Valstybinės kalbos tikriniai žodžiai ir jų rašyba

KAZIMIERAS GARŠVA Institute of the Lithuanian Language PROPER WORDS OF THE STATE LANGUAGE AND THEIR SPELLING KEYWORDS: state language, proper words, personal names, place names, spelling. ANNOTATION The article examines personal names from southeastern Lithuania (their origin, structure, development, and place in the onomastic system) and the spelling of Lithuania’s proper names. This seeks to clarify new data about Lithuania’s proper words and helps improve related draft legislation. Over 1,000 years, proper words arriving from other languages became part of the Lithuanian language and ceased to differ from other words phonetically and grammatically. As in other nations, place names first entered written records through local inhabitants, whereas personal names came through scribes writing in other languages; consequently, more of them are of non-Lithuanian origin. The onomasticon of Lithuania is the cultural heritage of the Republic of Lithuania. ABSTRACT The author of this article was involved in the analysis of persons proper names of South East Lithuania. In Lithuania, most place names are of the Lithuanian origin, as they were named by the locals and only after that the place names came into writing in various languages. The majority of personal names (as in other languages) in Lithuania are not entirely of local origin, as many Christian and similar names and surnames originated from other languages and by non-Lithuanian scribes were usually first recorded in other languages. But even those personal names now have Lithuanian vowels, consonants, inflections, suffixes and are considered Lithuanian proper nouns by the locals. INTRODUCTION The aim of the article is to discuss new and problematic data on personal names in the state language of the Republic of Lithuania and their spelling in personal identity documents. It analyzes trends in the formation of personal names in southeastern Lithuania. The objectives of the article are to briefly examine important issues in the use of contemporary personal names and certain other proper words, BENDRINĖ KALBA 94 (2021) http://journals.lki.lt/bendrinekalba ISSN 2351-7204 KAZIMIERAS GARŠVA. Valstybinės kalbos tikriniai žodžiai ir jų rašyba | 2 doi.org/10.35321/bkalba.2021.94.03 spelling problems and their relationship to the state language system and its functioning. Today, discussion focuses mainly on the name system of southeastern Lithuania, so it is also the principal subject of discussion here. The author has collected extensive data on the name system of southeastern Lithuania and is preparing a scholarly monograph on the subject. This article focuses mainly on personal names and employs the areal (geolinguistic), comparative, contrastive, descriptive, sociolinguistic, and statistical research methods. The state language has always been and remains one of the most important conditions for the restoration, existence, and survival of a nation-state; therefore, the issue has been discussed more actively since 1988. In eastern Lithuania, a territorial autonomy with three state languages was being established (see LR 9–314), and there is still no willingness to abandon that idea, as legislation on national minorities and the writing of personal names in identity documents is being prepared and efforts are being made accordingly to amend the Law on the State Language and the Civil Code of the Republic of Lithuania. The Government and municipalities of southeastern Lithuania have already adopted resolutions that further restrict the functions of the state language and promote and introduce multilingualism in various ways. 1. THE NAME SYSTEM OF SOUTHEASTERN LITHUANIA: ORIGIN, STRUCTURE, DEVELOPMENT In the Slavicized name system of southeastern Lithuania, the author identified up to 99 percent of former Lithuanian hydronyms, 90 percent of settlement names (oikonyms), and up to 40 percent of personal names. Even the names of streams and lakes in Vilnius District, which had been Slavicized long ago, were just as Lithuanian as those in any other district of Lithuania. They were formed from Lithuanian words. These were formations with endings and suffixes, with counterparts elsewhere in Lithuania: Akmenė, Giraitė, Kuosinė, Plynis, Raudonė, Ringė, Veržuva, Vingris (the hydronyms reconstructed here from foreign-language sources are unstressed and have already disappeared; see Jurkštas 1985: 46–51). There are also many compound river names with -upis as the second component: Juodupis, Rudupis, Šaltupis, Verdenupė, Viršupis. Among the oikonyms recorded in Polish and officially used in parallel in Vilnius District, 65.5 percent of settlement names retained their Lithuanian-origin forms; in Šalčininkai District, 59.6 percent did, and even in Vilnius city the figure was 45.5 percent. The personal names in use today in the Republic of Lithuania reflect not the past of some other nation, but that of the Lithuanian nation itself. The languages used in the written records of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania were Latin, Ruthenian, and Polish, so they BENDRINĖ KALBA 94 (2021) http://journals.lki.lt/bendrinekalba ISSN 2351-7204 KAZIMIERAS GARŠVA. Valstybinės kalbos tikriniai žodžiai ir jų rašyba | 3 doi.org/10.35321/bkalba.2021.94.03 did not reflect the Lithuanian name system entirely accurately and Slavicized it. Prof. Zigmas Zinkevičius observed that the requirement to write in Polish letters Lithuanianized surnames of Slavic-speaking and Lithuanian residents of southeastern Lithuania is improper and serves Polonizing aims—to denationalize completely the formerly occupied part of Lithuania (Zinkevičius 2012: 351). Personal names from southeastern Lithuania were first collected, standardized, and published in a dictionary edited by Antanas Salys (Salys 1983: 305–488). The dictionary’s editor rightly restored Slavicized personal names to their original forms and added: “it seems to me that, for a true Lithuanian, a surname corrupted in times of national oppression and hardship cannot be something deeply their own and therefore precious” (Salys 1983: 64–65). After the Polish ultimatum expired, and with no expectation of a treacherous Russian ultimatum, Lithuanian linguists and legislators could state most clearly what they thought about the spelling of personal names of Lithuanian citizens in an independent state. All personal names in the aforementioned dictionary were written with Lithuanian letters, and no exceptions were made for so-called “Polish” surnames. For example, the name recorded during the Polish occupation as Donowagis was corrected to Duonavagis, Dwilewicz to Dvylis, Dziadulewicz to Diedulis, Dziatłowski to Genys, Dziedzziukiewicz to Diedžiukas, Dziedziul to Didžiulis, Dzienowagis to Dienovagis, Dziewałtowski–Gintowt to Deltuva–Gintautas, and Dziewieragis to Dievaragis (Salys 1983: 340–344). The surname of the head of the Russian KGB, Dzerzhinsky (who came from Vilnius District), was likewise recommended in that part of the dictionary to be written in Lithuanian as Diržys, Diržius, Diržaitis, Diržiūnas, Diržionis, Diržėnas, or Diržynas (the surname’s bearer could choose whichever of the seven forms he preferred). A characteristic way of Slavicizing the Lithuanian name system was to drop word endings. In the scholarly study, all these surnames and their endings were restored to their former forms: Aleksin < Aleks-ynas, Alksnin < Alksn-inis, Antul < Ant-ulis, Awgul < Aug-ulis, Augun < Aug-ūnas, Babul < Bab-ulis, Baczul < Bač-iulis, Bruzgul < Bruzg-ulis, Bumbul < Bumb-ulis, Biczel < Bič-elis, Czerniel < Čern-elis, Banel / Baniel < Ban-ėlis, Banul < Ban-iulis, Balul < Bal-iulis, Bil < Bìlius, Bit < Bitė, Blus < Blùsius, Dvil < Dvylýs, Gil < Gìlys, Gir < Girà, Gryn < Grìnius, Grodz < Grúodis, Guž < Gùžas, Hruzd < Grùždas, Kern < Kernà, Kerýs, Kiek < Kekýs, Kiel < Kiẽlė, Kìelm < Kélmas, Kien < Kenà, Kodz < Kuodýs, Kois < Kójis, Kust < Kustà, Naus < Náuša, Rodz < Radýs, Sak < Sãkas, Saul < Sáulis, Szer < Šerỹs1. 1 In the article, proper names are marked for stress only when they are stressed in the source and when it is important to emphasize this. BENDRINĖ KALBA 94 (2021) http://journals.lki.lt/bendrinekalba ISSN 2351-7204 KAZIMIERAS GARŠVA. Valstybinės kalbos tikriniai žodžiai ir jų rašyba | 4 doi.org/10.35321/bkalba.2021.94.03 The vowels, diphthongs, and consonants in the surnames in the dictionary were also correctly written using the Lithuanian alphabet and in accordance with our spelling rules. Lithuanian distinguishes long and short vowels, so the Polonized forms of the surnames (Alejunas, Aleksiejunas, Aleksiunas, Bajorunas, Gasiunas, etc.) were written in Lithuanian: Aliejūnas, Aleksiejūnas, Aleksiūnas, Bajorūnas, Gasiūnas (the Slavs harden the consonants r and ž, so Bajoriūnas may have been conflated here with Bajorūnu). Avižėn and similar surnames were corrected to Avižienį, etc., and the diphthongized e was restored to its authentic form: Gieczys was written as Gečys, Aszkielojc – Ožkelaitis, and so forth. In eastern Lithuanian dialects, the consonants t, d before i could in some places be rendered as c, dz, but they could also have been rendered this way during Slavicization. These changes, too, were systematically restored to standard Lithuanian; cf.: Ciesiul – Tiesiulis, Ciesiun – Tiesiūnas, Ciuksza – Čiūkša, Cipko – Čipkus, Civ il – Čiovylis, Ciunaitis – Tijūnaitis; Dziedz iul – Didžiulis, Dzi augis – Džiaugys, Dzieguc – Degutis. The compilers of the dictionary sought to avoid new Slavic suffixes (some were also avoided in spoken language) and therefore recommended using the Slavicized surnames as follows: Biciulewicz – Bičiulis, Blusiewicz – Blusius, Czepulkowski – Čepulis, Czesnulewicz – Česnulis, Cycynski – Cicinas, Dwilewicz – Dvylis. Where they had evidence that the entire surname could be translated into Polish, they recommended the original (authentic) form of the personal name: Brzeski – Beržinis, Drozd – Strazdas, etc. Now, with much greater knowledge of linguistics, we could refine the spelling of only some surnames: Biedulski – Bėdiulis (Bėdiulis lives in Paberžė, Vilnius district, and still speaks Lithuanian), Dziewulski – Dievulis (not Devulis), Smilgin – Smilginis (the Lithuanian man in Vigoniai village, Rodūnia parish, is not Smilginas), Stanul (not Stanulis, but Staniūlis lives in the Dieveniškės area), Szarejko – Šereika (not Šareika), Szawarejko – Švareika (not Šavareika), Szykuc – Šikutis (not Šakutis), Trabszo – Trepšys (in Rimdžiūnai village, Gervėčiai area, Trapšys was said only in dialect), Traszko – Treškà (not Traška). The dictionary’s authors proposed changing some imported surnames that sounded offensive (Kiaũličius, Visokogòrskis), but there was no time to take their suggestions into account. The dictionary first lists surnames transcribed from documents of the occupying Polish regime, whose bearers’ identities are not specified: the same surnames could belong to Lithuanians, Belarusians, Poles, Tuteish or other ethnic groups, since they had all been Polonized. The dictionary contains over 6,000 surnames, a treasure of the Lithuanian language. Once systematically restored to their original state (with the new and artificial Slavicization removed), many of these surnames coincide with those in use today. BENDRINĖ KALBA 94 (2021) http://journals.lki.lt/bendrinekalba ISSN 2351-7204 KAZIMIERAS GARŠVA. Valstybinės kalbos tikriniai žodžiai ir jų rašyba | 5 doi.org/10.35321/bkalba.2021.94.03 Some of them have even disappeared. The staff of the Institute of Lithuanian Studies did not have time to include some of these surnames in the card file of surnames used in Lithuania up to 1940; consequently, they were not later included in the Dictionary of Lithuanian Surnames and are now especially important. The surnames in the dictionary edited by Antanas Salys were prepared in haste for the passport offices of regained eastern Lithuania so that citizens could obtain their documents more quickly by choosing a suitable surname variant. No additional scholarly requirements were imposed on the dictionary that might have made it more difficult to use. This dictionary of surnames differs from the dictionary of Vilnius region place names edited by Antanas Salys (Salys 1983) in that the surnames are listed alphabetically rather than by the districts in which those personal names were used. Our study also brings the dictionary into scholarly circulation: we begin to mark the stress of the surnames (where it is clearly known how to do so) and indicate their formation, motivation (etymology), origin, and distribution. The surnames in the dictionary under discussion are simplex (Āšaka, Balsỹs, Daukšà), compound (Bùi-vydas, Dár-vydas) or shortened forms thereof, prefixal (Pa-kerys, Pa-pinigis), or suffixal (Bumb-ulis, Burn-eikà, Deg-utis, Drūt-elis, Dūd-aitis, etc.). Suffixal surnames are the most numerous (the language also formed many of them for children and grandchildren). The following surnames were formed solely from the Lithuanianized baptismal name Mātas with Lithuanian suffixes (but written in Polish letters by the Polonizers): Mat-ejko, Mat-uc, Mat-uk, Mat-ul-aniec, Mat-ul. In southeastern Lithuania, surnames with the suffixes -elis, -ulis, -ūnas and others were most widespread, for example: -ėlis: Brasel < Bras-ėlis, Bujel < Buj-ėlis, Bukiel < Bùkelis, Grygiel < Grig-elis, Gryszel < Griš-ėlis, Jutel < Jut-elis, Kordel < Kard-ėlis, Kukiel < Kuk-ėlis (< Kùkis), Kurmiel < Kurm-ėlis, Kuszel < Kuš-ėlis, Lawcel < Lauč-ėlis, Mackalo < Mack-ėlė, Masal < Mas-ėlis, Paszkel < Pašk-ėlis, Pural < Pūri-ėlis, Szymiel < Šim-elis; -(i)ùlis: Kadziul < Kadz-ìulis, Kaziul < Kaz-ìulis, Kerul < Ker-ùlis, Kurkul < Kurk-ùlis, Labul < Lab-ùlis, Masiul < Mas-ìulis, Mažul < Maž-(i)ùlis, Pieczul < Peč-ìulis, Stanul < Stan-ìulis; -(i)únas: Brasiun < Bras-iúnas, Česun < Čes-iúnas, Gasiul < Gas-iùlis, Gilun < Gil-iúnas, Gryszun < Griš-iúnas, Jackun < Jack-únas, Jaczun < Jač-iúnas, Jankun < Jank-únas, Karalun < Karal-iúnas, Kiežun < Kež-iúnas, Matejun < Motiej-iúnas, Mejhun < Meil-únas, Mieldun < Meld-únas, Mikolajun < Mikalaj-iúnas, Narkun < Nork-únas, Paciun < Poc-iúnas, Pawlun < Paul-iúnas, Pieczun < Peč-iúnas, Pietkun < Petk-únas, Radziun < Radž-iúnas; BENDRINĖ KALBA 94 (2021) http://journals.lki.lt/bendrinekalba ISSN 2351-7204 KAZIMIERAS GARŠVA. Valstybinės kalbos tikriniai žodžiai ir jų rašyba | 6 doi.org/10.35321/bkalba.2021.94.03 -ùkas: Braziuk < Braz-iùkas, Daniuk < Dan-iùkas, Grysiuk < Gris-iùkas, Macuk < Mac-iùkas, Masiuk < Mas-iùkas, Misiuk < Mis-iùkas; -áitis: Grygojc < Grig-áitis, Jankojc < Jank-áitis, Janukojc < Jan-uk-áitis, Jurkojc < Jurk-áitis, Klukojc < Kluk-áitis, Masojc < Mas-áitis, Wincelojc < Vinc-el-áitis; -ùtis: Giruc < Gir-ùtis, Labuc / Łabudz < Lab-ùtis, Matuc < Mat-ùtis, Pietruc < Petr-ùtis, Siekut < Sek-ùtis; -ė́nas, -ónis: Grygianiec < Grig-ėnas, Masiulaniec < Mas-iul-ionis (and Masiulanis), Mieżaniec < Mież-iónis, Oszkielaniec < Ožk-el-iónis, Pietrukaniec < Petr-uk-ónis, Szymaniec < Šim-onis; -eikà: Masiejko < Mas-eikà, Matejko < Mat-eikà, Sudejko < Sud-eikà, Szadejko < Šad-eikà, Szawejko < Šao-eikà. 2. SPELLING OF LITHUANIAN PLACE AND PERSONAL NAMES It is customary to write the place names, personal names, street names, and names of legal entities in the independent democratic Republic of Lithuania in the state language, Lithuanian, which is understandable to everyone. The Nemunas River, which has a Baltic name and flows through the diminished territory of the Lithuanian state, is officially called not in Lithuanian but in Belarusian in Belarus, and in Russian in the present-day Kaliningrad Region. The same is true of Neris, which in Belarus is called Viliya. And no one complains that Lithuanian river names there are written using non-Lithuanian letters and in different forms, or that the “identity markers” of hydronyms have been changed—markers that the Speaker of the Seimas now attributes to personal names (cf. Rašimaitė 2021: 6). Some officials are increasingly seeking by various means to distort Lithuania’s name system (especially personal names) and disregard the arguments of language specialists. Dr. Pranas Kniūkšta, former secretary of the State Commission of the Lithuanian Language, wrote as early as 2009 and 2010 that a personal name is part of language, not a “unique identity marker of a particular person” (Kniūkšta 2013: 159–169). The general legal principle that personal names in documents are to be written using Lithuanian letters also applies to citizens of the Republic of Lithuania. This in no way prevents the expression of a spouse’s family relationships and other relationships arising from them: these are indicated not by the identical form of surnames, but by legal acts and those attesting to them BENDRINĖ KALBA 94 (2021) http://journals.lki.lt/bendrinekalba ISSN 2351-7204 KAZIMIERAS GARŠVA. Valstybinės kalbos tikriniai žodžiai ir jų rašyba | 7 doi.org/10.35321/bkalba.2021.94.03 documents. A Lithuanian woman who marries a foreigner may keep her Lithuanian surname, and this does not change or weaken her ties with her spouse in any way. If a citizen of the Republic of Lithuania has their surname written in the documents of our state using the characters of a foreign state, that language is being used as a state language. This is an attempt to restore the situation that prevailed in 1920–1939, when Poland occupied eastern Lithuania. The use of Polish and Russian in Lithuania’s border regions would separate them from the rest of Lithuania and weaken the integrity of the state. Pranas Kniūkšta emphasized that, by foisting Polish forms of personal names, street names, and public inscriptions, “the Poles openly and deliberately lay claim to the Vilnius region by foisting Polish forms of place names. Politics clearly protrudes here from behind language” (Kniūkšta 2013: 157). In official usage, officials in southeastern Lithuania, by persistently spreading such a set of names, seek to portray the Vilnius region as supposedly “an area Polish from time immemorial,” which must be granted special status. Writing the first and last names of Lithuanian citizens in documents using Polish orthography is not as simple and innocent a matter as some of our politicians and journalists make it out to be (Kniūkšta 2013: 165). In an effort to revive the effects of the occupations and narrow the functioning of the state Lithuanian language in Lithuania, very deliberate and coordinated actions were undertaken to damage the state language system. The State Commission of the Lithuanian Language (hereinafter – VLKK) also failed to withstand the pressure: it took into account not only the language system, but also the 2009 formulation by the chair of the Seimas Committee on Legal Affairs and Law Enforcement, allegedly prompted by a sudden “change in Lithuania’s geopolitical, economic and social situation” (cf. Kniūkšta 2013: 150, 152), supposedly requiring the unofficial abolition of the status of Lithuanian as the state language. VLKK was compelled to formulate this exception, which cannot be justified by the language system, in similar terms: “taking into account the needs of contemporary society,” as if it were permissible to disregard the Constitution, change the language policy of state institutions, hinder the transmission of the mother tongue from one generation of residents to the next, change community members’ relationship with their language, and thereby violate one third of the criteria for language vitality set out in the UNESCO Atlas of the World’s Languages in Danger, endorsed on 24 March 2009. In pursuit of goals that are inconsistent with the Constitution, some 20 scholarly fabrications are also being spread: that a first name and surname are not part of language but part of personal identity and its principal marker; that Lithuanian surnames are supposedly only Lithuanian, while non-Lithuanian ones are exclusively foreign; that personal names are supposedly only part of private life and that decisions about their “original” spelling and pronunciation should be made not by society but by the “owner” of the personal name, and so on. These errors were warned against long ago (Garšva 2014), but no one wants to hear about it, and the same errors keep being repeated. They want to turn Lithuania into BENDRINĖ KALBA 94 (2021) http://journals.lki.lt/bendrinekalba ISSN 2351-7204 KAZIMIERAS GARŠVA. Valstybinės kalbos tikriniai žodžiai ir jų rašyba | 8 doi.org/10.35321/bkalba.2021.94.03 an island in the world where the state language is no longer observed and where, perhaps uniquely in the whole world, surnames with diacritical marks are written using “original” Latin-based orthographies. The Grammar of Contemporary Lithuanian provides for no spelling exceptions. The note on citing foreign authors (DLKG 1994: 19) was added without the knowledge of the authors of this chapter, was not approved at any meeting of language specialists, and has no connection whatsoever with the spelling of the personal names of citizens of the Republic of Lithuania in documents. To this day, public discussion of personal-name spelling is most often carried on incompetently and superficially by people with little understanding of the issues, who express only unfounded subjective opinions. For example, the website of the Ministry of Justice still publishes a speech by former Minister of Justice Remigijus Šimašius, delivered on 24 November 2011 during a discussion of personal-name spelling, in which he stated: “a woman marries a foreigner, a Dane or an Englishman, and she has to choose whom to love more: Lithuania or her husband, if, when choosing her husband’s surname, it cannot be entered unaltered in documents issued in Lithuania”2. In fact, that surname would be recorded exactly as heard, according to pronunciation (as has been done for 500 years), and the guest’s surname would in no way be distorted. And if he also needs foreign letters, the surname can be given in those letters in parentheses as well. In addition, the guest could allow the Lithuanian woman to keep her maiden name in Lithuania, or write down her surname himself. The guest should respect the rights of the many local residents in Lithuania to use their state language, grammar, and laws, and should learn to integrate. Any spelling exception—or, more precisely, the transfer of the spelling and pronunciation rules of foreign languages into traditional Lithuanian orthography—would mean its destruction. Such exceptions would become more and more numerous. It was not without reason that Pranas Kniūkšta wrote of the proposed project to copy letters in personal names: “the project is officially biased, anti-citizen, of no benefit to society, and, most importantly, unconstitutional. Such a law cannot be adopted <...>. It is sad that the State Commission of the Lithuanian Language, too, failed to withstand the pressure and accepted a project promoting such an approach” (Kniūkšta 2013: 150–151). The best-prepared proposal to date is Talkos project on the spelling of personal names in documents, which was supported by 50 professional linguists, over 300 other university-qualified Lithuanian language and literature specialists, 100,000 active citizens of the Republic of Lithuania, and the Institute of the Lithuanian Language. In its opinion of 29 February 2016 on Bill No. XIIP-3796, prepared by representatives of Talkos, the Institute wrote: 2 Available online: www.tm.lt. BENDRINĖ KALBA 94 (2021) http://journals.lki.lt/bendrinekalba ISSN 2351-7204 KAZIMIERAS GARŠVA. Valstybinės kalbos tikriniai žodžiai ir jų rašyba | 9 doi.org/10.35321/bkalba.2021.94.03 “The first name(s) and surname(s) of a citizen of the Republic of Lithuania must be written in personal documents in the state language, using the 32 letters of the Lithuanian alphabet according to pronunciation <...>. Additional entries in another language could be made: 1) in a passport—in the first page of the section for other entries; 2) on an identity card—on the reverse side of the card”3. This was consistent with the conclusions of the comprehensive scholarly discussion on writing personal names in identity documents, held at the Institute on April 25, 2014: there is no linguistic argument for changing the current provisions on writing personal names in the personal documents of citizens of the Republic of Lithuania; writing personal names in them with non-Lithuanian letters would change the Lithuanian alphabet and destabilize the spelling system. It would also deny the constitutional status of Lithuanian as the state language, violate the distinctiveness of its spelling, and disrupt traditions of usage. More than 30 linguists took part in the discussion; its conclusions to the Seimas and the VLKK were signed by the discussion chairs, habilitated doctors Ona Aleknavičienė, Professor Laima Kalėdienė, Rita Miliūnaitė, and Professor Sergejus Temčinas4. Under the Constitution, all personal names of citizens of the Republic of Lithuania must be written in documents in correct state-language form: using the official standard Lithuanian alphabet and without violating grammatical rules (in the singular nominative, first names and surnames must not be abbreviated). One’s nationality and personal names in a foreign language may be indicated in additional entries in documents. The 1622 inventory of the Vilnius economy shows that the names of local inhabitants at the time were Jonas, Jurgis (LVIŠ 70, 88), and their surnames were Drutelaytis, Gudaycis, Katelaytis, Szermuksztaytis, Lukasztelis, Rugielis, Storelis, Kuktonis, Kibilda, etc. (LVIŠ 128, 122, 88, 128, 102, 114, 60, 56, 118). It is now demanded that documents record altered rather than authentic surnames Druteloic, Gudoic, Kateloic, Szermukszoic (not Šermukštaitis), Łuksztełło, Rugiel, Starel, Kukłan, Kibildo, because these surnames were forcibly Slavicized in the 19th–20th centuries. What conclusions on the spelling of these and similar surnames in documents will the VLKK submit to the Seimas and the courts if requested by citizens of the Republic of Lithuania and their relatives who are foreign nationals from Poland, Belarus, etc.? Until now the Commission has apparently not objected to this (Pangonytė 2019). In 2021, the Klaipėda District Court dismissed a Lithuanian citizen’s complaint seeking to “restore” the letter v in his surname in place of the letter w, because that letter was acquired in 1940 in the “Memel” (i.e., Klaipėda) district by 3 Available online: www.lrs.lt. BENDRINĖ KALBA 94 (2021) http://journals.lki.lt/bendrinekalba ISSN 2351-7204 KAZIMIERAS GARŠVA. Valstybinės kalbos tikriniai žodžiai ir jų rašyba | 10 doi.org/10.35321/b kalba.2021.94.03 the applicant’s great-grandfather, while his grandparents and parents changed the letter w to v. The court was unaware that international laws also do not recognize changes imposed by force because of wars and occupations. On May 12, 2011, in the case Wardyn/Vardyn prieš Lietuvą, the Court of Justice of the European Union dismissed a complaint by a Lithuanian citizen, the current chair of the so-called European Human Rights Foundation, concerning the spelling of this surname and the alleged violation of the right to free movement under European Union (hereinafter, EU) law, as well as the alleged conflict between the laws of the Republic of Lithuania and EU law. It held that, under EU law, the legal regulation of entries of first names and surnames in civil-status records falls within the competence of EU Member States (Kuzborska 2012: 174–176; cf. also Urbutis 2007: 85–100). Nearly 2,000 years ago, the Roman historian Cassius Dio (Lucius Cassius Cocceianus) wrote that their emperor had been told: “You, Caesar, can grant Roman citizenship to people, not to words” (Cassius, LVII 17). From then on, the saying “Caesar is not above the grammarians (Latin: Caesar non supra grammaticos)” came into being. On February 27, 2014, the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Lithuania reiterated this: “when the legislature establishes the legal regulation of the writing of a person’s first name and surname in a passport of a citizen of the Republic of Lithuania, specialized knowledge is required; it must obtain an official conclusion, a clearly stated position, and clear proposals from persons (institutions) with professional expertise”4 (emphasis added). The author of the spelling and transcription chapter in the Grammar of Contemporary Lithuanian presents precisely such a very clear conclusion, reiterating the Constitutional Court’s ruling of November 6, 2009: once a person’s first name and surname have been entered in the passport of a citizen of the Republic of Lithuania in the state language, the section for other entries in that passport and on the identity card may record the person’s first name and surname using other, non-Lithuanian characters, if the person so wishes and the VLKK and the Institute of the Lithuanian Language agree. No one authorized the so-called politicians to change the Lithuanian alphabet, pronunciation, and principles of spelling. Many of the arguments advanced for writing personal names in the state language also apply to the writing of place names, street names, and names of legal entities. Such writing is guaranteed by Articles 4, 14, 15, and 17 of the Law on the State Language. 4 Available online: www.lrs.lt. BENDRINĖ KALBA 94 (2021) http://journals.lki.lt/bendrinekalba ISSN 2351-7204 KAZIMIERAS GARŠVA. Valstybinės kalbos tikriniai žodžiai ir jų rašyba | 11 doi.org/10.35321/bkalba.2021.94.03 SUMMARY Proper nouns, like common nouns, are part of language: they are written using the same letters and have the same endings, suffixes, prefixes, word roots, and genders as other words; they are stressed and declined according to the same rules and conform equally to the language system. The Lithuanian alphabet, like the alphabets of many other Western European languages, is based on the Latin alphabet. Classical Latin had 23 letters, while Lithuanian has 32. In Lithuanian, one letter is used to represent each speech sound, so there are no letters x, q, which represent two sounds. Nor is there the letter w, which Latin adopted from Germanic languages in more recent times. The letters v and w represent the same sound, so there is no reason to represent one sound in a language with two different letters. In Lithuania (as in many other countries), traditional place names and personal names are considered to be those that have long been used by local residents and are fully established in the local language (dialect). Most place names in Lithuania are of Lithuanian origin, since local residents named the places, and only afterward did the place names enter written records in various languages. A larger share of personal names (as in other languages) in Lithuania are not entirely local in origin, because many Christian and similar given names and surnames derive from other languages and were generally first entered in documents by non-Lithuanian scribes in other languages. Yet these personal names now have Lithuanian vowels, consonants, endings, and suffixes, and local residents regard them as Lithuanian proper nouns. It is wrong to propose that the allegedly “non-Lithuanian” given names and surnames of citizens of the Republic of Lithuania and foreign citizens be written in the documents of the Republic of Lithuania using “non-Lithuanian Latin characters.” In that case, rather than three new letters, approximately 150 new letters would be added to Lithuanian when writing letters from the Latin-based alphabets of all countries, thereby changing the Lithuanian alphabet. Those who want “foreign letters” could have them entered in supplementary document entries, without violating Article 14 of the Constitution of the Republic of Lithuania, the state-language system, or the rights of the majority of citizens to read and pronounce unfamiliar personal names accurately. This would also benefit holders of “foreign” personal names, since their names would be pronounced correctly and not distorted. Moreover, this would not violate the rights of those Lithuanians who live in Lithuania, have received unfamiliar personal names, and wish to retain their nationality, be well understood, and be loyal citizens of the Republic of Lithuania. BENDRINĖ KALBA 94 (2021) http://journals.lki.lt/bendrinekalba ISSN 2351-7204 KAZIMIERAS GARŠVA. Valstybinės kalbos tikriniai žodžiai ir jų rašyba | 12 doi.org/10.35321/bkalba.2021.94.03 It is unreasonable to demand that “foreign” given names and surnames receive special (privileged) legal protection in Lithuania “as the principal markers of personal identity.” Over a thousand years, personal names that came to Lithuania became established in the Lithuanian language and became part of it. The principal personal identifier is the personal identification code, and there are thousands of people with the same given names and surnames. These may be changed or written using the alphabets of other languages, but this does not change anyone’s identity. A personal name is part of a language, not the private property of any individual. It is also wrong to assume that there are no Lithuanian (Baltic) personal names abroad. Lithuanians have lived and continue to live in many countries around the world, and Balticisms are found between Berlin and Moscow because the Balts, from whom Lithuanians descended, lived there earlier. There is no basis for officially writing Lithuanian personal names, place names, or street names using foreign-language alphabets or in distorted forms. Proper nouns are not translated into other languages. It is likewise unreasonable to demand that the names of legal entities in Lithuania be written in non-Lithuanian and to change the laws for this reason. This, too, violates the rights of the majority of citizens to receive accurate information, and those institutions would lose some of their clients. Nothing prevents Lithuanian legal entities from advertising abroad in the language of their choice. LITERATŪRA DLKG – Dabartinės lietuvių kalbos gramatika, red. V. Ambrazas. Vilnius: Mokslo ir enciklopedijų leidykla, 1994, 1996, 2006. Garšva Kazimieras 2014: Asmenvardžių rašymas Lietuvos Respublikos dokumentuose ir valstybinės kalbos funkcijos. – Bendrinė kalba 87. Jurkštas Jonas 1985: Vilniaus vietovardžiai. Vilnius: Mokslas. Kniūkšta Pranas 2013: Tarp gramatikos ir politikos. Vilnius: Lietuvių kalbos institutas. Kuzborska Elžbieta 2012: Teisinė tautinių mažumų padėtis Lietuvoje. Vilnius: UAB „Artprint“. LKE – Lietuvių kalbos enciklopedija, sud. K. Morkūnas, red. V. Ambrazas. Vilnius: Mokslo ir enciklopedijų leidybos institutas, 2008. LR – Lietuvos rytai, sud. K. Garšva, L. Grumadienė. Vilnius: Valstybinis leidybos centras, 1993. BENDRINĖ KALBA 94 (2021) http://journals.lki.lt/bendrinekalba ISSN 2351-7204 KAZIMIERAS GARŠVA. Valstybinės kalbos tikriniai žodžiai ir jų rašyba | 13 doi.org/10.35321/bkalba.2021.94.03 LVIŠ – XVII a. pradžios Lietuvos vietovių istoriniai šaltiniai. Parengė D. Vilimas. Vilnius: Lietuvos istorijos institutas, 2014. Pangonytė Aistė 2019: VLKK pritaria Europos Komisijos nuostatai dėl judžių piliečių asmenvardžių. Prieiga internete: www.vlkk.lt. Rašimaitė Teodora 2021: Seimo sesijoje – įstatymų šuoras ir dideli užmojai. – Savaitė, Nr. 11, 2021 03 18, p. 6. Salys Antanas 1983: Raštai 2. Tikriniai vardai. Roma: Lietuvių katalikų mokslo akademija. Urbutis Vincas 2007: Lietuvių kalbos išdavystė. Vilnius: Margi raštai. Zinkevičius Zigmas 2008: Lietuvių asmenvardžiai. Vilnius: Lietuvių kalbos institutas. Zinkevičius Zigmas 2012: Vilnijos lenkakalbių pavardės. Vilnius: Mokslo ir enciklopedijų leidybos institutas. Gauta 2021 07 21 Priimta 2021 09 02 BENDRINĖ KALBA 94 (2021) http://journals.lki.lt/bendrinekalba ISSN 2351-7204 KAZIMIERAS GARŠVA. Valstybinės kalbos tikriniai žodžiai ir jų rašyba | 14 doi.org/10.35321/bkalba.2021.94.03 PROPER NOUNS OF THE STATE LANGUAGE AND THEIR SPELLING Summary Proper nouns, like common nouns, are a part of speech written in the same letters, with the same inflections, suffixes, prefixes, roots, genders, according to the same rules accentuated, inflected and equally subject to the language system. The Lithuanian alphabet, like the alphabet of many other Western European languages, is based on the Latin alphabet. There were 23 letters in classical Latin and 32 letters in Lithuanian. In Lithuanian, there is one separate letter for each sound in the language, so there are no letters x and q denoting two sounds. There is also no letter w, which in recent times has been taken over from Germanic languages by Latin. The letters v and w denote the same sound, so it makes no sense to denote one sound in speech by two different letters. In Lithuania (and in many other countries) traditional place names and personal names are considered to be those that have been used for a very long time by the local population and are completely rooted in the local language. In Lithuania, most place names are of the Lithuanian origin, as they were named by the locals and only after that the place names came into writing in various languages. The majority of personal names (as in other languages) in Lithuania are not entirely of local origin, as many Christian and similar names and surnames originated from other languages and by non-Lithuanian scribes were usually first recorded in other languages. But even those personal names now have Lithuanian vowels, consonants, inflections, suffixes and are considered Lithuanian proper nouns by the locals. It is incorrect to suggest that the supposedly “non-Lithuanian” names and surnames of the citizens of the Republic of Lithuania and foreign countries would be written in the documents of the Republic of Lithuania in “non-Lithuanian Latin characters”. Then three new letters would appear in the Lithuanian language, and by writing letters based on the Latin alphabet of all countries – about 150 new letters, and thus the Lithuanian alphabet would be changed. For those who wish to use “foreign letters”, this can be entered in additional document records, without violating Article 14 of the Constitution of the Republic of Lithuania, the state language system and the rights of the majority of citizens to read and pronounce an unusual personal name accurately. It is also useful for anyone with a personal BENDRINĖ KALBA 94 (2021) http://journals.lki.lt/bendrinekalba ISSN 2351-7204 KAZIMIERAS GARŠVA. Valstybinės kalbos tikriniai žodžiai ir jų rašyba | 15 doi.org/10.35321/bkalba.2021.94.03 name written "foreign", as it would be spoken correctly and not distorted in this case. In addition, then the rights of those Lithuanians, who live in Lithuania, received unusual names and want to maintain their nationality, to be well-understood and loyal citizens of the Republic of Lithuania, are inviolable. It is unreasonable to demand the provision of special (privileged) legal protection of “foreign” names and surnames “as the main signs of personal identity” in Lithuania. Personal names who came to Lithuania during a thousand years used to take roots in the Lithuanian language and to become a part of it. The main personal identifier is the personal code, and there are thousands of many identical names and surnames. They can also be changed, written in the alphabets of other languages, but no person's identity changes from then on. A personal name is part of a language, not the private property of any person. It is wrong to think that there are no Lithuanian (Baltic) personal names abroad. Lithuanians have lived and are living in many countries of the world, and the Baltisms are found between Berlin and Moscow, because the Balts, from whom Lithuanians originated, lived there before. There is no reason to officially write Lithuanian personal names, place names, street names in foreign language alphabets and in distorted forms. Proper nouns are not translated into other languages. It is unreasonable to require the names of juridical persons in Lithuania to be written in non-Lithuanian and therefore to change the laws. This would also violate the rights of most citizens to accurate information, and would deprive these bodies of some of their interest. Nothing prevents Lithuanian juridical entities from advertising in the desired language abroad. KEYWORDS: state language, proper nouns, personal names, place names, spelling. KAZIMIERAS GARŠVA Lietuvių kalbos institutas Petro Vileišio g. 5, LT-10308, Vilnius [email protected] BENDRINĖ KALBA 94 (2021) http://journals.lki.lt/bendrinekalba ISSN 2351-7204