A subject of the paper Substantive Declension in Slavic Linguistic Atlas is based on an extensive field research of the Dialects of all Slavic languages. The territory of the research is delimited by the international Slavistic project Slavic Linguistic Atlas the database of which is formed by answers to 3400 questions within 853 localities of the overall Slavic territory. However, not all the forms of all the substantive paradigms are presented, but only the selected representative phenomena testifying to the natural constitutive processes of the national languages in connection with the phonetic changes proving the specifi c character of the linguistic development under the infl uence of a genetically homogeneous or heterogeneous environment and testifying to linguistic changes as results of intercultural, interlingual and probably also inter-confessional infl uences. The final part of the publication is oriented upon the constitutive processes of substantive declination in the Slavic macro-areas (South-Slavic, West-Slavic, and East-Slavic – and within them also in the particular Slavic languages) from the point of view of “otherness” and “foreignness”, i.e. from the point of view of the original and non-original grammatical endings in the particular declension types. The genuine basis of the transgression from the original domestic elements to the new ones gets manifested not only within the adaptation processes of the lexical level, but its basis is hidden in the long-term stabilization processes, in systemic changes by which the inner structure of the language, the area of the distribution of changes, and their impact upon the typological substance of the language are modified. By its interpretative character, the paper The Interpretation of Substantive Declension in Slavic Languages aims at integrating the genetic, areal as well as typological aspects of the investigated domain.
The text discusses words occurring in the Polish-East Slavic borderlands and prevalent in eastern Polish dialects. Differntiation between old references and loans in this area is not always easy. The material presented here is very diverse. In the case of certain words, identifying them as East Slavic loans with an indisputable source is possible, while in the case of others it is difficult to identify the direct source of the loan. Among the words recorded in the East Slavic borderlands we can find those whose range in Polish dialects seems to indicate the possibility of Ruthenian influence; however, their Polish phonetic form implies their native origin and one should speak about an old reference in this respect. We also encounter Pan-Slavic words, where a doubt arises as to whether they are loans or old references in Polish in the East Slavic area and Eastern Poland.
The article attempts to differentiate, on the basis of selected words recorded in the Polish-East Slavic borderland, whether we are dealing with language loans or old references. The analysis takes into account e.g. ethymological, morphological and geographical criteria. The study focuses on the following words: cot ‘an even number’, czapigi, czepigi ‘plough handle’, had ‘an abominable animal’ and hydzić się ‘loathe’, ‘abhor’, ‘denigrate’, kosiec ‘scyther’, liszka ‘an odd number’, liszny/liszni ‘superfluous’, ‘supernumerary’, przewiąsło ‘a straw belt to tie sheaths siewiec ‘sower’, śloza ‘tear’, żeniec ‘harvester’, żenich, żeniuch ‘bridegroom’, ‘fiancé’, żnieja ‘female harvester’. Recognition as borrowings may be based on those word forms where phonetic elements characteristic of other languages, unknown in Polish, occur. Analysis of certain words has revealed the occurrence of Proto-Slavic and all- -Slavic words, preserved in the Polish language as relics, in peripheral areas. In some cases, it is difficult to make clear-cut decisions, because, for example, the stem of the word is a continuation of the Proto-Slavic forms, to be found in the Polish language, while the derivatives are borrowings.
To study language contact in the Polish-East Slavic borderland, we employ extensive subdialect records from atlases, dictionaries, monographic studies, and various file collections. Significantly, however, all of the above lack historical information about the words they contain. Such data can be obtained by using local names and by taking into account all pan-Slavic references. Such comparisons justify the conclusion that historically many of the presented names extended far further westward than is indicated by typically used materials, mainly from the 20th century, though much less frequently from the second half of the 19th century. This sheds new light on the problem of whether the names in question are loan words, naturally older than had previously been thought, or rather relics of former regional convergence, covering the broad Polish-Russian language borderland, and constituting the Mazovian-Russian community.
This article presents the essential information about the Polish language variety in Stubno, a village located about 20 km north-east of Przemyśl, close to the border with Ukraine. Until 1945, the village was inhabited by Poles, Ukrainians and Jews. A significant part of the paper is devoted to some passages authored by one M.W,. a woman who lived in Stubno in 1924-2004 and kept records in her personal journals from 1981 and until her death. In this case, her parents were Poles, but maternal grandparents were of Ukrainian descent. The author of the analysed texts received primary education only, worked on a farm and raised children and never left the village for long periods of time. Also, the notes contain a number of information concerning mostly farming and significant events of both the country’s and the world’s history. In addition, the texts include a language commentary on the most important phonetic, morphologic, word-formation, syntactic and lexical features of the local variety that occurred in the records. Furthermore, the notes provide answers to some questions about regional features of the Southern Kresy (present-day Ukraine) as reflected in the language of native inhabitants including the extent of the influence of Ukrainian, together with its local variety of the Nadsannia region.
Pavol Żigo’s work, which opens the development of morphological maps in the OLA team, is worthy of the highest praise. It offers an interpretation of selected maps concerning declination of nouns, accompanied by detailed theoretical considerations of the process of changes in the declination system in Slavic languages. Drawing on extensive dialectal records, the Atlas offers an excellent overview of the complex development of declination of nouns in Slavic languages. This publication may serve as a model for further studies in this field.
This article analyzes the common Slavic linguistic atlas maps (OLA). Assessing the preliminary results of the OLA project, the author focused her attention on the new linguistic geography data given in the Atlas, and the evolution of some units and Proto-Slavic dialect differentiation of Slavia.