Because Patavian split off early and was surrounded by Romance speakers, it has missed a number of pan-Slavic changes and undergone influence from northern dialects of Italian. Most notably, it has maintained the Law of Open Syllables and has completely missed the fall of the yers except after word-final *j; *ь *ъ are usually /i o/. It has lost the neuter gender, and the case system has been reduced to a single nominative-accusative-oblique system, the last deriving from the genitive. Its syntax and phonology have been influenced heavily by Romance; adjectives now follow nouns and there is a definite article to/ta. There is a stress accent, but no pitch-accent.
Phonology
The phonology of Patavian is relatively conservative in many ways. In stressed syllables:
*ь *i *y > i
*e *ę > e
*ě > æ > ie (a diphthong)
*u > u
*ъ *ǫ > o
*o > ɔ > uo
*a > a
But note *ě *o > é ó word-finally.
Additionally, a nasalized vowel changes a following voiced stop to a nasal: domo 'oak' (*dǫ̂bъ) (compare duomo 'house', which stays separate). (Note *ž > /ɲ/ in this context.)
In unstressed syllables, both of *e *ě become /e/, and all of *ъ *o *ǫ become /o/. Unstressed vowels tend to drop after *j, yielding diphthongs.
*t *d > ts dz > ts z before *i but not *ь or *y. (*-sti- > stsi > tsi). Liquid diphthongs generally resolve by metathesis: *VRCV > VCRV (so *dêrvo 'tree' gives diebro).
Consonants are generally conservative, but *ž fortites to /dʒ/ (as was probably its original value); merged here is word-initial /j/ (thus gesico [dʒe'ziko] 'language'). *x is maintained and written <h>.
Spelling is mostly as in Italian. <s> is /z/, <ss> /s/. Perhaps even word-initially (ssotó 'hundred'?). /ts/ is <z> (ziezizi 'castrate' < *cěstiti), zenà 'price'). Stress falls on <ie uo>; failing that, the penult; failing that, any accented syllable.
Nouns
Nominative, accusative, oblique. The oblique derives from the genitive.
The neuter has been lost, both due to contact and to the falling-together of the neuter -o with the masculine -ъ. Masculines do not distinguish an accusative, but (as in OCS) animate masculine objects which are definite (preceded with the article) take the genitive. Bottoms up for Declension I, comprising the descendents of masculine and neuter o- and u-stems.
The accent paradigms have been leveled out. There now only exist stem-accents and ending-accents. Stem-accent (bico 'bull'):
Note that the pressure for the definite article to be a single syllable has reduced original togo to simply go in the oblique singular.
Ending-accent (vinó 'wine'):
Done and done.
Declension II is feminine a-stems. These also have stem-accents and ending-accents, and surprisingly have a separate accusative. Stem-accent lapa 'paw':
Ending-accent genà 'woman':
Declension III consists of the old i-stems plus the jo- and ja-stems.. These show complete ending syncretism in the singular because of the merger of *i and *ь. However, endings in old -i trigger palatalization of /t st d/ to /ts ts z/. Note that only stem-accents exist in Declension III. Masculine example seti ['zeti] 'son-in-law':
['zeti 'zetsi 'zetse 'zetsi]. Has a nice ring to it, doesn't it? Of course, if you have a word whose stem ends in another consonant, you get even more syncretism--e.g. in geravi 'crane' (bird), whose nom. pl. is gerave; geravi in all other forms.
Feminines (cuosti 'bone', also with palatalization):
There is one more quirk: some nouns have a nominative singular stem which is not the same as the stem used elsewhere. Examples include dozi 'daughter', a Declension III noun with non-NOM.SG. stem dózer- (also in this category is mati/máter-); brato 'brother', a Declension I (stem bratr-); sieme 'seed', a Declension I with stem siemen-; and so on.
Additionally, ssino 'son' has an entirely irregular paradigm.
...those should read ss- but I'm too lazy to fix it.
