Lithuanian thread

[rotting bones]

Wikipedia on Lithuanian grammar:

Nouns and other parts of nominal morphology are declined in seven cases: nominative, genitive, dative, accusative, instrumental, locative (inessive), and vocative. In older Lithuanian texts, three additional varieties of the locative case are found: illative, adessive and allative. The most common are the illative, which is still used, mostly in spoken language, and the allative, which survives in the standard language in some idiomatic usages. The adessive is nearly extinct. These additional cases are probably due to the influence of Uralic languages, with which Baltic languages have had a longstanding contact. (Uralic languages possess a great variety of noun cases, a number of which are specialised locative cases.)

Is Lithuanian so conservative because it spent all these centuries developing additional cases from Uralic influence and then losing them again?

(Sorry, this is the level at which I understand IE linguistics.)

[hwhatting]

It's in an area where case inflection is usual; Russian has 6*) (true AFAIK also for Belarussian and Ukrainian), Polish has 7. Being in contact with Uralic languages with a rich agglutinative case system probably has played a role.
*) Not counting 2-3 more marginal cases.

[rotting bones]

It's in an area where case inflection is usual; Russian has 6*) (true AFAIK also for Belarussian and Ukrainian), Polish has 7. Being in contact with Uralic languages with a rich agglutinative case system probably has played a role.
*) Not counting 2-3 more marginal cases.

Thanks. I associate a language having the "illative, adessive and allative" cases with Uralic.

[rotting bones]

All the linguistic histories of Lithuanian are behind a paywall, so here are a few sentences of BALTA DROBULĖ, a Lithuanian novel set in New York City: https://www.xn--altiniai-4wb.info/files ... LHP200.pdf Warning: I don't speak Lithuanian. Nor have I studied it in much detail.

BALTA DROBULĖ
White Shroud

B. M. T. Broadway line.

Ekspresas

express

sustoja.

stop.3s

The Express stops.

Antanas

Anthony

Garšva

Garšva

išeina

exit.3

į

towards

peroną.

platform

Antanas Garšva enters the station.

Šešios

six

iki

until

keturių

four.gen

popiet.

afternoon

It's six to four in the afternoon.

(Really?)

Jis

3s.m

žingsniuoja

walk.3s

apytuščiu

half.empty

peronu.

platform

He walks across the half-empty platform.

Dvi

two

negrės

black.woman.pl

žaliom

green.inst

sukniom

dress.inst

stebi

watch.3p

išeinančius.

departee.pl.acc

Two black women in green dresses watch the leaving passengers.

Garšva

Garšva

užtraukia

pull.3s

škotiškų

Scottish.pl

marškinių

shirt.pl.gen

ziperį.

zipper.acc

Garšva pulls up the zipper of his Scottish shirt.

Šąla

freezing

rankų

hand.gen

ir

also

kojų

leg.pl.gen

pirštai,

finger.pl

His hands and toes are freezing

nors

although

rugpjūčio

August.gen

mėnuo

moon

New

New

Yorke.

York.loc

even though it's only the month of August in New York.

[hwhatting]

Thanks. I associate a language having the "illative, adessive and allative" cases with Uralic.

To be clear, these three are indeed usually explained as due to the influence of Fennic lanugages. But the retention of more of the PIE case system is a feature of neigboring Slavic languages as well.
And as your textbook says, the three extra cases are on the way out; none of them shows up in the excerpt you quote (not that a short excerpt like this can be really representative).

Šešios

six

iki

until

keturių

four.gen

popiet.

afternoon

It's six to four in the afternoon.

(Really?)

Why the "really"?

[rotting bones]

To be clear, these three are indeed usually explained as due to the influence of Fennic lanugages. But the retention of more of the PIE case system is a feature of neigboring Slavic languages as well.

Thanks. I'm fluent in Russian (or at least I was a few years ago). I'm on the lookout for the cases I'm familiar with being used differently.

And as your textbook says, the three extra cases are on the way out; none of them shows up in the excerpt you quote (not that a short excerpt like this can be really representative).

I was saying that maybe Lithuanian wasn't exactly standing still. It innovated new cases. That was the thrust of its innovation. Then it got rid of the novel cases it had created.

Šešios

six

iki

until

keturių

four.gen

popiet.

afternoon

It's six to four in the afternoon.

(Really?)

Why the "really"?

The minutes weren't a multiple of five, so I wondered if I was misreading something.