Dialects

L.L .Bonaparte placed the speech from this valley within the Northern Upper Navarran, but in other studies the Baztan has been classified as Labourdin (a neighboring French-Basque dialect.). Recently, Koldo Zuazo has included it within the dialect which he labels as Navarrese Basque. Within our classification, however, the Baztan dialect is taken to be an independent dialect in line with what the Basque General Dictionary asserts. Although there are no old literary texts available, this dialect cannot be said to be totally abandoned, especially as there are fairly numerous religious texts from the XIX century. Furthermore, this dialect has already been fairly well examined. Thus, for example, we have the work of Pello Salaburu (Baztango euskalkiaz (1), Bilbao, 1980: Baztango kontsonantismoa, Euskara XXVIII, 1983; Hizkuntzaren soinu egitura, Bilbao, 1984; Hizkuntza teoria eta Baztango euskalkia: fonetika eta fonologia, Bilbao,1984) and the investigation of G.N´diaye about the speech from Maya (Structure du dialecte basque de Maya, La Haya 1970), and not forgetting the work of Mariano Izeta: Baztango Hiztegia, and his many articles written out in the Baztan dialect.

Beyond the common traits of the spoken Basque in general, the Northern Upper Navarran deviates from the standard norm in the following aspects:

Morphology (verbal, nominal) / Phonetics / Lexicon/ Syntax

.

MORPHOLOGY

Verbal

1- In the greater part of the area, -a- appears in the past tense of the strong verbs (synthetics): zagoen, zabilen... etc, (standard zegoen, zebilen... etc.):

2- All the Navarran dialects have the characteristic form of nitzen without -n- (bat. nintzen):

3- In the forms of Nor-Nori-Nork, the pluralizing form is -zki-, (type dazkit, Baztan dauzkit):

Kartzen omen dazkute gure launtzeko

But even within the same Baztan the forms in -dio as in the Nor-Nork (ditio... etc, standard dizkio etc) they form the plural as in High Navarrese (tio etc):

hari re eman behar tiogu hainbertze...

On the other hand, in Baztan, Nor-Nori-Nork forms are based on the the root -erau-, which contracts into -au- (excepting in the third person dio and so on:

pues yaten datzute

zer errain datzut nik?

4- Duzue se oye en todo el valle, salvo en Baztangoiza (duze).

4- Duzue can be heard all over the valley except in Baztangoiza (duze).

5-With verbs finishing in -n (edan, egon, izan etc), the future form is generally -en:

In many towns this ending -anen, -onen is pronounced -ain, -oin:

zer errain datzut nik?

ta yaen tuzte pues bedratzi buru.

6-Instead of diet, diezu, zien, zaie, etc. in this zone the forms diotet are almost general (=diet), zioten (=zien), zaiote (=zaie) that is to say -ote- instead of -e-:

yendia heldu bazaiote

Aunque en Baztán parece haber vacilación:

hoi tortzen zaie hiru korte

7-Just as in other speech zones of Navarra, y- has come into being for the second person singular: yaiz (=haiz).

8- Besides the above-mentioned traits which are systemized, it must be pointed out that in this dialect many non-standard verbal flexions can be heard.

9- In the periphrastic conjugations all kinds of verbal contractions can be heard, although the corpus is not large enough to be systemized or to define zones. The contractions of behar +auxiliary transitive are very characteristic.

ya probetxu man behauten denboran

10-There is a generalized tendency (non distinctive) in the Navarra speech to confuse the verbal paradigms Nor -Nork and nor-nori-nork (usually in favor of the second). What is distinctive is (it establishes an isogloss) is the degree to which the tendency has been completed: the Southern High Navarrese is characterized by its total confusion. But in other zones also it appears (Ultzama) and as a tendency it is very widespread: Ituren, Baztan, Barranca:

11- The causal suffix -lako has a variant -lako(t)z, like in the continental dialects:

NOMINAL

12- -ak is distinguished from -ek in plural:

beleek yatekottan ere, pues....

 

13- With the numbers the forms with -tan are very common: hirutan hogei, lautan hogei (=hirurogei, laurogei), although these latter can also be heard (for reasons of prestige from the Guipuzcan speech and of the standard form):

In Baztan we can find the form bida (bide) for the numeral bi, used as pronoun:

Bide korriente

14-The nondik case in the indefinite and the plural is formed en -tarik just like in the Southern High Navarrese.

15-It is common to find -arendako for -arentzat:

baño zetako ai behar dugu hekendako uzten?

16-In words such as artzain, arrain, haurtzain -ain is pronounced - unlike the Northern High Navarrese (-ai):

17-The use is quite widespread of employing the Spanish ending -ón with loan words (in standard Basque -oi): xabona. Although not in the oldest language: arratoi is quite general:

18-In the demonstratives, there exist many non-standard forms. In the Baztan hek for haiek exists:

baño zetako ai behar dugu hekendako uzten?

 

PHONETICS

19-The automatic palate after -i is not generally found:

ta yaen tuzte pues bedratzi buru

20- In the declination -ea (etxea) and -oa (astoa) the sound is -ia and ua:

ez omen da zil hiltzia

yendia heldu bazaiote

Tortzen den bezain laster, ta ezpada heldu, aitziñian maztekie

21-The vocalized harmony is (dirua>dirue, ogia>ogie) very extended. It normally exists in the interior of word: uketu (=ukatu):

ersistitzeko neguen

pues aziendain lan... azienda kuidetu

biziaindeko aine harpatiko du

22-Just as happens with other Navarrese dialects, here too the ascending diphthongs are very frequent: ándriak (=andreak):

23-It is very common (and almost exclusive to the High Navarrese speakers) for the verbs to miss the first vowel (aphaeresis): baki (=ebaki), karri (=ekarri), kusi (=ikusi), man (=eman), torri (=etorri). This also sometimes occurs with the nouns: makome (=emakume), mazte (=emazte).

beleak zaindu bidenaar artoa karri

Kartzen omen dazkute gure launtzeko

pues aunitz maztekik ere bai

24-It is also very common to miss a vowel in the core of a word (syncope). It occurs in a space similar to that of the aphaeresis: hirugarna (=hirugarrena) abistu (=abisatu), probextu (probetxatu), karko, kusko (=ekarriko, ikusiko), engaintu (=engainatu):

biziaindeko aine harpatiko du

ersistitzeko neguen

25-The diphthong eu evolves into au on some occasions: daus (=deus)

26- The participles in -tu (galdetu, barkatu, etc) make the future with -tiko: galdetiko, barkatiko, and also when they join with behar: galdeti ihar dut (=galdetu behar dut):

pues sartiko die bedratzi

biziaindeko aine harpatiko du

27-With words such as joan, jarri, jasa, jende etc, the initial sound becomes y-:

pues yaten datzute

yendia heldu bazaiote

It is also possible to hear j- in those towns where it is not normal for reasons of prestige:

In the Baztan area the pronunciation of the typical Navarran word ja (= "anything, something") is said as j-

LEXICON

28-The Baztan dialect shows many lexical variants from the standard form. However, not a few of these are not characteristics of the dialect nor even of the Navarran speech, but rather, are found in many other parts of the Basque country: amatxi, aitatxi, gan (=joan), etc:

29-Few words or variants of the corpus are exclusive to the Navarrese Basque language: ja (ere) “nada, algo”

30-Within the scope of the Basque-speaking peninsular, if the Baztan has some particular features, this is due in large part to the eastern character (a closeness to the French dialects) of the lexicon and the variants used there (although normally in competition with the Westernized forms): guti ´little´ (standard gutxi), goatze “bed”, aitzin “in front”, paratu “to put”, bakotxa “each”, beheiti “below”, goiti “above”, izitu “to frighten”, bertze “another”, erran “to say”, artio “until”, altxatu “to hide”, zil(egi) “allowed”, heldu izan “to come”, mazteki “woman”, etc.

ez omen da zil hiltzia

yendia heldu bazaiote

ez oaño ez

pues aunitz maztekik ere bai

31-Moreover, the Baztan dialect contains many loan-words, of various kinds.

On the one hand it maintains many old loan-words and traditions which, in the written form, have been more or less eliminated for the sake of purity. It also has many more-recent loan-words, and these are quite extended. Finally, it also has many sporadic Spanish-isms, often in substitution of an existing Basque word that might be known by the speaker. Within this area there are the conjunctions and nexus such as ..o sea que. ..porque…which are spoken directly

porke seko gan du

 

SYNTAX

32-Forms of the relative (explicative) with the prefix bait can be frequently heard.

33-The restrictive relative in -n functions freely to express all sorts of grammatical relationships, even in unusual cases in the written language.

34-Within the dialect zone, the suffix -larik(an) has come to substitute (as is also the case with continental Basque) -nean in all its functions.

35- The periphrasis -tzen ahal is used for the conditional, even in the negative form.

36- The conjunction bidenabar is very common “as well”:

beleak zaindu bidenaar artoa karri

37-In the Baztan dialect cases of the direct object can be heard in the genitive form:

Kartzen omen dazkute gure launtzeko

L.L .Bonaparte placed the speech from this valley within the Northern Upper Navarran, but in other studies the Baztan has been classified as Labourdin (a neighboring French-Basque dialect.). Recently, Koldo Zuazo has included it within the dialect which he labels as Navarrese Basque. Within our classification, however, the Baztan dialect is taken to be an independent dialect in line with what the Basque General Dictionary asserts. Although there are no old literary texts available, this dialect cannot be said to be totally abandoned, especially as there are fairly numerous religious texts from the XIX century. Furthermore, this dialect has already been fairly well examined. Thus, for example, we have the work of Pello Salaburu (Baztango euskalkiaz (1), Bilbao, 1980: Baztango kontsonantismoa, Euskara XXVIII, 1983; Hizkuntzaren soinu egitura, Bilbao, 1984; Hizkuntza teoria eta Baztango euskalkia: fonetika eta fonologia, Bilbao,1984) and the investigation of G.N´diaye about the speech from Maya (Structure du dialecte basque de Maya, La Haya 1970), and not forgetting the work of Mariano Izeta: Baztango Hiztegia, and his many articles written out in the Baztan dialect.

Beyond the common traits of the spoken Basque in general, the Northern Upper Navarran deviates from the standard norm in the following aspects:

Morphology (verbal, nominal) / Phonetics / Lexicon/ Syntax

.

MORPHOLOGY

Verbal

1- In the greater part of the area, -a- appears in the past tense of the strong verbs (synthetics): zagoen, zabilen... etc, (standard zegoen, zebilen... etc.):

2- All the Navarran dialects have the characteristic form of nitzen without -n- (bat. nintzen):

3- In the forms of Nor-Nori-Nork, the pluralizing form is -zki-, (type dazkit, Baztan dauzkit):

Kartzen omen dazkute gure launtzeko

But even within the same Baztan the forms in -dio as in the Nor-Nork (ditio... etc, standard dizkio etc) they form the plural as in High Navarrese (tio etc):

hari re eman behar tiogu hainbertze...

On the other hand, in Baztan, Nor-Nori-Nork forms are based on the the root -erau-, which contracts into -au- (excepting in the third person dio and so on:

pues yaten datzute

zer errain datzut nik?

4- Duzue se oye en todo el valle, salvo en Baztangoiza (duze).

4- Duzue can be heard all over the valley except in Baztangoiza (duze).

5-With verbs finishing in -n (edan, egon, izan etc), the future form is generally -en:

In many towns this ending -anen, -onen is pronounced -ain, -oin:

zer errain datzut nik?

ta yaen tuzte pues bedratzi buru.

6-Instead of diet, diezu, zien, zaie, etc. in this zone the forms diotet are almost general (=diet), zioten (=zien), zaiote (=zaie) that is to say -ote- instead of -e-:

yendia heldu bazaiote

Aunque en Baztán parece haber vacilación:

hoi tortzen zaie hiru korte

7-Just as in other speech zones of Navarra, y- has come into being for the second person singular: yaiz (=haiz).

8- Besides the above-mentioned traits which are systemized, it must be pointed out that in this dialect many non-standard verbal flexions can be heard.

9- In the periphrastic conjugations all kinds of verbal contractions can be heard, although the corpus is not large enough to be systemized or to define zones. The contractions of behar +auxiliary transitive are very characteristic.

ya probetxu man behauten denboran

10-There is a generalized tendency (non distinctive) in the Navarra speech to confuse the verbal paradigms Nor -Nork and nor-nori-nork (usually in favor of the second). What is distinctive is (it establishes an isogloss) is the degree to which the tendency has been completed: the Southern High Navarrese is characterized by its total confusion. But in other zones also it appears (Ultzama) and as a tendency it is very widespread: Ituren, Baztan, Barranca:

11- The causal suffix -lako has a variant -lako(t)z, like in the continental dialects:

NOMINAL

12- -ak is distinguished from -ek in plural:

beleek yatekottan ere, pues....

 

13- With the numbers the forms with -tan are very common: hirutan hogei, lautan hogei (=hirurogei, laurogei), although these latter can also be heard (for reasons of prestige from the Guipuzcan speech and of the standard form):

In Baztan we can find the form bida (bide) for the numeral bi, used as pronoun:

Bide korriente

14-The nondik case in the indefinite and the plural is formed en -tarik just like in the Southern High Navarrese.

15-It is common to find -arendako for -arentzat:

baño zetako ai behar dugu hekendako uzten?

16-In words such as artzain, arrain, haurtzain -ain is pronounced - unlike the Northern High Navarrese (-ai):

17-The use is quite widespread of employing the Spanish ending -ón with loan words (in standard Basque -oi): xabona. Although not in the oldest language: arratoi is quite general:

18-In the demonstratives, there exist many non-standard forms. In the Baztan hek for haiek exists:

baño zetako ai behar dugu hekendako uzten?

 

PHONETICS

19-The automatic palate after -i is not generally found:

ta yaen tuzte pues bedratzi buru

20- In the declination -ea (etxea) and -oa (astoa) the sound is -ia and ua:

ez omen da zil hiltzia

yendia heldu bazaiote

Tortzen den bezain laster, ta ezpada heldu, aitziñian maztekie

21-The vocalized harmony is (dirua>dirue, ogia>ogie) very extended. It normally exists in the interior of word: uketu (=ukatu):

ersistitzeko neguen

pues aziendain lan... azienda kuidetu

biziaindeko aine harpatiko du

22-Just as happens with other Navarrese dialects, here too the ascending diphthongs are very frequent: ándriak (=andreak):

23-It is very common (and almost exclusive to the High Navarrese speakers) for the verbs to miss the first vowel (aphaeresis): baki (=ebaki), karri (=ekarri), kusi (=ikusi), man (=eman), torri (=etorri). This also sometimes occurs with the nouns: makome (=emakume), mazte (=emazte).

beleak zaindu bidenaar artoa karri

Kartzen omen dazkute gure launtzeko

pues aunitz maztekik ere bai

24-It is also very common to miss a vowel in the core of a word (syncope). It occurs in a space similar to that of the aphaeresis: hirugarna (=hirugarrena) abistu (=abisatu), probextu (probetxatu), karko, kusko (=ekarriko, ikusiko), engaintu (=engainatu):

biziaindeko aine harpatiko du

ersistitzeko neguen

25-The diphthong eu evolves into au on some occasions: daus (=deus)

26- The participles in -tu (galdetu, barkatu, etc) make the future with -tiko: galdetiko, barkatiko, and also when they join with behar: galdeti ihar dut (=galdetu behar dut):

pues sartiko die bedratzi

biziaindeko aine harpatiko du

27-With words such as joan, jarri, jasa, jende etc, the initial sound becomes y-:

pues yaten datzute

yendia heldu bazaiote

It is also possible to hear j- in those towns where it is not normal for reasons of prestige:

In the Baztan area the pronunciation of the typical Navarran word ja (= "anything, something") is said as j-

LEXICON

28-The Baztan dialect shows many lexical variants from the standard form. However, not a few of these are not characteristics of the dialect nor even of the Navarran speech, but rather, are found in many other parts of the Basque country: amatxi, aitatxi, gan (=joan), etc:

29-Few words or variants of the corpus are exclusive to the Navarrese Basque language: ja (ere) “nada, algo”

30-Within the scope of the Basque-speaking peninsular, if the Baztan has some particular features, this is due in large part to the eastern character (a closeness to the French dialects) of the lexicon and the variants used there (although normally in competition with the Westernized forms): guti ´little´ (standard gutxi), goatze “bed”, aitzin “in front”, paratu “to put”, bakotxa “each”, beheiti “below”, goiti “above”, izitu “to frighten”, bertze “another”, erran “to say”, artio “until”, altxatu “to hide”, zil(egi) “allowed”, heldu izan “to come”, mazteki “woman”, etc.

ez omen da zil hiltzia

yendia heldu bazaiote

ez oaño ez

pues aunitz maztekik ere bai

31-Moreover, the Baztan dialect contains many loan-words, of various kinds.

On the one hand it maintains many old loan-words and traditions which, in the written form, have been more or less eliminated for the sake of purity. It also has many more-recent loan-words, and these are quite extended. Finally, it also has many sporadic Spanish-isms, often in substitution of an existing Basque word that might be known by the speaker. Within this area there are the conjunctions and nexus such as ..o sea que. ..porque…which are spoken directly

porke seko gan du

 

SYNTAX

32-Forms of the relative (explicative) with the prefix bait can be frequently heard.

33-The restrictive relative in -n functions freely to express all sorts of grammatical relationships, even in unusual cases in the written language.

34-Within the dialect zone, the suffix -larik(an) has come to substitute (as is also the case with continental Basque) -nean in all its functions.

35- The periphrasis -tzen ahal is used for the conditional, even in the negative form.

36- The conjunction bidenabar is very common “as well”:

beleak zaindu bidenaar artoa karri

37-In the Baztan dialect cases of the direct object can be heard in the genitive form:

Kartzen omen dazkute gure launtzeko