U radu se na temelju autorova terenskog rada obrađuju novoštokavski ijekavski govori u Neretvanskoj krajini i Donjoj Hercegovini s osobitim naglaskom na promjene koje su posljedica migracijskih kretanja. Izno-se se bilježite naglasne, fonološke i morfološke značajke mjesnih govora upotpunjene istraživanjem povijesnih vrela kako bi se pokušalo rekon-struirati predmigracijsku dijalektnu sliku obrađenog područja. Iznose se i neke sociolingvističke činjenice bitne za razumijevanje suvremenog stanja.The dialectological situation in the Neretva region and Lower Hercegovina is very complex. In the past, the Neretva basin was the boundary between Šćakavian and Štokavian dialects, while today it is the boundary between Ikavian and Ijekavian Štokavian dialects. Only a little to the east is the boundary between the west Štokavian and the east Štokavian dialects; in the south, Štokavian dialects come into contact with south Čakavian dialects, in addition to which this whole area is under a strong influence of the Dubrovnik dialect, and frequent migrations have changed the dialectal picture. The linguistic analysis undertaken in this paper confirms that the local subdialects belong to the west Štokavian dialect, while the analysis of historical sources, toponymy, and the speech of immigrants from this area suggests that the subdialects which are now Ijekavian were formerly Ikavian
