The territory of the second formation (e.g. where Russians settled after the 16th century) consist of most of the land to the North and North-East of Central Russia, that is
Karelia,
Murmansk,
Vyatka,
Perm,
Komi,
Udmurtia, and as well as
Siberia and
Far East.
Lack of
vowel reduction:[1] unstressed /ɔ/ does not merge with /a/ (
okanye).[2] Unstressed /ɔ/, /a/ and /ɛ/ after soft consonants also do not typically merge.[3]
In the eastern part of the group the change of every
Proto-Slavic *e to /ɔ/ before hard (
unpalatalized) consonants occurs (in Standard Russian only in stressed syllables).
Proto-Slavic *ě also changes to /ɔ/ in these positions but only in stressed syllables.[3]
Also in the eastern part of the dialect group there is /o̝~u̯ɔ/ in certain positions instead of Standard Russian /ɔ/.[2][3]
Tsokanye: the merger of Standard Russian /t͡ɕ/ and /t͡s/ into one consonant whether /t͡s/, /t͡sʲ/ or /t͡ɕ/ (like in
Pskov and
RyazanSouthern Russian dialects).[3]
In the
Vologda region, final hard /ɫ/ is replaced by a semivowel /w~u̯/.
In some dialects traces of unreduced
Proto-Slavic *tl, dl, which normally reduced to /ɫ/ in all of
East Slavic: Жерегло/ʐɛrɛˈɡɫɔ/ "the
sound between
Lake Pskov and
Lake Chud" (instead of expected жерело/ʐɛrɛˈɫɔ/), перецок/pʲɛrʲɛˈt͡sɔk/ from earlier перецокл/pʲɛrʲɛˈt͡sɔkɫ/ "reread (past tense)" (instead of standard перечёл/pʲɛrʲɛˈt͡ɕɔɫ/). In these examples the groups *tl, dldissimilated to /kɫ/, /ɡɫ/ instead of reducing to /ɫ/. Some (
Shakhmatov,
Durnovo) see this as an indication of possible
West Slavicadmixture in those areas, while others (
Trubetzkoy,
Lehr-Spławiński[4]) treat it as an archaism from Proto-Slavic times.[5]
Morphology
A suffixed definite article -to, -ta, -te similarly existing in Bulgarian and Macedonian.[2]
3rd person verbal ending with non-palatalized -t as in Standard Russian.[3]
Vocabulary
Northern dialects are characterized by a number of words like, изба ('log hut'), квашня, озимь ('winter crop'), лаять ('to bark'), ухват, орать ('to plough'), жито ('rye'), беседки ('gathering'), шибко ('very much'), баской ('beautiful') and others. They also have about 200 words of
Uralic origin.
Kuraszkiewicz, Władysław (1963). Zarys dialektologii wschodniosłowiańskiej z wyborem tekstów gwarowych (in Polish). Warszawa:
Państwowe Wydawnictwo Naukowe.