Lyginamoji kalbotyra ir tarybinės lietuvių filologijos uždaviniai

LIETUVIŲ KALBOTYROS KLAUSIMAI, VI LIETUVOS TSR MOKSLŲ AKADEMIJA COMPARATIVE LINGUISTICS AND THE TASKS OF SOVIET LITHUANIAN PHILOLOGY K. KORSAKAS The great international interest of philologists in the Lithuanian language, dating from the very beginnings of comparative-historical linguistics, is widely known. For more than a century and a half, beginning with F. Bopp, the founder of comparative linguistics, many eminent linguists in both the West and the Slavic countries have devoted numerous works to the study of Lithuanian and its related Baltic languages. Among these linguists are such luminaries of linguistic scholarship as A. Schleicher, F. Fortunatov, A. Leskien, V. Thomsen, A. Bezzenberger, J. Baudouin de Courtenay, A. Potebnia, F. de Saussure, A. Meillet, J. Zubatý, H. Pedersen, N. van Wijk, V. Pisani, and others. There is no need here to recall that the bibliography of international Lithuanian philology now comprises several tens of thousands of entries of varying length, any more than there is need to explain why the Lithuanian language has merited such great attention in international linguistics. These matters are well known to everyone, especially insofar as they concern earlier and prewar times. Unfortunately, far less is known to us about the state of international Lithuanian philology in the postwar years. Without attempting to provide a comprehensive survey of that state—a task for a separate study, which our specialist linguists should undertake in the near future1—here we would like merely to note one or two more important aspects of its current development and to emphasize the urgent tasks that confront our Soviet philologists in this field today. 1A fairly comprehensive bibliographic survey of Lithuanian and Baltic studies published during 1945–1955—though chiefly with regard to the topic of Baltic-Slavic linguistic relations—was presented by V. Toporov (see В. Н. Топоров. Новейшие работы в области изучения балто-славянских языковых отношений. — Вопросы славянского языкознания. Выпуск 3, М., 1958, стр. 134—161). Some of the Lithuanian and Baltic studies that appeared are also mentioned in the survey of general and comparative linguistics published in 1953 by the Italian linguist V. Pisani (see the translation in Общее и индоевропейское языкознание. М., 1956, стр. 83—199), as well as in the book on contemporary comparative linguistics by the Soviet linguist T. Degtereva (Т. А. Дегтерева. Пути развития современной лингвистики, 1, М., 1961, 215 стр.; 2, М., 1962, 213 стр.), and in the work of another Soviet linguist, A. Desnitskaya, on research into the relationship among Indo-European languages, though that work is already somewhat outdated (А. Десницкая. Вопросы изучения родства индоевропейских языков. М., 1955, 332 стр.). 5 and representatives of the humanities in general. It is especially important to discuss this in connection with the Fifth International Congress of Slavists, whose program includes papers addressing certain questions in the study of Lithuanian, particularly problematic issues concerning the historical development of Baltic-Slavic linguistic relations. Although in the first postwar years research by linguists of other nations into the Lithuanian language and related problems of comparative linguistics had somewhat declined, the past decade has seen a clear revival in this field. First of all, it should be noted that a considerable group of Russian Soviet linguists, including S. Bernstein, V. Toporov, O. Trubachev, F. Filin, B. Gornung, P. Chernykh, V. Ivanov, and others, have contributed substantially to this revival and continue to do so with increasing activity. It is largely thanks to their efforts and newly published works that the use of material from Lithuanian and Baltic languages in Soviet linguistics—an approach that had almost completely disappeared during the period when Marrism prevailed—has now been revived. Russian Soviet linguists, especially the younger generation, are now reviving and successfully continuing the old traditions of Russian philology, when Lithuanian was studied specifically by such eminent linguists as F. Fortunatov, A. Shakhmatov, G. Ulyanov, A. Potebnia, and V. Porzhezinsky, and its facts were widely used to address problems in comparative-historical linguistics generally, and especially in Baltic-Slavic linguistic relations, the ethnogenesis of the Baltic and Slavic peoples, and other linguistic and historical fields.2Today, Soviet Russian linguistics is once again returning both to the solution of these problems and to the use of Lithuanian linguistic facts in addressing them. This is clearly evident, for example, in the course on comparative Slavic grammar taught by Prof. S. Bernstein at Moscow University in 1952–1954. The author of the course emphasizes that “the Baltic languages are of primary importance for the comparative grammar of the Slavic languages. This is equally acknowledged by both supporters and opponents of the theory of a Baltic-Slavic proto-language”3. And elsewhere he puts it even more forcefully: “The facts of the Baltic languages are extraordinarily important for illuminating the history of the Proto-Slavic language (праславянского языка). All linguists make extensive use of data from the Baltic languages. The significance of Baltic-language data for Slavists is also determined by the extraordinary archaism of these languages”4. The view of the prominent Bulgarian linguist, Academician V. Georgiev, on the importance of Lithuanian for Indo-European studies as a whole accords with these statements by the Soviet linguist. In his work “Studies in Comparative-Historical Linguistics,” while addressing the problem of the origin and homeland of the Indo-European languages, V. Georgiev writes: “In Europe today we find the most archaic of all living Indo-European languages—the Lithuanian language. This is explained by the fact that Lithuanian developed in its own se- 2See J. P a l i o n i s. The Contribution of Russian Linguists to Lithuanian Studies. V., 1963, p. 74. 3С. Б. Б е р н ш т е й н. Очерк сравнительной грамматики славянских языков. М., 1961, стр. 28. 4Ibid., p. 37. -6 within the boundaries of their homeland (or close to it) and was influenced only by the closest related languages—Slavic and Germanic—and, to a very slight degree, by Finno-Ugric languages. This fact is significant in determining the Indo-European homeland5. It should be noted that the aforementioned work by V. Georgiev consists of his somewhat expanded lectures, delivered at the Faculty of Philology of Moscow University in the autumn of 1956. Thus, it may be said that the significance of Lithuanian and the other Baltic languages (Latvian and Old Prussian) for Slavic studies and, more broadly, for all Indo-European studies has recently once again been emphatically highlighted at the university in the capital of the Soviet Union—the foremost center of Soviet scholarship. It should also be noted that the authors of both of the works mentioned not only declared the importance of these Baltic languages, but also made extensive use of their data in examining the questions addressed in their works6. The same can be seen in the recently published, interesting work “The Formation of the Languages of the Eastern Slavs”7 by the well-known Russian Soviet linguist, Professor F. Filin. In surveying the problems of Baltic-Slavic linguistic relations and ethnogenesis, and describing the historical formation of the language of the Eastern Slavs, its author likewise draws in many instances on Lithuanian or Baltic etymologies and provides numerous examples from Lithuanian and Latvian, while also revealing more than one new aspect of the prehistory of the Baltic tribes. Finally, mention should be made of another important work, genuinely innovative in its results: the study “Linguistic Analysis of the Hydronyms of the Upper Dnieper Region”8 by the younger-generation Russian Soviet linguists V. Toporov and O. Trubachev. This work, whose publication was also noted in our republic’s press, examines linguistically the names of the tributaries of the upper Dnieper and identifies about 800 hydronyms of Baltic origin. To support their analysis, the authors drew on abundant Lithuanian toponymic and hydronymic material, as well as a whole series of Lithuanian etymologies. Although some of these etymologies are debatable and certain claims merely hypothetical, the study as a whole provides a fairly solid basis for placing the area inhabited by the ancient Baltic tribes considerably farther east (as far as the Seim river basin) than has been done to date. At the same time, it makes it possible to interpret in an entirely different way the prehistoric relations of the Baltic tribes not only with the Slavs and Finno-Ugric peoples, but even with the Iranians, whose direct contacts with the Balts had generally always been denied by scholars. 5 В. И. Георгиев. Исследования по сравнительно-историческому языкознанию. М., 1958, стр. 247. 6 For example, S. Bernstein’s work contains 180 instances, and V. Georgiev’s 90 instances, in which specific facts of the Lithuanian language are used—quite apart from general theoretical discussions, assumptions, and claims concerning Lithuanian and the prehistoric linguistic relations of the Lithuanians and the Baltic tribes more broadly with the Slavs, Germans, and other Indo-European peoples. 7 Ф. П. Филин. Образование языка восточных славян. М., 1962, 292 стр. 8 В. Н. Топоров, О. Н. Трубачев. Лингвистический анализ гидронимов Верхнего Поднепровья. М., 1962, 270 стр. A summary of this work, particularly its Lithuanian studies section, is provided by an article by the same authors, “Балтийские гидронимы Верхнего Поднепровья”, published in 1961 in volume IV of “Lietuvių kalbotyros klausimai” (pp. 195—218). 7 The works mentioned above, published in the Soviet Union during 1958–1962, together with a series of larger and smaller studies and articles (whose authors included, besides Russians, representatives of other Soviet peoples as well as foreign linguists), published during this period in Soviet philological journals⁹, not only restored a significant profile for the Lithuanian language in the revived Soviet comparative-historical linguistics, but once again brought the problems of the Balto-Slavic proto-language and homeland to the fore with particular urgency. These problems prompted especially lively discussion and even passionate debate on the eve of and during the Fourth International Congress of Slavists, held in Moscow in 1958¹⁰; and one may expect them to receive no less attention at the Fifth International Congress of Slavists, to be held in Sofia this year. Recently, the problem of the Balto-Slavic proto-language and homeland has once again become perhaps one of the most pressing and widely discussed problems in comparative-historical linguistics internationally. Besides Soviet linguists, many prominent contemporary Polish linguists, historians, and archaeologists devote particular attention to this problem—T. Lehr-Splawinski, J. Kuryłowicz, J. Otrębski, J. Safarewicz, K. Moszyński, J. Kostrzewski, K. Jażdżewski, K. Tymieniecki, and others. Especially noteworthy are the works by Academician T. Lehr-Splawinski that appeared in the first postwar years (“On the Origin and Homeland of the Slavs” and “The Proto-Slavs,” both published in 1946), whose principal claims the author later repeated in his articles, including those published in the Soviet press¹¹. The works of J. Kuryłowicz are of exceptional importance: in them, the hypothesis of a Balto-Slavic proto-language is grounded in the affinity between the intonational systems of the Baltic and Slavic languages. Kuryłowicz’s longstanding research in this field, which also made a substantial contribution to elucidating the historical development of Lithuanian accentology, was summarized in the postwar years in two editions (1952 and 1958) of his major work on Indo-European accentuation, as well as in some of his articles¹². It should be noted that questions concerning the common features of Balto-Slavic accentology and intonational systems have, over the past decade, received more or less thorough examination in a series of newly published works, studies, and monographs in both Slavic and Western countries, which essentially 9 See “Вопросы филологии”, “Вопросы славянского языкознания”, “Славянская филология”; “Ученые записки института славяноведения” and others. 10 Žr. „Вопросы языкознания“, 1958, № 1, стр. 36—35; taip pat Сборник ответов на вопросы по языкознанию (к IV Международному съезду славистов). М., 1958, стр. 152—174. Čia šiuo klausimu pareiškė savo nuomonę: T. Lēr-Splavinskis (Krokuva), L. Bulachovskis (Kijevas), K. Janačekas (Praha), K. Treineris (Gracas), S. Bernšteinas (Maskva), P. Trostas (Praha), V. Kiparskis (Vakarų Berlynas), M. Budimiras (Belgradas), I. Lekovas (Sofija), V. Er-nitsas (Tartu), V. Georgijevas (Sofija), E. Dikemanas (Bernas). 11 See Балто-славянская языковая общность и проблема этногенеза славян. — Вопросы славянского языкознания, вып. 3. М., 1958, стр. 5—14. Professor V. Falkenhan has provided a detailed review of T. Lehr-Splawinski’s works on the Proto-Slavic language and homeland published between 1946 and 1955 (see “Zeitschrift für Slavistik”, 1956, no. 2, pp. 49—88). 12 See his article “О балто-славянском языковом единстве. — Вопросы славянского языкознания, Вып. 3, 1958, стр. 15—49. 8 changes traditional views in this field and substantiates them on entirely new principles. Recent work in this area is so significant and innovative that, according to the German linguist R. Aicetmiuleris, one may speak of a “period of flourishing in the study of Baltic-Slavic accentual and intonational relations (Akzent- und Intonationsverhältnisse)”13. In addressing the problem of the Proto-Baltic-Slavic language, both specifically and in the context of other problems in Indo-European studies, many Western linguists have in recent years also touched, from one angle or another, on questions concerning Baltic-Slavic linguistic relations, their prehistory, migration, and ethnogenesis. Without claiming to be exhaustive, let us mention at least the most important works in this field. These include a study of the Slavic and Baltic verb (1942) by the renowned Norwegian Slavist and Lithuanian specialist Ch. Stangas, as well as some of his later works on Slavic and Baltic accentuation; an overview of the Baltic languages and their relations with other Indo-European languages (1950) by the recently deceased, renowned German Lithuanian specialist E. Frenkelis, as well as his etymological dictionary of the Lithuanian language, which provides considerable material for illuminating Lithuanian-Slavic linguistic relations; and, finally, the two-volume comparative grammar of the Slavic languages (1950, 1958) by the eminent French linguist A. Vajanas, which devotes substantial attention to questions concerning the Proto-Baltic-Slavic language. Also worth mentioning are various works by the recently deceased distinguished German linguist M. Fasmeris, the Norwegian K. Falkas, and the Frenchman R. Smitleinas, concerning Slavic and Baltic studies, including Lithuanian toponymy and hydronymy, and the examination of Lithuanian place names and personal names. These works provide much new material for illuminating the Slavicization of Lithuanian toponymy and, more generally, prehistoric and historical-era Baltic-Slavic relations. We do not undertake here either to survey or to assess the highly diverse and often sharply conflicting solutions to the problem of Baltic-Slavic linguistic relations presented in the works cited above, still less to suggest one approach or another to resolving that problem. This should be the task of our specialist linguists. On this occasion, however, we cannot refrain from making a few observations and expressing some wishes closely connected with the further development of Soviet Lithuanian studies and with the immediate tasks facing our philologists. The important recent works mentioned above, in one way or another, once again raise the problem of Baltic-Slavic linguistic relations, which has been debated for many decades, and are of fundamental relevance to Soviet Lithuanian philology as well. No contemporary Lithuanian scholar among us—not only a specialist linguist, but also a humanist more broadly—can afford to remain indifferent to these works. Some have already attracted wide international attention and are influencing the further development of comparative linguistics as a whole. After all, these works make extensive use of Lithuanian-language material and, on its basis, often draw far-reaching conclusions not only in philology but also in history, ethnology, and archaeology. To test the scholarly reliability of those conclusions and generalizations on the basis of Lithuanian material 13 R. Aitzetmüller. Das baltoslavische Akzent- und Intonationssystem. Grundzüge und Grundprobleme, dargestellt nach dem heutigen Stand und Forschung. „Die Sprache“ VIII. Bd., 1. Heft, 1962, p. 46—58. The article provides a critical overview of this question and the most recent works addressing it. 9 should be the direct responsibility of our Lithuanian scholars. As experience shows, even the work of qualified foreign scholars sometimes contains major inaccuracies and errors when Lithuanian-language facts are used. These may arise from insufficient knowledge of our language, reliance on outdated sources, or simply a certain degree of subjectivity. Cases in which unreliable etymologies are proposed are especially common, and some are downright bizarre. A striking example is the etymological explanation of the place name Sūduva offered by the renowned Polish historian and linguist M. Rudnickis14. Is it not a matter of honor for our Soviet linguists to notice such inaccuracies in time and correct them as necessary—even when they arise, not always in good faith?! Unfortunately, this is still done very rarely and without sufficient resolve. An even more important task for our philologists and Lithuanian scholars generally is not to stand aside from the important problems addressed by Soviet and international linguistic scholarship that directly concern the Lithuanian language and the past of the Lithuanian people. On the contrary, they should express their views on how these problems ought to be resolved, grounding them in Lithuanian studies and the latest findings in Lithuanian linguistics and historiography. And yet, so much new material has been gathered in the Soviet years: through the publication of the great “Dictionary of the Lithuanian Language” and the expansion of its card index; through the study of Lithuanian dialects and Lithuanian toponymy; and through archaeological excavations and ethnographic expeditions. All this exceptionally valuable material, which often provides entirely new evidence for resolving long-standing questions in Baltic and Slavic studies, should be introduced into scholarly circulation as quickly as possible and used as widely as possible in addressing linguistic and historiographical problems of all-Union and international significance. Consider, for example, the very problem of the Proto-Baltic-Slavic language and homeland, which is currently the subject of such heated debate in both Soviet and foreign linguistics. As is known, three main approaches to resolving this question have emerged in recent years. Proponents of one maintain that there once was a Proto-Baltic-Slavic language, and they attempt to explain the common features of the Baltic and Slavic languages on the basis of its reconstruction. Today, this hypothesis is supported by most of the Polish scholars mentioned above, as well as by linguists such as A. Vajanas, V. Georgijevas, and others. By contrast, proponents of the second approach, initiated by A. Meje, argue that in antiquity there was neither a Proto-Baltic-Slavic language nor any special Baltic-Slavic linguistic unity. According to this view, which has recently been defended most categorically by A. Zenas, the Baltic and Slavic languages diverged from the Indo-European linguistic community (языковая общность, wspólnota, Gemeinschaft) independently of one another and 14 M. Rudnicki. Prasłowianszczyzna Lechia-Polska. II t., 1961, p. 36—37. Dėl šios M. Rudnickio etimologijos klaidingumo žr. „Lietuvių kalbotyros klausimai“, VI t., p. 323—325. 10 continued to develop in parallel, coming into contact only during particular historical periods, and then for limited times interrupted by long intervals. Finally, the third position on Baltic-Slavic linguistic relations is held by those scholars who, rejecting extreme views, believe that a separate group of tribal dialects took shape while the Indo-European linguistic community was still in its earliest stages. Although these dialects were not completely isolated from other neighboring Indo-European dialects, they were linked to one another by certain similarities. Without merging into a single language, they underwent many common changes and periods of close interaction (сообщность, Verkehrsgemeinschaft) in their historical development. The ancestors of the Proto-Baltic and Proto-Slavic languages belonged to this group of related dialects. When the Indo-European linguistic community finally disintegrated (it is thought to have happened in the third millennium BCE), the Proto-Baltic and Proto-Slavic languages emerged from that dialect group; for a long time they remained close to one another precisely because of the common heritage inherited from the aforementioned group of tribal dialects. In the end, that commonality would have disappeared entirely if the Proto-Balts and Proto-Slavs had lost all contact with one another and entered different geographical or linguistic areas. But this did not happen: geographical and historical contacts between the Balts and Slavs persisted until our time, albeit perhaps with fairly long interruptions in the past. Thus, instead of a Proto-Baltic-Slavic language, proponents of this view generally speak of a Baltic-Slavic period or a Baltic-Slavic linguistic union, and so on. Today this view—one of whose founders was J. Endzelīns—is represented by E. Frenkel, Ch. Stang, and some other Western linguists, and more recently it has been supported by such Soviet philologists as S. Bernstein, F. Filin, and others. Not feeling competent to say which of these three views is closest to historical truth, I wish merely to note here that the way the prehistory of Baltic and Slavic linguistic relations is interpreted significantly affects the way many questions of Lithuanian philology are approached, and may even shape the assessment of the significance of the Lithuanian language itself in relation to this problem. For instance, Academician V. Georgiev has stated on several occasions that “Baltic and Slavic are so close to one another that, in phonetic and morphological terms, the conservative Lithuanian language can to a certain extent stand in for the unattested Proto-Slavic language”15. Some Soviet linguists have openly expressed the opposite view in response to this categorical assertion by the Bulgarian linguist. S. Bernstein, for example, says that in this respect V. Georgiev “goes much too far,” exaggerating the significance of Lithuanian for the reconstruction of the Proto-Slavic language16, while F. Filin simply declares that V. Georgiev’s assertion is “more a dogma of faith than a conclusion based on historical research”17. 15 В. Георгиев. Исследования по сравнительно-историческому языкознанию. М., 1958, стр 221; tai pat — Сборник ответов на вопросы по языкознанию. М., 1958, стр. 174; „Slavia“, т. 28, 1. 16 С. Б. Бернштейн. Очерк сравнительной грамматики славянских языков. М., 1961, стр. 34. 17 Ф. П. Филин. Образование языка восточных славян. М., 1962, стр. 126. 11 Which of these sharply conflicting claims, of lively interest to every Lithuanian philologist, should we believe? So far, the voice of our republic’s linguists has not been heard in this debate. Yet the views of Lithuanian philologists could and should carry considerable scholarly weight in this matter. It seems that, to overcome the passivity of our linguists in this field, we need to free ourselves from certain negative preconceptions. One such preconception, apparently formed in connection with the discussion of the Baltic-Slavic problem at the Fourth International Congress of Slavists, is that Soviet linguistics supposedly requires adherence to the Proto-Baltic-Slavic hypothesis when addressing this problem. Some abroad are deliberately trying to magnify this preconception. This tendency is clearly evident, for instance, in the comments made about V. Mažiulis’s paper18, delivered at the Fourth International Congress of Slavists in Moscow, by certain Lithuanian nationalist linguists who had emigrated to the West. Yet this preconception is entirely unfounded and does not at all reflect the current practice of Soviet linguistics. In Soviet linguistics, sharply conflicting views on the question of a Proto-Baltic-Slavic language are freely expressed and debated today. This is evident above all from the works of S. Bernstein and F. Filin mentioned earlier, and from the claims made in them. For instance, having surveyed various theories and hypotheses on this question, F. Filin states openly on several occasions that “the hypothesis of a Proto-Baltic-Slavic language, taken as a whole, has no sound scholarly basis”19. S. Bernstein takes an even stronger position, asserting that “the theory of a Proto-Baltic-Slavic language did great harm to the comparative grammar of the Slavic languages. It led researchers to confuse linguistic phenomena from different periods, drew them into artificial constructions and hypotheses that impeded the study of the history of the Proto-Slavic language”20. As we can see, S. Bernstein speaks of the theory of a Proto-Baltic-Slavic language in the past tense, as of a stage in the history of linguistics that has passed, although it should be noted that even today some Soviet linguists still adhere to this hypothesis. Therefore, our Soviet Lithuanian philologists, too, should not feel constrained by any preconceived notions or, still less, apprehensions, but should address this question sine ira et studio, relying above all on facts concerning the Lithuanian language and the prehistory of Lithuania. I have already once21 publicly reproached the Lithuanian philologists of our republic for devoting, so far, very little attention to the problem of Baltic-Slavic relations. Without repeating what has already been said, I would like to emphasize once again that this problem is important not only from a linguistic point of view. In our opinion, the following words of Prof. F. Filin aptly express its much broader significance: “However we explain the closeness of the Baltic and Slavic languages—which undoubtedly goes back to the distant past (the Baltic-Slavic problem is far from resolved)—this closeness, which has persisted to our time, undoubtedly, 18 Б. П. Мажюлис. О древнейших отношениях балтийских и славянских языков. Вильнюс, 1958, 20 стр. Rankraščio teisėmis. 19 F. P. Filin. Ibid., p. 125 et al. 20 S. B. Bernstein. Ibid., p. 36. 21 See “Дружба народов”, 1962, no. 8, p. 259; K. Korsakas. Friendship of Literatures. V., 1962, pp. 102–107. 12 This attests to the close neighborhood of the ancient Balts and Slavs, at the very least in the last centuries before our era and the first centuries of our era. This circumstance is extraordinarily important in determining the Slavic homeland. To establish where the Slavs lived in the neighborhood of the Balts is to answer the question of where the homeland of the Balts and Slavs was in the second half of the first millennium before our era and in the first centuries of our era22. Is this question, which scholars of the Slavs as well as of many other foreign peoples have been striving so insistently for several decades to resolve, any less relevant to Lithuanian and Baltic studies? After all, people of every nation care to know their origins and past as accurately and fully as possible, and Lithuanians can be no exception in this respect. And when sharp debates on this question are taking place in scholarship today, in some cases acquiring even an urgent ideological and political significance, Lithuanian scholars in our republic should also take an active part in them. Indeed, the resolution of many fundamental problems in Lithuanian studies depends considerably on one or another localization of the homeland of the Balts and Slavs. These problems would have to be resolved one way if, for example, we adhered to the so-called “autochthonous” hypothesis of the Slavic homeland (its principal proponents are the contemporary Polish linguists and historians T. Lehr-Splavinski, K. Jażdżewski, M. Rudnicki, J. Kostrzewski, and others), according to which the Slavic homeland is localized between the Vistula and the Oder, or even on the western shores of the Baltic. The solution to these problems of importance to Lithuanian studies would have to be different if, instead, we accepted the theory now increasingly gaining ground in Soviet scholarship that the Slavic homeland should be sought south of the area inhabited by the ancient Baltic tribes, which “extended in a broad belt approximately from the lower reaches of the Nemunas and the Daugava eastward, and for a time reached the upper reaches of the Dnieper, Volga, and Oka”23, while “in the second half of the first millennium before our era, the Slavic tribes occupied the forested plain from the upper reaches of the Western Bug to the middle course of the Dnieper”24. According to this theory, at that time neither the Baltic nor, still less, the Slavic tribes had yet reached the Baltic coast, which was inhabited by western Finnic peoples. (On this occasion, we note that some have recently argued that the name of our Nemunas is of Finnish origin, while the names of rivers such as the Vistula, Warta, and Oder, which flow through present-day western Slavic territories, are likewise of Slavic origin.) Incidentally, this solution to the question of the homeland of the ancient Balts and Slavs already has a certain tradition in Lithuanian and Baltic studies as well. It is enough to recall the works in this field by our K. Būga and the Latvian J. Endzelīns, which are once again being widely brought into scholarly circulation today and are becoming both important sources of arguments in resolving problematic questions concerning historical Baltic-Slavic relations and objects of a certain degree of criticism in the ongoing debates on these questions. This is clearly evident, for example, in the works mentioned here by S. Bernštein, F. Filin, V. Toporov, and O. Trubachev. 22 Ф. П. Филин. Ibid., pp. 129–130. 23 Ф. П. Филин. Ibid., p. 133. 24 Ф. П. Филин. Ibid., p. 147. 13 For example, in the study by the latter two authors on the hydronyms of the Upper Dnieper region, K. Būga’s contribution to the study of the hydronymy of this region and Belarus is highly valued. Building on the earlier work of K. Būga and other scholars who investigated this question, the authors of the study not only place the settlements of the ancient Baltic tribes considerably farther east and northeast than the distinguished Lithuanian linguist did, but also substantially revise K. Būga’s conception. According to the study’s authors, K. Būga had developed “a fairly coherent and unified conception according to which the presence of Baltic hydronyms in Belarus north of the Pripyat attests that it was precisely in these places that the original settlements of the Baltic tribes were located (the Slavs, according to Būga, lived south of the Pripyat). The Lithuanian scholar portrays the entire subsequent history of the Balts,” the study’s authors emphasize in summarizing the essence of K. Būga’s conception, “as an unceasing retreat north and west toward the Baltic under Slavic pressure”25. Having carried out a meticulous and extensive analysis of the hydronymy of the Upper Dnieper region and its neighboring areas, V. Toporov and O. Trubachev put forward, at the end of their study, a new hypothesis contrary to K. Būga’s conception, which they express in these words: “It should be particularly emphasized that the bulk of the Baltic population of the Upper Dnieper region did not move northwest as the Slavs spread across this territory; rather, it was gradually assimilated by the latter.” Only by accepting this hypothesis, they contend, can one convincingly explain why Baltic hydronyms survived in this region for so long and why they have such Slavicized phonetic forms. “From what has been said,” the study’s authors conclude, “the question of the contribution of the ancient Balts, in the broadest sense, to the history of the Upper Dnieper region assumes particular significance”26. Although this question has not been resolved in the study, as the authors themselves acknowledge, there is no doubt that, once raised, it will be further examined and debated in the near future. Need one even argue how important and relevant it is for the entire prehistory of the Balts, not to mention the assessment of K. Būga’s scholarly legacy? If we add to this hypothesis of V. Toporov and O. Trubachev some further claims published in recent works27 concerning 25 Б. Н. Топоров, О. Н. Трубачев. Ibid., p. 6. 26 Ibid., p. 236. 27 See М. Я. Гринблат. К вопросу об участии литовцев в этногенезе белорусов. — „Вопросы этнической истории народов Прибалтики“. М., 1959, стр. 533—543. In this work, on the basis of an analysis of extensive Lithuanian toponymic material and relevant historical facts, the author arrives at the following conclusion: “In the northwestern part of the present-day territory of Belarus, where Lithuanian toponymic material is abundant, the oldest inhabitants of this territory, the Lithuanians—a part of the Aukštaitians and a part of the Yotvingians—were Slavicized by two opposing waves of colonization: from the northeast, from the direction of the Polotsians, and from the south and southeast, from the direction of the Dregovichians and Volhynians. The process of Slavicization of the Lithuanian population lasted a long time. Beginning in the sixth to ninth centuries, it ended in the most remote northwestern districts of Belarus in the early nineteenth century. The Slavic colonization of Lithuanian-inhabited areas proceeded, in general, peacefully and was not associated with the displacement of the local population” (p. 543). This is also confirmed by recent studies conducted by Lithuanian Soviet linguists (A. Vidugiris and others) in localities of the Byelorussian SSR still inhabited by Lithuanians (Zietela and elsewhere). 14 If we consider the ethnic ties between Lithuanians and Belarusians in historical times, a broad and complex problem emerges, the solution of which should involve Lithuanian studies scholars from all fields, since it is fundamentally important to linguists, historians, archaeologists, ethnographers, and folklorists alike. Meanwhile, Soviet Lithuanian studies scholars have done very little to address this problem. Almost the only people in the republic who have taken an interest in this question in recent times have been our archaeologists28. Yet even while acknowledging that archaeology, anthropology, and ethnography can contribute much to the study of ethnogenesis, one must agree with F. Filin that “the decisive word in this question belonged, and still belongs, to linguistics, since language is the most important indicator of the ethnic affiliation of a population”29, whereas “archaeology has no basis for determining what language was spoken by the people of an excavated culture. Under the mantle of one and the same culture, ethnically different tribes may lie hidden, just as one and the same ethnos may have different cultures”30. K. Moszyński31 particularly stresses this point in criticizing the method of T. Lehr-Splawiński and other Polish scholars, who discern a direct link between the territory of excavated archaeological cultures and the ancient ethnic groups that lived there. Incidentally, it should be noted that this method is not foreign to our Soviet archaeologists either; it is therefore no coincidence that they have drawn on the works of T. Lehr-Splawiński to support some of their conclusions32. Here, however, our primary concern is not so much to criticize archaeologists as to emphasize that our Lithuanian philologists, too, should devote considerably more attention to the question of Lithuanian prehistory and ethnogenesis, rather than ceding a monopoly in this field to archaeologists alone. So far, among the major works by our Soviet philologists that could be directly useful in examining the problem of historical Balto-Slavic relations, only one or two can be cited. Of particular note among them is the register of Lithuanian hydronyms33, comprising the names of about 7,000 rivers and 3,000 lakes. This collective work will, one may hope, be useful to all who rely on toponymic material in addressing the Balto-Slavic problem. Thus, the regret expressed by V. Toporov and O. Trubachev that until now there had been no “complete compilation of hydronymic material concerning Lithuania in particular” 28 Žr. Lietuvos archeologijos bruožai. V., 1961, p. 82—86, 142—143. Čia taip pat teigiama, kad „probaltai yra gyvenę Padnieprės ir Volgos—Okos aukštupio srityje“ (p. 86), o senovės rytiniai baltai „I tūkstantmetyje pr. m. e., kaip rodo piliakalnių su brūkšniuota keramika ir baltiškų vietovardžių paplitimas, gyveno toliau į rytus nuo dabartinės Lietuvos TSR teritorijos. Jų teritorijos ribos siekė Dniepro aukštupio baseiną ir apėmė žymią dalį Dauguvos aukštupio baseino. Tuo tarpu vakariniai baltai buvo apsigyvenę šiaurvakarių Lenkijoje, Kaliningrado srities teritorijoje, vakariniuose Lietuvos rajonuose ir iš dalies Kuršė“ (p. 142). 29 Ф. П. Филин. Тен pat, p. 15. 30 Ф. П. Филин. Тен pat, p. 42—43. 31 Žr. K. Moszynski. Pierwotny zasiąg języka prasłowiańskiego. Wrocław — Kraków, 1957. 32 Plg. Lietuvos archeologijos bruožai, p. 83 (žemėlapis). 33 Lietuvos TSR hidronimų vardynas [Lietuvių kalbos ir literatūros institutas. Atsak. red. E. Grinaveckienė]. V., 1963, XX+226 p. 15 of hydronymic material34, it seems, can now be set aside. But how many other pressing and major questions remain for the philologists of our republic to resolve! We shall recall just two or three of these questions here, since they, too, are closely connected with the same problem of Balto-Slavic relations. Perhaps the most pressing is the question of the Yotvingians. During the past decade, many Polish historians, archaeologists, and linguists (A. Kamiński, J. Antoniewicz, S. Zajączkowski, J. Otrębski, and others) have devoted considerable attention to illuminating the past of this ancient Baltic tribe, which disappeared in historical times. Poland even has a special so-called Comprehensive Yotvingian Expedition (Kompleksowa Ekspedycja Jaćwieska), led by J. Antoniewicz, which for a number of years has been conducting extensive archaeological, toponymic, and linguistic research in Suwałki—presumed to be the ancient territory of the extinct Yotvingians. A prominent Swedish Slavist and Balticist, Prof. K. O. Falk, also actively participates in the expedition’s work as head of its Linguistics Section. He previously (1941) published a valuable monograph on the hydronymy of the Wigry Lake area and continues his studies in Lithuanian toponymy35. Among Lithuanian Soviet linguists, so far only Academician J. Balčikonis has shown some interest in the Yotvingian problem, chiefly by supplying some linguistic facts on the subject for Prof. J. Otrębski’s articles. Incidentally, our linguists have yet to offer a critical assessment of Prof. J. Otrębski’s hypothesis that the ancient Yotvingians spoke a dialect intermediate between the Baltic and Slavic languages. So far, Soviet Lithuanian studies scholars have also not investigated in depth the questions concerning the ancient Prussian language and its past, whereas Polish scholars (H. Łowmiański and others) have already produced a number of valuable works in this field during the postwar years. The broadest field of research, naturally, consists of Balto-Slavic linguistic relations in historical times. New, comprehensive studies are awaited in this area on such questions as the elucidation of interaction and influence between Lithuanian and Russian, Lithuanian and Belarusian, and Lithuanian and Polish. Given the extraordinarily broad range of problems in this field, very little has been done so far, although in the past decade valuable work has also been carried out in our republic and neighboring Belarus (by V. Kostelnitsky, M. Zakarian, A. Verzhbovsky, A. Sabaliauskas, and others), chiefly to elucidate lexical relations among Russian, Belarusian, and Lithuanian, based on analysis of chronicle and archival document texts or toponymic material. Among studies in this field conducted abroad, the works of H. Łowmiański deserve mention first, especially his study (1957) of Slavic linguistic influence on Lithuanian church terminology. That study convincingly demonstrates the cultural contacts between Lithuania 34 В. Н. Топоров, О. Н. Трубачев. Ten pat. p. 24. 35 On K. O. Falko’s work in Slavic and Lithuanian studies, see: Rocznik Białostocki, II. Białystok, 1961, pp. 9—16. On the work of Polish scholars on the Yotvingian and, more generally, the past of Lithuania, see here J. Ochmański’s article, “Dzieje Litwy w pracach współczesnych historyków polskich,” pp. 451—458. Also—D. Jaskanis. Jaćwież. Białystok, 1962, 44 pp. 16 Lithuanian and Rus’ relations date back to a very early period, as far as the 12th century36. The well-known Slavic scholar and philologist V. Kiparsky has for some time been preparing a major study of Slavic lexical borrowings in the Baltic languages. More recently, the German Balticist and Slavist V. Falkenhan has undertaken to examine anew the relations between Lithuanian and Polish. Drawing on the theory of language unions (Sprachbund) currently cultivated in the West37, V. Falkenhan argues that, until the not-too-distant past, there existed a Polish-Lithuanian language union and a German-Latvian-Estonian language union. To substantiate this assumption, he presents numerous interesting morphological and syntactic parallels between the Baltic and Slavic, as well as Germanic, languages. It should be noted, however, that the theory of language unions may at present also suggest certain political or even revanchist tendencies; therefore, some of its aspects must be treated with particular criticism. A separate broad question, closely connected with the Baltic-Slavic problem, concerns the linguistic relations among the Baltic, Slavic, and Finno-Ugric languages. Although the recent work of B. Serebrennikov, P. Ariste, E. Neminen, V. Kiparsky, and certain other Soviet and foreign linguists has contributed much new material to the study of this question, many problematic issues still remain in this field, and Soviet Lithuanian scholars could provide valuable new data for their successful resolution. Their first works on this subject, even if still compilatory and of a survey nature, should therefore be viewed positively38. So far, these studies have dealt only with the linguistic relations between the Baltic Finns and the Lithuanians. Recently, however, an increasing number of facts have been brought to light showing that in remote antiquity the Balts also had direct relations with the Finno-Volgaic tribes (the Mordvins and Mari). This question has not yet been addressed at all by our Lithuanian scholars, although, as V. Toporov and O. Trubachev point out, having brought to light a great deal of new material on the subject in their study, “this aspect of Baltic-Finnic relations is very important, since throughout the ancient Baltic territory in the Upper Dnieper region, their neighbors were the Finno-Volgaic peoples”39. It would be desirable for scientific cooperation between our Lithuanian scholars and the philologists of Soviet Estonia to begin as soon as possible in the study of linguistic relations between the Balts and the Finno-Ugric peoples. So far, there have been no contacts or attempts in this field to address the problem comprehensively. Meanwhile, the practice of Soviet Baltic archaeologists has shown that such cooperation produces very fruitful results (let us recall, for example, the work of the well-known Estonian archaeologist H. Moora, important for Baltic studies as a whole). This example should be 36 The author of the study also argues that ancient Lithuania was ready to adopt a new religion as early as the 13th century, when all Lithuanian lands had been united into a single feudal monarchy. The Teutonic Order, however, prevented the Lithuanians from adopting a new religion corresponding to the new social formation, doing everything in its power to prevent Lithuania from being baptized, since it did not want to lose its pretext for seizing the country by the sword as a pagan land. See H. Lowmianski. Uwagi o wpływach słowiańskich na litewską terminologią kościelną. Studia z filologii polskiej i słowiańskiej, t. II, Warszawa, 1957, p. 366—372. 37 One of its most prominent representatives is Prof. H. Becher of the University of Jena, who published a comprehensive study on this subject, “Der Sprachbund,” in 1958. 38 See J. Sabaliauskas, “Relations between the Baltic and Baltic Finnic languages.” „Lietuvių kalbotyros klausimai“, VI t., p. 109—136. 39 Б. Н. Топоров, О. Н. Трубачев. Ibid., p. 247. 2. Kalbotyros klausimai VI. 17 instructive and encouraging for the Soviet philologists of the Baltic republics as well. In this article, from among recent works in comparative-historical linguistics, we have discussed in greater breadth and detail only those works connected with Lithuanian philology and Lithuanian studies more generally that examine the problem of Baltic-Slavic linguistic relations. Almost entirely unmentioned here are works addressing the problem of Baltic-Germanic linguistic relations, as well as works dealing with problems of Proto-Indo-European studies (e.g., the so-called laryngeal theory), in the investigation of which the Baltic languages are linked with the recently discovered Tocharian and Hittite languages. In addition, almost all works published abroad in recent times and devoted directly to the study of the Lithuanian language fall outside the scope of this article—these would require a separate survey40. As we have seen above, one treatment or another of Baltic-Slavic linguistic relations, closely linked to the broad problem of Baltic-Slavic kinship as a whole, also bears fundamentally on the foundations of the prehistory and ethnogenesis of the Lithuanian people and the historical development of the Lithuanian language. Therefore, neither Lithuanian scholars in our republic nor Soviet scholars of Baltic languages more generally should remain indifferent to the further resolution of this problem. Finally, the material furnished by Lithuanian studies may be of considerable scholarly significance for the further development of comparative-historical linguistics itself and the refinement of its methods41. It is to be hoped that the International Commission on Baltic-Slavic Relations, established under the International Committee of Slavists and whose work many distinguished Soviet and foreign philologists have pledged to join, will in the near future greatly intensify the comprehensive study of Baltic-Slavic linguistic relations and Baltic languages in general, both internationally and across the Soviet Union. In conclusion, we would like once again to identify as one of the principal tasks facing our Soviet scholars of Lithuanian the need to engage more decisively in the examination of current problems of Slavic studies and, more broadly, Indo-European studies, which are widely debated today, enriching this work with new Lithuanian material and at the same time making effective use of the latest achievements of international linguistics in order to continue successfully developing Soviet Lithuanian studies. Vilnius 40 To give a sense of the scope, let us at least list the most substantial works. These are M. Niedermann’s five-volume dictionary of the Lithuanian language, begun before the war and published in Germany (three volumes have appeared; A. Zenas and A. Salys are continuing the dictionary); E. Fraenkel’s etymological dictionary of the Lithuanian language, publication of which began in 1955 (14 fascicles have appeared; E. Hofmann and E. Tangl are continuing the dictionary); and J. Otrębski’s five-volume grammar of the Lithuanian language (volumes I and III have been published). Among the research works, the following should be mentioned: Č. Kudzinowski’s study of Chilinskis’s Lithuanian translation of the Bible; Tamara Buch’s (Poland) dissertation on the accentuation of K. Donelaitis’s “The Seasons”; and G. Benze’s (East Germany) dissertation on converbs in the Baltic languages. In recent years, several other linguists of different nationalities have also published individual articles specifically on Lithuanian or Baltic-language topics in foreign journals: the Czechs P. Trost and A. Erhart, the Swiss J. Locher, the Americans W. Schmalstieg and E. Hamp, and others. 41 Cf. J. Otrębski. Über die Vervollkommung der Forschungsmethoden in der indoeuropäischen Sprachwissenschaft. — Lingue Posnaniensis, t. 9, Poznań, 1963, p. 7—28. In this article, the author, calling for further improvement of the methods of comparative linguistics and addressing some of its problems that remain controversial to this day, makes extensive use of Lithuanian-language evidence. 18 COMPARATIVE LINGUISTICS AND THE TASKS OF SOVIET LITHUANIAN PHILOLOGY К. КОРСАКАС S u m m a r y The Lithuanian language has long attracted considerable attention from scholars working in the field of comparative-historical linguistics, as one of the oldest Indo-European languages. In recent years, the use of Lithuanian-language materials has increased significantly in the works of a number of Soviet and foreign scholars studying problems of Indo-European studies. The article presents statements by S. B. Bernshtein, F. P. Filin, and V. I. Georgiev on the significance of the Lithuanian language for resolving the problem of Balto-Slavic unity and for clarifying the ethnogenesis, ancestral homeland, and proto-language of both the Slavic and Baltic peoples. After briefly reviewing the most important contemporary hypotheses on these questions, the author emphasizes the need for Lithuanian linguists to participate as actively as possible in resolving these issues, which are now widely debated and are also of great interest to Lithuanian studies. The rich materials collected over recent decades by Lithuanian scholars in lexicography (see the academic “Dictionary of the Lithuanian Language,” volumes I—VI), dialectology, toponymy (see the “Dictionary of Hydronyms of the Lithuanian SSR”), accentology, and Lithuanian phonetics, as well as in the archaeology and ethnography of Lithuania, have not yet truly entered scholarly circulation. Yet these materials could be of considerable use in resolving many disputed questions concerning the historical and linguistic relations between the Slavic and Baltic peoples. Using the work by V. N. Toporov and O. N. Trubachev, “Linguistic Analysis of the Hydronyms of the Upper Dnieper Basin,” as an example, the article shows how the latest toponymic research substantially revises the earlier views of K. Būga and other scholars that ancient Baltic tribes had supposedly gradually retreated under pressure from the Slavic peoples, from the Upper Dnieper basin to the shores of the Baltic. In fact, what took place here was a process of assimilation, not displacement. This historical fact gives the Balto-Slavic problem an entirely different aspect, whose clarification in the future requires the involvement of as much Lithuanian material as possible. The article notes that in the Lithuanian SSR some work has already been carried out in recent years, chiefly on lexical and archival material (works by A. Sabaliauskas, V. Kostelnitsky, M. Zakaryan, and others), to clarify the linguistic 19 the ties of the Lithuanian people with the Russian, Belarusian, and other Slavic peoples. In conclusion, the article sets before Soviet Lithuanian scholars the task of studying more closely than hitherto the language and past of such now completely vanished Baltic tribes as the ancient Prussians and Yotvingians, and of devoting more attention to the study of the linguistic ties between the Baltic peoples and the Finno-Ugric peoples in the distant past. The author of the article expresses the hope that the International Commission for the Study of Balto-Slavic Relations, newly established under the International Committee of Slavists, will help intensify work on the most important questions in both Slavic studies and Lithuanian studies.