Íslenzk tunga - 01.01.1961, Blaðsíða 86
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HREINN BENEDIKTSSON
south to Reyðarf jörður and Vellir (in Fljótsdalshérað) in the east.
The area of the latter is in the West, North and North-East, from
Norðurá (in Mýrasýsla) in the west to Sandvíkurheiði (north of
Vopnafjörður) in the east. In between there are two mixed areas, one
in the East, the other in the South-West.
4) The confusion of i and e, and of u and ö (especially of their long
variants, but also of the short vowels) into intermediate monoph-
thongs or diphthongs (flámœli ‘slack-jawed speech’ vs. réttmœli ‘cor-
rect speech’). On the one hand, e. g., viður ‘wood’ and veður ‘weat-
her’ or flugur (plur. of fluga ‘fly’) and flögur (plur. of flaga ‘slab,
flake’) are confused and pronounced as [ve:ÖYr] or [vic:ðYr] and
[fl0:qYr] or [flYÖ:qYr]. On the other hand, these forms are distin-
guished, with [i:] and [e:], and [y:] and [ö:] resp.
This confusion occurs in three separate areas: (a) In the East,
from Langanes in the north to the westernmost community in Austur-
Skaftafellssýsla (Hofshreppur); (b) In the South-West, especially in
Gullbringu- og Kjósarsýsla and Borgarfjarðarsýsla, with mixed areas
on both sides; (c) In the western part of the North, in Húnavatns-
sýslur. Conversely, we also find three main areas of distinction, (a)
in the South-East, especially Vestur-Skaftafellssýsla, (b) in the
North-West (in Vestfirðir and Dalasýsla), and (c) in the eastern
part of the North, where, however, there are slight traces of flámœli.
5) Before [q], i. e. before ng or nk in writing, there are, on the
one hand, monophthongs [a, ö, c], and on the other, diphthongs [au,
öy, ci]. E. g. langur ‘long’ (masc.) [larjgrr] vs. [lauqg-Yr] ; löng
(fem.) [lörjgW] vs. [löyr)g(h)]; lengi (adv.) [lcqjgji] vs. [leiijgji] ;
hanki ‘hook (of a trunk), loop’ [harjjg-jl] vs. [haurjjgji] or
[hauqjkjhi].
The main area of monophthongal pronunciation is in Norður-ísa-
fjarðarsýsla (in Vestfirðir), with mixed areas on both sides, in the
northern part of Strandasýsla on the one hand, and in the rest of
Vestfirðir and in Dalasýsla and the northern coast of Snæfellsnes on
the other.
6) In the clusters rl and rn a dental, lax, unvoiced occlusive [<jl