Dybo's law

English

Etymology

Named after the Soviet accentologist Vladimir Dybo.

Proper noun

Dybo's law

  1. (Indo-European studies) A law posited to explain the occurrence of nouns and verbs in Slavic languages that are invariantly accented on the inflectional ending.
  2. (Indo-European studies) A proposed sound law for some branches of Indo-European which posits that long vowels (often reflecting a sequence of short vowel plus laryngeal) inherited from Proto-Indo-European were shortened when immediately preceding an accented syllable.
    Synonyms: Dybo's rule, pretonic shortening

Usage notes

  • The two sound laws are named after the same linguist but otherwise unrelated.
  • The law for pretonic shortening (sense 2) is highly controversial and varies by author. In one version, it only operates when there is an intervening resonant between the long vowel or laryngeal and the accented vowel, i.e. * VH.RV́ > V.RV́ or * V̄RV́ > VRV́.

Translations