In this contribution, problems of investigating handwritten Cyrillic literary creation are discussed and some aspects of results accomplished so far are pointed out. The author turns his attention above all to some controversial questions related to interpretation of Cyrillic literary creation from linguistic, historical, cultural and religious points of view. Circumstances promoting paraliturgical song creation on the border of two religiously and culturally differing communities - the Slavonic East and the Slavonic West - are explained. Some aspects of the traditional, or stereotypical views on cultural, religious and linguistic coexistence in the investigated area are re-defined. The author emphasizes the urgency of rigorous interpretation and re-interpretation of Cyrillic manuscripts originating from the contact area of Slavia Latina and Slavia Byzantina.
(Polish title: Fragmenty cerkiewnoslowianskich rekopismiennych lekcjonarzy w zbiorach Muzeum Narodowego w Pradze (edycja tekstu i klasyfikacja typologiczna). The object of the paper are three fragments of the church slavonic lectionary manuscripts form the collections of the National Museum in Prague: 1 Dc 2/3; 1 Dc 2/5 and 1 Dc 2/14. The Author gives the description, edition and typological classification of these manuscripts. The 1 Dc 2/5 - known as Hradecki Fragment from the middle of XIX c. - is a part of abbreviated gospel lectionary. The 1 Dc 2/3 and 1 Dc 2/14 are, the most probably, fragments form apostle-gospel columnar lectionary, that constitute part of the liturgical books.
The article analyzes the issues of using the linguistic corpus to research Cyril’s and Methodius’s cultural heritage and Church Slavonic texts: the text is considered as the main point for analyzing the history of the Church Slavonic language. The author names topical issues for the research of the Church Slavonic language in the area of Slavia Ortodoxa, and demonstrates the possibilities of using corpus linguistics and its methods in the research of ancient and modern Church Slavonic texts. The article substantiates the theoretical and methodological possibility of analyzing linguistic phenomena (based on the text-centric principle) with the methods of corpus language research. The author analyzes the explanatory possibilities of modern text-oriented corpus linguistics and describes the dynamics of the text-centric approach in modern linguistic developments. The methodological connection of linguistics of Church Slavonic discourse with the corpus method of its research is explained.
Do Cyrillic Paraliturgical Songs Belong in the Context of Slovak Culture? The paper discusses some issues of linguistic research concerning Cyrillic texts of Eastern Slovak provenance. Phonetic, morphological and lexical examples are adduced that attest to the influence the Slovak language environment exerted on the texts.
The article deals with materials related to the exclusion of expressions offensive to Muslims from liturgical books sent to Orthodox Slavs in the Balkans, and aims to introduce such materials into scholarly discourse. In order to avoid problems with Turkish customs officers, the Synod proposed to refrain from sending the Menaia and the Great Euchologion (Trebnik) to the southern Slavs and to exclude references to the Bulgarian martyr George the New from other books, as the very title of the service to this martyr refers to Yavuz Sultan Selim as 'impious king'. It is significant that the service to George the New containing extremely insulting anti-Muslim statements was composed in Russia, while Bulgaria used a different version of the same service, which was devoid of any derogatory characteristics of Muslims. The article confirms the assumption that it was primarily due to political concerns that harsh statements directed against non-believers were removed from liturgical books.
The article deals with the linguistic situation existing in the sphere of church-and-religion public social activity. It is characterized as the situation of bilinguism because both the Church Slavonic language and the church-and-religion functional language style function in modern literary Russian language.
Byzantine culture began to develop in the Great Moravian environment on the Middle Danube and in Slovakia of that period of time. However, the beginning of its expansion is associated not only with the southern and eastern Slavs, where through the Wallachian colonization the Church Slavonic language, liturgy, religiosity and spirituality spread to Slovakia. The important centre of the Byzantine culture was Vyšehrad (hung. Visegrád) on the Danube, especially during the 11th – 13th century, where the Greek liturgy existed. The autochthonous Slovak ethnic group in connection with the application of the Wallachian economic system was also significantly involved in the process of its revival in Slovakia. Evidence of this process is petrified in the language of the Slovak community. It is the language, as a representative of cultural and national identity that preserves all important and historically verifiable cultural-communication traces in its system. The present study thus provides a picture of the earlier period of the development of the Slovak language in relation to the Byzantine-Slavic tradition as a forming component of Slovak national culture.
The appearance of Slavonic literature is related to the history of early medieval Europe. Speaking of the early literature, as well as translations of liturgical texts, we must mention the oldest centers of literature, whose division has been made in terms of the mission of St. Cyril and Methodius. In the so-called Moravian period this were Mikulčicei Sady near Old Mesta, and Pannonia Mosapurk, the seat of the Duke Kocela. After the collapse of the mission of St. Cyril and Methodius, there remained for some time Slavic monasteries in the Czech Republic (the most famous is the Sazava near Prague), and probably in Pannonia, but the main center of Slavic literature moved to the south. There was a Bulgarian school in Preslav and Macedonian school of St. Clement in Ochrid. Translation of biblical texts by Cyril and Methodius is characterized by beautiful language and fidelity to the content, but it is not an accurate translation. Indeed, they explained for clarity, not for the accuracy of the expressions and phrases. St. Cyril and Methodius were faithful to the Greek model, where it was possible. This was based on two sources: firstly a deep knowledge of the Bible, secondly the mastery of the original language and translation of it. Lexical fidelity were rarely broken , and it was never result of chance. Rather, it was due to subordination of the other, considered to be more important, substantive way. The inaccuracy inherited in the past by the Slavonic translation of the inaccuracy was due to causes similar to those that drove the St. Cyril and Methodius: minuteness of the lexical field could cause confusion on the merits, dismissed the biblical text rather than explain it. Accomplishment of precise clarity in the Slavonic text proceeded patchily. St. Cyril and Methodius were guided by different methods, whose implementation was possible due to the excellent linguistic intuition, and realization of the morphological differences occurring between the Greek and Slavic words, and thanks to their ingenuity in creating new words. The work of the first Apostles of the Slavs didn’t disappeared along with their death, founding worthy successors and followers among their students, who, after the fall of the mission in 885, moved the sacred books to new missionary territories, mostly to Bulgaria. In the period between IX–X to the XIV century there arose three great centers of literature, two of Old-Church-Slavonic and a one Middle-Bulgarian, called schools of Ochrid, Preslav and Tyrnovo.
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