LL-L "Lexicon" 2005.09.05 (07) [E]

[Lowlands-L]

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A=Afrikaans Ap=Appalachian B=Brabantish D=Dutch E=English F=Frisian
L=Limburgish LS=Lowlands Saxon (Low German) N=Northumbrian
S=Scots Sh=Shetlandic V=(West)Flemish Z=Zeelandic (Zeêuws)
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From: Heiko Evermann <heiko.evermann at gmx.de>
Subject: LL-L "Lexicon" 2005.09.02 (04) [E/LS/German]

Hi Ron,

thanks a lot for your proposals for mathematical terms in Platt.

This just reminds me of a discussion that we had in nds.wikipedia.org just
recently. Is the a in Tall short or long? My dictionaries show both (Tall 
and
Tahl). And someone now told us that "Tall" is totally wrong, because 
everyone
speaks the "a" long here. Do you know anything about this?

Kind regards,

Heiko

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From: R. F. Hahn <sassisch at yahoo.com>
Subject: Lexicon

Heiko (above):

> thanks a lot for your proposals for mathematical terms in Platt.

You're most welcome, buddy.  It was fun.

> This just reminds me of a discussion that we had in nds.wikipedia.org just
> recently. Is the a in Tall short or long? My dictionaries show both (Tall 
> and
> Tahl). And someone now told us that "Tall" is totally wrong, because 
> everyone
> speaks the "a" long here. Do you know anything about this?

_Tal_ (<Tall>) has a short /a/, certainly in the majority of North Saxon 
dialects.  It is most definitely not wrong.  In fact, it is predominant. 
There are some dialects that actually do have a long /aa/, and I believe 
they are only in the Eastern Friesland, Emsland and Oldenburg areas, where 
LS has Frisian substrates.

Now, here's the phonological rub:

Yes, the vowel does sound somewhat long (and it would be wrong to pronounce 
_Tall_ [ta\:l] in the German way, as in _Fall_ [fal]).

Most, if not all, Low Saxon and Low Franconian varieties have a rule by 
which a short vowel comes to be lengthened before a sonorant consonant (/l/, 
/r/, /n/, /m/, /ng/).  The result of this regularly applying rule *lengthens 
a short vowel*, creating an allophone.  In other words, the phoneme is still 
short.  (I assume that this was the reason for spelling such as _aan_ in 
Dutch.)

In the case of /a/ this is very evident.  As you know, the true phonemic 
("underlying") long /aa/ is phonetically realized as [Q:] (like in Queen's 
English "party" or Swedish _ja_) and in some dialects (e.g., in Hamburg) as 
[o:].  However, a short /a/ lengthened by rule still has the sound quality 
of the short vowel: [a], except that it is somewhat longer: [a\:] or even 
[a:].  Examples:

tal <Tall> [ta\:l] 'number'
taal <Taal> ~ <Tol> [tQ:l] ~ [to:l] 'language' ('number') (Old., EF)

spar! <sparr!> [spa:] 'obstruct!', 'spread!'
spaar! <spaar!> ~ <spor!> [spQ:V] ~ [spo:V] 'save!'

ban <Bann> [ba\:n] 'ban' (cf. German _Bann_ [ban])
baan <Bahn> ~ <Bohn> [bQ:n] ~ [bo:n] 'track', 'train'

kam <Kamm> [ka\:m] 'comb' (cf. German _Kamm_ [kam])
kaam <kahm> ~ <kohm> [kQ:m] ~ [ko:m] 'come'

So it's the *quality" of the vowel that is the give-away.

Now, having said all this -- and you know why I hesitate to add it -- I have 
heard _Taal_ used by people (not from Oldenburg and Eastern Friesland) whose 
"Platt" was shaky.  If you look at dictionaries, you will find only _Tall_, 
perhaps secondarily "_Taal_ siehe _Tall_" with references to the areas with 
Frisian substrates.  What dictionary did you find _Tahl_ in?

Hold Dy vuchtig!
Reinhard/Ron

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