Authors

Discussion

Late Common Slavic palatalizations refer to the first two palatlizations of velars g, k, x (5-8) and reduction in the clusters ‘consonant (velar, dental, labial) + j’ into a single palatalized consonant (6th-10th centuries) (Shevelov 1965, 216-222, 346). In Old Ukrainian of a period of Kyivan Rus’, these changes resulted in a development of new consonantal phonemes, that is, palatal fricatives ž’ (ǯ’), š’, č’, ź, ś, ć, nasal n’, and liquids l’, r’, which I analyse in connection with the phonetic/phonological system of the Kryvorivnja dialect (Kr) of Ukrainian. Kr, one of the Hutsul dialects in the Carpathian area, largely renders k-reflexes of the late fourth palatalization of velars and before e as [t^j] in the medial phase and palatal plosive [c] close to [k^j] by articulation withing a frame of a syllable and word. Most of Kr consonants are palatalized after unrounded vowels and non-palatalized after rounded, according to a tendency toward intrasyllabic harmony introduced in LCS. I argue that fluctuations served as a requirement for the first velar palatalization in LCS supplemented by the fact that j-clusters underwent palatalization two centuries later