Minor as more prestigeous, but this thing isn't explored sufficiently. So, the later generations in Suvalkija might consider many natively Minor Lithuanian features as features of their own dialect (of more literate sort of the same dialect, for example) . They used language with these "Minor Lithuanicisms" even not thinking about their descent. So it's possible, that many features of the written language of Lithuania Minor reached the standard language not directly, but from the spoken language in Suvalkija.

Now, I suggest to leave the statement in the article as it is, while it's in one sentence, or to write a more detailed explanation. Linas Lituanus 16:53, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] "Oldest"

Using the superlative form may be a bit problematic. Ancient Prussian, Lithuanian, and Latvian (dialects in all aside) were the three surviving languages, then only Lithuanian and Latvian remained. I can't say I've seen research as to which of those two is older, although from my own readings Lithuanian appears to have the most votes for comparisons to Sanskrit. More importantly, Albanian, an Indo-European language, also lays claim to the "oldest" title. A discussion of "oldest" based on several sources, and briefly dealing with the other likely contenders, would be appropriate. For example, Albanian might be older while Lithuanian might have stayed truer to proto-Indo-European. The underlying assumption of "oldest" here--starting with the opening quote--is that the most similar to ancient = the most ancient. Purely an editorial comment to suggest a bit more attention to the claim of "oldest". PētersV 22:41, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

P.S. You'll pardon my simplistic representation. My primary editorial concern is reconciliation with the Albanian claim, which would require some discussion of "oldest how." PētersV 22:46, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

Pēters, I find hard to understand that you are trying to say. Oldest? M.K. 11:19, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
Archaic is the term. Having all those cases seems to be the major criterion, since they have disappeared in other modern spoken I-E languages.[2] (memo to self -should put this in). I spent a few minutes looking for the Albanian version, but found nothing academic for "most archaic" as an overall description, although several sources say it has retained many archaic features. It's a strange claim to fame, but there it is. A separate "archaic features" paragraph could include comparisons to other languages? Novickas 12:30, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
(More to M.K.) Whether Lithuanian or Latvian is "older" would be a "friendly" discourse between sister languages. On the other hand, Albanian though Indo-European is unrelated, also laying claim to "oldest." Lithuanian and Albanian can't both be "oldest" (no qualifier), but they could each be "oldest" based on one qualifier/set of criteria for one and a different qualifier/set of criteria for the other, for example, Novickas' "most archaic."
   "Oldest" on its own is ambiguous and should be clarified (that's my "oldest how?") so that it doesn't look like there's simply some Lithuanian-Albanian claim-to-fame rivalry. I'd personally suggest to mention Albanian in the article if only as to the criteria used for "oldest" so that it doesn't look like the Albanian claim is being ignored. PētersV 16:17, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
Dear Pēters, but article does not call Lithuanian language the oldest. It just speaks about archaic nature of it, these terms differ from each other. M.K. 16:24, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
Well, now I am puzzling where I (clearly) Wiki-read the "oldest" reference! (it wasn't the "oldest" on the picture caption...) Hopefully it will come to me! Too much or too little coffee, apparently, must adjust dosage. PētersV 19:00, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
Probably you was confused with first pic caption: The oldest surviving manuscript in Lithuanian ? M.K. 19:03, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Cyrillic variant

It might be worth mentioning that there was an attempt in the late 19th century, as part of Russification, to force Lithuanian to be written in the Cyrillic rather than Latin alphabet. --Delirium 23:22, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] slavic influenced

Lithuanian sound mutch like slavic langues. And it is heavily slavic influenced langue. For example like palatisation. Modern lithuanian deffinetly isn't more ancient, then say polish. The article should mention it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 91.190.44.4 (talk) 17:43, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, but you are wrong. Lithuanian is a quite pure language and it definitely doesn't sound like those slavic languages. Probably the most related dialect to Slavic languages is the Southern dialect (Dzūkų tarmė), because of close relations with Polsh-speaking people during the ages. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.61.59.236 (talk) 15:09, 27 March 2008 (UTC)