The Polabian language is an extinct West Slavic language that was spoken by the Polabian Slavs (German: Wenden) in present-day northeastern Germany around the Elbe (Labe in Slavic) river, from which derives its name ("po Labe" - on the Elbe). It was spoken approximately until the mid-18th century, when it was superseded by Low German, in the areas of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, central Brandenburg (Mittelmark) and eastern Saxony-Anhalt (Wittenberg), as well as in eastern parts of Lower Saxony (Wendland) and Schleswig-Holstein (Ostholstein and Lauenburg). In the south it bordered on the Sorbian languages area in Lusatia.
By the 18th century Lechitic Polabian was in some respects markedly different from other Slavic languages, most notably in having a strong German influence. It was close to Pomeranian and Kashubian, and attested only in a handful of manuscripts, dictionaries and various writings from the 17th and 18th centuries. As can be seen in the comparisons of the Lord's Prayer below, Polabian contained many German loanwords, such as Wader (Father) and Rîk (Kingdom).
Contents
-
History 1
-
Grammar 2
-
Example of Polabian 3
-
Notes 4
-
References 5
-
See also 6
History
About 2800 Polabian words are known (but of prosaic writings, only a few prayers, one wedding song and a few folktales). Immediately before the language went extinct several people started to collect phrases, compile wordlists and were engaged with folklore of the Polabian Slavs, but only one of them appears to have been a native speaker of Polabian (himself leaving only 13 pages of linguistically relevant material from a 310-page manuscript).[2] The last native speaker of Polabian, a woman, died in 1756, and the last person who spoke limited Polabian died in 1825.
The most important monument of the language is the so-called Vocabularium Venedicum (1679–1719) by Christian Hennig.
The language left many traces to this day in toponymy; for example, Wustrow "Place on the island", Lüchow (Polabian: Ljauchüw), Sagard, Gartow etc. It is also a likely origin of the name Berlin, from the Polabian stem berl-/birl- (“swamp”).
Grammar
Phonology
For Polabian the following segments are reconstructable:[3]
Oral non-reduced monophthongs
|
i
|
ü
|
|
u
|
|
ė
|
|
|
|
|
e
|
ö
|
|
o
|
|
|
|
a
|
å
|
|
|
Diphthongs
|
ai
|
åi
|
oi
|
au
|
åu
|
|
|
Example of Polabian
The
Lord's Prayer in Polabian and related
Lechitic languages, compared to German and English:
[4] Germanic loanwords, which are comparatively rare in the other West Slavic languages, are highlighted in
bold. (Even English, which has extensive Latin influence, has only three Latinate loanwords in its version: "trespass[es]", "temptation", and "deliver".)
Notes
-
^
-
^ Kapović (2008, p. 109)
-
^ Cited after Kazimierz (1993, p. 799)
-
^ Polabian version quoted after TITUS project
-
^ Praying Together
References
-
Słownik etymologiczny języka Drzewian połabskich, Part 1: ed. Tadeusz Lehr-Spławiński & Kazimierz Polański, Wrocław, 1962, from Part 2 on: ed. K. Polański, Wrocław, 1971-
-
Kazimierz Polański & Janusz Sehnert: Polabian-English Dictionary. The Hague: Mouton 1967
See also
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Archaeological cultures
|
|
|
|
|
Peoples
|
|
|
|
|
Major demographic events
|
|
|
|
|
Languages and dialects
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Treaties
|
|
|
|
|
1200–1500
|
|
|
|
|
1500–1700
|
|
|
|
|
1700–present
|
|
|
|
|
This article was sourced from Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply. World Heritage Encyclopedia content is assembled from numerous content providers, Open Access Publishing, and in compliance with The Fair Access to Science and Technology Research Act (FASTR), Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., Public Library of Science, The Encyclopedia of Life, Open Book Publishers (OBP), PubMed, U.S. National Library of Medicine, National Center for Biotechnology Information, U.S. National Library of Medicine, National Institutes of Health (NIH), U.S. Department of Health & Human Services, and USA.gov, which sources content from all federal, state, local, tribal, and territorial government publication portals (.gov, .mil, .edu). Funding for USA.gov and content contributors is made possible from the U.S. Congress, E-Government Act of 2002.
Crowd sourced content that is contributed to World Heritage Encyclopedia is peer reviewed and edited by our editorial staff to ensure quality scholarly research articles.
By using this site, you agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. World Heritage Encyclopedia™ is a registered trademark of the World Public Library Association, a non-profit organization.