Reconstruction:Proto-Slavic/modlitva

This Proto-Slavic entry contains reconstructed terms and roots. As such, the term(s) in this entry are not directly attested, but are hypothesized to have existed based on comparative evidence.

Proto-Slavic

Etymology

*modliti (“to pray”) + *-tva.

Noun

*modlitva f

1. prayer

Inflection

Declension of *modlitva (hard a-stem)

	singular	dual	plural
nominative	*modlitva	*modlitvě	*modlitvy
genitive	*modlitvy	*modlitvu	*modlitvъ
dative	*modlitvě	*modlitvama	*modlitvamъ
accusative	*modlitvǫ	*modlitvě	*modlitvy
instrumental	*modlitvojǫ, *modlitvǫ**	*modlitvama	*modlitvami
locative	*modlitvě	*modlitvu	*modlitvasъ, *modlitvaxъ*
vocative	*modlitvo	*modlitvě	*modlitvy

^* -asъ is the expected Balto-Slavic form but is found only in some Old Czech documents; -axъ is found everywhere else and is formed by analogy with other locative plurals in -xъ.
^** The second form occurs in languages that contract early across /j/ (e.g. Czech), while the first form occurs in languages that do not (e.g. Russian).

Descendants

• East Slavic:
  • Old East Slavic: молитва (molitva)
    • Old Ruthenian: моли́тва (molítva)
      • Belarusian: малі́тва (malítva)
      • Carpathian Rusyn: моли́тва (molýtva)
      • Ukrainian: моли́тва (molýtva)
    • Russian: моли́тва (molítva)
• South Slavic:
  • Old Church Slavonic:

    Old Cyrillic script: молитва (molitva)

    Glagolitic script: ⰿⱁⰾⰻⱅⰲⰰ (molitva)

  • Bulgarian: моли́тва (molítva)
  • Macedonian: молитва (molitva)
  • Serbo-Croatian:

    Cyrillic script: мо̀литва

    Latin script: mòlitva

  • Slovene: molȋtəv (tonal orthography) (reanalyzed)
• West Slavic:
  • Old Czech: modlitva
    • Czech: modlitba
  • Kashubian: mòdlëtwa
  • Old Polish: modlitwa, moglitwa
    • Polish: modlitwa
  • Slovak: modlitba
  • Sorbian:
    • Upper Sorbian: modlitwa
    • Lower Sorbian: módlitwa

• Non-Slavic:
  • → Romanian: molitfă, molitvă
  • → Yakut: мэлииппэ (meliippe), малыыппа (malııppa)

Further reading

• Georgiev, Vladimir I., Duridanov, I. V., editors (1995), “молитва”, in Български етимологичен речник [Bulgarian Etymological Dictionary] (in Bulgarian), volume 4 (мѝнго² – па̀дам), Sofia: Prof. Marin Drinov Pubg. House, →ISBN, page 216