# Genitive plural in Serbian



## Зрак

As I found out when I studied the genitive case in Serbian, consonant clusters at the end of the words get divided by an "a" in the genitive plural, except when those clusters are ст, зд, шт, жд, шћ и жђ or consonant-j. Are there any exceptions to this rule and if yes can someone give an example. I also couldn't think of a word ending in an жд cluster, so such an example would be appreciated.


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## iezik

жд examples: дужд, вожд, Либражд, Звижд, Велбужд, Бикмођорижд, Горажд

So, mostly foreign proper names.


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## Panceltic

I think that the "dividing a" only appears when there was a semi-vowel in Proto-Slavic.

An example (from Wikipedia) without the dividing a: sg. _raščupànko_, gen. _raščupànka_; pl. _raščupànci_, gen. _*raščupánkā*_.

There is also the strange case of _brȅskva_, gen.pl. *brȅskvī* or _brȅsākā_.


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## bragpipes

Panceltic said:


> I think that the "dividing a" only appears when there was a semi-vowel in Proto-Slavic.



I don't know about that, Panceltic.   This also happens to student > studenti > studenata.  

Also: 
sestra > sestara
pjesma > pjesama *1
pismo > pisama *2
banka > banaka 


*1 This is a South Slavic word.  It went through a lot of transformations: from *pěsnь:  n became m, the reduced vowel became "a" but the gen. pl. a breaks up the s-m cluster.  pjesama.

*2 - I don't know what the PS root of pismo is.  Russian has a soft sign after the s.  I don't know if that's the remnant of a soft vowel or just a palatalized s.  

Also, društvo > društava.  The root is *drugъ + *-ьstvo, but the -a- appears not where the reduced vowels are, but where here in the consonant cluster -stvo > št*a*va.


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## Зрак

The root of pismo I can deduce being with an yer vowel, because of Bulgarian dimunitive писмо->пис*ъ*мце.


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## Panceltic

I stand corrected. Also about пис*ъ*мце, this vowel may have been inserted later to facilitate pronunciation? Slovenian: pismo > pisemce


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## Sobakus

The reason for the epenthetic vowel is that the original Gen. Pl. for all stems but i-stems ended in a yer, which after being dropped sometimes resulted in a final cluster (originally with few native words, but with many borrowings that ended in a cluster). BCS apparently took the hint from _-*ьk/ъk*_ (as well as _-*ьмо*_ and the like) suffixed words where the vowel was restored regularly from a strong yer, and extended it to most other cases of clusters in Gen. Pl. The final -_*ā*_ appears later, around 14th century, and is usually explained as some kind of analogy. Interestingly, Slovene too has an unexpected Gen.Pl. in _-*a*_ for some a-stem nouns.

Most other languages chose the *-ov* ending from u-stems to do the same instead, but for ex. the Gen.Pl. of *-stvo* still produces an awkward cluster in Russian.


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## Panceltic

Sobakus said:


> Interestingly, Slovene too has an unexpected Gen.Pl. in _-*a*_ for some a-stem nouns.
> 
> Most other languages chose the *-ov* ending from u-stems to do the same instead, but for ex. the Gen.Pl. of *-stvo* still produces an awkward cluster in Russian.



True. It also appears in one r-stem noun (*hči*, gen. pl. *hčera*) but not in the other (*mati*, gen. pl. *mater*).

As for the *-stvo* ending, it is resolved like this: *-stev*.


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## Sobakus

Panceltic said:


> As for the *-stvo* ending, it is resolved like this: *-stev*.


This happens only with a few words like _*сестра́*_ (Gen.Pl. *сестёр*) and _*веслó*_ (Gen.Pl. _*вёсел*_) in Russian as far as I can think, at least orthographically, while other cases of final *-Cr* are resolved with a non-orthographic shwa (unless you postulate a syllabic /r/).


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## Panceltic

Sobakus said:


> This happens only with _*сестра́*_ (Gen.Pl. *сестёр*) in Russian as far as I can think, at least orthographically, while other cases of final *-Cr* are resolved with a non-orthographic shwa (unless you postulate a syllabic /r/).



Interestingly, sestra in Slovenian is one of those nouns mentioned above, so gen.pl is sestra.


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## Зрак

Panceltic said:


> I stand corrected. Also about пис*ъ*мце, this vowel may have been inserted later to facilitate pronunciation? Slovenian: pismo > pisemce


A regular outcome of the law of the open syllables, nonetheless you are right, there is no yer in the original form писмѧ.


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## Милан

Одежда gen.pl. одежда

Срце gen.pl. срца
there is also gen.pl. срдаца (but this is archaic)


акорд has also 2 gen.pl. forms акорда and акорада
бицикл also бицикала and бицикла
приповетка also приповедака and приповетки
колевка also колевака and колевки
дупља -> дупаља and дупља and дупљи (omg )

no 'fleeting a' (mostly new foreign words)
волт -> волти and волта
хорда -> хорди
ритам -> ритмова
офсајд ->офсајда
митинг -> митинга
викенд -> викенда


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## ahvalj

Sobakus said:


> The final -_*ā*_ appears later, around 14th century, and is usually explained as some kind of analogy. Interestingly, Slovene too has an unexpected Gen.Pl. in _-*a*_ for some a-stem nouns.


Dybo (_Дыбо ВА · 2000 · Морфологизированные парадигматические акцентные системы. Типология и генезис. Том I:_ 21) believes that this ending continues the Late Common Slavic abnormal long final _ъ,_ which in its turn probably represents the irregular outcome of _*-ōn<*-ōm._ This view is supported by the prosodic properties of this ending in Serbo-Croatian and Slovene that cause the change from the acute to the neo-circumflex intonation on the stressed vowel — a phenomenon which otherwise is found before:

the Common Slavic non-acute lengths
the _ē_ of the thematic Present stems
the new long vowels of contractional origin (in Slovene)
the new long vowels that arise as a result of the fall of the yers _before_ them (_ьja>ā_).
In all cases it is the long vowel that causes this acute>neo-circumflex metatony.

So, in this framework, earlier Common Slavic had _*-ōn_ in the _ā-_ and _o/e_-stems (<_-*ehₐom,_ *_-oom: *rankōn, *stalōn_) and *_-an_ elsewhere (<*_-om: *nebesan, *sūnau̯an, *galambiı̯an_), then the former variant was influenced by the latter while keeping and expanding its prosodic properties to the new generalized ending.

What this theory fails to explain is the clarification of _ъ_ before this ending in Serbo-Croatian (*_pisьmъ̄>pisamā_ instead of the expected _**pismā_).


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