Western Slavic languages. Slavic

Languages. Distributed in Czechoslovakia, Poland, partly in the USSR (Ukraine, Belarus, Lithuania), the GDR [Upper Sorbian and Lower Sorbian languages - in the vicinity of the cities. Bautzen (Budiszyn), Cottbus and Dresden]. Speakers of Z. i. They also live in America (USA, Canada), Australia and Europe (Austria, Hungary, France, Yugoslavia, etc.). The total number of speakers is over 60 million people.

In the 6th-7th centuries. the ancestors of the Western Slavs occupied vast areas between the Oder and the Elbe (Laba). The movement of the Slavs from the Carpathian region and the Vistula basin occurred west and southwest to the Oder, beyond the Sudetenland, to the northern tributaries of the Danube. In the west, Slavic tribes lived interspersed with Germanic ones (some of them were Germanized during the 8th-14th centuries; until the mid-18th century, the language of the Polabian tribes was retained), in the south they reached the Danube.

In Z. I. 3 subgroups are distinguished: Lechitic, Czech-Slovak, Serbo-Sorbian, the differences between which appeared in the late Proto-Slavic era. From the Lechitic subgroup, which included Polish, Polabian, Kashubian, and earlier other tribal languages, the Polish language with the Kashubian dialect, which retained a certain genetic independence, was preserved.

Z. I. differ from the East Slavic and South Slavic languages in a number of features that developed during the Proto-Slavic period:

Selishchev A. M., Slavic linguistics, vol. 1, West Slavic languages, M., 1941;
Bernstein S. B., Essay on the comparative grammar of Slavic languages. [Introduction. Phonetics], M., 1961;
his, Essay on the comparative grammar of Slavic languages. Alternations. Name bases, M., 1974;
Nachtigal R., Slavic languages, trans. from Slovenian, M., 1963;
Entry into the historical-historical learning of Slovenian language, Kiev, 1966;
Slavic languages. (Essays on the grammar of West Slavic and South Slavic languages), ed. A. G. Shirokova and V. P. Gudkova, M., 1977;
Historical typology of Slavic languages. Phonetics, word formation, vocabulary and phraseology, Kyiv, 1986;
Lehr-Spławiński T., Kuraszkiewicz W., Sławski Fr., Przegląd i charakterystyka języków słowiańskich, Warszawa, 1954;
Horalek K., Úvod do studia slovanských jazyků, Praha, 1955;
Peter J., Zaklady slavistiky, Prague, 1984.

SLAVIC LANGUAGES, a group of languages belonging to the Indo-European family, spoken by more than 440 million people in Eastern Europe and North and Central Asia. The thirteen currently existing Slavic languages are divided into three groups: 1) the East Slavic group includes Russian, Ukrainian and Belarusian languages; 2) West Slavic includes Polish, Czech, Slovak, Kashubian (spoken in a small area in northern Poland) and two Lusatian (or Serbian) languages - Upper Lusatian and Lower Lusatian, spoken in small areas in eastern Germany; 3) the South Slavic group includes: Serbo-Croatian (spoken in Yugoslavia, Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina), Slovenian, Macedonian and Bulgarian. In addition, there are three dead languages - Slovinian, which disappeared at the beginning of the 20th century, Polabian, which died out in the 18th century, as well as Old Church Slavonic - the language of the first Slavic translations of the Holy Scriptures, which is based on one of the ancient South Slavic dialects and which was used in worship in the Slavic Orthodox Church, but was never an everyday spoken language ( cm. OLD SLAVIC LANGUAGE).

Modern Slavic languages have many words in common with other Indo-European languages. Many Slavic words are similar to the corresponding English ones, for example: sister –sister,three – three,nose – nose,night – night etc. In other cases, the common origin of the words is less obvious. Russian word see cognate with Latin videre, Russian word five cognate with German fünf, Latin quinque(cf. musical term quintet), Greek penta, which is present, for example, in a borrowed word pentagon(lit. "pentagon") .

An important role in the system of Slavic consonantism is played by palatalization - the approach of the flat middle part of the tongue to the palate when pronouncing a sound. Almost all consonants in Slavic languages can be either hard (non-palatalized) or soft (palatalized). In the field of phonetics, there are also some significant differences between the Slavic languages. In Polish and Kashubian, for example, two nasal vowels have been preserved - ą And ERROR, disappeared in other Slavic languages. Slavic languages vary greatly in stress. In Czech, Slovak and Sorbian the stress usually falls on the first syllable of a word; in Polish – to the penultimate; in Serbo-Croatian, any syllable except the last one can be stressed; in Russian, Ukrainian and Belarusian, stress can fall on any syllable of a word.

All Slavic languages, except Bulgarian and Macedonian, have several types of declension of nouns and adjectives, which vary in six or seven cases, in number and in three genders. The presence of seven cases (nominative, genitive, dative, accusative, instrumental, locative or prepositional and vocative) indicates the archaic nature of the Slavic languages and their closeness to the Indo-European language, which supposedly had eight cases. An important feature of Slavic languages is the category of verbal aspect: every verb belongs to either the perfective or imperfective form and denotes, respectively, either a completed, or a continuing or repeating action.

The territory inhabited by Slavic tribes in Eastern Europe in the 5th–8th centuries. AD expanded rapidly, and by the 8th century. The common Slavic language spread from the north of Russia to the south of Greece and from the Elbe and the Adriatic Sea to the Volga. Up to the 8th or 9th century. it was basically a single language, but gradually the differences between territorial dialects became more noticeable. By the 10th century. There were already predecessors to modern Slavic languages.

The Slavic group of languages is the closest of this family to the Baltic group, so some scientists combine these two groups into one - Balto-Slavic subfamily Indo-European languages. The total number of native speakers of Slavic languages is over 300 million. The majority of speakers of Slavic languages live in Russia and Ukraine.

The Slavic group of languages is divided into three branches: East Slavic, West Slavic And South Slavic. The East Slavic branch of languages includes: Russian language or Great Russian, Ukrainian, also known as Little Russian or Ruthenian, and Belarusian. These languages are collectively spoken by about 225 million people. The West Slavic branch includes: Polish, Czech, Slovak, Lusatian, Kashubian and the extinct Polabian language. Living West Slavic languages are spoken today by approximately 56 million people, mainly in Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovakia. The South Slavic branch consists of Serbo-Croatian, Bulgarian, Slovenian and Macedonian languages. The language of church services, Church Slavonic, also belongs to this branch. The first four languages are spoken collectively by more than 30 million people in Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Yugoslavia, Macedonia and Bulgaria.

All Slavic languages, according to linguistic research, are rooted in one common ancestor language, usually called Proto-Slavic language, which in turn separated much earlier from Proto-Indo-European language(around 2000 BC), the ancestor of all Indo-European languages. The Proto-Slavic language was probably common to all Slavs as early as the 1st century BC, and already from the 8th century AD. Separate Slavic languages begin to form.

General characteristics

Conversational Slavic languages are very similar to each other, more so than the Germanic or Romance languages are to each other. However, even though they share similarities in vocabulary, grammar and phonetics, they still differ in many respects. One of the common characteristics of all Slavic languages is the relatively large number of consonants. A striking example of different usage is the variety of basic stress positions in individual Slavic languages. For example, in Czech the stress falls on the first syllable of a word, and in Polish on the next syllable after the last, while in Russian and Bulgarian the stress can fall on any syllable.

Grammar

Grammatically, Slavic languages, with the exception of Bulgarian and Macedonian, have a highly developed system of noun inflections, up to seven cases(nominative, genitive, dative, accusative, instrumental, prepositional and vocative). The verb in Slavic languages has three simple tenses(past, present and future), but is also characterized by such a complex characteristic as species. A verb can be imperfect (shows continuity or repetition of an action) or perfect (denotes the completion of an action). Participles and gerunds are widely used (one can compare their use with the use of participles and gerunds in English). In all Slavic languages, except Bulgarian and Macedonian, there is no article. The languages of the Slavic subfamily are more conservative and therefore closer to Proto-Indo-European language than the languages of the Germanic and Romance groups, as evidenced by the preservation by the Slavic languages of seven of the eight cases for nouns that were characteristic of the Proto-Indo-European language, as well as the development of the aspect of the verb.

Vocabulary composition

The vocabulary of Slavic languages is predominantly of Indo-European origin. There is also an important element of the mutual influence of the Baltic and Slavic languages on each other, which is reflected in the vocabulary. Borrowed words or translations of words go back to Iranian and German groups, and also to Greek, Latin, and Turkic languages. They influenced the vocabulary of such languages as Italian and French. Slavic languages also borrowed words from each other. The borrowing of foreign words tends to translate and imitate rather than simply absorb them.

Writing

Perhaps it is in the written form that the most significant differences between the Slavic languages lie. Some Slavic languages (in particular Czech, Slovak, Slovenian and Polish) have a written language based on the Latin alphabet, since the speakers of these languages belong predominantly to the Catholic faith. Other Slavic languages (such as Russian, Ukrainian, Belarusian, Macedonian, and Bulgarian) use adopted variants of the Cyrillic alphabet as a result of the influence of the Orthodox Church. The only language, Serbo-Croatian, uses two alphabets: Cyrillic for Serbian and Latin for Croatian.
The invention of the Cyrillic alphabet is traditionally attributed to Cyril, a Greek missionary who was sent by the Byzantine Emperor Michael III to the Slavic peoples then in the 9th century AD. in the territory of present-day Slovakia. There is no doubt that Kirill created the predecessor of the Cyrillic alphabet - Glagolitic, based on the Greek alphabet, where new symbols were added to represent Slavic sounds that did not find a correspondence in the Greek language. However, the very first texts in Cyrillic dating back to the 9th century AD. not preserved. The oldest Slavic texts preserved in the ecclesiastical Old Church Slavonic language date back to the 10th and 11th centuries.

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Western Slavic languages.

Western Slavic languages

West Slavic languages are a group within the Slavic branch of the Indo-European language family. Distributed in Central and Eastern Europe (in Czechoslovakia, Poland, partly in Ukraine, Belarus, Lithuania, Germany [Upper Sorbian and Lower Sorbian languages - in the vicinity of the cities of Bautzen (Budiszyn), Cottbus and Dresden]. Speakers of Western languages also live in territories of America (USA, Canada), Australia and Europe (Austria, Hungary, France, Yugoslavia, etc.). The total number of speakers is over 60 million people.

West Slavic languages include:

§ Lehitic subgroup

§ Kashubian

§ Polabian †

§ Polish

§ Silesian (in Poland, the Silesian language is officially considered a dialect of Polish or transitional dialects between the Polish and Czech languages. According to 2002 data in Poland, 60,000 people called the Silesian language their native language. The language does not have its own literary tradition, although it was singled out as special by the Slavists of the 19th century)

§ Slovinsky †

§ Lusatian subgroup(Serbologian)

§ Upper Sorbian

§ Lower Sorbian

§ Czech-Slovak subgroup

§ Slovak

§ Czech

§ knanite †

The most common West Slavic languages are:Polish(35 million),Czech(9.5 million) andSlovak(4.5 million). A small population of Kashubians lives in Poland. The Polabian language is now a dead language. It is reconstructed on the basis of individual words and local names available in Latin and German documents, in small recordings of live speech of the 17th-18th centuries.

In Z. I. 3 subgroups are distinguished: Lechitic, Czech-Slovak, Serbian, differences between which appeared in the late Proto-Slavic era. From the Lechitic subgroup, which included Polish, Polabian, Kashubian, and earlier other tribal languages, the Polish language with the Kashubian dialect, which retained a certain genetic independence, was preserved.

Z. I. differ from the East Slavic and South Slavic languages in a number of features that developed during the Proto-Slavic period:

preservation of the consonant group kv", gv" before the vowels i, "e, "a (‹м) in accordance with cv, zv in South Slavic and West Slavic languages: Polish. kwiat, gwiazda; Czech kvмt, hvмzda; Slovak kvet, hviezda; lower-puddle kwмt, gwмzda; top-puddle kwмt, hwмzda (cf. Russian “color”, “star”, etc.).

Preservation of unsimplified consonant groups tl, dl in accordance with l in the languages of other Slavic groups: Polish. plуti, mydіo; Czech pletl, medlo; Slovak plietol, mydlo; lower-puddle pleti, mydio; top-puddle pleti, mydio; (cf. Russian “plait”, “soap”).

Consonants c, dz (or z) in place of the Proto-Slavic *tj, *dj, *ktj, *kti, which in other Slavic languages correspond to the consonants i, ћ, љt, dj, ћd, zh: Polish. њwieca, sadzаж; Czech svнce, sбzet; Slovak svieca, sбdzaќ; lower-puddle swmca, sajџaj; top-puddle swмca, sadџeж (cf. Russian “candle”, “to plant”).

The presence of the consonant љ in those cases that correspond to s or њ in the languages of other Slavic groups (with analogous formations ch): Polish. wszak, musze (Danish-prepositional clause from mucha); Czech vљak, mouљe; Slovak vљak, muљe; lower-puddle vљako, muљe; top-puddle vљak, muљe [cf. rus. “everyone”, “fly”; Ukrainian “everyone”, “musi” (= fly)].

Absence of l epenthetic after labials in the non-initial position of a word (from the combination labial + j): Polish. ziemia, cupiony; Czech zemм, koupм; Slovak zem, kъpene; lower-luzh.zemja, kupju; top-puddle zemja, kupju (cf. Russian “land”, “purchase”).

In the history of the development of Z. I. changes common to the entire group occurred:

contraction of groups of vowels into one long with the loss of intervocalic j and assimilation of vowels in inflections and roots: Czech. good

In Z. I. a fixed stress was established either on the first (Czech, Slovak, Lusatian languages) or on the penultimate syllable (Polish, some Czech dialects). The Kashubian dialect has different accents.

For most of Z. I. and dialects are characterized by the same change in strong reduced ъ and ь > e: Czech. sen

The main differences between individual vowels that arose during the historical period of their development: the different fate of nasal vowels, the sound m (yat), long and short vowels; the Proto-Slavic consonant g in Czech, Slovak and Sorbian languages changed into h (glottal, fricative), the differences also concern the category of hardness/softness of consonants. In the system of nominal declension of all Z. i. All-Slavic processes took place: regrouping of declension types based on grammatical gender, loss of some previous types (mainly consonant stems), mutual influence of case inflections within the paradigm, reorganization of stems, and the appearance of new endings. Unlike East Slavic languages, the influence of the feminine gender is more limited. The Czech language has retained the most archaic declension system. All Z. I. (except for Lusatian ones) have lost the forms of the dual number. The category of animation (Czech, Slovak) and the specific category of personality (Polish, Upper Sorbian) developed and received morphological expression. Short forms of adjectives have disappeared (Slovak, Upper Sorbian) or have been preserved to a limited extent (Czech, Polish).

The verb is characterized by the transition of unproductive conjugation classes to productive ones (cf. Czech siesti > sednouti), the loss (except for the Sorbian languages) of simple past tenses (aorist and imperfect), in some languages, and the plusquaperfect (Czech, partly Polish). The most significant changes in the conjugation of present forms of the verb have been experienced by the Slovak language, where all verbs in the present tense have the same ending system.

Syntactic features are partly due to the influence of Latin and German. In contrast to the East Slavic languages, modal verbs, reflexive forms of verbs in an indefinite-personal and generalized-personal meaning such as Czech are more often used. Jak se jde? `How to get there?', etc.

The vocabulary reflected Latin and German influence, in Slovak - Czech and Hungarian. InfluenceRussian language, significant in the 18th and 19th centuries, especially intensified after World War II.

In the early feudal period as a written language The Western Slavs used Latin. The oldest literary language of the Slavs is Old Church Slavonic, which emerged in the 9th century. The first Czech monuments proper date back to the end of the 13th century, Polish ones - to the beginning of the 14th century, Slovak ones - to the end of the 15th - 16th centuries, Lusatian ones - to the 16th century. Modern Z. i. use Latin script.

The most common West Slavic languages are Polish (35 million), Czech (9.5 million) and Slovak (4.5 million). A small population of Kashubians lives in Poland. The Polabian language is now a dead language. It is reconstructed on the basis of individual words and local names available in Latin and German documents, in small recordings of live speech of the 17th-18th centuries.

The Lusatian languages are preserved in the form of small islands in Germany. There are about 150 thousand Lusatian residents. They have their own schools, their own press, and there is a Slavic department at the University of Berlin.

Lehitic subgroup

Kaszumbian language (alternative names: Pomeranian language, Pomeranian language; Kashubian kaszлbsczi jгzлk, ptmрsczi jгzлk, kaszлbskф mтwa, kaszлbskт-siowiсskф mтwa) is a West Slavic language of the Lechitic subgroup, widespread to the west and south of Gdańsk. Currently, approximately 50 thousand people speak Kashubian in everyday life, and approximately 150 thousand people are familiar with it.

The closest language to Kashubian is Polish, with which Kashubian shares most of its core vocabulary. Kashubian has also experienced significant influence from Polish on its grammar and word formation. The main differences from Polish are borrowings from Old Prussian and German (from the latter - approximately 5% of the vocabulary), as well as the omission of vowels in syllables without stress and other stress rules, which in Kashubian itself, however, are also heterogeneous. While in the south the stress always falls on the first syllable, in the north the stress can vary.

Pomlian language (jкzyk polski, polszczyzna) is the language of the Poles and is the native language of approximately 40 million people in many countries around the world, including approximately 38 million people in the Republic of Poland. About 5-10 million more people speak Polish as a second and foreign language.

The dialects of the Polish language include:

§ Wielkopolska dialect, covers the territory of Greater Poland, Krajna and Borow Tucholski. This dialect is based on the tribal dialect of the Polyans.

§ Lesser Poland dialect, occupies the territory of the Lesser Poland, Subcarpathian, Świętokrzyskie and Lublin voivodeships. It was based on the Vistula dialect.

§ The Masovian dialect occupies the eastern and central part of Poland. It was formed on the basis of the dialect of the Mazovshan tribe.

§ The Silesian dialect, widespread in Upper Silesia, is a continuation of the development of the dialect of the Slenzan tribe.

Polambian language is an extinct West Slavic language. The native language of the Polabian Slavs, assimilated by the Germans at the beginning of the 19th century.

The Polabian language was closest to Polish and together with it, Kashubian and the extinct Slovinian.

The name of the language comes from the Slavic name of the Elbe River (Polish: Јaba, Czech: Labe, etc.). Other names: Old-Solabian, Vendian. Accordingly, the Slavic tribe that spoke it was called Polabian Slavs, Drevyans (Drevans) or Vends (Vends is the German name for all the Slavs of Germany). The language was widespread until the first half of the 18th century on the left bank of the Elbe in the Principality of Lunenburg (now the Lüchow-Dannenberg district of Lower Saxony), where monuments of this language were recorded, and earlier also in the north of modern Germany (Mecklenburg, Brandenburg, Schleswig, Fr. Rügen).

In the south, the area of the Polabian language bordered on the Lusatian languages, which were widespread in the southern part of modern eastern Germany.

In the 17th century, the Polabian language became socially unprestigious, the “Vendas” hid or did not advertise their origin and switched to the German language, including being subjected to forced Germanization. By 1725 there is information about a family of native speakers, in which the younger generation no longer knew Polabian. The last entry was made around 1750. In 1790, the compiler of the first consolidated Polabian dictionary, Johann Jugler, looked for people who could understand at least a little Polish, but he could no longer find anyone.

Slovinsky (Slovintsy) language is a West Slavic idiom of the Lechitic subgroup, extinct in the 20th century. It is considered by some authors as an independent language, by others as a dialect of Kashubian or (not distinguishing Kashubian in turn) Polish. The term “Pomeranian (Pomeranian) language” is used, combining Kashubian and Slovinian. It was spoken by the Slovinians, first ethnographically described by A.F. Hilferding in 1856 and living northwest of the Kashubians, between Lake Łebski and Lake Gardno.

In the 17th - 19th centuries, the Slovinian language/dialect was used even in church sermons, but after the unification of Germany in 1871 it began to be finally replaced by the German language. By the beginning of the 20th century, no more than a few hundred speakers remained, and all of them spoke German.

After 1945, the Slovinians - Protestants (since the 16th century), speaking mainly German - were considered by the Polish government as Germans and were mostly expelled to Germany or then left Poland of their own free will, settling in Germany (many in area of Hamburg). There they finally assimilated. Some old people who remained in Poland remembered Slovinian words back in the 1950s.

Lumzhitsky languages, Serbolumzhitsky languages: (obsolete name - Serbian) - the languages of the Lusatians, one of the national minorities in Germany.

They belong to the Slavic group of languages. The total number of speakers is about 60,000 people, of which about 40,000 live in Saxony and about 20,000 in Brandenburg. In the region where the Lusatian language is spoken, tables with the names of cities and streets are often bilingual.

There are two written languages, which in turn consist of several dialects: Upper Sorbian (in Upper Lusatia) and Low Sorbian (in Lower Lusatia).

The number of speakers of Lusatian languages in everyday life is significantly lower than the above figures. In contrast to the fairly stable Upper Sorbian language, the Lower Sorbian language is on the verge of extinction.

Slovak language West Slavic ethnic

Czech-Slovak subgroup

Chemsh language (self-name - eeљtina, eeske jazyk) - total number of speakers - 12 million. Latin (Czech alphabet)

The Czech language is divided into several dialects, the speakers of which generally understand each other. Currently, under the influence of the literary language, the boundaries between dialects are blurred. Czech dialects are divided into 4 groups:

§ Czech dialects (with colloquial Czech as koine)

§ Central Moravian group of dialects (Ganatsky);

§ East Moravian group of dialects (Moravian-Slovak);

§ Silesian dialects.

The border lands formerly inhabited by Sudeten Germans cannot be classified as one dialect due to the heterogeneity of the population.

As in many related languages that have developed independently for a long time, similar-sounding Czech and Russian words often have different and even opposite meanings (for example, иerstve - fresh; pozor - attention; mmsto - city; hrad - castle; ovoce - - fruits; rodina - family; and other so-called false friends of the translator).

Slovak language (Slovak slovenіina, slovenskе jazyk) - total number of speakers - 6 million. The Slovak language is very close to the Czech language.

The standardization of the Slovak language began at the end of the 18th century. Then Anton Bernolak’s book “Dissertatio philologico-critica de litteris Slavorum” with the appendix “Orthographia” (1787) was published. This literary language was based on Western Slovak dialects. The modern literary Slovak language, which is based on Central Slovak linguistic features, arose in the middle of the 19th century thanks to the efforts of the Slovak patriots Ludovit Štur, Michal Miloslav Goji, Josef Miloslav Gurban and others. The first version of Štur’s codification was formulated in the books “Nauka reii slovenskej” ( The science of the Slovak language) and “Nbreija slovenskuo alebo potreba pнsатja v tomto nbrein” (Slovak dialect or the need to write in this dialect) and came primarily from the speech of the intelligentsia of the central Slovak city of Liptovsky Mikulas and was characterized by a strong phonological principle of spelling, the absence of soft “ l" ("ѕ") and the long vowel "й" with the exception of the word "dcеra" (daughter) and other linguistic features that exist in the modern version of the Slovak language. In 1851, at a meeting of Slovak intellectuals, a reformed version of the Stuhr codification was adopted, the author of which was linguist Milan Gattala (we are talking about the so-called “Godjov-Gattala reform”). This variant is the basis of today's literary Slovak language. Important moments in the history of further standardization of the Slovak language are the publication of spelling books in 1931 and 1953. and the development of terminology in the interwar and especially postwar period.

During the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Hungarian authorities persecuted the literary Slovak language while promoting the less widespread Eastern Slovak dialect.

Jewish-Slavic dialects (Qna'anith) is the conventional name for several dialects and registers of Slavic languages spoken by Jews who lived in Slavic countries in the Middle Ages. All known Judeo-Slavic dialects were supplanted by Yiddish or surrounding Slavic languages by the end of the Middle Ages.

The best known is the Judeo-Czech variant of the Old Czech language, which was spoken by Bohemian and Moravian Jews before the massive influx of Yiddish-speaking Ashkenazim from Germany and the subsequent resettlement of both to the east and northeast within the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. However, nothing is known about its differences from the language of the surrounding population. Most likely, as in the case of other medieval Hebrew languages of Europe, the differences were minimal and were limited to the inclusion of Hebrew and Aramaic words and the use of the Hebrew alphabet.

The name Knaanite (English Knaanic) is associated with the designation of Slavic countries by the term Qna`an (Hebrew lrtp, anciently denoting Palestine - Canaan), found in Jewish texts (for example, Benjamin of Tudela in the 12th century calls Kievan Rus " Land of Canaan"). The reason for this identification is unknown.

Polabian	Polish	Kashubian	Upper Lusatian	Lower Lusatian	Ukrainian	Belorussian
					man, man




prenja zaima, jisin




					vogon, vogon	fire, fire

						veter, wind

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Origin and history of Slavic languages

Slavic languages are closest to the Baltic languages. Both are part of the Indo-European family of languages. From the Indo-European proto-language, the Balto-Slavic proto-language first emerged, which later split into Proto-Baltic and Proto-Slavic. But not all scientists agree with this. They explain the special closeness of these proto-languages by the long-term contact of the ancient Balts and Slavs, and deny the existence of the Balto-Slavic language.
But what is clear is that from one of the Indo-European dialects (Proto-Slavic) the Proto-Slavic language was formed, which is the ancestor of all modern Slavic languages.
The history of the Proto-Slavic language was long. For a long time, the Proto-Slavic language developed as a single dialect. Dialectal variants arose later.
In the second half of the 1st millennium AD. e. Early Slavic states began to form in Southeast and Eastern Europe. Then the process of dividing the Proto-Slavic language into independent Slavic languages began.

Slavic languages have retained significant similarities with each other, but at the same time, each of them has unique features.

Eastern group of Slavic languages

Russian (250 million people)
Ukrainian (45 million people)
Belarusian (6.4 million people).
The writing of all East Slavic languages is based on the Cyrillic alphabet.

Differences between East Slavic languages and other Slavic languages:

reduction of vowels (akanye);
the presence of Church Slavonicisms in the vocabulary;
free dynamic stress.

Western group of Slavic languages

Polish (40 million people)
Slovak (5.2 million people)
Czech (9.5 million people)
The writing of all West Slavic languages is based on the Latin alphabet.

Differences between West Slavic languages and other Slavic languages:

In Polish - the presence of nasal vowels and two rows of sibilant consonants; fixed stress on the penultimate syllable. In Czech, the stress is fixed on the first syllable; presence of long and short vowels. The Slovak language has the same features as the Czech language.

Southern group of Slavic languages

Serbo-Croatian (21 million people)
Bulgarian (8.5 million people)
Macedonian (2 million people)
Slovenian (2.2 million people)
Written language: Bulgarian and Macedonian - Cyrillic, Serbo-Croatian - Cyrillic/Latin, Slovenian - Latin.

Differences between South Slavic languages and other Slavic languages:

Serbo-Croatian has free musical stress. In the Bulgarian language there are no cases, a variety of verb forms and the absence of an infinitive (undefined form of the verb), free dynamic stress. Macedonian language - the same as in the Bulgarian language + fixed stress (no further than the third syllable from the end of the word). The Slovenian language has many dialects, the presence of a dual number, and free musical stress.

Writing of Slavic languages

The creators of Slavic writing were the brothers Cyril (Constantine the Philosopher) and Methodius. They translated liturgical texts from Greek into Slavic for the needs of Great Moravia.

Prayer in Old Church Slavonic
Great Moravia is a Slavic state that existed in 822-907. on the Middle Danube. At its best, it included the territories of modern Hungary, Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Lesser Poland, part of Ukraine and the historical region of Silesia.
Great Moravia had a great influence on the cultural development of the entire Slavic world.

Great Moravia

The new literary language was based on the South Macedonian dialect, but in Great Moravia it acquired many local linguistic features. Later it was further developed in Bulgaria. A rich original and translated literature was created in this language (Old Church Slavonic) in Moravia, Bulgaria, Rus', and Serbia. There were two Slavic alphabets: Glagolitic and Cyrillic.

The most ancient Old Church Slavonic texts date back to the 10th century. Since the 11th century. More Slavic monuments have survived.
Modern Slavic languages use alphabets based on Cyrillic and Latin. Glagolitic script is used in Catholic worship in Montenegro and several coastal areas in Croatia. In Bosnia, for some time, in parallel with the Cyrillic and Latin alphabet, the Arabic alphabet was also used (in 1463, Bosnia completely lost its independence and became part of the Ottoman Empire as an administrative unit).

Slavic literary languages

Slavic literary languages did not always have strict norms. Sometimes the literary language in Slavic countries was a foreign language (in Rus' - Old Church Slavonic, in the Czech Republic and Poland - Latin).
The Russian literary language had a complex evolution. It absorbed folk elements, elements of the Old Church Slavonic language, and was influenced by many European languages.
In the Czech Republic in the 18th century. German was dominant. During the period of national revival in the Czech Republic, the language of the 16th century was artificially revived, which at that time was already far from the national language.
The Slovak literary language developed on the basis of the folk language. In Serbia until the 19th century. The Church Slavonic language was dominant. In the 18th century the process of bringing this language closer to the folk language began. As a result of the reform carried out by Vuk Karadzic in the mid-19th century, a new literary language was created.
The Macedonian literary language was finally formed only in the middle of the 20th century.
But there are also a number of small Slavic literary languages (microlanguages), which function along with national literary languages in small ethnic groups. This is, for example, the Polesie microlanguage, Podlyashian in Belarus; Rusyn - in Ukraine; Wichsky - in Poland; Banat-Bulgarian microlanguage - in Bulgaria, etc.