Võro language

Võro
Võro
võro kiil
Native to	Estonia
Region	Southern Estonia
Native speakers	70,000
Language family	Uralic Finno-Ugric Finno-Lappic Baltic-Finnic South Estonian Võro; ; ; ; ;
Official status
Regulated by	Võro Institute (semi-official)
Language codes
ISO 639-2	fiu
ISO 639-3	; vro – Võro
ELP	Võro
	Võro language area — Võromaa (Võro county) in its historical boundaries between Tartu and Seto areas, Russia (Vinnemaa) and Latvia (Lätimaa)

Template:Estonian dialects

A 1998 ABC-book in Võro language written by Jüvä Sullõv, Kauksi Ülle etc.: "ABC kiräoppus"

The Võro language (Võro: võro kiil, Estonian: võru keel)^[1] ^[2] is a language^[3] belonging to the Baltic-Finnic branch of the Finno-Ugric languages^[4]. Traditionally it has been considered a dialect of South Estonian dialect group of the Estonian language, but nowadays it has its own literary language^[5] and is in search of official recognition as an autochthonous regional language of Estonia. Võro has about 70,000 speakers (Võros) mostly in south-eastern Estonia, in the eight parishes of historical Võru County: Karula, Harglõ, Urvastõ, Rõugõ, Kanepi, Põlva, Räpinä, and Vahtsõliina. These parishes are currently centered (due to redistricting) in Võru and Põlva Counties with parts extending into Valga and Tartu counties. Speakers can also be found in the towns of Tallinn, Tartu and the rest of Estonia^[6]^[7]^[8].

History

Võro is a descendant of the old South Estonian tribal language and is the least influenced by Standard Estonian (which is based on Northern Estonian dialects). Võro was once spoken further south and east of historical Võromaa in South Estonian-speaking enclaves Lutsi, Leivu and Kraasna in what is now Latvia and Russia. In addition to Võro, other contemporary variants of South Estonian include the Mulgi, Tartu and Seto language or dialect.

One of the earliest written evidences of South Estonian is a translation of the New Testament (Wastne Testament) published in 1686. Although the status of South Estonian began to diminish after the 1880s, the language began to undergo a revival in the late 1980s.

Present situation

Today, Võro is used in the works of some of Estonia's most well known playwrights, poets, and authors (Madis Kõiv, Ülle Kauksi, Jaan Kaplinski, Ain Kaalep etc.). One newspaper is printed in Võro: the fortnightly Uma Leht (literally Our Own Newspaper). 26 public schools offer weekly special (mostly extracurricular) classes in modern Võro. Estonia's contribution to the Eurovision Song Contest 2004 was the song "Tii", which was performed by Neiokõsõ in Võro. The language is definitely endangered^[9] by standard Estonian due to the lack of the government's legal commitment to protect the language.

Writing system

Võro employs the Latin alphabet, like Estonian and Finnish.

А /ɑ/	B /p/	C /t͡s/	D /t/	E /e/	F /f/	G /k/	H /h/	I /i/	J /j/	K /kk/
L /l/	M /m/	N /n/	O /o/	P /pp/	Q /ʔ/	R /r/	S /ss/	Š /ʃʃ/	T /tt/	U /u/
V /v/	W /v/	Õ /ɤ/	Ä /æ/	Ö [ø]	Ü /y/	X /ks/	Y /ɨ/	Z /s/	Ž /ʃ/	' /◌ʲ/

Most letters (including ä, ö, ü, and õ) denote the same sounds as in Estonian, with a few exceptions. The letter q stands for the glottal stop /ʔ/ and y denotes /ɨ/, a vowel very close to Russian ы or Polish y (from 2005 written õ). The acute accent marks palatalization of consonants (like in Polish): ś, ń, ľ, ť, ḱ, h́, ḿ, and so on.

Phonology

Vowels

	Unrounded	Rounded	Unrounded	Rounded
	Front		Back
Close	i	y	ɨ	u
Mid	e	ø	ɤ	o
Open	æ		ɑ

In Võro there is vowel harmony, typical of many Finno-Ugric languages but lacking in modern standard Estonian.

Consonants

	Bilabial	Labio- dental	Alveolar	Palatal	Velar	Glottal
Plosive	p pʲ		t tʲ		k kʲ	ʔ
Affricate			ts tsʲ
Nasal	m mʲ		n nʲ		ŋ ŋʲ
Fricative		v vʲ	s sʲ			h hʲ
Approximant			l lʲ	j
Trill			r rʲ

All Võro consonants (except /j/ and /ʔ/) can be palatalized. The glottal stop (q, IPA [ʔ]) is a very common sound in Võro.

Differences between Võro, Estonian and Finnish

Significant difference between standard Estonian and the Võro language is vowel harmony. There is no vowel harmony in the majority of North Estonian dialects and standard Estonian, but it exists in the Võro and Finnish languages; compare:

Estonian	Võro	Finnish	Meaning
küla	külä	kylä	village
küsinud	küsünüq	kysynyt	(has been) asked
hõbedane	hõbõhõnõ	hopeinen	(made of) silver

Some morphological features of the Võro language are considered to be very old. For instance the 3rd person singular of the indicative mood can be either without an ending or, alternatively, with a s-ending:

Estonian	Võro	Finnish	Meaning
kirjutab	kirotas	kirjoittaa	he writes
annab	and	antaa	he gives

Among the Finnic languages, such double verb conjugation can be found only in the South Estonian and Karelian languages.

Võro has a negative particle that is appended to the end of the verb, whereas standard Estonian and Finnish have a negative verb, which precedes the verb. In Estonian and Finnish, the negative verb ei (Finnish en/et/ei/emme/ette/eivät) is used in both present and past negation, whereas in Võro the same is expressed by different particles ending with -i(q) or -s:

Estonian	Võro	Finnish	Meaning
sa ei anna	saq anna-aiq	sinä et anna	You don't give
ma ei tule	maq tulõ-õiq	minä en tule	I don't come
sa ei andnud	saq anna-as	sinä et antanut	You didn't give
ma ei tulnud	maq tulõ-õs	minä en tullut	I didn't come

Differences in vocabulary between Estonian and the Võro language can be clearly seen in everyday speech (yet a common Estonian is able to understand most everyday Võro words, since many of them exist in Standard Estonian as dialectal synonyms for the words given or in literary language); many Võro words are closer to Finnish than to Estonian:

Estonian	Võro	Dialectal/literary Estonian	Finnish	Meaning
punane	verrev	verev	(punainen)	red
soe	lämmi	lämmi, lämbe	lämmin	warm
jahe	oigõ	-	(haalea)	cool, chilly
õde	sõsar	sõsar- (in compound words)	sisar	sister
uus	vahtsõnõ	vastne	(uusi)	new
koer	pini	peni	(koira)	dog
pöial	päss	-	(peukalo)	thumb
pesema	mõskma	mõskma	(pestä)	to wash
tänavu	timahavva	-	(tänä vuonna)	this year
hunt	susi	susi	susi	wolf
mäger	kähr	-	(mäyrä)	badger
laupäev	puulpäiv	-	(lauantai)	Saturday
surema	kuulma	koolma	kuolla	to die
sõstar	hõrak	-	herukka	currant
kask	kõiv	kõiv	koivu	birch
nutma	ikma	itkema	itkeä	to weep
märkama	rõbahtama	-	(huomata)	to notice

Language example

Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in Võro:

[Kõik inemiseq sünnüseq avvo ja õiguisi poolõst ütesugumaidsis. Näile om annõt mudsu ja süämetunnistus ja nä piät ütstõõsõga vele muudu läbi käümä.] Error: {{Lang}}: text has italic markup (help)

As comparison the same sentence in Standard Estonian:

[Kõik inimesed sünnivad vabadena ja võrdsetena oma väärikuselt ja õigustelt. Neile on antud mõistus ja südametunnistus ja nende suhtumist üksteisesse peab kandma vendluse vaim.] Error: {{Lang}}: text has italic markup (help)

In Finnish:

[Kaikki ihmiset syntyvät vapaina ja tasavertaisina arvoltaan ja oikeuksiltaan. Heille on annettu järki ja omatunto, ja heidän on toimittava toisiaan kohtaan veljeyden hengessä.] Error: {{Lang}}: text has italic markup (help)

Basic greetings

Tereq! - Hello! Good day!

(Tere) hummogust - Good morning

(Tere) õdagust - Good evening

Hääd üüd / hüvvä üüd - Good night

Näemiq - See you later

Hüvvä / hääd nägemist - Goodbye

Rõõm nätäq - Nice to meet you

Aiteh / Aitjumma - Thank you

Kuis lätt - How are you / How you doing?

Häste - I'm fine

Olõq terveq tulõmast! - Welcome!

Important words and phrases

jah / jaa - yes

ei - no

ma olõ - I am

maq, saq, tä - I, you, he/she

miiq, tiiq, nääq - we, you, they

seo - this, it

taa / tuu - that, it

muidoki - of course

Mul om - I have

Sul om - You have

Kas sul om? - do you have?

Mul olõ-õiq - I have not

üts, kats, kolm, neli, viis - one, two, three, four, five

kuus, säidse, katõsa, ütesä, kümme - six, seven, eight, nine, ten

sada, tuhat, mill'on - hundred, thousand, million

vabandust / pallõ andis - sorry or excuse me

vesi - water

Eesti - Estonia

Võromaa - Võro area

võro kiil - Võro language

võrokõnõ - Võro (person)

eestläne - Estonian (person)

saa-i arvo - I don't understand

saa arvo - (I) understand

Kas võro kiilt mõistat? - Do you understand Võro?

Kas inglüse kiilt kõnõlõt? - Do you speak English?

Ma olõ ingläne / ameeriklanõ / kanadalanõ / austraallanõ / vahtsõmeremaalanõ / iirläne / sotlanõ - I am English / American / Canadian / Australian / New Zealander / Irish / Scottish

Kon sa elät / kon ti elät? - Where do you live?

Notes

^ Võro language by Kara D. Brown, Phd at Indiana University
^ Database Linguae: Maailma keeled, kirjad ja rahvad at Institute of the Estonian Language
^ Documentation for ISO 639 identifier: vro at ISO 639-3
^ Endangered languages in Europe and North Asia by Tapani Salminen. Published in: Encyclopedia of the world’s endangered languages. Edited by Christopher Moseley. London & New York: Routledge, 2007. 211–280.
^ Võru kirjakeele sõnamuutmissüsteem (Inflectional Morphology in the Võro Literary Language) by Sulev Iva, Phd at Tartu University, (English summary pp 144-146)
^ About the Võro language at Võro Institute
^ Võro language by Evar Saar, Phd at Võro Institute
^ Võro language at Omniglot linguistic database
^ UNESCO Interactive Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger UNESCO

External links

[1] Võro language by Kara D. Brown, Phd at Indiana University

[2] Database Linguae: Maailma keeled, kirjad ja rahvad at Institute of the Estonian Language

[3] Documentation for ISO 639 identifier: vro at ISO 639-3

[4] Endangered languages in Europe and North Asia by Tapani Salminen. Published in: Encyclopedia of the world’s endangered languages. Edited by Christopher Moseley. London & New York: Routledge, 2007. 211–280.

[5] Võru kirjakeele sõnamuutmissüsteem (Inflectional Morphology in the Võro Literary Language) by Sulev Iva, Phd at Tartu University, (English summary pp 144-146)

[6] About the Võro language at Võro Institute

[7] Võro language by Evar Saar, Phd at Võro Institute

[8] Võro language at Omniglot linguistic database

[9] UNESCO Interactive Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger UNESCO

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