Old Polish language

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Old Polish
ięzyk Polſki 
Pronunciation: ['jɛ̃zɨk 'pɔlski]
Spoken in: Central and Eastern Europe
Language extinction: developed into Middle Polish by the 16th century
Language family: Indo-European
 Balto-Slavic
  Slavic
   West Slavic
    Lechitic
     Old Polish
Language codes
ISO 639-1: none
ISO 639-2: –
ISO 639-3: –
Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode.

Old Polish (Old Polish: ięzyk Polſki, modern Polish: język staropolski) is a name used to describe the period in the history of the Polish language between 9th and 16th century.

Contents

[edit] History

The Polish Language started to change after the Baptism of Poland - then came some words from the Latin, such as kościół (a church, lat. castellum - a castle). Around the 14th or 15th centuries the aorist and imperfect tenses became obsolete. In the 15th century the dual stopped being used.

[edit] The alphabet

[edit] Parkoszowic

About 1440 Cracow Academy professor and rector Jakub Parkoszowic tried to codify the Polish alphabet. He wrote first tract on Polish orthographic rules (in Latin) and rhyme Obiecado (in Polish). Parkoszowic wanted to differentiate:

  • long and short vowels by doubling long ones,
  • palatal and non-palatal consonants with letter of different shapes (round and edged).

His idea wasn't popular and did not became obligatory.

[edit] Kochanowski

In 16th century Jan Kochanowski proposed a set of orthographic rules and an alphabet of 48 letters and digraphs: a á à ą b b' c ć cz d dz dź dż é è ę f g h ch i j k l ł m m' n ń o ó p p' q r rz s ś sz t u v w w' x y z ź ż.

[edit] Literature

  • Bulla gnieźnieńska - papal document which includes 410 Polish names bulla papieska wydana 7 lipca 1136 (This document in polish wikisource)
  • Bogurodzica 10th-13th century - the oldest known Polish religious hymn
  • The Book of Henryków (Polish: Księga henrykowska, Latin: Liber fundationis) - includes the earliest known sentence written in the Polish language.
  • The Holy Cross Sermons (Polish: Kazania świętokrzyskie) 14th century
  • Psałterz floriański 14th century - a psalmody; consists of parallel Latin, Polish and German texts
  • Rozmowa Mistrza Polikarpa ze Śmiercią (Latin: De morte prologus, Dialogus inter Mortem et Magistrum Polikarpum) - Polish verse
  • Lament świętokrzyski (also known as: Żale Matki Boskiej pod krzyżem or Posłuchajcie Bracia Miła)

[edit] Example

Ach, Królu wieliki nasz
Coż Ci dzieją Maszyjasz,
Przydaj rozumu k mej rzeczy,
Me sierce bostwem obleczy,
Raczy mię mych grzechów pozbawić
Bych mógł o Twych świętych prawić.

(The introduction to The Legend of Saint Alexander (15th century)

[edit] See also

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