# All Slavic Languages: -mo/-me in 1st person plural



## Vulcho

Hello!

One of the major isoglosses separating east from west South Slavic languages is the -mo/-me isogloss (gledamo/gledame). I was quite surprised to find out that Slovak and Czech also use -me, while Ukrainian uses -mo. Naturally, I was expecting it to be the other way round. So, I guess my question is, is this just a coincidence, or there are some weird language contacts crossing each other? As far as I know Proto-Slavic forms ended in -mъ, so all these must be later developments. 
I would be glad to hear your thoughts on this.


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## SkyScout

Perhaps the commentary for the choice of the *"-mo"* ending at the "Slovianski" panslavic auxiliary language website may give you some further insight on this 
*HERE*  It reads:



> *1st plural:* the ending *-me* (present in Czech, Slovak, Bulgarian and Macedonian) has a slight majority over *-mo* (Ukrainian, Slovene, Serbo-Croat), *-my* (Polish, Sorbian) and *-m* (Russian, Belarussian). *However, as **o* *is the regular reflex of ъ, this solution is to be preferred. *


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## DarkChild

Bulgarian has both -me and -m, depending on the verb.


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## xpictianoc

in Polish the same but -m is rather a colloquial. 
- idzie*my* (we are going)
- idzie*m*
- będzie*my* (we will be)
- będzie*m*
In Bulgaria I very often heard people saying: govorime, mislime, vidime. My friend called them "shopska salata" becouse in this way usually speak people in western part of Bulgaria.


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## iobyo

xpictianoc said:


> In Bulgaria I very often heard people saying: govorime, mislime, vidime. My friend called them "shopska salata" becouse in this way usually speak people in western part of Bulgaria.



What they call _мекане_, right?


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## Orlin

iobyo said:


> What they call _мекане_, right?


Да.


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## ilocas2

There are 3 endings in 1st person plural in Czech:
*-íme
-áme
-eme*
(exception: jsme - we are)
In colloquial Czech the ending *-eme* is frequently shortened to *-em*.


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## DarkChild

xpictianoc said:


> in Polish the same but -m is rather a colloquial.
> - idzie*my* (we are going)
> - idzie*m*
> - będzie*my* (we will be)
> - będzie*m*
> In Bulgaria I very often heard people saying: govorime, mislime, vidime. My friend called them "shopska salata" becouse in this way usually speak people in western part of Bulgaria.


Mekane is when they add "e" to verbs that should end in -m, but there are many verbs that do end in -me (correctly).


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## francisgranada

In Slovak there is always *-me.*

It never shortens to -m because of the possible confusion with the 1. pers. singular (-m). 

But as far as I know, there are some Slovak dialects whith *-mo*, too.


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## Vulcho

So, are these endings old Slavic, or they are new developments?

O is not a reflex of ъ in Serbo-Croatian or Slovenian, so I still have no idea how it appeared (it should have been dropped by all rules).

I saw that Greek endings are -me, I wonder if this is a coincidence.

Also, is it true that Kajkavian dialect of Croatian uses -me?? The Wikipedia articles are contradicting each other.


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## Sobakus

I guess it was added to distinguish 1st person singular from plural, because all the languages except for the Eastern ones turned many(or all) -u verbs into -m verbs. I can only guess they did that in turn to differentiate between 1st person sing. and 3d person plural, which in Eastern Slavic ended in -t and didn't cause confusion.


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## Istriano

In Kajkavian Croatian it is very common, because of the frequent change of final o's to e's.

_Ideme _instead of _idemo_
_Delame _instead of _delamo_
(_dobre _instead of _dobro_)


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## Istriano

Vulcho said:


> .
> 
> Also, is it true that Kajkavian dialect of Croatian uses -me??



Yes 
Ideme spat.   [spat = supin]
Ne moreme spati. [spati = infinitive]


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## francisgranada

Istriano said:


> In Kajkavian Croatian it is very common, because of the frequent change of final o's to e's.
> 
> _Ideme _instead of _idemo_
> _Delame _instead of _delamo_
> (_dobre _instead of _dobro_)


 
It's very interesting because it seems to negate the theory about the isoglosses but rather supports the theory of "later local" solutions ... (like the -o in some Slovak dialects).

But I don't believe that the example with _dobro/dobre_ is the same thing. In the western Slavic laguages it's _dobr*e*/dobř*e*/dobrz*e ...*_, but in some other cases we find also the ending *-o* in function of adverbs (p.e. in Slovak horko, teplo, veselo, dlho, krátko ...). I think that the "regular" ending for adverbs is *-e* (of indoeoropean origin), but the original neuter form of adjectives (*-o*) could be also used in function of adverbs (and not only in the Slavic languages).


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## Istriano

There's a famous song:
_Zato braćo pijme ga, dok ne pukne zora._


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## ilocas2

francisgranada said:


> In Slovak there is always *-me.*
> 
> It never shortens to -m because of the possible confusion with the 1. pers. singular (-m).
> 
> But as far as I know, there are some Slovak dialects whith *-mo*, too.



That shortening in Czech is possible, because there's no -*em* ending in 1st person singular (exception: jsem - I am), all those verbs with the ending *-eme* have in 1st person singular *-u*, *-u/i* or *-i* (some of them have 2 patterns of conjugation, the second with the ending *-ám* or *-ím*). 

The endings *-áme* and *-íme* can't be shortened, because then it would be the same as 1st person singular.

So sometimes there are 3 forms in the plural, for example - koupeme, koupem, koupáme (in singular - koupu, koupám), and the form koupem doesn't confuse with the form koupám.


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## iobyo

I can add that Standard Macedonian and most dialects have _-ме_ while _-мо _occurs in the eastern subgroup of northern dialects.


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## vianie

francisgranada said:


> In Slovak there is always *-me.*
> 
> It never shortens to -m because of the possible confusion with the 1. pers. singular (-m).



Slovak can works only with phones in a stem.

môžeme - môžete / môžme - môžte (vowel reduction)

choďme - choďte / chojme - chojte
poďme - poďte / po(j)me - pojte (reduction of consonant clusters)


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