Iš J. Balčikonio akcentologijos

LIETUVIŲ KALBOS SANDAROS TYRINĖJIMAI LIETUVIŲ KALBOTYROS KLAUSIMAI, XXVI (1987) BONIFACAS STUNDŽIA ON J. BALČIKONIS’S ACCENTOLOGY J. Balčikonis was interested in accentology, as in most other areas of language studies, as a practitioner—a passionate champion of language culture and an original lexicographer. While teaching a Lithuanian language course at the Panevėžys Teachers’ Seminary in 1919–1924, he introduced prospective teachers to the fundamentals of accentology and instilled correct stress-placement skills. In an open letter to the Minister of Education published in 1927 (I 75)1, he complained about poor theatrical diction and pointed out several stress errors (medžiagos, išmokyti). In lectures broadcast on Kaunas radio from 1929 to 1934, he corrected the best-known errors in vocabulary, word formation, and stress. From 1935, J. Balčikonis was a member of the Commission of the Stress and Pronunciation Section of the Lithuanian Language Society. He continued to correct stress errors on later occasions—in articles and reviews, and in his pedagogical work. Having become editor of the Dictionary of the Lithuanian Language, he made great efforts to enrich its card index with authentic words from various parts of Lithuania. In more than one article, while urging the general public to collect the treasures of living speech, he asked them to send in notes about their stress and meaning. J. Balčikonis should be regarded as the foremost and probably most consistent continuer of J. Jablonskis’s tradition. He drew on Jablonskis and upheld his authority not only by correcting language errors, but also by teaching a Lithuanian language course to prospective teachers. This is especially clear from Balčikonis’s lectures published in volume 2 of “Selected Writings,” where some space is devoted to matters of stress. Stress is defined as “raising the voice on a particular syllable” (II 5); cf. the definition in J. Jablonskis’s 1922 grammar: “the raising of the voice when pronouncing a word is its stress” (RR I 189). In lectures delivered after the Great Patriotic War, “word stress is called not a raising of the voice, but a stronger pronunciation (of the beginning or end of a vowel or diphthong)” (II 294). Like J. Jablonskis, J. Balčikonis does not yet use the term *priegaidė* (intonation); stress is also used to refer to intonation, although the concepts of stress and intonation are generally distinguished: the acute accent indicates a short syllable, the grave accent—circumflex length, and the circumflex accent—acute length. Following J. Jablonskis’s 1901 grammar, in the notes for lectures delivered at the Panevėžys Teachers’ Seminary, he marks i, u + R with ´; later, like J. Jablonskis in his 1922 grammar, he adopts F. Kuršaitis’s tradition and begins using the grave accent. The semantic function of stress is also mentioned (incidentally, all examples contrast intonation): aušta — aušta, mėrkti — merkti, and so on (II 8). 1 Skliausteliuose nurodoma J. Balčikonio „Rinktinių raštų“ (V., 1978, 1982) tomas ir puslapis. Kai kalbama apie J. Jablonskį, vartojama santrumpa RR, žyminti jo „Rinktinius raštus“ (V., 1957, 1959). 19 J. Balčikonis used the term paradigma to mean an accent paradigm. Incidentally, the linguist disagreed with the current classification of accent paradigms until the end of his life; it had become established after K. Būga’s study in the first fascicle of LKŽ. Like J. Jablonskis before 1925, he adhered to the Kuršaitis–Jaunius scheme, arguing that it was better suited to the language of the day (I 387–388). Although, as has already been said, J. Balčikonis followed Jablonskis (especially his 1922 grammar), the aforementioned lecture notes also contain certain, admittedly minor, differences in accentuation. This is particularly true of pronouns, pronominal adjectives, and active voice participles. For instance, J. Balčikonis gives the following variants: the pronouns he, she, that, this; singular instrumental juõ (juo), ją (ją), etc.; plural accusative juõs (juos), jąs (jas), etc.; such, which, etc.; and singular dative tókiai, tokiái and tokiai. The first forms are given in J. Jablonskis’s 1922 grammar, with the note that they are pronounced differently in some places; the singular dative tokiai is accented in two ways (tókiai and tokiai; 1901 grammar). J. Balčikonis accents the singular dative of pronominal adjectives on the first syllable (jaũnajam, didžiãjam), while treating the more characteristic accentuation jaunãjam (jaunámjam), given after the war, as a variant (II 34). J. Jablonskis consistently accented the penultimate syllable: didžiãjam (1901 grammar, RR I 84), didžiãjam (1922 grammar, RR I 211). J. Balčikonis accented present active participles on accent class 32, except for the feminine singular nominative nešanti, and on accent class 1, except for the masculine singular dative nešančiam. J. Jablonskis likewise accents them similarly, with the sole exception of the singular locative, which has only accent class 1 (sūkancíame, sūkancíoje). J. Balčikonis accents the numeral šiñtas according to accent paradigm 2, while Jablonskis uses paradigm 4 (accent class 2 only as a variant). J. Balčikonis also wrote several articles devoted specifically to stress. In one, published in 1938, he argues that the form próc entas, rather than proceñtas, should be preferred in the standard language. Another, written in 1960 and printed in “Selected Writings” from the manuscript (I 354–357), discusses the stress of prefixed verbs (in Balčikonis’s terminology, “prefix-derived” verbs). Having noted that “because of stress retraction to the prefix, the present tense differs from the past simple tense” (I 355), the author attempts to distinguish only the present-tense phonological-morphological verb classes that retract stress to the prefix from those that do not. It would probably be more productive here to look for similarities and differences in the stress patterns of the two tense forms—J. Balčikonis would likely have done so himself (it is clear that the article is unfinished)—but the facts presented in it alone are valuable. It should be added that the term *priegaidė* (intonation) is already used in the article. The scholar’s most substantial and undoubtedly most valuable work on accentology is the article “Adjectives with the Suffix -inis and Their Stress,” written in 1951 (I 201–207). Here J. Balčikonis, drawing on abundant evidence from various dialects (“living speech”), formulates a very simple rule that is essentially still followed today3: “stress the suffix if [the adjectives.—B. S.] are derived from words with ending stress; stress the root (stem) if they are derived from words with root (stem) stress” (I 205). Nouns with the suffix -ininkas should also be stressed according to the same rule. In the article 2 Abbreviation a.p. = accent paradigm (stress pattern). 3 Plg. Laigonaitė A. Lietuvių kalbos akcentologija. — V., 1978, p. 58. 20 we find the correct observation that Samogitians and the western Highlanders closest to them tend to generalize stress on the antepenultimate syllable, while no dialect lacks occasional deviations from the rule or variation in the stress of one or another word; even the same person may stress a word in two different ways. However, the most original point, which can be developed into more substantial theoretical generalizations, is J. Balčikonis’s observation that incorrect stress on an adjective with the suffix -inis that is unfamiliar in everyday speech goes unnoticed by us, whereas if it is a product of living speech, its unusual stress immediately catches the eye (I 206). J. Balčikonis evidently sensed that new words are not always inclined to observe established stress rules. Dialect observations bear this out. In general, the accentual paradigm according to which a particular word is stressed also depends on whether the word is familiar to the language user, “one’s own,” or unfamiliar, “foreign.” Here we come to matters of pragmatics, which could be discussed separately (see “Mūsų kalba,” 1985, No. 6, p. 9). A few words should also be said about some of Balčikonis’s other interesting observations. He was perhaps the first to point out that root-stressed singularia tantum, when used in the plural with a figurative meaning, shift to ending stress, e.g., auksas, but knyga su auksais (I 275, 286). The guiding credo, the fundamental principle of all Balčikonis’s Lithuanian studies, as of Jablonskis’s, was reliance on facts from living speech. For instance, as early as 1928, reviewing V. Kamantauskas’s “A Short Treatise on Lithuanian Stress” (Kaunas, 1928), he notes that the adjective aiškus belongs to the first stress paradigm in some dialects and the fourth in others (I 100)—whenever criticizing, Balčikonis sought support in living, dialectal speech. Nevertheless, the linguist was quite cautious even with dialect facts: “one cannot always rely solely on what is found in dialects today; we find much there that has been corrupted” (I 95). Thus, here too the grain must be separated from the chaff. The principle of analogy, on which J. Balčikonis relies, for example, when criticizing S. Dabušis in that same year, often helps to do this. Dabušis had recommended the form lietùvys – lietùvį for the standard language (this stress pattern is familiar to the southern Highlanders and their neighbors): if alongside Raguvà, Šeduvà (one may also add Linkuvà, etc.) we have ragùvis, šedùvis (and linkùvis …), then alongside Lietuvà there should be lietùvis (I 95). The adjective lietuviškas also shows this underlying form. As the scholar goes on to state, adjectives with this suffix retain the stress and pitch accent of the stem of the base word (bróli – bróliškas, sėserì – sėserìškas, galvìją – galvìjiškas, etc.). Elsewhere, he reasons that now and then stress may be leveled by analogy with the stress pattern of words with a similar meaning (I 206). However, applying analogy by no means always produces the expected results. For instance, one can argue equally convincingly that the stress should be on either pròcentas or proceñtas; compare loanwords of identical structure that are stressed in two different ways: brãvoras and tavõras, sliẽsorius and totòrius, ùbagas and nabãgas. In recommending the normative form pròcentas in an article written in 1938, J. Balčikonis appeals to tradition—the variant proceñtas was supposedly only beginning to spread (I 161–162). Nevertheless, in this case, it would probably have been appropriate to recognize the variants pròcentas | proceñtas; compare ãdventas|adveñtas, tãlentas|taleñtas, etc. On the other hand, preliminary observations of present-day spoken standard language suggest that some three-syllable loanwords tend to generalize stress on the first syllable—so J. Balčikonis’s proposal turns out to be promising. 21 When discussing stress retraction and shift in dialects, J. Balčikonis occasionally made mistakes. For instance, in 1928 he considered the variants progą, odą, rūšis to have the stress incorrectly shifted to the ending (I 95). He even tries to formulate a kind of regularity: dialects that preserve final stress “have a tendency, for some unknown reason, to shift the stress to the ending of every word that comes from elsewhere” (I 95), e.g., lietūvis → lietuvỹs. There is little reason to be too surprised by such mistakes: confusion between stress retraction or shift and differences between stress paradigms occurs even in our own times⁴. As for variants of the lietuvỹs type, it should be noted that the final-stressed form here is probably related to semantic factors: final stress in the singular may have been generalized from the collective form lietuviai; compare latviai, lenkai, vokiečiai, etc.⁵ Another example: in the review of the aforementioned book by V. Kamantauskas (I 100), it is stated that “an added syllable sometimes retracts the stress from the root to the ending (širdžia, širdimi), and sometimes shifts it from the ending to the beginning (pirštė, peilyje).” A brief word should also be said about proper-name vocabulary, whose standardization J. Balčikonis devoted much attention to. In more than one article or review, while defending authentic place-name forms, he also indicated their correct stress, for example: Daugai 2, Galšia 4, Juoda 3 (not Júoda 1), Maišiagala 1, Širvintos 3ᵃ, Vilnia 1. J. Balčikonis had not personally checked every name; he also relied on informants, who were unfortunately not always competent. Consequently, some of his corrections have been abandoned in more recent works on onomastics, for example forms such as Bilsas 1, Griežūnė, Leité, Taurág-nas, etc. (I 340, 372)⁶. One would like to point out one more valuable observation of a more general nature made by Balčikonis (I 372): it is not correct to assign a stress paradigm—2 or 4—to short-root and circumflex-root a-stem hydronyms in the singular (Būktas, Klãnas, Brãdas, etc.)⁷. Nevertheless, as V. Vitkauskas⁸ recently pointed out, the stress paradigm of such toponyms can be determined in dialects where the illative is used. In an article published in “Moksle ir technikoje” in 1965, “What Must Be Done Without Delay for Our Study of Language,” Balčikonis wrote, among other things: “It would be very useful to phonemically transcribe entire dialect texts… Songs, tales, and other folklore should also be marked for stress as they are written down” (I 379). The professor himself made a fine contribution to this work, setting an example: in 1953–1954 he wrote down all the songs known to the folk singer J. Jurkonienė, transcribed and marked their stress, and prepared a collection that appeared after his death (“Druskininkų dainos,” V., 1972). Incidentally, the words here are stressed not according to the melody but as they are used in spoken language. Recording as many authentic dialect texts as possible remains highly relevant today,— 4 Žr. Zinkevičius Z. Kirčio atitraukimas ir kirčiavimo paradigmos. — Kalbotyra, 1979, t. 30(1), p. 90—93. 5 For more detail, see Stundžia B. Plural personal-name oikonyms and their significance for reconstructing declension and stress systems. — In: Studies in Lithuanian Onomastics (Questions of Lithuanian Linguistics). V., 1981, vol. 21, pp. 192—193. 6 The authentic forms of these hydronyms are Bilsas, Griežūnė, Leitė, Taurãgnas; see Vanagas A. Etymological Dictionary of Lithuanian Hydronyms. — V., 1981. 7 Taip daryta „Lietuvos TSR upių ir ežerų vardyne“ (V., 1963), kurį J. Balčikonis recenzavo (I 371—373). 8 See Mūsų kalba, 1985, No. 5, pp. 40—41. 22 This was also evident in the papers presented and discussions held at the conference dedicated to the 100th anniversary of J. Balčikonis’s birth. In summary, it can be said that, in studying and standardizing accentuation, J. Balčikonis (a) followed the principle of prioritizing “living language,” inherited from J. Jablonskis and others in the tradition; (b) strictly distinguished authentic dialect facts from newly emerging phenomena; and (c) applied the principle of analogy quite successfully. Some of J. Balčikonis’s subtle observations about the relationship between accentual paradigms and semantics, as well as pragmatic differences, can be fruitfully developed further. From the Accentology of J. Balčikonis Summary In his study of accentological problems, as in his standardization work, J. Balčikonis proceeded from the priority of living language, strictly distinguished native dialect facts from innovations, and skillfully applied the principle of analogy. His works draw attention to several subtle questions of accentuation.