| | LINGUIST List 5.400: Question Particles |
 | | It seems to me that the clause-initial interrogative particle which also functions as a disjunctive conjunction is an areal feature encompassing Polish, Belorussian and Ukrainian (as well as some Russian transitional dialects), possibly some dialects of Slovak, Lithuanian, as well as some northeastern European varieties of Yiddish. |
 | | The geographical distribution suggests that Polish was most likely the source, although the particle "ci" (originally the instrumental form of CS *ch'to) is presumed to have been present as an interrogative marker in Common Slavic, so its occurrence as an interrogative particle in Slavic languages other than Polish may not necessarily be due to borrowing. |
 | | On the other hand, Polish texts up until the 16th century tend to use the particles "aza" or "azali" rather than "czy" in the same function, so we might be dealing here with a common Polish-Belorussian-Ukrainian innovation that arose in a linguistically mixed area. |
| www.ling.ed.ac.uk /linguist/issues/5/5-400.html (1307 words) |