Šatrovački Explained

Šatrovački (pronounced as /ʃâtroʋatʃkiː/; Serbian Cyrillic: шатровачки) or šatra (pronounced as /ʃâtra/; Serbian Cyrillic: шатра) is an argot within the Serbo-Croatian language comparable to verlan in French or vesre in Spanish.

Šatrovački was initially developed by Gypsies and various marginal subcultures and criminal groups in Yugoslavia, who employed it a device of secret communication. The term "Šatrovački" is attested in Serbian literature since as early as the year 1900, as a secret language of gamblers in Aleksinac.[1] As late as 1954 for instance, a German-Croatian dictionary translated "šatrovački" as "Yenish speech".[2] By the year 1981 however, one could find elements of šatrovački in the speech of very different strata of Zagreb society, from prostitutes and prisoners to scientists and professors.[3] With each generation, more elements are added to the Šatrovački register. It is more widespread in urban areas, such as Belgrade and Novi Sad (Serbia), Zagreb (Croatia) and Sarajevo (Bosnia and Herzegovina).

Usual šatrovački

Words are formed by replacing the syllable order. For example: pivo (beer), becomes vopi. The new word has the same meaning as the original word stem. Since the spelling is nearly phonetic it does not change. However, sometimes one of the vowels is changed to make the new word easier to pronounce, avoid ambiguity, or if the stem word is not in nominative. For example, trava ("grass", marijuana) would become vutra instead of vatra ("fire").

Some words are more commonly spoken in Šatrovački than others, but there is no specific rule. Examples of transformed sentences (although, most of the words in a single sentence are rarely transformed) are:

Examples


Utrovački

Utrovački (Утровачки) is a more complex form of šatrovački. Words are formed using: U + last part + ZA + first part + NJE. E.g. vikipedija (Wikipedia) becomes ukipedijazavinje. Today, utrovački is not widely used.

Alternative Utrovački is same as above, but without "ZA", e.g. pivo (beer) becomes uvopinje, or cigare (cigarettes) becomes ugarecinje.

Syllable omission

A more simplified version of šatrovački is using only parts of the word, while excluding the first syllable, and is most commonly used among young people in Serbia. For example, koncert (concert) would be shortened to cert. The rules of creating a new word that can be used in nominative while the stem is not apply similarly to standard šatrovački. An example of a full sentence would be:

Drugar i ja idemo na koncert na Tvrđavi. (My friend and I are going to a concert on the Fortress)

Gari i ja idemo na cert na Đavi.

This is particularly characteristic of Novi Sad youth subculture, and is very rarely spoken outside of Vojvodina.

Common examples

Adding syllables

A very rare but present form of expression found in the Belgrade projects (blokovi). Words are reconstructed by adding various suffixes so that the original word remains relatively intact. Usually, the basis is šatrovački. The resulting words have a generally diminutive meaning.

Examples

These diminutives can later be combined using the Šatrovački method, resulting in words like kajblo, or kićblo. It is hard to locate the origin of this version of the urban dialect, but it is found in neighbourhoods of Karaburma, Zemun and New Belgrade.

Also there is another type of šatrovački, where the words are reconstructed by addition of letter P followed by the vowel preceding the inserted P after each syllable. In Macedonia, this type of speech is called papagalski (parrot speech). Since syllables, usually, end on a vowel that vowel is repeated after the inserted P as follows:

šapatropovapačkipi (ša+pa-tro+po-va+pa-čki+pi)

Examples

See also

References

External links

Notes and References

  1. https://www.google.com/books/edition/Karadzi%C4%87/7BpoUk7_pZ0C?hl=en&gbpv=1&bsq=%D1%88%D0%B0%D1%82%D1%80%D0%BE%D0%B2%D0%B0%D1%87%D0%BA%D0%B8+before:1910&dq=%D1%88%D0%B0%D1%82%D1%80%D0%BE%D0%B2%D0%B0%D1%87%D0%BA%D0%B8+before:1910&printsec=frontcover 1
  2. Hurm, Antun. Njemačko-hrvatski rječnik s gramatičkim podacima i frazeologijom. Croatia: Školska knjiga, 1954.
  3. Book: Sabljak . Tomislav . Rječnik šatrovačkog govora . 1981 . Globus . Zagreb . hr.

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