Language interference in place names in north-eastern Poland

Abstract

This article analyses language interference in place names in the Polish-East Slavonic and Polish-Lithuanian linguistic borderland. Many-sided linguistic contacts over several centuries have resulted in mutual penetration of language features, mainly phonetic, with Belarusian/Ukrainian place names bearing Polish features being much more common than examples to the contrary. The most frequently observed changes include stress changes, vowel reduction, pleophony, epenthetic l and palatalisation of certain consonants. The dominant Polish feature is a plosive realisation of g instead of the fricative or laryngeal East-Slavonic h.