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critical editions of individual parts of KN, although this is an extremely difficult and meticulous task. The remarks made here, sometimes perhaps overly subjective, were intended above all to draw the editor’s attention to what should be corrected and examined more extensively in future critical editions. And if these remarks prove even somewhat useful, their author will have achieved his aim.

LITERATURE AND SOURCES

BIRŽIŠKA, V. 1990: Aleksandrynas 1, Vilnius: Sietynas.

Clavis Germanico–Lithuana 1997. Rankraštinis XVII amžiaus vokiečių–lietuvių kalbų žodynas. I dalis: A–E, Vilnius: Mokslo ir enciklopedijų leidykla.

KAVALIŪNAITĖ, G. 2003: Samuelio Boguslavo Chylinskio Naujojo Testamento vertimo santykis su originalais. Daktaro disertacija, Vilnius.

KREGŽDĖ, J. 1978: Lietuvos reformatu raštija, Chicago: Devenių kultūrinio fondo leidinys.

Lexicon Lithuanicum 1987. Rankraštinis XVII a. vokiečių–lietuvių kalbų žodynas, Vilnius: Mokslas.

LUKŠAITĖ, I. 1999: Reformacija Lietuvos Didžiojoje Kunigaikštystėje ir Mažojoje Lietuvoje, Vilnius: Baltos lankos.

LUKŠAITĖ, I. 2001: Knygos nobanžystės (1653) parengimo kultūrinė aplinka. Knyga nobanžystės krikščioniškos (1653), XVII a. Lietuvos kultūros paminklas, Kėdainiai: Kėdainių krašto muziejus, 4–29.

NEPOKUPNAS, A. 1994: M. Mažvydo „Katekizmo“ – bylojančio vadovėlio (knygelių) vaizdas istorijos ir kultūros kontekste. Protestantizmas Lietuvoje: istorija ir dabartis, Vilnius: Apyaušris, 70–77.

RUBŠYS, A. 1995: Raktas į Senąjį Testamentą 1, Vilnius: Katalikų pasaulis.

Juozas Karaciejus Lietuvių kalbos institutas P. Vileišio g. 5, 10308 Vilnius, Lietuva

Received 2004 12 12

BERTHOLD FORSSMAN LATVIAN GRAMMAR

Dettelbach: J. H. Röll, 2001, 418 p., ISBN 3-89754-194-7 (Münchener Studien zur Sprachwissenschaft, Beiheft 20)

Berthold Forssman’s Latvian Grammar, as stated in its “Preface,” is intended not only for Indo-Europeanists and Balticists, but also for Slavists and other linguists interested both in contemporary written Latvian and in the historical grammar of the language. Despite their late attestation in written sources, the Baltic languages are considered highly archaic on account of their phonetics and well-preserved inflectional system. The author of the grammar also notes that Jānis Endzelīns’s Latvian Grammar, published in 1923, was and remains an indispensable model textbook; however, it is too comprehensive for someone beginning to learn Latvian, difficult to use in practice, and does not relate to contemporary literary Latvian. B. Forssman’s grammar under review therefore serves as a bridge between contemporary literary Latvian and its historical treatment, while its synchronic chapters may serve as an introduction for those interested in Latvian. The author also emphasizes that knowledge of Lithuanian is essential for Indo-Europeanists; consequently, Lithuanian material is used contrastively in the diachronic chapters, but,

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unlike in the historical comparative grammar of the Baltic languages, Latvian and its data are placed in the foreground.

The first chapter, “The Latvian Language,” discusses not only Latvian but also matters concerning Baltic ethnogenesis and history, and describes the position of the Baltic languages within the Indo-European language family—all with a thorough command of the subject and an excellent grasp of the rather complex historical development of the individual Indo-European branches. The author is well acquainted with the latest methods and findings of historical comparative Indo-European linguistics (for example, he presents a concise account of laryngeal theory) and rightly does not hesitate to draw on them to illuminate the development of Latvian as well as the Baltic languages.

The second chapter, “Phonetics and Phonology” (pp. 67–104), begins with a description of spelling and orthography, outlining their changes and the transition from the German system to the modern orthographic system standardized by Mühlenbach and Endzelīns (pp. 67–72). It then turns to a description of the pronunciation of the sounds (vowels and consonants) of standard Latvian (pp. 72–76), illustrating them with German examples that roughly correspond to Latvian sounds, so that readers unfamiliar with the language can better orient themselves (e.g., Latvian ū in the word ūdens should be pronounced like German Uhr [p. 73]). Most of the second chapter examines the changes and development of Latvian sounds and phonemes using the historical comparative method.

In describing the morphological structure of Latvian, to which the largest chapter, “Morphology” (pp. 109–227), is devoted, the author justifiably distinguishes two levels—synchronic and diachronic (p. 109). The formation of nominal stems and the categories of gender, case, and number are explained. The author’s suggestion that ē-stem nouns, rightly regarded as a Baltic innovation, may in origin be connected with the archaic stem *-ih₂ / -i̯āh₂, that is, with the Sanskrit devī ‘goddess’ noun class, is noteworthy (p. 110). It would be logical to derive the Baltic ē-stem from *-(i)jā- through the intermediate stage *-(i)jē- (p. 125). The structure and history of the verb are also described in detail and systematically.

The author argues that centum reflexes arose in the Baltic languages, among other reasons, perhaps also under the influence of Germanic languages. In particular cases, of course, this may have been so. On the other hand, the presence of centum elements in the Baltic languages (e.g., Lithuanian pekus: Sanskrit paśú) should be explained by the peripheral position of the Baltic dialects in the Indo-European linguistic area. In fact, the author of the grammar himself notes this (p. 23). He believes that Baltic, Slavic, and Germanic formed a communicative continuum in ancient times, with many isoglosses, and probably descended from the same northern dialect of Proto-Indo-European, rightly stressing that the centum / satəm boundary—which separates Baltic and Slavic on the one hand from Germanic on the other—is of secondary importance (p. 25). Also interesting is the author’s suggestion that Proto-Indo-European distinguished an opposition of intonations (circumflex/acute) at the end of words. The Baltic and Slavic languages extended this opposition to word-internal position as well (p. 27). It should be added that the emergence of the intonational opposition in Baltic and Slavic may have been connected with the loss of the opposition between short and long diphthongs (e.g., ai: āi > ai̯: āi̯). The author follows the widely held view in Slavic studies that de Saussure’s law also operated in Slavic (p. 28). This is, of course, a controversial claim. In the Russian forms nom. sing. рука́ (cf. acc. sing. ру́ку), the accent shifted to the ending most likely for the same reason as in the forms gen. sing. руку́, dat. sing. руке́, but hardly because of an acute on the ending in the nom. sing. form рука́.

B. Forssman presents a fairly accurate picture of the position of the Baltic languages within the Indo-European family. The grammar under review surveys general phenomena of Baltic and Slavic accentual systems, phonetics, morphology, word formation, lexicon, and syntax. Even rather fundamental differences are not left unmentioned, for example in the field of verbal morphology. In the author’s view, those

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These differences show that the Baltic and Slavic language area did not form a homogeneous block (kein einheitlicher Block); the Baltic and Slavic languages most likely originated from the same Proto-Indo-European dialect and formed a continuum in which innovations arose and spread, though they did not always encompass the entire area; most of the individual innovations in these languages arose over the long period from the breakup of the linguistic union (des Sprachverbandes) to the earliest written records, that is, up to the 9th century AD (pp. 31–32).

In his grammar, B. Forssman repeats K. Būga’s thesis that the Baltic tribes, under pressure from Slavs invading from the south, moved from their southeastern territory into areas near the Baltic Sea. The ancestors of the Prussians were the first to arrive on the Baltic coast, around the 5th century BC, followed much later (around the 5th century AD) by the Curonians. However, research on the hydronyms of the area inhabited by the Balts (W. Schmid and others), together with archaeological evidence, suggests otherwise. The hydronyms of the former Prussian lands, Lithuania and Latvia form part of the ancient European hydronymy, so the Finnic tribes probably did not live there (p. 46). In their famous study, V. Toporov and O. Trubačiov concluded that the Baltic tribes in the Upper Dnieper region had been assimilated in situ by Slavs who had arrived from the south (Toporov, Trubačev 1962). Thus A. Bezzenberger’s assertion that the Eastern Balts had lived there since the Bronze Age presumably remains valid. This view also underlies another of Forssman’s claims: namely, that it is still unclear whether Tacitus’s Aestii were in fact Balts (ob es sich dabei tatsächlich um Balten gehandelt hat) (p. 18). The prevailing scholarly opinion, however, is that Tacitus’s Aestii were southern Prussian tribes (for references, see Karaliūnas, Bammesberger 1998).

The author prefers the term Prußisch to avoid confusion, since the use of Altpreußisch may evoke the term used in German literature (Ostpreußisch), which denotes a German dialect.

A few remarks on the interpretation of individual points in the grammar. The pronominal forms Avestan mana, Old Church Slavonic mene, and Old Lithuanian mane—gen. sing.!—are regarded as having developed by dissimilation from Proto-Indo-European *meme (p. 33); cf. Vedic gen. sing. mā́ma. It seems, rather, that the reverse is true: the Vedic form may be the result of assimilation, deriving from Proto-Indo-European *mene (Szemerényi 1980: 229, Meiser 1998: 157). It is quite possible that the Proto-Indo-European proto-language should be reconstructed with the lexemes Lithuanian sūnus, Old Church Slavonic synъ, Old Indic sūnuḥ; Lithuanian vyras, Latvian vīrs, Old Indic vīrāḥ, with long vowels in the root; whereas the short vowels in Gothic sunus, Latin vir, Old Irish fer, and Old High German wer may be the result of shortening under Dybo’s law: the vowels ū and ī may have shortened when they occurred in a pretonic syllable, that is, Italic *uiro- < *u̯īró (Meiser 1998: 75). It is inaccurate to reconstruct forms such as *žeḿia- (p. 38), *ākis (p. 47), *ākmenes, *āvis, *pātis (p. 98), *sākāu (p. 104), *mēdija- (p. 106), because the short vowels following the stress had probably not yet lengthened at that time; it would therefore be more accurate to write *žeḿia, *ākis, *ākmenes, *āvis, *pātis, *sākāu. The grave accent indicates stress position and vowel shortness, as is customary in Lithuanian; cf. kìtas, bùtas, kàsti, nèšti. But the stresses and intonations are reconstructed correctly in, for example, Proto-Baltic nom. sing. *dei̯uas, 3rd person pres. *eī́ti (p. 98).

For the Latvian verbs bāudīt ‘erfahren’ (the more precise meaning is ‘prüfen, versuchen, wagen’) and baūdīt, it would be more appropriate to cite as cognates Lithuanian forms of the same stem, baūdytis (-osi, -ėsi) ‘prepare’ and baudyti (-o, -ė) ‘urge, incite’, rather than Lithuanian baudinti (p. 88).

There are some errors: the Lithuanian gen. plur. form of medùs is medų̃, not *medų (p. 51); the Lithuanian gen. plur. form of ėžys is ėžių̃, not *ėžių (p. 96); -st- cannot derive from Proto-Indo-European *-sk- (p. 90).

A bibliography is provided after the overview of each part of speech, which greatly helps readers find their way. Word formation and syntax are also covered in the fourth (pp. 229–263) and fifth (pp. 264–340) chapters. The appendix (pp. 341–357) contains a list of o-stem nouns and athematic verbs with monosyllabic infinitives. Readers will also find a list of abbreviations (pp. 357–

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359), a subject index (pp. 389–396), and explanations of special symbols (p. 396). The word indexes occupy pp. 360–388, and the bibliography pp. 397–418.

Having surveyed the grammar under review, we can conclude that Berthold Forssman’s Lettische Grammatik is not only a modern textbook on the Latvian language and its history intended for foreign learners, but also a scholarly work—a valuable contribution to the historical comparative grammar of the Baltic languages.

LITERATŪRA

KARALIŪNAS, S., BAMMESBERGER, A. 1998: Zu Fragen nach der ethnischen Identität der Aisten. Bammesberger, A., Hrsg., Baltistik: Aufgaben und Methoden, Heidelberg: Winter.

MEISER, G. 1998: Historische Laut- und Formenlehre der lateinischen Sprache, Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft.

SZEMERÉNYI [Семереньи], O. 1980: Введение в сравнительное языкознание. Перев. Б. Абрамова, Москва: Прогресс.

ТОПОРОВ, В. Н., ТРУБАЧЕВ, О. Н. 1962: Лингвистический анализ гидронимов Верхнего Поднепровья, Москва: Наука.

Simas Karaliūnas Lietuvių kalbos institutas P. Vileišio g. 5, 10308 Vilnius, Lietuva

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