In Lithuanian phonology, stressed heavy syllables are pronounced in one of two prosodically distinct ways.Antanas Pakerys, "Lietuvių bendrinės kalbos prozodija." 1982. Priegaidė is translated as an accent.Kudirka R. "Acoustic features of pitch in Standard Lithuanian monophthongs." Ceeol.com One way is known as the acute or falling accent: this may be described as "sudden, sharp or rough". In Lithuanian it is called , literally 'firm-start accent'. The second way is known as the circumflex or rising accent, which may be described as "continued, mild or smooth". In Lithuanian it is called , literally 'firm-end accent'. Light (i.e. short) syllables may be stressed or unstressed, but cannot be differentiated by accent.
In written Lithuanian, various diacritic marks (acute , tilde , and grave ) are used to mark the tonal accent and stress.
Syllable weight In Lithuanian, heavy (i.e. long) syllables include those containing: long vowels (monophthongs) diphthongs (/aw aj ɛj uj/) which end in a glide ( or ) closed syllables ending in sonorants (/l m n r/) complex monophthongs (/ie/ and /uo/) behaving as a phonemic unit
Heavy syllables can be either stressed or unstressed.
In mixed acute diphthongs beginning with /i/ or /u/, the acute mark is replaced by a grave; this reflects the fact that, in the standard language (but not in some dialects), the first part of the diphthong is short. In complex diphthongs, the acute accent is marked by an acute diacritic over the first letter and the circumflex by a tilde over the second letter. This indicates a perception that the letter is stronger in some way. For example, a higher pitch or a longer or louder sound, depending on the dialect and speaker. Stressed short vowels are marked by a grave diacritic .
Stress Stress is free and can occur on any syllable of the word. However, it rarely occurs more than four syllables before the end of the word. Some nouns and adjectives have fixed stress, that is, an accent remains on the same stem syllable in all the inflections. Other nouns and adjectives have mobile stress where the accent moves from place to place, particularly between stem and ending. In each declension of the noun or adjective, there are four accent classes, one fixed and three mobile, all with different patterns of movement.
Stress is a complex of various acoustic features, particularly loudness (strength and intensity).Pakerys A. "Lietuvių bendrinės kalbos prozodija." Mokslas, Vilnius 1982. Other features such as duration, spectrum and pitch, are of lesser importance in normal speech.
The frequency of syllables stressed at various positions from the ends of words varies: the last syllable is stressed 28.67% of the time; the second last, 53.22% of the time (most commonly); the third last, 16.10%, the fourth last, 1.86% and the fifth last, 0.15% (least commonly).,Stundžia B "Lietuvių kalbos kirčiavimas: mokytojo knyga." Baltos lankos, Vilnius 1996, p20. which means that despite the apparent freedom of accentuation, more than 97% of words are in fact stressed on one of the last three syllables. The most distant syllable that can be stressed is the sixth.
Nouns stressed in this way are declined in the same manner as other polysyllabic nouns. For example, pageležinkelė̃ meaning "place along the railway" and pãgeležinkelei meaning, "in the place along the railway" (geleži̇̀nkelis meaning "railway", from geleži̇̀s meaning "iron" and kẽlias meaning "road")
Polysyllabic compound words and prefixed words, usually have one or sometimes two secondary (or weaker) stresses. The further the secondary stress is from the main stress, the stronger it is. For example, sep'tynias-dešim̃tas, "the seventieth"; pasigerv-uogiáudamas, "when picking blackberries for oneself" (masculine singular), pasigerv-uogiáuti, "to pick blackberries for oneself for some wanted period of time" pagerv-uogiáuti, "to pick blackberries for some time" (perfective verb - in the present tense the meaning is abstract) gerv-uogiáuti, "to pick blackberries" (imperfective), (gérvuogė meaning blackberry from gérvė meaning "crane" and úoga meaning "berry").
In international words, which consist of three poorly inter-flowing parts, two secondary stresses may occur. For example, 'mikro/"foto/grãfija 1, "microphotograph" 'mili/"amper/mètras 2, "milliampere meter" 'hidro/a"ero/dròmas 2, "seadrome".
Long syllables, that is, those containing a long vowel, a diphthong, or a mixed diphthong which ends in a sonorant, may have one of two types of accents: the acute or the circumflex. In an unstressed position, the opposition of the two accents is neutralized and reflected by a circumflex accent.
In dialects, there are cases when words may be differentiated only by the use of accents on unstressed syllables. One example is where an accent determines the declensional case, statýtám sg. dat., statýtam̃ sg. loc. This sg. loc. is a shorter form of statýtame. statýtas, meaning "built", the past participle (masculine sg. nom.) of statýti, meaning "to build (something)".
In standard language, such a difference would not be emphasized. The m might have an increased emphasis in the case of an ending -e drop in sg. locative.
Syllable nucleus Mixed and simple diphthongs are present only when they are followed by consonants or when they occur at the end of a word. When they are followed by a vowel, the diphthong is split into two syllables. For instance, gul̃-ti (infinitive), gù-la (third person present) and, gù-lė (third person past) (meaning "to lie on or in") kél-ti, kẽ-lia, kė́-lė ("to raise") gui-ti, gu-ja, gu-jo ("to harass or banish").
Diphthongs are distinguished from monophthongs (simple vowels) by the fact that they do not have short equivalents. Complex diphthongs differ from the others in that the second component is a vowel rather than a consonant, that is, a semivowel or sonorant, and they do not split into two syllables. For example, pri̇́eangis: the prefix is prie, not pri-e núoara: the prefix is núo, not nú-o.
Complex diphthongs also differ from monophthongs in that their rise is variable; they are longer than long vowels and, in comparison to au, ai, ei, an accent does not lengthen their parts.Kazimieras Garšva "Complex diphthongs ie, uo and their phonological interpretation." Žmogus ir žodis 2001 p.23
When foreign words are adopted, and there are simple (eu, oi, ou) or mixed diphthongs (o or e with l, m, n, or r); the sounds of the o and the e are not lengthened. One exception is the mixed diphthong or which is found in old, nativized foreign words like morkà "carrot" and, gõrčius "measure of about three litres". In this case, the o is long and marked by a circumflex when stressed or written ò when short. (Both variants are used).
Mixed diphthongs with long vowels can be found in compound words. For example, dvárponis kérplėša žẽmuogė (žẽmė meaning "earth" and úoga meaning "berry").
These can be compared to other mixed diphthongs where the long vowel is not present such as: keliõnmaišis, "a hold-all or haversack" (keliõnė meaning "trip" and mai̇̃šas meaning "bag") alkū́nkaulis, "the ulnar bone" (alkū́nė meaning "elbow" and káulas meaning "bone").
Differentiating between tone patterns Heavy syllables and diphthongs (simple, complex or mixed) may have two accents. The presence of minimal pairs, indicates the role of the two accentual patterns. For example, áukštas [ˈâʊ̯kʃtɐs] "tall" vs. aũkštas [ˈɒ̌ʊ̯ˑkʃtɐs] "storey" káltas "chisel"; kal̃tas "guilty" kóšė "(he, she or they) filtered, was/were filtering"; kõšė "porridge" rūgšti̇̀s (sg. acc., rū́gštį) "acid", rū̃gštis (sg. acc. rū̃gštį) "sourness" sū́ris "cheese"; sū̃ris "saltiness" táipinti "to type" (borrowing from the English); tai̇̃pinti* "to say 'yes' many times about something"
An accent represents a complex of acoustic features such as, sound quality (timbre), quantity, strength (intensity), fundamental frequency (pitch), and degree of pitch separation.Kudirka R. "Acoustic features of pitch in Standard Lithuanian monophthongs." Acta linguistica Lithuanica 2005 p.4a and 20b. (An analysis of the language of two speakers of standard Lithuanian). These features may be varied in order to produce dialect and in order to differentiate between two accents when they are present.
The differentiation between two accents present in monophthongs and complex diphthongs is clearest in the Samogitian dialect. It is less so in western Aukštaitian and more assimilated in the eastern and southern Aukštaitian dialects. In the standard language, accents in monophthongs differ with longer circumflex vowels both in diapason (tonal grouping) and intensity. In practice, however, these distinctions are minor. Similarly, in complex diphthongs (ie and uo), and mixed diphthongs beginning with i and u, the first element of these diphthongs does not lengthen when stressed. On the other hand, simple and mixed diphthongs starting in a and e are clearly differentiated in the standard language. The first part of the diphthong becomes longer and more tense under the acute accent. In eastern and southern Aukštaitian, diphthongs starting in i and u lengthen similarly to those in a and e, and thus the accents can be easily differentiated.
In the Samogitian and western Aukštaitian dialects, variation of pitch and tone is an important way to differentiate accents. For instance, accents may differ in where they appear in time relative to the peak of the pitch and the peak of the diapason. In particular, the acute accent, when depicted as a graph, has a curve with pitch similar to the circumflex, but more sudden. The rise lasts for a shorter time and falls more rapidly. It starts when the pitch is higher and then, after a slight and quick rise, it falls. In comparison, the circumflex accent, when depicted as a graph, has a curve in which the rise lasts longer and falls less rapidly. It begins when the pitch is a little lower than that of the acute, rises slightly to a peak that is later than the acute and then falls at a similar rate but to a lesser extent. The Samogitian dialect also uses the "laužtinė priegaidė", a variant of the acute accent. It is similar to the Latvian broken tone and the Danish stød.
Choice of intonation is used in Lithuanian and other Indo-European languages to determine meaning. The other Indo-European languages include Latvian, Serbo-Croatian and Ancient Greek. Swedish and Norwegian also have tonal distinctions, but these latter are not Proto-Germanic in origin. Rather, they are a Scandinavian innovation where tonal differences have arisen when old monosyllabic words have received an additional vowel, but have kept their original tonal characteristics.
Pronunciation Friedrich Kurschat, in his "Grammar of the Lithuanian language" (Grammatik der littauischen Sprache, 1876) called the two accents "sudden" (gestossene Betonung) and "continued" (geschliffene Betonung). He described them as different variations (rise and fall) of tone and illustrated them with notes. The circumflex tone is described as a rise of a minor third interval and for the mixed diphthongs as a rise of a perfect fourth interval. The acute tone is described as a fall of a perfect fifth interval.Girdenis A. "Frydricho Kuršaičio priegaidės (akustinė rekonstrukcija)." Baltistica 2008 XLIII (3) p.381 - 404.
Kazimieras Jaunius describes strength of voice (more than tone) as an element differentiating between the two accents. The acute accent, tvirtapradė priegaidė changes from stronger and higher to weaker and lower. The circumflex accent, tvirtagalė changes from weaker and lower to stronger and higher.Laigonaitė A. "Literatūrinės lietuvių kalbos kirčiavimas" Vilnius 1959 p. 5, 6 and 17.