Debar dialect

The Debar dialect (Macedonian: Дебарски дијалект, Debarski dijalekt) is a member of the subgroup of the western and north-western dialects of the western group of dialects of Macedonian.^[1] The dialect is mainly spoken in the city of Debar and the surrounding areas in North Macedonia.^[2] The Debar dialect is closed with the Reka dialect and the dialect of Galicnik. In the dialect are used a lot of archaic words.

The Debar dialect on the map of the Macedonian dialects

Phonological characteristics

• fixed accent
• /d͡ʒ/ deaffricated and merged with /ʒ/
• the Proto-Slavic *ǫ has denasalized to [o] (*rǫka → рока)
• use of o instead of the soft form (крв > корв)
• absence of the intervocalic [v] in the plural forms of monosyllabic nouns (e.g. лебо(в)и, дождо(в)и, etc.)

Morphological characteristics

• use of ќа instead of ќе
• three definite articles pertaining to the position of the object (see Macedonian grammar)
• use of the suffix -т for third person singular