Sudovian language

Sudovian (also known as Jatvingian, Yatvingian, or Yotvingian) is an extinct western Baltic language of Northeastern Europe. Closely related to the Old Prussian language, it was formerly spoken southwest of the Nemunas river in what is now Lithuania, east of Galindia and north of Yotvingia, and by exiles in East Prussia.

History

Distribution of the Baltic tribes, circa 1200 CE (boundaries are approximate).

Sudovia and neighboring Galindia were two Baltic tribes or nations mentioned by the Greek geographer Ptolemy in the 2nd century AD as Galindai and Soudinoi, (Γαλίνδαι, Σουδινοί). Although Sudovian and Yotvingian were separate dialects of the same language, Sudovian and Yotvingian merged as a common dialect in the 10th century when the two nations created a Federation together with the Denowe – Dainavians. Peter of Dusburg, in his 14th-century Chronicon Terrae Prussiae, refers to Sudovia and to its inhabitants as Sudovites.

After the district was conquered by the Teutonic Knights, the language died out and its speakers were gradually absorbed by German, Lithuanian and Slavic populations.

The language has six grammatical cases: nominative, vocative, accusative, genitive, dative and locative, and a complex morphology with a variety of moods. It was a frontier dialect of Old Baltic, which preserved many archaic features which had been lost in the Middle Baltic group.

Sudovian was very similar to and mutually intelligible with the archaic Old Prussian language, as stated in the introduction to the 1st Old Prussian Catechism (printed in Königsberg – 1545 – the 1st Baltic language book):

Die Sudawen aber wiewol ihre rede etwas nyderiger wissen sich doch inn diese preüßnische sprach : wie sie alhie im Catechismo gedruckt ist auch wol zuschicken und vernemen alle wort – "But the Sudovians, although their speech is somewhat lower, understand this Prussian language, as it is printed in the Catechism, and they express themselves well and understand every word".

There are also some Sudovian language phrases in "Warhafftige Beschreibung der Sudawen auff Samland sambt ihren Bock heyligen und Ceremonien" – True Description of the Sudovians in Samland together with their goat sanctifications and ceremonies – written in the mid-16th century by Hieronymus Meletius.

• Beigeite beygeyte peckolle.
• Kails naussen gnigethe.
• Kails poskails ains par antres. (a drinking toast)
• Kellewesze perioth, Kellewesze perioth.
• Ocho Moy myle schwante Panike.

John Poliander wrote in 1535 about the Sudovians living near Königsberg, Prussia, while referring to amber production, that 32 villages used Sudini speech in a 6-7 mile stretch of land of the Samland Corner that bears the name of Sudavia. They spoke their own speech, which is near to Old Prussian language. They used the term "gentaras" for amber and not the Samlandish (Old Prussian) term. From him we learn that the Sudovians lived secluded from the Samlandish, would marry within their own tribe and did not allow intermarriage with the neighbouring Prussian population "even if begged". They stubbornly held to their own traditions, and wore finger and ear rings with bronze bells and silver belts. Nothing was imported from abroad, but everything was produced by local craftsmen. Christoph Hartknoch reported in 1684 that there were still Sudovians there.

The Constit. Synod. Evangel. of 1530 contains the following list of deities who were still worshipped by the Sudavians in Samland: "Occopirmus, Sualxtix, Ausschauts, Autrympus, Potrympus, Bardoayts, Piluuytis, Parcunas, Pecols,..." (Hastings, p 488)

Toponyms from N.E. Poland, N.W. Belarus, and Lithuania also preserve words. Sudovian was influenced by the Gothic language, as was Old Prussian. As did other West Baltic dialects, it preserved the nominative singular neuter case ending - an absent from Latvian and Lithuanian. In the declension of nouns, five cases are the same as in Old Prussian: nominative, genitive, dative, accusative, vocative. The vocative example "Kails naussen gnigethe." is listed above. The noun declension was very conservative and preserved many archaic features.

The Yotvingian territories of Sudovia and Galindia were later overrun and populated by Slavs around present-day Białystok and Suwałki in north-eastern Poland and nearby Hrodna (formerly Grodno) in Belarus. Some elements of Baltic speech are still retained in the Belarus and Ukraine territory, owing to the sparse indigenous populations and resettlements of refugees from Lithuania. The dialect of Zietela (Belarusian Дзятлава, Russian Дятлово, Yiddish Zietil, Polish Zdzięcioł) was of particular interest. Kazlauskas (1968, p. 285) suggested that the word mėnas ("month") (dative singular mënui) encountered in dialects (Zietela, Lazdijai) and in the writings of Bretkūnas is a remnant of nouns with the stem suffix -s.

Until the 1970s, Yotvingian was chiefly known from toponyms and medieval Russian sources.^[1] But in the 1970s a monument with Yotvingian writing was discovered by accident. In Belarus, a young man named Viacheslav Zinov,^[2] an amateur collector, bought a manuscript titled Pogańskie gwary z Narewu ("Pagan speeches of Narew") from a priest. It was written partly in Polish, and partly in an unknown, "pagan" language. Unfortunately, Zinov had an argument with his mother, who burned the priceless manuscript in a rage. However, before the manuscript was destroyed, Zinov had made notes of it which he subsequently sent to the renowned Baltist Vladimir Toporov. Even though Zinov's notes were riddled with errors, it has been proven beyond doubt that the notes are indeed a copy of an authentic Yotvingian text.^[3] This short Yotvingian–Polish dictionary (of just 215 words), Pogańskie gwary z Narewu, appears to have been written by some Polish priest in order to preach to Yotvingians in their mother tongue.

See also

• Yotvingians / Sudovians

References

Literature

• Marija Gimbutas, The Balts. London : Thames and Hudson, Ancient peoples and places 33, 1963.
• Peter von Dusburg, Chronicon Terrae Prussiae, in Scriptores rerum Prussicarum (ed. Max Toeppen). Leipzig: Hirzel, 1861
• J. Endzelīns, Senprūšu valoda. – Gr. Darbu izlase, IV sēj., 2. daļa, Rīga, 1982. 9.-351. lpp.
• V. Mažiulis, Prūsų kalbos paminklai, Vilnius, t. I 1966, t. II 1981.
• W. R. Schmalstieg, An Old Prussian Grammar, University Park and London, 1974.
• W. R. Schmalstieg, Studies in Old Prussian, University Park and London, 1976.
• V. Toporov, Prusskij jazyk: Slovar', A – L, Moskva, 1975–1990.
• V. Mažiulis, Prūsų kalbos etimologijos žodynas, Vilnius, t. I-IV, 1988–1997.
• Schmalstieg, W. R., Armenian and Jatvingian mard: A Shared Lexical Item, Annual of Armenian Linguistics Vol. VII, 1986
• Eckert, R., An exact correlation to apr. Kellewesze in the Russian Church Slavonic, Linguistica Baltica, 1, 1992, p179–82
• Savukynas, B., Del M Rudnickio Galandos, Priegliaus ir Sūduvos etimologinių aiskinimų, Lietuvių kalbotyras klausimai, 6, 1963, pp 320–325
• Witczak, K. T., Traces of Dual Forms in Old Prussian and Jatvingian in Wojciech Smoczyński and Axel Holvoet, eds, Colloquium Rruthenicum primum, 1992, pp 93–98
• Archäologie der UDSSR: Die Finno-Ugrier und die Balten im Mittelalter, Teil II, Balten, S. 411-419, Moskau 1987
• Gerullis, G., Zur Sprache der Sudauer-Jadwinger, in Festschrift A. Bezzenberger, Göttingen 1927
• Lepa, Gerhard (Hrsg): Die Sudauer, in Tolkemita-Texte Nr. 55, Dieburg 1998
• Lepa, G., Gedanken über die Prußen und ihre Lieder, in Tolkemita-Texte „25 Lieder der Sudauer“ Nr. 56, Dieburg 1999
• Salemke, G., Lagepläne der Wallburganlagen von der ehemaligen Provinz Ostpreußen, Gütersloh, 2005, Karten 19/ 7 – 19/ 13
• Tettau, v.: Volkssagen Ostpreußens, Litthauens und Westpreußens, Berlin 1837, S.10
• Žilevičius, J. Grundzüge der kleinlitauischen Volksmusik, in Tolkemita-Texte „25 Lieder der Sudauer“ Nr. 56, Dieburg 1999
• Toporov,V., ИНДОЕВРОПЕЙСКИЕ ЯЗЫКИ [Indo-European languages] Лингвистический энциклопедический словарь.[Linguistic encyclopedic dictionary] Мoskva, 1990, pp 186–189
• Illič-Svityč V., Imennaja akcentuacija v baltijskom i slavjanskom. Moskva: SSSR. 1963
• Illič-Svityč V., Sledy isčeznuvšych baltijskich akcentuacionnych sistem. Slavjanskaja i baltijskaja akcentologija. Moskva: Nauka. 1964. pp 18–26.
• Vytautas J. Mažiulis. "Baltic languages". Britannica Online Encyclopedia.
• Henning, E., De rebus Jazygum sive Jazuin-gorum, Regiomonti, 1812
• Sjoegren, A., Ueber die Wohnsitz Verhaeltnisse und der Jatwaeger, St. Petersburg, 1859
• Sembrzycki, J., Die Nord-und Westgebiete the Jadwinger und deren Grenzen, Altpreussischeme Monatschrift, XXVIII, 1891, pp. 76–89
• Matthews, W.K., Medieval Baltic Tribes, The American Slavic and East European Review, Vol. 8, No. 2, Apr., 1949 pp 126–136.
• Białuński, Grzegorz, Studia z dziejów plemion pruskich i jaćwieskich, Olsztyn, 1999.
• Nalepa, Jerzy, Jaćwięgowie – nazwa i lokalizacja, Białystok, 1964.
• Nalepa, Jerzy, Z badań nad jaćwieskimi relikatami onomastycznymi Połeksza, Studia linguistica slavica baltica K.-O. Falk, Lund 1966, S. 185-202.
• Nalepa, Jerzy, Połekszanie (Pollexiani) – Plemię Jaćwięskie u północno-wschodnich granic Polski, Rocznik Białostocki, t. VII: 1966, Warszawa 1967, s. 7-33.

Bibliography

• Kapović, Mate (2008), Uvod u indoeuropsku lingvistiku (in Croatian), Zagreb: Matica hrvatska, pp. 96–97, ISBN 978-953-150-847-6 
• Catechiſmus jn Peűßniſcher ſprach, Königsberg, Hans Weinreich, 1545, p. 3
• Hartknoch, C., Altes und Neues Preussen. Frankfurt, Königsberg, 1684
• Būga, K., Kalba ir senovė, I, Vilnius, 1922, p. 78
• Būga, K., Lietuvių kalbos žodynas, I, Vilnius, 1924, p. LXXV
• Kazlauskas J., 1968, Lietuvių Kalbos Istorinė Gramatika [Historical Grammar of Lithuanian], Vilnius, 1968, p 285
• Salys, A, Sūduviai [including Sūdovian language], Sūduvių Kampas. Liet. Enciklopedija, XXIX, Boston, USA, 1963, pp 114–126
• Schmalstieg, W. R., Studies in Old Prussian, (1976) University Park and London, pp 17–23, 91-93, ISBN 0-271-01231-5
• Mažiulis, V., Prūsų kalbos paminklai, t. II (1981) Vilnius, pp 62–64, 67-68.
• Mažiulis, V., Prūsų kalbos etimologijos žodynas,t. IV, (1997) Vilnius, pp 166–167, ISBN 5-420-01406-8
• Vidugiris, A., Zietelos Šnektos žodynas [A Dictionary of the Subdialect of Zietela.], Vilnius: Mokslo ir enciklopedijų leidybos institutas, 1998
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• Naktinienė, G., Paulauskienė,A., Vitkauskas, V., Druskininkų tarmės žodynas, Vilnius 1988
• Zinkevičius, Z., Lietuvių kalbos dialektologija, Vilnius 1994
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• Zinkevičius, Z, The History of the Lithuanian Language (1996) Vilnius: Mokslas pp 50–53 ISBN 5-420-01363-0
• Zinkevičius Z. Lenkų-jotvingių žodynėlis? – Rinktiniai straipsniai. T. I. Vilnius, 2002. P. 30–60.
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• Gimbutas, Marija, The Balts, (1963) London : Thames and Hudson, pp 19, 22-23, 83, 112, 126, 139, 141, 147, 159.
• Gerullis, G., Zur Sprache der Sudauer-Jotwinger. Festschrift Bezzen-berger, 1921, p. 44
• Hastings, J., Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics: Volume IX, New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1917, pp 488

External links

• M. Gimbutas book on the Balts, with maps
• (Latin) Chronicon Terrae Prussiae, Peter von Dusburg