Dialectal peculiarities in riddles of Suntarsky district

Abstract

The article is the first in Yakut linguistics to examine the dialectal lexicon of Yakut folk riddles of Suntarsky district. The necessity of this study is due to the fact that Yakut riddles rarely serve as a material for studying the dialectal lexicon of the Yakut language. Dialectal data can provide information about the preservation of the dialect, as well as clarify the issues of semantics in the field of Yakut dialectology. The scholarly novelty of the study lies in the fact that for the first time the linguistic analysis of riddles collected in Suntarsky district is carried out and the main semantic-motivational features of dialectal units on the material of folklore text are highlighted for the first time. The purpose of the study is to identify the most characteristic phonetic correspondences and lexical features of dialect words in folk riddles of Suntarsky district. The source and material for the study were riddles collected in 1960–1969 by the local historian Ivan Ivanov – Chopchu Uybaan and published in a separate edition in 2014. The texts of 2891 riddles were frontally reviewed for the presence of dialectal features. To achieve the goal, the methods of phonetic, lexical analysis, as well as descriptive method with the application of interpretation of linguistic material were used. Phonetic features characteristic of the Suntar dialect were revealed: assimilation and dissimilation of consonants; phonetic correspondences (long/short vowels; doubling/short consonants, etc.). We present typical examples of dialectal units from riddles that belong to the lexicon of the Olyokma-Vilyui dialects. In addition to the well-known lexemes of the Suntar dialect (e. g. muruku ‘chipmunk’), one can pay attention to some dialectal meanings (e. g. keghe kulgaagha ‘snowdrop’), which were not previously included in dialectological dictionaries. The main motivational type of the semantics of dialect words – metaphorical or figurative – was established. This type of nomination is characteristic of the text of riddles, which is expressed by figurative words, euphemisms. The riddles emphasize the dominant features of the subject, phenomenon: shape, sounds, process, action, etc. The presentation of the semantic-motivational picture on the example of dialect words in riddles can fill the gaps in the study of the dialect linguistic picture of the world of the Yakut language.

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