Unique Macedonian Words (List)

[TheNikoWhiteIch]

The purpose of this thread will be to keep a running list of vocabulary that is exclusively found in Macedonian and not in the neighboring Slavic languages. I hope to keep it to just one post, so if you guys find that there are words missing from this list that you know of, please private message me and I will update the list to include them.

List:
•стило: pen
•чакмак: lighter
•ламја: snake
•џам: window
•акне: to strike, to hit, to fall down
•бара: to seek, to request, to wish
•бендиса: to like, to fancy
•ѕуница: rainbow, mountain strawberry
•кандиса: to convince, to agree, to consent
•калеш: tanned, browned
•киниса: to depart, to go
•сардиса: to encircle, to surround
•пули: to stare, to gaze
•скорна: boot
•шмерк: hose
•кадри: footage, pictures
•фута: apron
•ѕрцала: mirror, glasses
•окалки: spectacles, eyeglasses
•ношја: tonight, nighttime
•плачки: clothes, cloth
•скорни: to wake up, to rise up
•јабана: abroad, away
•куртули: to save, to rescue, to be relieved of
•мака: suffering, insult, trouble
•спуфтоса: to become soiled
•лупа: to knock, to rumble
•ѕемне: to freeze, to quiver, to be chilly
•точак: bicycle
•јадранки: sandals, flip-flops
•дрмне: to shake, to tremble
•мласка: to smack
•кодоши: to snitch, to slander
•скама: foam
•меана: tavern, café
•карпуз: watermelon
•кајче: rowboat, boat
•саат: hour, time, clock
•скали: stairs, steps
•зајтин: oil, gasoline
•апче: pill, tablet
•пентари: to climb
•гредам: I am coming
•ѓомити: as if, as though
•окица: opium
•вјава: to mount
•вјана: to climb up
•гиба: to touch
•брав: a ram
•бунела: a fork
•калеса: invite
•кус: back of the leg
•бишка: piglet
•горница: wild pear, almond-leafed pear
•ќердоса: to have a successful marriage
•слач: tasty, sweet
•тро: a little
•кација: iron paddle for holding objects over flames
•пешник: bread loaf, cornbread
•пупале: small ceremonial bread made without yeast
•рало: a pair
•пресол: brine
•соба: oven, stove
•фара: family, relatives
•урива: demolish, destroy, bring down
•ластар: a thin twig, a small branch
•ластегарка: a club, a stick
•мастар: a plank used by carpenters
•коска: bone
•армас: engagement
•вработување: recruitment, employment
•нарушување: infringement
•боледување: sick-leave
•секогаш: always, forever
•праша: to ask, to inquire
•арно: good, well, alive
•бостан: melon, watermelon
•лафи: to talk, to speak
•гурелки: the dried mucus lumps that form on the eyelid
•катиљ: murderer, villain
•зине: to open ones’ mouth
•шиба: to speed away, to flee quickly
•алишта: clothing
•рипа: to jump, to spring, to leap
•пајнца: dish, plate, bowl
•муцка: snout, mouth, lips
•фиока: drawer of a cabinet
•дикат: attention
•рачник: hand towel
•урбус: face towel
•калезба: wedding invitation
•печали: to profit, to earn, to gain
•паралдиса: to shine, to gleam, to sparkle
•ареса: to like, to admire
•наваса: to complete, to finish, to end
•вјаса: to hurry
•курдиса: to wind up, to perch up, to set up
•тептиса: to lose oneself, to get carried away, to stray
•црвоса: to rot, to degenerate
•сироса: to coagulate, to curdle
•бајалдиса: to faint
•ептен: totally
•мнук: grandson
•гламна: torch, burnt log
•ѕенѕер: apricot
•опинај: to stretch, to overexert
•сабасаба: very early morning
•поќе: more so, mostly
•чактисва: to understand, to comprehend
•дида: fool, idiot
•оти: "why" when written with a question mark, "because" in answer to a question
•апансаз: suddenly, without prelude
•набавтана: luckily, fortunately
•такуѓере: likewise, also
•исав: sympathy, feeling, sensitivity
•љуфна: missed (a mark, a target)
•шубе: suspicion, doubt
•стипса: stingy, overly cautious
•немукает: thoughtlessness, recklessness
•крлешка: a swing
•шуќур: thankfully, thank God
•терсене: difficult, hard to resolve, hard to handle
•бучкуруш: chaos, disorder
•ленгир: ruler, straightedge
•режало: sharpener
•јанлаш: wrong, incorrect
•ќенеф: toilet, washroom
•муфте: for nothing, with no result
•уландисан: worried, uneasy, frustrated, disappointed, anxious, upset
•ексис: faulty, with error
•ѕунѕурки: decorations
•чикмак: impasse, dead-end, corridor
•ѕирка: to peek, to look

Methodology: I did some data mining from the thread titled "Edinstveni Makedonski Zborovi - Unique Macedonian Words (postable)" and referenced each word to the database over on the website "https://makedonski.info/". This website includes words that are dialectic, archaic, or otherwise just rare. Then I checked to make sure that the word was exclusive to Macedonian by translating it from Serbian and Bulgarian into English. If this produced no translation, I finally checked for information on the word on https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Wiktionary:Main_Page. After this series of tests, I finally added it to the list. I will use this methodology for all words that come my way.

Note: while some of those words may not be shared by Serbian or Bulgarian, a number of are probably of Greek or Ottoman (Turkish, Persian, Arabic) origin. The purpose of this thread is to highlight the differences between Macedonian and the neighboring Slavic languages by showing that Macedonian vocabulary was influenced by a different substratum.

[Toska]

alot of those words are greek,turkish or have slightly different accents in other slavic languages thats why you cant translate them

example cakmak is turkish,stylo is greek and cupe is pronounced in serbo/croatian as cupa.

[TheNikoWhiteIch]

alot of those words are greek,turkish or have slightly different accents in other slavic languages thats why you cant translate them

example cakmak is turkish,stylo is greek and cupe is pronounced in serbo/croatian as cupa.

Interesting, I did not know that Greek also had стило for "pen"; I always thought the word was French actually. I will also remove чупе since it's nearly the same as the Serbo-Croatian word. Also, P.M. me with further comments please, I'm trying to keep this thread short

[vicsinad]

Interesting, I did not know that Greek also had стило for "pen"; I always thought the word was French actually. I will also remove чупе since it's nearly the same as the Serbo-Croatian word. Also, P.M. me with further comments please, I'm trying to keep this thread short

Niko, good idea for a thread. I know you said that you wanted to keep it to one post, so sorry. Mods can delete mine after!

I just wanted to know if there's a source for cupa in Serbo-Croat? Is it standard or a dialect? And from where

[Toska]

no it wouldnt be standard probably just a dialect word, possibly a loan word from us, id guess Torlak Dialect of Nis.

[Liberator of Makedonija]

Стило is probably of Latin origin. Also whilst there may be no direction translations into Serbo-Croat or Bulgarian there may be localised translations, e.g. Ќ is exclusive to Macedonian and as such its equivalents are Ћ and Щ in Serbian/Montenegrin and Bulgarian respectively. Sometimes words between our languages may only differ by one phoneme because they are not present in the surrounding languages. The same logic applies to Ѓ which is also exclusive to Macedonian and its Serbo-Croat and Bulgarian equivalents are Ђ and ЖД (diagraph) respectively. This can be expressed with the word for birth which in Macedonian is раѓање and is рађање and раждане in Serbian/Montenegrin and Bulgarian respectively.

[Carlin]

I found the following interesting. It has more to do with grammar than lexicon / words.

[Karposh]

Carlin, with all due respect, I doubt very much that a couple of hundred years of Vlach settlement in Macedonia has influenced the Bitola-Lerin and Voden dialects to the point that it has introduced certain grammatical nuances into these dialects such as the dative case mu. Although it is true, as indicated in the thesis' example that most people in Bitola don't bother with the dative cases i and im and simply use mu in all instances, to suggest that this is the result of “Aromanian being intensely spoken in the area” is a bit far-fetched, at best. Admittedly, the thesis doesn't make conclusions but is merely proposing a theory that is “the most likely source” for this very Bitola-like nuance in their dialect, however, I would argue that it is just a coincidence and nothing more.

The Vlach presence in the Bitola region has been around since the 1820's and mainly concentrated on the slopes of Mt. Pelister in the hugely populated villages of Magarevo, Trnovo, Malovishte, Nizhepole and Gopesh. Outside of Bitola other large concentrations of Vlachs included Krushevo (which, prior to 1830, was exclusively Macedonian), and the surrounding mountainous regions of western and southern parts of Aegean Macedonia. Most of the inhabitants of these Vlach villages in Macedonia can trace their roots back to villages and towns in southern Albania, Mt. Gramos, Epirus and Thessaly and were a direct result of constant Muslim-Albanian raids on their original homelands.

Prior to the destruction of Moskopole by Ali Pasha from Janina in 1788, which forced the Vlachs to seek a home elsewhere, and establish permanent settlements in certain mountainous regions of Macedonia, their presence in Macedonia was more transshumant and nomadic in nature, moving as they did with their livestock from one fixed place to another with the changing seasons – higher pastures in summer and lower pastures in winter.

[Liberator of Makedonija]

The gendered dative cases are also not present in the Kostur dialect

[Rogi]

Do any of you use, or are familiar with, the word "чучи" as in to sit/squat? Is this word used in a similar way/context in any of the neighbouring areas?

Find ourselves using it all the time with the kids but just paused to think about it and was curious about its' etymology

[Karposh]

Hi Rogi, I've only ever heard the word being used in the diminutive sense, i.e. a cute way that grown-ups use to tell small kids to sit down eg. "chuchni tuka" instead of "sedni tuka". My Macedonian dictionary has: to kneel; to crouch down; to squat. I also have a very old Serbian dictionary and they have the word too (chuchati) and it means the same thing.