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Prosodische Geschichte des Slovakischen

The following work explains the influence of the discourse of Slavic accentology on Slovak linguistics in its development. The prosodic features of Slovak – especially the syllabic quantity – were explained first as an inherited ablaut-system, and since 1930s by the theory of Common Slavic metatony. Nevertheless, a parallel discourse in Leiden school of accentology developed, concerning some language changes in (especially Central) Slovak dialects, e.g. the rhythmic law and the compensatory lengthening. The text asks, in how far we can productively explain historical changes by using synchrone dialectal data, as well as the methods employed by Slovak linguists in this matter. The text concludes with a model of relative chronology of prosodic changes in the dialect of Liptau, which was used as a model for standard Slovak language.