History of the Macedonian language

Last updated

The history of the Macedonian language refers to the developmental periods of current-day Macedonian, an Eastern South Slavic language spoken on the territory of North Macedonia. The Macedonian language developed during the Middle Ages from the Old Church Slavonic, the common language spoken by Slavic people.[ further explanation needed ]

Contents

In 1903 Krste Petkov Misirkov was the first to argue for the codification of a standard literary Macedonian language in his book Za makedonckite raboti (On Macedonian Matters). Standard Macedonian was formally proclaimed an official language on 2 August 1944 by the Anti-Fascist Assembly for the National Liberation of Macedonia (ASNOM). Its codification followed in the year after.

According to Macedonian scholars, the history of the Macedonian language can be divided into nine developmental stages. [1] [2] Blaže Koneski distinguishes two different periods in the development of the Macedonian language, namely, old from the 12th to the 15th century and modern after the 15th century. [3] According to the Macedonian Academy of Sciences and Arts (MANU), the development of the Macedonian language involved two different scripts, namely the Glagolitic and Cyrillic scripts. [4]

Overview of periods

Medieval

For many centuries, Slavic people who settled on the Balkans spoke their own dialects and used other dialects or languages to communicate with other people. [5] The "canonical" Old Church Slavonic period of the development of Macedonian started in the 9th century and lasted until the first half of the 11th century. During this period common to all Slavic languages, Greek religious texts were translated to Old Church Slavonic (based on a dialect spoken in Thessaloniki). [1] [6] [7] The Macedonian recension of Old Church Slavonic also appeared around that period in the First Bulgarian Empire and was referred to as such due to works of the Ohrid Literary School, with its seat in Ohrid, current-day North Macedonia. [8]

The 11th century saw the fall of the Proto-Slavic linguistic unity and the rise of Macedonian dialects, which were still within the borders of the Bulgarian-Macedonian dialect continuum. [9] The Macedonian recension of Church Slavonic developed between the 11th and 13th century and during this period, in addition to translation of canonical texts, religious passages were created including praising texts and sermons (слова/беседи) of saints such as Saint Clement of Ohrid. These texts use linguistic features different from Church Slavonic and since the language was characteristic of the region of current-day North Macedonia, this variant can also be referred to as Old Macedonian Church Slavonic. [10]

This period, whose span also included the Ottoman conquest, witnessed grammatical and linguistic changes that came to characterize Macedonian as a member of the Balkan sprachbund. [10] [1] This marked a dialectal differentiation of the Macedonian language in the 13th century that largely reflected Slavic and Balkan characteristics and saw the formation of dialects that are preserved in modern-day Macedonian. [5] [9] During the five centuries of Ottoman rule in Macedonia, loanwords from Turkish entered the Macedonian language, which by extension had an Arabo-Persian origin. [11] While the written language remained static as a result of Turkish domination, the spoken dialects moved further apart. Only very slight traces of texts written in the Macedonian language survive from the 16th and 17th centuries. [12] The first printed work that included written specimens of the Macedonian language was a multilingual "conversational manual", that was printed during the Ottoman era. [13] It was published in 1793 and contained texts written by a priest in the dialect of the Ohrid region. In the Ottoman Empire, religion was the primary means of social differentiation, with Muslims forming the ruling class and non-Muslims the subordinate classes. [14] In the period between the 14th and 18th century, the Serbian recension of Church Slavonic prevailed on the territory and elements of the vernacular language started entering the language of church literature from the 16th century. [9]

The earliest lexicographic evidence of the Macedonian dialects, described as Bulgarian, [15] [16] can be found in a lexicon from the 16th century written in the Greek alphabet. [17] The concept of the various Macedonian dialects as a part of the Bulgarian language can be seen also from early vernacular texts from Macedonia such as the four-language dictionary of Daniel Moscopolites, the works of Kiril Peichinovich and Yoakim Karchovski, and some vernacular gospels written in the Greek alphabet. These written works influenced by or completely written in the local Slavic vernacular appeared in Macedonia in the 18th and beginning of the 19th century and their authors referred to their language as Bulgarian. [18]

The earliest texts showing specifically Macedonian phonetic features are Old Church Slavonic classical texts written in Glagolitic which date from the 10th to 11th centuries (Codex Zographensis, Codex Assemanianus, Psalterium Sinaiticum). By the 12th century the Church Slavonic Cyrillic become the main alphabet. Texts reflecting vernacular Macedonian language features appear in the second half of the 16th century (translations of the sermons of the Greek writer Damascene Studite). [19]

Modern era

The latter half of the 18th century saw the rise of modern literary Macedonian. Macedonian dialects started being used during this period for ecclesiastical and didactic works although the vernacular used was referred to as "Bulgarian" by writers. [10] Writers of that period, namely Joakim Krchovski and Kiril Pejchinovik opted for writing in their dialects since they wanted to make the language of the first printed books understandable to the people. The southern half of the Macedonian dialectal territory in Aegean Macedonia used the Greek alphabet. [9] The first half of the 19th century saw the rise of nationalism among South Slavs under the Ottoman Empire. [20] Bulgarian and Macedonian Slavs wanted to create their own Church and schools, which would use a common modern Macedono-Bulgarian literary standard. [21] [22] The national elites active at that time used mainly ethnolinguistic principles to differentiate between Slavic-Bulgarian and Greek groups. [23] Initially, every ethnographic subgroup in the Macedonian-Bulgarian linguistic area wrote in its own local dialect and choosing a "base dialect" for the new standard was not an issue. [24]

During the period between 1840 and 1870, there was a struggle to define a dialectal base of the vernacular used, with two different literary centers arising – one in current-day northeastern Bulgaria and one in current-day southwestern North Macedonia. The two centers had opposing views concerning the dialectal basis that should be used as the new common standard language for the Macedonian and Bulgarian Slavic people due to the vast differences between western Macedonian and eastern Bulgarian dialects. [21] During this period, Macedonian intellectuals who proposed the creation of a Bulgarian literary language based on Macedonian dialects emerged. [10]

By the early 1870s, an independent Bulgarian autocepholous church and a separate Bulgarian ethnic community was recognized by the Ottoman authorities. Linguistic proposals for a common language were rejected by the Bulgarian Movement, proclaiming Macedonian a "degenerate dialect" and stating that Macedonian Slavs should learn standard Bulgarian. [21] The same period also saw the rise of the "Macedonists" who argued that the Macedonian language should be used for the Macedonian Slavs, who they saw as a distinct people on the Balkans. [25] Poetry written in the Struga dialect with elements from Russian also appeared. [9] At that time, textbooks were also published and they used either spoken dialectal forms of the language or a mixed Bulgarian-Macedonian language. [25]

Revival era

Krste Petkov Misirkov (pictured) was the first to outline the distinctiveness of the Macedonian language in his book Za makedonckite raboti (On the Macedonian Matters), published in 1903. Krste P. Misirkov.jpg
Krste Petkov Misirkov (pictured) was the first to outline the distinctiveness of the Macedonian language in his book Za makedonckite raboti (On the Macedonian Matters), published in 1903.

In 1875, Gjorgji Pulevski, in Belgrade published a book called Dictionary of Three Languages (Rečnik od tri jezika, Речник од три језика) which was a phrasebook composed in a "question-and-answer" style in Macedonian, Albanian and Turkish, all three spelled in Cyrillic. Pulevski wrote in his native eastern Tarnovo dialect and his language was an attempt at creating a supra-dialectal Macedonian norm, based on his own native local Galičnik dialect. This marked the first pro-Macedonian views expressed in print. [26]

Between 1892 and 1894 the maganize Loza, which was run by IMRO revolutionaries, used a distinct style of writing for their monthly magazine: they dropped the usage of the letter ya (Я) and big yus (Ѫ) and instead used the letter i for je (J), while also taking some inspiration from Serbian grammar. [27] [ non-primary source needed ]

Krste Petkov Misirkov's book Za makedonckite raboti (On Macedonian Matters) published in 1903, is the first attempt to create a separate literary language. [21] With the book, the author proposed a Macedonian grammar and expressed the goal of codifying the language and using it in schools. The author postulated the principle that the Prilep-Bitola dialect be used as a dialectal basis for the formation of the Macedonian standard language; his idea however was not adopted until the 1940s. [10] [9] The book was met with opposition and initial prints at the printing press in Sofia were destroyed. [21] [26] [28]

Prior to the codification of the standard languages (incl. Standard Macedonian), the boundaries between the South Slavic languages had yet to be "conceptualized in modern terms" and the linguistic norms were still in the process of development (including the Bulgarian standard language). [29] [25] Thus, the creation of boundaries within the South Slavic linguistic continuum is "relatively recent", with the distinction between Bulgarian and Serbian still being contested in 1822 among European Slavists. [26]

The period after the First Balkan War and between the two World Wars saw linguists outside the Balkans publishing studies to emphasize that Macedonian is a language distinct from Serbo-Croatian and Bulgarian. [10] In the interwar period, the territory of today's North Macedonia became part of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia and the local vernacular fell under the influence of Serbo-Croatian. [30] In 1934, the Comintern issued a resolution which supported the codification of a separate Macedonian language. [31] During the World wars Bulgaria's short annexations over Macedonia saw two attempts to bring the Macedonian dialects back towards Bulgarian linguistic influence. [32]

Codification

Decision about the proclamation of the Macedonian as an official language on 2 August 1944. Reseniie na asnom za jazik.jpg
Decision about the proclamation of the Macedonian as an official language on 2 August 1944.

On 2 August 1944 at the first Anti-fascist Assembly for the National Liberation of Macedonia (ASNOM) meeting, the Macedonian language was declared an official language. [10] [28] With this, Macedonian became the last of the major Slavic languages to achieve a standard literary form. [6] As such, it served as one of the three official languages of Yugoslavia from 1945 to 1991. [4] The first official Macedonian grammar was developed by Krume Kepeski in 1946. One of the most important contributors in the standardisation of the Macedonian literary language was Blaže Koneski. Most of the codification of Standard Macedonian took place between 1945 and 1950 (Friedman, 1998). Some contemporary linguists argued that during its codification, the Macedonian language was Serbianized, specifically in terms of its orthography. [33] [34] [35] [36] [37] The standardization of Macedonian established a second standard language within a dialect continuum comprising Macedonian, Bulgarian and the Torlakian dialects, [38] itself a legacy of the linguistic developments during the height of the Preslav and Ohrid literary schools. [39] There are some researchers who hold that the standardization of Macedonian was done with the need to differentiate from Serbian and Bulgarian in mind but the dialects chosen for the base of the standard language had never yet been covered by an existing standard, so the codification of Macedonian was not exactly a separation from an existing pluricentric language. [40] Some argue that the codification was done intentionally on the variant most unlike Standard Bulgarian (i.e. the Prilep-Bitola dialect), [41] while others argue that this view does not take into account the fact that a Macedonian koiné language was already in existence. [42] The policy is argued to stem from the works of Misirkov, who suggested that Standard Macedonian should abstract on those dialects "most distinct from the standards of the other Slavonic languages". [43]

"Ilinden" magazine published in the Aegean Macedonian linguistic norm in Bucharest. Ilinden July-August 1954 First Page.jpg
"Ilinden" magazine published in the Aegean Macedonian linguistic norm in Bucharest.

After the Tito–Stalin split in 1948, under the auspices of some Aegean Macedonian intellectuals in Bucharest, anti-Yugoslav alphabet, grammar, and primer closer to Bulgarian, purported to be "purified" of the Serbo-Croatian loanwords of the "language of Skopje" were created. [44] [45] The Communist Party of Greece led by Nikos Zahariadis took the side of the Cominform. After the defeat of communists in the Greek Civil War in 1949, a hunt for Titoist spies began in the midst of Greek political immigrants - civil war refugees, living in socialist countries in Eastern Europe. As a result, the Greek communist publisher "Nea Ellada" issued a Macedonian grammar (1952) and developed a different alphabet. Between 1952 and 1956, the Macedonian Department of "Nea Ellada" published a number of issues in this literary standard, officially called "Macedonian language of the Slavomacedonians from Greek or Aegean Macedonia". This failed attempt of codification included the Ъ, Ь, Ю, Я, Й and was merely a linguistic norm of the Bulgarian language. [46] The grammar was prepared by a team headed by Atanas Peykov. [47] The Aegean Macedonian norm made some Aegean emigrants unable to adopt the Macedonian standard language in Yugoslavia, where many of them settled. [45] The Soviet-Yugoslav rapprochement from the mid-1950s helped to put this codification to an end. [45] The end of Moscow's support for the contestation of standard Macedonian's legitimacy from abroad coincided with the period of excerption for the Macedonian dictionary of Blaže Koneski, which according to Christian Voss, marked the turning poing of the Serbianisation of Macedonian. [35] Thus, the Aegean codification did not gain widespread acceptance. [48] However, the printed editions of the refugees from Aegean Macedonia in Eastern Europe published until 1977 continued to be written in this linguistic norm.

History of the Macedonian alphabet

Decision about the Macedonian Alphabet 1 May 1945. Note it is written on Bulgarian typewriter using I and there are hand-written Dz, J and Dzh, and diacritics added to create Gj and Kj. The rejection of the ', together with the adoption of J, Dzh, Lj and Nj, led to accusations of "Serbianization". Decision about the Macedonian Alphabet 1 May 1945.tiff
Decision about the Macedonian Alphabet 1 May 1945. Note it is written on Bulgarian typewriter using Й and there are hand-written Ѕ, Ј and Џ, and diacritics added to create Ѓ and Ќ. The rejection of the Ъ, together with the adoption of Ј, Џ, Љ and Њ, led to accusations of "Serbianization".

In the 19th and first half of the 20th century, Macedonian writers started writing texts in their own Macedonian dialects using Bulgarian and Serbian Cyrillic scripts. In South Macedonia, the Greek alphabet was also widespread and used by Macedonian writers who finished their education at Greek schools. [55] The period between the two World Wars saw the usage of the alphabets of the surrounding countries including the Albanian one depending on where the writers came from. During that period, the typewriter available to writers was also a determining factor for which alphabet would be used. [56] The official Macedonian alphabet was codified on 5 May 1945 by the Presidium of the Anti-fascist Assembly for the National Liberation of Macedonia (abbreviated as ASNOM in Macedonian) headed by Blaže Koneski. [57]

Political views on the language through history

Recognition

Politicians and scholars from North Macedonia, Bulgaria and Greece have opposing views about the existence and distinctiveness of the Macedonian language. Through history and especially before its codification, Macedonian has been referred to as a variant of Bulgarian, [58] Serbian [42] or a distinct language of its own. [59] [60] During the late 19th/early 20th century, Greeks claimed that Macedonian dialects were "a corrupted version of ancient Macedonian". [61] Historically, after its codification, the use of the language has been a subject of different views in Serbia, Bulgaria and Greece. In the interwar period, Macedonian was treated as a South Serbian dialect in Yugoslavia in accordance with claims made in the 19th century but the government permitted its use in dialectal literature. [10] The 1940s saw opposing views on the Macedonian language in Bulgaria; while its existence was recognized in 1946-47 and allowed as the language of instruction in schools in Pirin Macedonia, the period after 1948 saw its rejection and restricted domestic use. [21]

Until 1999, Macedonian had never been recognized as a minority language in Greece and attempts to have Macedonian-language books introduced in education have failed. [21] For instance, a Macedonian primer Abecedar was published in 1925 in Athens but was never used and eventually, most copies were destroyed. [10] Professor Christina Kramer argues that Greek policies have largely been based on denying connection between the Macedonian codified standard and that of the Slavophone minority in the country and sees it as "clearly directed towards the elimination of Macedonian". [21] The number of speakers of Macedonian in Greece has been difficult to establish since part of the Slavophone Greek population is also considered speakers of Bulgarian by Bulgarian linguists. [58] [62] [63] In recent years, there have been attempts to have the language recognized as a minority language in Greece. [64] In Albania, Macedonian was recognized after 1946 and mother-tongue instructions were offered in some village schools until grade four. [21]

Autonomous language dispute

Bulgarian scholars have and continue to widely consider Macedonian part of the Bulgarian dialect area. In many Bulgarian and international sources before the World War II, the South Slavic dialect continuum covering the area of today's North Macedonia and Northern Greece was referred to as a group of Bulgarian dialects. Some scholars argue that the idea of linguistic separatism emerged in the late 19th century with the advent of Macedonian nationalism and the need for a separate Macedonian standard language subsequently appeared in the early 20th century. [65] [66] Local variants used to name the language were also balgàrtzki, bùgarski or bugàrski; i.e. Bulgarian. [67]

Although Bulgaria was the first country to recognize the independence of the Republic of Macedonia, most of its academics, as well as the general public, regarded the language spoken there as a form of Bulgarian. Dialect experts of the Bulgarian language refer to the Macedonian language as македонска езикова форма i.e. Macedonian linguistic norm of the Bulgarian language. [68] In 1999 the government in Sofia signed a Joint Declaration in the official languages of the two countries, marking the first time it agreed to sign a bilateral agreement written in Macedonian. [21] As of 2019, disputes regarding the language and its origins are ongoing in academic and political circles in the countries. Macedonian is still widely regarded as a dialect by Bulgarian scholars, historians and politicians alike including the Government of Bulgaria and the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, which denies the existence of a separate Macedonian language and declares it a written regional form of the Bulgarian language. [69] [70] Similar sentiments are also expressed by the majority of the Bulgarian population. [25] The current international consensus outside of Bulgaria is that Macedonian is an autonomous language within the Eastern South Slavic dialect continuum. [68] [71] As such, the language is recognized by 138 countries of the United Nations. [4]

Naming dispute

The Greek scientific and local community was opposed to using the denomination Macedonian to refer to the language in light of the Greek-Macedonian naming dispute. The term is often avoided in the Greek context, and vehemently rejected by most Greeks, for whom Macedonian has very different connotations. Instead, the language is often called simply "Slavic" or "Slavomacedonian" (translated to "Macedonian Slavic" in English). Speakers themselves variously refer to their language as makedonski, makedoniski ("Macedonian"), [72] slaviká (Greek : σλαβικά, "Slavic"), dópia or entópia (Greek : εντόπια, "local/indigenous [language]"), [73] balgàrtzki (Bulgarian) or "Macedonian" in some parts of the region of Kastoria, [74] bògartski ("Bulgarian") in some parts of Dolna Prespa [67] along with naši ("our own") and stariski ("old"). [75] With the Prespa agreement signed in 2018 between the Government of North Macedonia and the Government of Greece, the latter country accepted the use of the adjective Macedonian to refer to the language using a footnote to describe it as Slavic. [76]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cyrillic script</span> Writing system used for various Eurasian languages

The Cyrillic script, Slavonic script or simply Slavic script is a writing system used for various languages across Eurasia. It is the designated national script in various Slavic, Turkic, Mongolic, Uralic, Caucasian and Iranic-speaking countries in Southeastern Europe, Eastern Europe, the Caucasus, Central Asia, North Asia, and East Asia, and used by many other minority languages.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Macedonian language</span> South Slavic language spoken in North Macedonia

Macedonian is an Eastern South Slavic language. It is part of the Indo-European language family, and is one of the Slavic languages, which are part of a larger Balto-Slavic branch. Spoken as a first language by around 1.6 million people, it serves as the official language of North Macedonia. Most speakers can be found in the country and its diaspora, with a smaller number of speakers throughout the transnational region of Macedonia. Macedonian is also a recognized minority language in parts of Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Romania, and Serbia and it is spoken by expatriate communities predominantly in Australia, Canada, and the United States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Old Church Slavonic</span> Medieval Slavic literary language

Old Church Slavonic or Old Slavonic is the first Slavic literary language and the oldest extant written Slavonic language attested in literary sources. It belongs to the South Slavic subgroup of the Balto-Slavic branch of the Indo-European language family and remains the liturgical language of many Christian Orthodox churches. Until the reforms of Patriarch Nikon of Moscow between 1652 and 1666, Church Slavonic was the mandatory language of the Russian Orthodox Church.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Church Slavonic</span> Liturgical language of the Eastern Orthodox Church in Slavic countries

Church Slavonic is the conservative Slavic liturgical language used by the Eastern Orthodox Church in Belarus, Bulgaria, North Macedonia, Montenegro, Poland, Ukraine, Russia, Serbia, the Czech Republic and Slovakia, Slovenia and Croatia. The language appears also in the services of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia, the American Carpatho-Russian Orthodox Diocese, and occasionally in the services of the Orthodox Church in America.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">South Slavic languages</span> Language family

The South Slavic languages are one of three branches of the Slavic languages. There are approximately 30 million speakers, mainly in the Balkans. These are separated geographically from speakers of the other two Slavic branches by a belt of German, Hungarian and Romanian speakers.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dze</span> Cyrillic letter

Dze is a letter of the Cyrillic script, used in the Macedonian alphabet to represent the voiced alveolar affricate, similar to the pronunciation of ⟨ds⟩ in "needs" or "kids" in English. It is derived from the letter dzelo or zelo of the Early Cyrillic alphabet, and it was used historically in all Slavic languages that use Cyrillic.

The orthography of the Macedonian language includes an alphabet consisting of 31 letters, which is an adaptation of the Cyrillic script, as well as language-specific conventions of spelling and punctuation.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">History of the Bulgarian language</span>

The history of the Bulgarian language can be divided into three major periods:

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Torlakian dialects</span> Group of South Slavic dialects

Torlakian, or Torlak, is a group of Transitional South Slavic dialects of southeastern Serbia, Kosovo, northeastern North Macedonia, and northwestern Bulgaria. Torlakian, together with Bulgarian and Macedonian, falls into the Balkan Slavic linguistic area, which is part of the broader Balkan sprachbund. According to UNESCO's list of endangered languages, Torlakian is vulnerable distinct language.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Political views on the Macedonian language</span>

The existence and distinctiveness of the Macedonian language is disputed in Bulgaria and the name of the language was disputed by Greece. By signing the Prespa Agreement, Greece accepted the name "Macedonian language" in reference to the official language of North Macedonia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Blaže Koneski</span> Macedonian poet, writer, literary translator, and linguistic scholar

Blaže Koneski was a Macedonian poet, writer, literary translator, and linguistic scholar.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Slavic dialects of Greece</span> Dialects of Macedonian and Bulgarian

The Slavic dialects of Greece are the Eastern South Slavic dialects of Macedonian and Bulgarian spoken by minority groups in the regions of Macedonia and Thrace in northern Greece. Usually, dialects in Thrace are classified as Bulgarian, while the dialects in Macedonia are classified as Macedonian, with the exception of some eastern dialects which can also be classified as Bulgarian. Before World War II, most linguists considered all of these dialects to be Bulgarian dialects. However, other linguists opposed this view and considered Macedonian dialects as comprising an independent language distinct from both Bulgarian and Serbo-Croatian.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Gora dialect</span> Variety of South Slavic spoken by the Gorani people

The Gorani or Goranski, also Našinski language, is a regiolectal variety of South Slavic spoken by the Gorani people in the border area between Kosovo, North Macedonia, and Albania. It is part of the Torlakian dialect group, which is transitional between Eastern and Western South Slavic languages.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Geographical distribution of Macedonian speakers</span>

The geographical distribution of speakers of Macedonian refers to the total number of native speakers of Macedonian, an East South Slavic language that serves as the official language of North Macedonia. Estimates of the number of native and second language speakers of Macedonian varies; the number of native speakers in the country ranges from 1,344,815 according to the 2002 census in North Macedonia to 1,476,500 per linguistic database Ethnologue in 2016. Estimates of the total number of speakers in the world include 3.5 million people. Macedonian is studied and spoken as a second language by all ethnic minorities in the country.

Slavic microlanguages are literary linguistic varieties that exist alongside the better-known Slavic languages of historically prominent nations. The term "literary microlanguages" was coined by Aleksandr Dulichenko in late 1970s; it subsequently became a standard term in Slavistics.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ser-Drama-Lagadin-Nevrokop dialect</span> East South Slavic dialect

The Ser-Drama-Lagadin-Nevrokop dialect is a dialect currently treated both in the contexts of the southeastern group of Bulgarian dialects and the southeastern subgroup of dialects of the Macedonian. Prior to the codification of standard Macedonian in 1945, the dialects of Macedonia were classified as Bulgarian. The dialect is dynamic and is well known for the shortening of the words, and also characterised by the excessive use of for the Proto-Slavic yat even in cases where standard Bulgarian has, a feature which is typical for a number of dialects spoken in southern and southwestern Bulgaria . The Ser-Drama-Lagadin-Nevrokop dialect is closely related to the neighbouring dialects. It is closer to all Eastern Bulgarian dialects than to all Western. Macedonian shares much less features with the dialect than it does with the Maleševo-Pirin dialect of Macedonian and Bulgarian. Some Bulgarian dialects are more similar to Macedonian than the Ser-Nevrokop dialect, the Samokov dialect shares more features with Macedonian than both the Ser-Nevrokop and the Pirin-Malasevo dialects do, even though it is not considered a Macedonian dialect, most of the western Bulgarian dialects and the Smolyan dialect share more similarities with Macedonian than the Ser dialect does. The Samokov dialect, most remarkably, shares with Macedonian and the Maleševo-Pirin dialect—the "to be" verb for future tense—"ke", which in contrast is "shte" in the Ser-Nevrokop dialect and in the Bulgarian language. The Yat border passes through the Maleševo-Pirin dialect and divides it on such a way that in the northern area of the dialect the yat is pronounced "e" and in the south—"ya". In the Ser-Nevrokop dialect the yat is pronounced in most places "ya", therefore the city of Serres, after which the dialect is named, is called "Syar" by the locals, as opposed to "Ser" in Macedonian. The first person singular is as in Bulgarian, ending with "a" or "am" as opposed to the constant "am" in Macedonian and the Bulgarian Smolyan dialect. The words for man -"m'zh" and for a dream "s'n" are as in Bulgarian, unlike the Macedonian "mazh" and "son". The words for night and tear—"nosht" and "s'lza" are as the Bulgarian, unlike the Macedonian "nok" and "solza".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Parteniy Zografski</span> Bulgarian bishop (1818–1876)

Parteniy Zografski or Parteniy Nishavski was a 19th-century Bulgarian cleric, philologist, and folklorist from Galičnik in today's North Macedonia, one of the early figures of the Bulgarian National Revival. In his works he referred to his language as Bulgarian and demonstrated a Bulgarian spirit, though besides contributing to the development of the Bulgarian language, in North Macedonia he is also thought to have contributed to the codification of present-day Macedonian.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Macedonian studies</span> Study of the Macedonian language

Macedonian studies is an academic discipline within Slavic studies that focuses on the comprehensive study of the Macedonian language, literature, history, and culture. As part of Slavic studies, it falls within the subgroup of South Slavic languages and cultures. Apart from North Macedonia, Macedonian Studies is also taught at universities worldwide, including in Albania, Canada, Poland, the United States, and post-Yugoslav countries. A linguist who studies Macedonian as part of the field is called a Macedonist.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bible translations into Macedonian</span>

The history of Bible translations into Macedonian is connected in its early years with the history of Bible translations into Bulgarian. After the codification of Macedonian in 1945, in 1952 a liturgical edition of the four Gospels was printed as the first official translation into standard Macedonian.

The Eastern South Slavic dialects form the eastern subgroup of the South Slavic languages. They are spoken mostly in Bulgaria and North Macedonia, and adjacent areas in the neighbouring countries. They form the so-called Balkan Slavic linguistic area, which encompasses the southeastern part of the dialect continuum of South Slavic.

References

  1. 1 2 3 Spasov, Ljudmil (2007). "Периодизација на историјата на македонскиот писмен јазик и неговата стандардизација во дваесеттиот век" [Periodization of the history of the Macedonian literary language and its standardization in the twentieth century]. Filološki Studii (in Macedonian). 5 (1). Skopje: St. Cyril and Methodius University: 229–235. ISSN   1857-6060.
  2. ↑ Koneski, Blazhe (1967). Историја на македонскиот јазик[History of the Macedonian Language] (in Macedonian). Skopje: Kultura.
  3. ↑ Friedman 2001 , p. 435
  4. 1 2 3 "Повелба за македонскиот јазик" [Charter for the Macedonian language](PDF) (in Macedonian). Skopje: Macedonian Academy of Sciences and Arts. 3 December 2019. Archived from the original (PDF) on 3 August 2022. Retrieved 18 March 2020.
  5. 1 2 Usikova 2005 , p. 103
  6. 1 2 Browne, Wayles; Vsevolodovich Ivanov, Vyacheslav. "Slavic languages". Encyclopædia Britannica . Retrieved 18 March 2020.
  7. ↑ "Old Church Slavonic language". Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved 18 March 2020.
  8. ↑ Horace Gray Lunt, Old Church Slavonic Grammar, Walter de Gruyter, 2001. ISBN   3110162849, p. 4.
  9. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Usikova 2005 , p. 106
  10. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Friedman 2001 , p. 436
  11. ↑ Friedman 2001 , p. 438
  12. 1 2 Lunt, H. (1953) "A Survey of Macedonian Literature" in Harvard Slavic Studies, Vol. 1, pp. 363-396
  13. 1 2 Lunt, H. (1952) Grammar of the Macedonian Literary Language (Skopje)
  14. 1 2 Lunt, H. (1986) "On Macedonian Nationality" in Slavic Review , Vol. 45, pp. 729-734
  15. ↑ "Bulgarians" were they called by the Greeks of Macedonia and "Bulgarian" was their dialect termed, as is shown by the 16th century "Macedonian Dictionary", a glossary of 301 Slavic words and phrases that were current in the region of Kastoria. For more see: Nikolaos P. Andriōtēs, The Federative Republic of Skopje and its language, Volume 77 of Macedonian Bibliotheca, Edition 2, Society for Macedonian Studies, 1991, p. 19.
  16. ↑ The dictionary presented in the monument includes words and expressions apparently collected for the purpose of direct communication. It is a manual drawn up by a Greek who has visited settlements where he had to communicate with the local population... The dictionary homepage states: ἀρхὴἐ ν βοσλγαρίοις ριμά τον εἰςκῑ νῆ γλόταἐ pointed out by Al.Nichev, kῑλῆ ὴγιῶηηα' (Nichev 1085, p. 8), i.e.,'koine language', common language in the sense of "national language". This heading of the dictionary Al. Nitchev translates as 'The beginning of words by the Bulgarians, which (words) refer to the vernacular'... The designation of the dictionary as "Bulgarian words" is written not in the original dialect but is in Greek language and should not have been transmitted as a title in Bulgarian. However, the designation "Bulgarian words" translates well the original Greek designation "Βουλγάρος ρήματα", because of which I accept and use this title, with the proviso that it is translated from Greek. For more see: Лилия Илиева, Българският език в предисторията на компаративната лингвистика и в езиковия свят на ранния европейски модернизъм, Университетско издателство „Неофит Рилски“, Благоевград; ISBN   978-954-680-768-7, 2011, стр. 53-55. Lilia Ilieva, Bulgarian in the Prehistory of Comparative Linguistics and in the Linguistic World of Early European Modernism, University Publishing House "Neofit Rilski", Blagoevgrad; ISBN   978-954-680-768-7, 2011, pp. 53-55.(in Bulgarian).
  17. ↑ 'Un Lexique Macedonien Du XVIe Siecle', Giannelli, Ciro. Avec la collaboration de Andre Vaillant, 1958
  18. ↑ F. A. K. Yasamee "NATIONALITY IN THE BALKANS: THE CASE OF THE MACEDONIANS" in Balkans: A Mirror of the New World Order, Istanbul: EREN, 1995; pp. 121–132.
  19. 1 2 Price, G. (2000) Encyclopedia of the Languages of Europe. (Oxford : Blackwell) ISBN   0-631-22039-9
  20. ↑ Detrez, Raymond; Segaert, Barbara; Lang, Peter (2008). Europe and the Historical Legacies in the Balkans. Peter Lang. pp. 36–38. ISBN   978-90-5201-374-9 . Retrieved 27 March 2020.
  21. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Kramer 1999 , p. ?
  22. ↑ Bechev, Dimitar (13 April 2009). Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Macedonia Historical Dictionaries of Europe. Scarecrow Press. p. 134. ISBN   978-0-8108-6295-1 . Retrieved 27 March 2020.
  23. ↑ Theodora Dragostinova, From Rum Millet to Greek and Bulgarian Nations: Religious and National Debates in the Borderlands of the Ottoman Empire, 1870–1913. Ohio State University, 2011, Columbus, OH.
  24. ↑ "Венедиктов Г. К. Болгарский литературный язык эпохи Возрождения. Проблемы нормализации и выбора диалектной основы. Отв. ред. Л. Н. Смирнов. М.: "Наука"" (PDF). 1990. pp. 163–170. (Rus.). Retrieved 27 March 2020.
  25. 1 2 3 4 Nihtinen 1999 , p. ?
  26. 1 2 3 Victor A. Friedman (1975). "Macedonian language and nationalism during the 19th and early 20th centuries" (PDF). Balcanistica. 2: 83–98. Archived from the original (PDF) on 15 September 2006. Retrieved 26 March 2020.
  27. ↑ Loza Magazines between 1892 and 1894
  28. 1 2 Pejoska-Bouchereau 2008 , p. 146
  29. ↑ Joseph, Brian D. et al. When Languages Collide: Perspectives on Language Conflict, Competition and Coexistence; Ohio State University Press (2002), p.261
  30. ↑ Hupchick, Dennis P. (15 March 1995). Conflict and Chaos in Eastern Europe. Palgrave Macmillan. p. 143. ISBN   0-312-12116-4 . Retrieved 27 March 2020.
  31. ↑ Duncan Perry, "The Republic of Macedonia: finding its way" in Karen Dawisha and Bruce Parrot (eds.), Politics, power and the struggle for Democracy in South-Eastern Europe, Cambridge University Press, 1997, pp. 228-229.
  32. ↑ Thammy Evans, Philip Briggs, North Macedonia; Bradt Travel Guides, 2019; ISBN   1784770841, p. 47.
  33. ↑ Friedman 1998 , p. ?
  34. ↑ Marinov, Tchavdar (25 May 2010). "Historiographical Revisionism and Re-Articulation of Memory in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia" (PDF). Sociétés politiques comparées. 25: 7. S2CID   174770777. Archived from the original (PDF) on 15 February 2020.
  35. 1 2 Voss C., The Macedonian Standard Language: Tito—Yugoslav Experiment or Symbol of "Great Macedonian" Ethnic Inclusion? in C. Mar-Molinero, P. Stevenson as ed. Language Ideologies, Policies and Practices: Language and the Future of Europe, Springer, 2016, ISBN   0230523889, p. 126.
  36. ↑ De Gruyter as contributor. The Slavic Languages. Volume 32 of Handbooks of Linguistics and Communication Science (HSK), Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG, 2014, p. 1472. ISBN   3110215470.
  37. ↑ Lerner W. Goetingen, Formation of the standard language – Macedonian in the Slavic languages, Volume 32, Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co. KG, 2014, ISBN   3110393689, chapter 109.
  38. ↑ The Languages and Linguistics of Europe: A Comprehensive Guide. 27 July 2011. Retrieved 7 August 2014.
  39. ↑ Florin Curta. Southeastern Europe in the Middle Ages; 500–1250.; Cambridge. Pg 216
  40. ↑ Sussex, Roland; Cubberley, Paul (2006). The Slavic Languages . Cambridge University Press. p.  70. ISBN   1139457284.
  41. ↑ Trudgill, Peter (2002). Sociolinguistic variation and change. Edinburgh University Press. p. 120. ISBN   0-7486-1515-6 . Retrieved 7 August 2014.
  42. 1 2 Comrie & Corbett 2002 , p. 251
  43. ↑ Dedaić, Mirjana N. et al. South Slavic Discourse Particles; John Benjamins Publishing (2010) p. 13
  44. ↑ Keith Brown, Macedonia's Child-grandfathers: The Transnational Politics of Memory, Exile, and Return, 1948-1998; Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies, University of Washington, 2003, p. 32.
  45. 1 2 3 Roumen Daskalov, Tchavdar Marinov, Entangled Histories of the Balkans - Volume One: National Ideologies and Language Policies; BRILL, 2013; ISBN   900425076X, pp. 479–480.
  46. ↑ Euangelos Kōphos, Speros Basil Vryonis, Nationalism and communism in Macedonia: civil conflict, politics of mutation, national identity; Center for the Study of Hellenism, A. D. Caratzas, 1993, ISBN   0892415401, p. 203.
  47. ↑ The Macedonian Times, issues 51–62; MI-AN, 1999, p. 141.
  48. ↑ Sebastian Kempgen, Peter Kosta, Tilman Berger, Karl Gutschmidt as ed., The Slavic Languages. Volume 32 of Handbooks of Linguistics and Communication Science (HSK) Walter de Gruyter, 2014; ISBN   3110215470, p. 1476.
  49. ↑ Проф. д-р Антони Стоилов и колектив, Крайно време е за сътрудничество. За езиковия спор, македонската литературна норма, Мисирков и възможностите за сътрудничество между езиковедите от Република Македония и Република България във В-к Култура – Брой 28 (2908), 21 юли 2017 г.
  50. ↑ Стефан Дечев: Българските и македонски политици задминаха националните историци; списание Marginalia, 24.06.2019 г.
  51. ↑ Кочев, Иван, Александров Иван, Документи за съчиняването на „македонския книжовен език", сп. Македонски преглед, Македонски научен институт, стр. 5-22; кн. 4. 1991 г.
  52. ↑ When Blaze Koneski, the founder of the Macedonian standard language, as a young boy, returned to his Macedonian native village from the Serbian town where he went to school, he was ridiculed for his Serbianized language. Cornelis H. van Schooneveld, Linguarum: Series maior, Issue 20, Mouton., 1966, p. 295.
  53. ↑ ...However this was not at all the case, as Koneski himself testifies. The use of the schwa is one of the most important points of dispute not only between Bulgarians and Macedonians, but also between Macedonians themselves – there are circles in Macedonia who in the beginning of the 1990s denounced its exclusion from the standard language as a hostile act of violent serbianization. For more see: Alexandra Ioannidou (Athens, Jena) Koneski, his successors and the peculiar narrative of a "late standardization" in the Balkans. in Romanica et Balcanica: Wolfgang Dahmen zum 65. Geburtstag, Volume 7 of Jenaer Beiträge zur Romanistik with Thede Kahl, Johannes Kramer and Elton Prifti as ed., Akademische Verlagsgemeinschaft München AVM, 2015, ISBN   3954770369, pp. 367-375.
  54. ↑ Kronsteiner, Otto, Zerfall Jugoslawiens und die Zukunft der makedonischen Literatursprache: Der späte Fall von Glottotomie? in: Die slawischen Sprachen (1992) 29, 142-171.
  55. ↑ Usikova 2005, p. 105.
  56. ↑ E. Kramer, Christina (January 2015). "Macedonian orthographic controversies". Written Language & Literacy. 18 (2): 287–308. doi:10.1075/wll.18.2.07kra.
  57. ↑ "Со решение на АСНОМ: 72 години од усвојувањето на македонската азбука". Javno (in Macedonian). 5 May 2017. Retrieved 15 March 2020.
  58. 1 2 Institute of Bulgarian Language (1978). Единството на българския език в миналото и днес[The unity of the Bulgarian language in the past and today] (in Bulgarian). Sofia: Bulgarian Academy of Sciences. p. 4. OCLC   6430481.
  59. ↑ Max K. Adler. Marxist Linguistic Theory and Communist Practice: A Sociolinguistic Study; Buske Verlag (1980), p.215
  60. ↑ Seriot 1997 , pp. 270–271
  61. ↑ Alexis Heraclides (2021). The Macedonian Question and the Macedonians. Taylor & Francis. p. 152.
  62. ↑ Shklifov, Blagoy (1995). Проблеми на българската диалектна и историческа фонетика с оглед на македонските говори (in Bulgarian). Sofia: Kacharmazov. p. 14.
  63. ↑ Shklifov, Blagoy (1977). Речник на костурския говор, Българска диалектология (in Bulgarian). Sofia: Book VIII. pp. 201–205.
  64. ↑ "Report of the independent expert on minority issues, Gay McDougall Mission to Greece 8–16 September 2008" (PDF). Greek Helsinki Monitor . United Nations Human Rights Council. 18 February 2009. Archived from the original (PDF) on 17 June 2011.
  65. ↑ Fishman, Joshua A.; de Gruyter, Walter (1993). The Earliest Stage of Language Planning: The "First Congress" Phenomenon. Walter de Gruyter. pp. 161–162. ISBN   3-11-013530-2 . Retrieved 7 August 2014.
  66. ↑ Danforth, Loring M. (1995). The Macedonian conflict: ethnic nationalism in a transnational world. Princeton University Press. p. 67. ISBN   0-691-04356-6 . Retrieved 7 August 2014.
  67. 1 2 Shklifov, Blagoy; Shklifova, Ekaterina (2003). Български деалектни текстове от Егейска Македония[Bulgarian dialect texts from Aegean Macedonia] (in Bulgarian). Sofia. pp. 28–36.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  68. 1 2 Reimann, Daniel (2014). Kontrastive Linguistik und Fremdsprachendidaktik Iberoromanisch (in German). Gunter Narr Verlag. ISBN   978-3823368250.
  69. ↑ "Bulgarian Academy of Sciences is firm that "Macedonian language" is Bulgarian dialect". Bulgarian National Radio. 12 November 2019. Retrieved 20 March 2020.
  70. ↑ Jakov Marusic, Sinisa (10 October 2019). "Bulgaria Sets Tough Terms for North Macedonia's EU Progress". Balkan Insights. Retrieved 18 March 2020.
  71. ↑ Trudgill 1992 , p. ?
  72. ↑ Lois Whitman (1994): Denying ethnic identity: The Macedonians of Greece Helsinki Human Rights Watch. p.39 at Google Books
  73. ↑ "Greek Helsinki Monitor – Report about Compliance with the Principles of the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities". Archived from the original on 23 May 2003. Retrieved 12 January 2009.
  74. ↑ Danforth, Loring M. The Macedonian Conflict: Ethnic Nationalism in a Transnational World. p. 62. Retrieved 7 August 2014.
  75. ↑ Whitman, Lois (1994). Denying ethnic identity: The Macedonians of Greece. Helsinki Human Rights Watch. p. 37. ISBN   1564321320.
  76. ↑ "Republic of North Macedonia with Macedonian language and identity, says Greek media". Meta.mk. Meta. 12 June 2018. Retrieved 12 June 2018.
  77. ↑ Friedman, V. (1998) "The implementation of standard Macedonian: problems and results" in International Journal of the Sociology of Language, Vol. 131, pp. 31-57
  78. ↑ Topolinjska, Z. (1998) "In place of a foreword: facts about the Republic of Macedonia and the Macedonian language" in International Journal of the Sociology of Language, Vol. 131, pp. 1-11
  79. ↑ Friedman, V. (1985) "The sociolinguistics of literary Macedonian" in International Journal of the Sociology of Language, Vol. 52, pp. 31-57
  80. ↑ Tomić, O. (1991) "Macedonian as an Ausbau language" in Pluricentric Languages: Differing Norms in Different Nations, pp. 437-454
  81. ↑ Mahon, M. (1998) "The Macedonian question in Bulgaria" in Nations and Nationalism , Vol. 4, pp. 389-407

Bibliography

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.