PC/WI: Different South Slavic languages

[Fehérvári]

Could the Croatian language standardise based on the Chakavian and the Slavonian language on the Kaykavian if Hungary remains intact, keeps and conquers Northern Serbia (Macva/ Syrmia South to the Danube) and the Great Serb Migration doesn't happen? If yes, what could be the consequences.

Also would the Serbs in Hungary and Turkey standardise their language based on different dialects? The Serbs in Hungary based on Eastern Shtokavian, while the Serbs in Turkey based on Torlakian? If yes, would most of the Serbs in Turkey eventually start to identify as Bulgarian?

what about the Bosnians?

What could be the other consequences?

I'm eager to hear your opinions on this subject!

 

[Dementor]

Could the Croatian language standardise based on the Chakavian and the Slavonian language on the Kaykavian if Hungary remains intact, keeps and conquers Northern Serbia (Macva/ Syrmia South to the Danube) and the Great Serb Migration doesn't happen? If yes, what could be the consequences.

It doesn't make much sense for Croatian to be standardized on Chakavian since this was always a minority language version, more common in Istria and Dalmatia than in Croatia proper. It's possible that Croatian could be standardized on the Kaykavian norm, which would also apply to Slavonian (no reason really for a separate language there).

Also would the Serbs in Hungary and Turkey standardise their language based on different dialects? The Serbs in Hungary based on Eastern Shtokavian, while the Serbs in Turkey based on Torlakian? If yes, would most of the Serbs in Turkey eventually start to identify as Bulgarian?

The Torlaks were not generally considered (and did not consider themselves) Serbs before Serbian influence spread from the Serbian principality and most importantly, before their area was incorporated in Serbia in 1878. Since this isn't happening in your scenario, it's most unlikely for Serbian to be standardized based on the Torlakian dialect.

what about the Bosnians?

Even in OTL while the language officially exists, it's the same language from the linguist point of view as the other languages standardized on Shtokavian, And since the Shtokavian dialects have dominated pretty thoroughly in Bosnia even before the Ottoman conquest (see map), it seems unlikely this would be any different.

So I would say that in you scenario there would be de-facto four South Slavic languages: Bulgarian (including Torlak), Serbian/Bosnian, Croatian (here much more distinct than in OTL) and Slovenian.

 

[Damian0358]

I've written before about possible alternate standardizations of Serbo-Croatian, though they all primarily centered around the 19th century, while this seems to be asking from a 18th century or earlier POD, something I'm not as well-versed on linguistically. With the Great Serb Migrations not happening, do the Croat Migrations also not happen? That may additionally affect the dialects of the region.

Around the 18th century, from what I've read, there was something akin to a standardized form of Croatian that was being used at the time by its administration and intellectuals. It seems to have been an Ikavian form of Kajkavian, though I can't seem to confirm this. Though something I can confirm is that, around this time, there were attempts to unify the best elements of Čakavian, Kajkavian and Štokavian into one Croatian language, mainly by those of the Ozaljan Literary Circle, which included Petar Zrinski and Fran Krsto Frankopan. Though this apparent linguistic renaissance in Croatia would come to an end with the execution of those two by Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I, as a result of the conspiracy they were a part of, and this Croatian literary standard would gradually be abandoned.

Around the same time, with works such as those by Andrija Kačić Miošić, as well as both the Serb and Croat Migrations, we would see a steady rise in the usage of Štokavian in Croatia, which had already been the preferred way of speaking in Serbia, Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina.

I can't really speculate any further unless a decisive POD could be identified, since Hungary remaining intact could imply a Hungarian victory during the Ottoman-Hungarian War against Sultan Suleiman I, and that alone causes so many butterflies.

 

[Fehérvári]

It doesn't make much sense for Croatian to be standardized on Chakavian since this was always a minority language version, more common in Istria and Dalmatia than in Croatia proper. It's possible that Croatian could be standardized on the Kaykavian norm, which would also apply to Slavonian (no reason really for a separate language there).

Interesting. My idea upon the split in the Croat and Slavon languages are based on, that until the mid-15th century, the nobilities in Croatia and Slavonia had quite distinctive conscousness, while the local customs were also a bit different among the folks. With the preservation of the separation of the two Banates, I speculated that they would probably evolve in different ways, thus by the time of the emergence of popular nationalism these two would have very different identity.

The Torlaks were not generally considered (and did not consider themselves) Serbs before Serbian influence spread from the Serbian principality and most importantly, before their area was incorporated in Serbia in 1878. Since this isn't happening in your scenario, it's most unlikely for Serbian to be standardized based on the Torlakian dialect.

This means, the Torlakians would probably become part of the Bulgarian nation then.

Even in OTL while the language officially exists, it's the same language from the linguist point of view as the other languages standardized on Shtokavian, And since the Shtokavian dialects have dominated pretty thoroughly in Bosnia even before the Ottoman conquest (see map), it seems unlikely this would be any different.

Ah yes, that map was which inspired me to launch this thread in the first place. However, the Bosnians were always a bit different, werent they? I speak primarily from a religious point of view, which even though their language with the Serbs is almost the same could still lead to a different identity. If they maintain their own church, that's their reason for separation, if they become muslim as OTL, than that's the reason, and if they somehow become catholic, then they basically become the OTL Croats. But if they become orthodox, then that's a whole different story.

So I would say that in you scenario there would be de-facto four South Slavic languages: Bulgarian (including Torlak), Serbian/Bosnian, Croatian (here much more distinct than in OTL) and Slovenian.

Sounds about right(, read my suggestions though, I'm eager to hear your opinion). Maybe my other question, that how close could the Kaykavian and Slovenian languages become?

I've written before about possible alternate standardizations of Serbo-Croatian, though they all primarily centered around the 19th century, while this seems to be asking from a 18th century or earlier POD, something I'm not as well-versed on linguistically. With the Great Serb Migrations not happening, do the Croat Migrations also not happen? That may additionally affect the dialects of the region.

Basically my goal is to preserve the linguistic boundaries of the region prior the the changes in the XVIth century. Dementor posted a quite good map about it (even though the Magyar population is not showed properly, nvm), but I here's my map, which partially covers this area:

This is a map about the Kingdom of Hungary in around 1500, which shows the approximate language borders of the time. Legend: Red = Magyar; Orange = Vlach; Light Turquoise = Slovak; Green = German; Purple = Rusyn; Levander = Slovene; and finally those which matter right now, Turquoise = Kaykavian; Bluish Grey = Chakavian; Brown = Western Shtokavian; Yellowish Green = Eastern Shtokavian.

Around the 18th century, from what I've read, there was something akin to a standardized form of Croatian that was being used at the time by its administration and intellectuals. It seems to have been an Ikavian form of Kajkavian, though I can't seem to confirm this. Though something I can confirm is that, around this time, there were attempts to unify the best elements of Čakavian, Kajkavian and Štokavian into one Croatian language, mainly by those of the Ozaljan Literary Circle, which included Petar Zrinski and Fran Krsto Frankopan. Though this apparent linguistic renaissance in Croatia would come to an end with the execution of those two by Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I, as a result of the conspiracy they were a part of, and this Croatian literary standard would gradually be abandoned.

Yes, by this time, the two sides of the Kapela Mountain Range was clearly on a path on cultural unification already, however this happened after/during the migration wave and the unification of the two Banates. It's quite a bit late for this POD.

Around the same time, with works such as those by Andrija Kačić Miošić, as well as both the Serb and Croat Migrations, we would see a steady rise in the usage of Štokavian in Croatia, which had already been the preferred way of speaking in Serbia, Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Well, yes, that was OTL.

I can't really speculate any further unless a decisive POD could be identified, since Hungary remaining intact could imply a Hungarian victory during the Ottoman-Hungarian War against Sultan Suleiman I, and that alone causes so many butterflies.

Let's say the Southern fortification system of Hungary doesn't collapse and the Turks remain bogged down there. The borders remain relatively the same until the very end of the XVIIth century, when Bosnia( without Hercegovina), whole Macva and Oltenia is lost by the Turks. Then the borders remain the same until around 1800. After that idk.

 

[Damian0358]

Yes, by this time, the two sides of the Kapela Mountain Range was clearly on a path on cultural unification already, however this happened after/during the migration wave and the unification of the two Banates. It's quite a bit late for this POD.

Well, yes, that was OTL.

Well, I hope you didn't mind that I wrote all that then, since I felt as though some extra regional context could've been used for the discussion.

Basically my goal is to preserve the linguistic boundaries of the region prior the the changes in the XVIth century. Dementor posted a quite good map about it (even though the Magyar population is not showed properly, nvm), but I here's my map, which partially covers this area.

Let's say the Southern fortification system of Hungary doesn't collapse and the Turks remain bogged down there. The borders remain relatively the same until the very end of the XVIIth century, when Bosnia( without Hercegovina), whole Macva and Oltenia is lost by the Turks. Then the borders remain the same until around 1800. After that idk.

Now, I'm not exactly sure how you can preserve linguistic boundaries completely during this time period, though that may be because I'm not a linguistic historian, only knowing some facts here or there.

So, we can assume the loss at Mohács, among others, is prevented. So, we have a time frame between the early 16th century and the very end of the 17th century, which I would imagine depicts a very different period of war between Hungary and the Ottomans, since I very much doubt the Ottomans would stop trying to take Hungary.

The main issue for me in continuing this discussion is, well, my unfamiliarity with the history of the region between the 15th and 18th centuries, roughly the majority period of the Ottoman wars against Europe. But I do know that there are severe implications for the continued survival of Louis II, especially when it comes to the Habsburgs. And while the historical implications of this entire scenario aren't all too relevant to this discussion, I generally like to have a base from which I could stand on when it comes to details such as this.

Ah yes, that map was which inspired me to launch this thread in the first place. However, the Bosnians were always a bit different, werent they? I speak primarily from a religious point of view, which even though their language with the Serbs is almost the same could still lead to a different identity. If they maintain their own church, that's their reason for separation, if they become muslim as OTL, than that's the reason, and if they somehow become catholic, then they basically become the OTL Croats. But if they become orthodox, then that's a whole different story.

Sounds about right(, read my suggestions though, I'm eager to hear your opinion). Maybe my other question, that how close could the Kaykavian and Slovenian languages become?

Religiously, speaking about their history with Christianity, the region of Bosnia, and Herzegovina (which by this point had received its regional name), had always been in some ways behind the times when it came to the latest dogma. The Bosnian Church was considered heretical, but it wasn't Bogomilist or anything as they were accused - they were heretical purely because they hadn't kept up with the developments the other churches were doing and were effectively out of touch (more info here). The Church itself was heavily connected with the aristocracy and court, and thus when Bosnia fell, the Church itself began to dissipate and merge with the other Christian groups in the region, with some slowly moving towards Islam due to it being more beneficial under the Ottomans, though for most of their occupation they seemingly ended up switching to a syncretic sort of Abrahamic religion, merging Islam and Christianity, leading to situations where one brother followed Muhammad's teachings while the other believed in Christ.

Personally, I feel as though there will be some sort of migration happening for the Serbs, especially if the same set of circumstances occurred this timeline. I'm not as certain about the Croats, but if we have continued conflict between the Hungarians and the Ottomans, there may be a much more minor migration. Still, this does leave us dialectically different for this Hungarian pushback against the Ottomans in the late 17th century.

While I'm not certain about the precise religious situation in Bosnia at that point, the Bosnian Church as an entity is long gone, and there may be a push towards getting those in the region to follow Catholicism, especially by the Pope. This doesn't guarantee that they become exactly like the Croats though. The region has had a very fascinating history up to this point, and any push towards making them more Croatian may result in them adopting a uniquely developed Bosnian identity. This has implications that I'll get into.

With Kajkavian, Slovenian, and we could also add Čakavian, honestly, the only reason they didn't effectively become the same language is because of the separation between Austria and Hungary, at first literal before becoming administerial with Cisleithania and Transleithania. With this POD, assuming the Habsburgs don't eventually take Hungary, we may see either no difference to OTL or slight more divergence between Kajkavian/Čakavian and Slovenian.

So, concentrating directly on dialects only, Serbian is unchanged in its course of Štokavian, though the exact dialect they may use could end up different from OTL, since we can assume Vuk Karadžić to have been butterflied. The way they speak could also end up differently, since we don't know if we'll see Ekavian manifest itself as the dominant way of speaking like OTL or if Ijekavian will win out. Croatian, by way of butterflies, could see a lot less Štokavian TTL, and this may push it towards a Kajkavian-Čakavian mix, though whether they'll speak in Ekavian, Ijekavian or Ikavian I'm not entirely certain. Bosnian, on the other hand, would probably also be Štokavian, though of a different kind to Serbian, and it may pick the way of speaking that isn't used by Croatian or Serbian (so if Serbian is Ijekavian and Croatian is Ikavian, Bosnian could end up Ekavian, etc, etc). If we also take into consideration that Slavonia would lean more towards Bosnian than Serbian when it comes to Štokavian, with the separation of the two banates, we may end up seeing Slavonian and Bosnian coincide with one another. So, the internal Serbo-Croatian languages would be Serbian, Bosnian (including Slavonian) and the more distant Croatian (or we have a Serbo-Bosnian language and a Sloveno-Croatian language, all depends on how linguistically things turn out by the time national identities develop and if we'll see things akin to the Vienna Literary Agreement TTL).

When it comes to the Torlaks, it is very likely that they'd be seen more as Bulgarian than Serbian TTL, but it is also equally as likely that we may see the manifestation of a unique Slavic identity, perhaps in tandem with the Slavic speakers of the Macedonian region. Though this all revolves around how the national identity of the people in the area develops, since at this time in the Ottoman Empire, Slavic national identity wasn't really a thing yet, revolving more around one's religious identity.

 

[Halagaz]

I think the question of Chakavian-Kajkavian differences would only be as important as politics make it. On one hand, it's possible that Slavonia doesn't merge into the Croatian nationality as it did in OTL. On the other hand, the whole process was not that unnatural. And Slavonia had much, much less autonomy and distinction within Hungary than Croatia (proper). So the Slavonians may eventually start looking towards Croatia as their "Piedmont", and adopt a Croatian identity anyway.
If there is a Slavonian language, that probably means a movement to unite with the Slovenes in Styria and Kranjska.

I don't think Serbian would ever be based on the Torlak dialects. AFAIK, the sources on Torlak national affiliation are inconclusive at best - but it seems that roughly half of the Torlak regions were identified with Serbs, and the other half with Bulgarians. And these were generally poor, passive and not very stable regions. When it comes to standardizing the entire Serbian language, the dialect(s) spoken in Hungary and Macva would have the advantage here. Followed by the dialect in central Serbia.

The inevitable migrations also make this whole thing harder to predict. If Hungary never falls, it will spend much of its time being flooded by refugees and migrants from Bosnia, Serbia and even other Ottoman-held regions.

 

[Dementor]

When it comes to the Torlaks, it is very likely that they'd be seen more as Bulgarian than Serbian TTL, but it is also equally as likely that we may see the manifestation of a unique Slavic identity, perhaps in tandem with the Slavic speakers of the Macedonian region. Though this all revolves around how the national identity of the people in the area develops, since at this time in the Ottoman Empire, Slavic national identity wasn't really a thing yet, revolving more around one's religious identity.

None of this is particularly likely. The separate Macedonian identity was a very event in history and is strongly connected with Macedonia being separated from Bulgaria and falling under Serbian control, which seems less likely in this scenario. The Torlak region was always peripheral between Bulgarian and Serbian, but it never really had any identity of its own, nor was it much of a center of literacy (unlike Macedonia, but that was also one of the main areas of development of Bulgarian culture).

 

[Dementor]

Ah yes, that map was which inspired me to launch this thread in the first place. However, the Bosnians were always a bit different, werent they? I speak primarily from a religious point of view, which even though their language with the Serbs is almost the same could still lead to a different identity. If they maintain their own church, that's their reason for separation, if they become muslim as OTL, than that's the reason, and if they somehow become catholic, then they basically become the OTL Croats. But if they become orthodox, then that's a whole different story.

Bosnian would be probably be considered a separate language politically, while being practically the same language with Serbian or at most like Bulgarian and Macedonian, depending on which dialects the two languages are standardized.

Sounds about right(, read my suggestions though, I'm eager to hear your opinion). Maybe my other question, that how close could the Kaykavian and Slovenian languages become?

Perhaps the big argument in this timeline would be not whether Serbian and Croatian are the same language, but whether Slovenian and Croatian are.

 

[Damian0358]

None of this is particularly likely. The separate Macedonian identity was a very event in history and is strongly connected with Macedonia being separated from Bulgaria and falling under Serbian control, which seems less likely in this scenario. The Torlak region was always peripheral between Bulgarian and Serbian, but it never really had any identity of its own, nor was it much of a center of literacy (unlike Macedonia, but that was also one of the main areas of development of Bulgarian culture).

True enough, though the reason why I even suggested such a possibility is due to the possible effects of this POD resonating within the still-Ottoman controlled Balkans, and how it may affect the internal politics of the eyalets/pashaliks, especially when we consider individuals such as Ali Pasha of Janina and Osman Pazvantoğlu from OTL. Perhaps a bit extreme when it comes to considering possible butterflies, but I generally see all options open unless specified otherwise.