North Slavic present participles and case endings of soft stems

Abstract

This article posits a regular sound change of final *-ı̄n(s) to *-ē(s) in the group of Slavic dialects from which East and West Slavic later developed. This change accounts for the origin of some case endings of the "soft" stems (the nominative and accusative plural and the genitive singular of jā-stems, as well as the accusative plural of jo-stems). This change never occurred in the ancestors of the South Slavic dialects, but it still preceded some Common Slavic sound changes, such as the change of Proto-Slavic *ē to *ā after *j. This accounts for the origin of the North Slavic present participles in -a (e.g. Old Russian nesa, bera) which spread analogically from the verbs in which -a developed regularly from *ā after j (e.g. Old Russian znaja).