jodece

Neapolitan

Alternative forms

• iodece (alt. spelling)

Etymology

Inherited from Latin iūdicem.

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The expected outcome of the stressed vowel would have been /u/. The shift to /o/ resulted from a sort of reverse-metaphony, whereby the plural judece was taken as implying a singular with /o/, on the pattern of nouns of metaphonic alternations such as ammore (“love”) ⇔ ammure (“loves”). This had the effect of introducing a singular-plural distinction: judece sg or pl → jodece sg, judece pl.

Pronunciation

• (Naples) IPA^(key): [ˈjoːrət͡ʃə]

Noun

jodece m (plural judece)

1. judge

Related terms

• jodecare

References

• Ledgeway, Adam (2009) Grammatica diacronica del napoletano, Tübingen: Niemeyer, page 66
• Rocco, Emmanuele (1882) “jodece”, in Vocabolario del dialetto napolitano