| Kajkavian | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| kajkavica | ||||
| Pronunciation | ||||
| Spoken in | Croatia | |||
| Native speakers | ~1.3 million (date missing) | |||
| Language family |
Indo-European
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| Language codes | ||||
| ISO 639-3 | – | |||
| Linguist List | hrv-kay | |||
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The Kajkavian dialect ( /kaɪˈkɑːviən/; Croatian: kajkavski, proper name: kajkavica or kajkavština) is one of the three main dialects of Croatian. It has low mutual intelligibility with the other two dialects, Štokavian and Čakavian. All three are named after their word for "what?", which in Kajkavian is kaj.
Kajkavian is spoken in the north-central part of Croatia, including the capital Zagreb, as well as in a few enclaves in Austria, Hungary, and Romania. Though its speakers are ethnic Croats and Kajkavian is thus considered a dialect of Croatian, it is closer to neighboring Slovene than it is to Chakavian or Shtokavian.[1]
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The Kajkavian area of Croatia is bordered on the northwest by Slovene language territory. It is bordered on the east and southeast by Štokavian dialects roughly along a line that was the former division between Civil Croatia and the Habsburg Military Frontier; in southwest along Kupa and Dobra rivers, it persisted in ancient (medieval) contact with Čakavian dialects.
Near relation exists with the Prekmurian language (variant of Slovene in Prekmurje and Hungary). The speakers of Prekmurian are Slovenes and Hungarian Slovenes who belonged to to the Archdiocese of Zagreb during the Habsburg era. Higher amounts of correspondences between the two exist in inflection and vocabulary.
Some Kajkavian words bear a closer resemblance to other Slavic languages (such as Russian) than they do to Štokavian or Čakavian. For instance gda seems (at first glance) to be unrelated to kada, however, when compared to the Russian когда, the relationship becomes more apparent, at the same time in Slovene: kdaj, in Prekmurian gda, kda. Kajkavian kak (how) and tak (so) are exactly like their Russian cognates, as compared to Štokavian and Čakavian kako and tako, in Prekmurian in turn tak, kak (in Slovene like Chakavian: tako, kako). (This vowel loss occurred in most other Slavic languages; Štokavian is a notable exception, whereas the same feature of Macedonian is probably not a Serbian influence, as the word is preserved in the same form in Bulgarian, to which Macedonian is much closer related than to Serbian.)
Another distinctive feature of Kajkavian is the preference for the future tense. Instead of Štokavian and Čakavian "ću", "ćeš", and "će", Kajkavian speakers say "bum", "buš" and "bu". The near-future tense is far more often used than in standard Croatian. For example, the phrase "I'll show you" is "Ti bum pokazal" in Kajkavian whereas in standard Croatian it is "Pokazat ću ti". This is a feature shared with Slovene, and also the Prekmurian language, Slovenian: bom, boš, bo; Prekmurian: Bom, boš, bou.
Dialectogical investigations of the Kajkavian dialect had begun at the end of the 19th century: the first comprehensive monograph was written in Russian by Ukrainian philologist A.M.Lukjanenko in 1905 (Kajkavskoe narečie). Kajkavian dialects have been classified along various criteria: Serbian philologist Aleksandar Belić had divided (1927) the Kajkavian dialect according to the reflexes of Proto-Slavic phonemes /tj/ and /DJ/ into three subdialects: eastern, northwestern and southwestern.
However, later investigations have not corroborated Belić's division. Contemporary Kajkavian dialectology originates mainly from Croatian philologist Stjepan Ivšić's work "Jezik Hrvata kajkavaca"/The Language of Kajkavian Croats, 1936, which is based on accentuation characteristics. Due to great diversity of Kajkavian speech, primarily in phonetics, phonology and morphology – the Kajkavian dialectological atlas is notable for its bewildering proliferation of subdialects: from four identified by Ivšić, up to six proposed by Croatian linguist Brozović (formerly accepted division) and even as many as fifteen, according to a monograph authored by Croatian linguist Mijo Lončarić (1995).
Kajkavians now include 31%, i.e. 1,300,000 of Croatia's inhabitants, chiefly in northern and northwestern Croatia. The mixed half-Kajkavian towns along the eastern and southern edge of Kajkavian speaking area are Pitomača, Čazma, Kutina, Popovača, Sunja, Petrinja, Martinska Ves, Ozalj, Ogulin, Fužine, and Čabar, with included newer Štokavian enclaves of Bjelovar, Sisak, Glina, Dubrava, Zagreb and Novi Zagreb. The southernmost Kajkavian villages are Krapje at Jasenovac; and Pavušek, Dvorišče and Hrvatsko selo in Zrinska Gora (R. Fureš & A. Jembrih: Kajkavski u povijesnom i sadašnjem obzorju p. 548, Zabok 2006). All three Croatian dialects collide between Karlovac and Ogulin.
The major cities in northern Croatia with prevailing urban Kajkavians are chiefly Zagreb (old central city, Sesvete and V. Gorica), Koprivnica, Križevci, Varaždin, Čakovec, etc. The typical and archaic Kajkavian is today spoken chiefly in Zagorje hills and Medjimurje plain, and in adjacent areas of northwestern Croatia where other immigrants and Štokavian standard had much less influence. The most peculiar Kajkavian archidiom (Baegnunski) is spoken at Bednja in northernmost Croatia.
Most other Croatian speakers know of Kajkavian as the metropolitan dialect of Zagreb city, where a half of citizens (nearly 300.000 ones) now widely use the "zagrebečki" speech (a half-Kajkavian koine) for their private communication at home and on street (using a Štokavian speech in official sites only).
Moreover, in the central city of old Zagreb and in satellite towns Sesvete and V. Gorica, up today persist at least 7,000 Kajkavian elders speaking old "Agramer" archidiom who understand the official standard but can hardly speak it. Also the coastal Čakavian immigrants in Zagreb or elsewhere in northwestern Croatia quickly transform to Kajkavians in one generation: their non-standard accentuation is subequal to Kajkavian, with many connecting archaisms in vocabulary. The best adaptable are the transitional northern Čakavians from northeastern Istria, Cres, Vinodol, and Pokupje accepting well Kajkavian in few years.
Other southeastern people who immigrate to Zagreb from Štokavian territories often pick up rare elements of Kajkavian in order to assimilate, notably the pronoun "kaj" instead of "što" and the extended use of future anterior (futur drugi), but they never adapt well because of alien eastern accents and ignoring Kajkavian-Čakavian archaisms and syntax.
Kajkavian is not only a folk dialect, but in the course of history of Croatian language, has been the written public language (along with the corpus written in Čakavian and Štokavian). Kajkavian was the last to appear on the scene, mainly due to economic and political reasons. While first Croatian truly vernacular Čakavian texts (i.e. not mixed with Church Slavonic) go back to the 13th century, Štokavian to 14th century, the first Kajkavian published work was Pergošić's "Decretum", 1574.
After that, numerous works appeared in Croatian Kajkavian literary language: chronicles by Vramec, liturgical works by Ratkaj, Habdelić, Mulih; poetry of Ana Katarina Zrinska, dramatic opus of Tituš Brezovački. Kajkavian-based are important lexicographic works like Jambrešić's "Dictionar", 1670, and monumental (2,000 pages and 50,000 words) inter-dialectal (Čakavian-Štokavian-Kajkavian, but based on Kajkavian idiom) dictionary "Gazophylacium" by Ivan Belostenec (posthumously, 1740). Interestingly enough, Miroslav Krleža's visionary poetic masterpiece, "Balade Petrice Kerempuha", 1936, drew heavily on Belostenec's dictionary. Croatian Kajkavian grammars include Kornig's, 1795, Matijević's, 1810 and Đurkovečki's, 1837.
Kajkavian literary language gradually fell into disuse since Croatian National Revival, ca. 1830-1850, when leaders of Croatian National Unification Movement (the majority of them being Kajkavian native speakers themselves) adopted the most widespread and developed Croatian Štokavian literary language as the idiom for Croatian standard language.
However, after a period of lethargy, the 20th century has witnessed new flourishing of literature in Kajkavian dialect - this time as Croatian dialectal poetry, main authors being Antun Gustav Matoš, Miroslav Krleža, Ivan Goran Kovačić, Dragutin Domjanić, Nikola Pavić etc.
Kajkavian lexical treasure is being published by the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts in "Rječnik hrvatskoga kajkavskoga književnoga jezika"/Dictionary of the Croatian Kajkavian Literary Language, 8 volumes (1999).
Latterly Dario Vid Balog, actor, linguist and writer translate the New Testament in Kajkavian.[2]
Below are examples of the Lord's Prayer in the Croatian variant of Shtokavian, literary Kajkavian and a Međimurje variant of the Kajkavian dialect.
| Standard Croatian | Standard Kajkavian | Međimurje-Kajkavian |
|---|---|---|
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Oče naš, koji jesi na nebesima, |
Otec naš, koji jesi v nebesih, |
Japa naš kteri si f 'nebesih, |
During Yugoslavia in 20th century, the exotic Kajkavian was mostly restricted in private communication, poetry and folklore. By the recent regional democratizing and cultural revival from 1990s, Kajkavians partly regained their former half-public positions chiefly in Zagorje County and Varaždin County and local towns, being now presented there in some modern public media e.g.: