The structure of the word, the use of grammatical categories, the structure of the sentence, the system of regular sound correspondences, morphonological alternations. This closeness is explained both by the unity of the origin of the Slavic languages, and by their long and intensive contacts at the level of literary languages ​​and dialects. There are, however, differences of a material, functional and typological nature, due to the long-term independent development of Slavic tribes and nationalities in different ethnic, geographical and historical and cultural conditions, their contacts with related and unrelated ethnic groups.

Slavic languages, according to the degree of their proximity to each other, are usually divided into 3 groups: East Slavic (Russian, Ukrainian and Belarusian), South Slavic (Bulgarian, Macedonian, Serbo-Croatian and Slovenian languages) and West Slavic (Czech, Slovak, Polish with a Kashubian dialect that has retained a certain genetic independence, Upper Sorbian and Lower Sorbian languages). Small local groups of Slavs with their own literary languages ​​are also known. Thus, the Croats in Austria (Burgenland) have their own literary language based on the Chakavian dialect. Not all Slavic languages ​​have come down to us. At the end of the 17th - beginning of the 18th centuries. the Polabian language disappeared. The distribution of Slavic languages ​​within each group has its own characteristics (see East Slavic languages, West Slavic languages, South Slavic languages). Each Slavic language includes a literary language with all its stylistic, genre and other varieties and its own territorial dialects. The ratios of all these elements in the Slavic languages ​​are different. The Czech literary language has a more complex stylistic structure than Slovak, but the latter better preserves the peculiarities of dialects. Sometimes dialects of one Slavic language differ more strongly than independent Slavic languages. For example, the morphology of the Shtokavian and Chakavian dialects of the Serbo-Croatian language differ much deeper than the morphology of the Russian and Belarusian languages. The proportion of identical elements is often different. For example, the category of diminutiveness in Czech is expressed in more varied and differentiated forms than in Russian.

Of the Indo-European languages, the Slavic languages ​​are the closest to the Baltic languages. This closeness served as the basis for the theory of the "Balto-Slavic proto-language", according to which the Balto-Slavic proto-language, which later split into Pro-Baltic and Proto-Slavic, first emerged from the Indo-European proto-language. However, most modern scientists explain their special closeness by the long-term contact of the ancient Balts and Slavs. It is not established in what territory the separation of the linguistic continuum from Indo-European took place. It can be assumed that it happened south of those territories that, according to various theories, belong to the territory of the Slavic ancestral homeland. There are many such theories, but all of them do not localize the ancestral home where the Indo-European proto-language could be located. On the basis of one of the Indo-European dialects (Proto-Slavic), the Proto-Slavic language was later formed, which is the ancestor of all modern Slavic languages. The history of the Proto-Slavic language was longer than the history of individual Slavic languages. For a long time, it developed as a single dialect with an identical structure. Later, dialect variants appear. The process of transition of the Proto-Slavic language and its dialects into independent Slavic languages ​​was long and complex. It took place most actively in the second half of the first millennium AD, during the formation of the early Slavic feudal states on the territory of Southeast and Eastern Europe. During this period, the territory of Slavic settlements increased significantly. Areas of different geographical zones with different natural and climatic conditions were developed, the Slavs entered into relationships with peoples and tribes at different stages of cultural development. All this is reflected in the history of the Slavic languages.

The Proto-Slavic language was preceded by the period of the Proto-Slavic language, the elements of which can be restored using the ancient Indo-European languages. The Proto-Slavic language in its main part is restored with the help of these Slavic languages ​​from different periods of their history. The history of the Proto-Slavic language is divided into three periods: the oldest - before the establishment of a close Balto-Slavic language contact, the period of the Balto-Slavic community and the period of dialectical fragmentation and the beginning of the formation of independent Slavic languages.

The individuality and originality of the Proto-Slavic language began to take shape in the early period. It was then that a new system of vowel sonants took shape, consonantism became much simpler, the reduction stage became widespread in the Ablaut, and the root ceased to obey ancient restrictions. According to the fate of the middle palates, the Proto-Slavic language is included in the satəm group ("sьrdьce", "pisati", "prositi", compare Latin "cor" - "cordis", "pictus", "precor"; "zьrno", "znati", "Zima", compare the Latin "granum", "cognosco", "hiems"). However, this feature was realized inconsistently: cf. Proto-Slavic “* kamy”, “* kosa”, “* gąsь”, “gordъ”, “bergъ” and others. Proto-Slavic morphology presents significant deviations from the Indo-European type. This primarily applies to the verb, to a lesser extent - to the name. Most of the suffixes were formed already on the Proto-Slavic soil. The Proto-Slavic vocabulary is distinguished by its great originality; already the early period of its development, the Proto-Slavic language experienced a number of significant transformations in the field of lexical composition. Having preserved in most cases the old Indo-European lexical fund, it at the same time lost many old Indo-European lexemes (for example, some terms from the field of social relations, nature, etc.). Many words have been lost in connection with various kinds of prohibitions. For example, the name of the oak was forbidden - the Indo-European "* perkuos", whence the Latin "quercus". The old Indo-European root came down to us only in the name of the pagan god Perun. In the Slavic languages, the taboo "* dąbъ" was established, whence the Russian "oak", the Polish "dąb", the Bulgarian "dab", etc. The Indo-European name for the bear has been lost. It remains only in the new scientific term "Arctic" (cf. Greek "αρκτος"). The Indo-European word in the Proto-Slavic language was replaced by the taboo word composition "* medvědь" - "honey eater". During the period of the Balto-Slavic community, the Slavs borrowed many words from the Balts. During this period, vowel sonants were lost in the Proto-Slavic language, in their place were diphthongic combinations in the position before consonants and the sequence “vowel sonant before vowels” (“smürti”, but “umirati”), intonation (acute and circumflex) became relevant features. The most important processes of the Proto-Slavic period were the loss of closed syllables and the softening of consonants before iota. In connection with the first process, all the ancient diphthongic combinations in monophthongs, syllabic smooth, nasal vowels arose, the syllable section moved, which, in turn, caused a simplification of consonant groups, the phenomenon of intersyllabic dissimilation. These ancient processes have left an imprint on all modern Slavic languages, which is reflected in many alternations: cf. Russian "reap - reap", "take - take", "name - yen", Czech "žíti - žnu", "vzíti - vezmu", Serbo-Croatian "zheti - we press", "uzeti - uzm", "name - names" ... The softening of consonants before iota is reflected in the form of alternations s / š, z / ž and others. All these processes had a strong impact on the grammatical structure, on the system of inflections. In connection with the softening of the consonants before the iota, the process of the so-called first palatalization of the posterior palatine was experienced: [k]> [č], [g]> [ž], [x]> [š]. On this basis, even in the Proto-Slavic language, the alternations k / č, g / ž, x / š were formed, which had a great influence on the nominal and verb word formation. later, the so-called second and third palatalizations of the posterior palatine began to operate, as a result of which alternations of k / c, g / z, x / s arose. The name changed in cases and numbers. In addition to the singular and plural, there was a dual, which was later lost in almost all Slavic languages. There were nominal stems that served as definitions. In the late Proto-Slavic period, pronominal adjectives arose. The verb had infinitive and present stems. From the first, the infinitive, supin, aorist, imperfect, participles in "-l", participles in the past tense in "-vъ" and participles in the passive voice in "-n" were formed. From the foundations of the present tense, the present tense, the imperative mood, the participle of the active voice of the present tense were formed. Later, in some Slavic languages, an imperfect began to form from this basis.

Even in the depths of the Proto-Slavic language, dialectical formations began to form. The most compact was that group of Proto-Slavic dialects, on the basis of which the East Slavic languages ​​later arose. There were three subgroups in the West Slavic group: Lehitskaya, Serbolicheskaya and Czech-Slovak. The most dialectically differentiated was the South Slavic group.

The Proto-Slavic language functioned in the pre-state period of the history of the Slavs, when tribal social relations prevailed. Significant changes took place during the period of early feudalism. This was reflected in the further differentiation of the Slavic languages. By the XII-XIII centuries. there was a loss of the super-short (reduced) vowels [b] and [b] characteristic of the Proto-Slavic language. In some cases, they disappeared, in others they passed into the vowels of a complete education. As a result, there have been significant changes in the phonetic and morphological structure of the Slavic languages. Slavic languages ​​have experienced many common processes in the field of grammar and lexical composition.

For the first time, the Slavic languages ​​received literary processing in the 60s. IX century The brothers Cyril (Constantine the Philosopher) and Methodius were the creators of Slavic writing. They translated liturgical texts from Greek into Slavic for the needs of Great Moravia. At its core, the new literary language had a South Macedonian (Solunian) dialect, but in Great Moravia it acquired many local linguistic features. It was later developed further in Bulgaria. In this language (usually called the Old Slavonic language), the richest original and translated literature was created in Moravia, Pannonia, Bulgaria, Russia, and Serbia. There were two Slavic alphabets: Glagolitic and Cyrillic. From the IX century. no Slavic texts have survived. The most ancient ones belong to the 10th century: the Dobrudzhan inscription 943, the inscription of Tsar Samuel 993, etc. From the 11th century. many Slavic monuments have already survived. Slavic literary languages ​​of the feudal era, as a rule, did not have strict norms. Some important functions were performed by foreign languages ​​(in Russia - the Old Slavonic language, in the Czech Republic and Poland - Latin). The unification of literary languages, the development of written and pronunciation norms, the expansion of the sphere of use of the native language - all this characterizes the long period of formation of national Slavic languages. The Russian literary language has gone through a centuries-old and complex evolution. It has absorbed folk elements and elements of the Old Church Slavonic, influenced by many European languages. It developed without interruption for a long time. The process of formation and history of a number of other literary Slavic languages ​​proceeded differently. In the Czech Republic in the 18th century. literary language, which reached in the XIV-XVI centuries. great perfection, almost disappeared. The German language predominated in the cities. During the period of national revival, the Czech “awakeners” artificially revived the language of the 16th century, which at that time was already far from the vernacular. The whole history of the Czech literary language of the XIX-XX centuries. reflects the interaction of the old bookish language and the spoken language. The development of the Slovak literary language proceeded differently. Not burdened with old book traditions, it is close to the folk language. In Serbia until the 19th century. the Church Slavonic language of the Russian version prevailed. In the XVIII century. the process of rapprochement of this language with the folk began. As a result of the reform carried out by V. Karadzic in the middle of the 19th century, a new literary language was created. This new language began to serve not only the Serbs, but also the Croats, in connection with which it began to be called Serbo-Croatian or Croatian-Serbian. The Macedonian literary language was finally formed in the middle of the 20th century. Slavic literary languages ​​have developed and are developing in close communication with each other. The Slavic languages ​​are studied by Slavic studies.

Slavic languages- a group of related languages ​​of the Indo-European family. Distributed in Europe and Asia. The total number of speakers is over 400 million. They differ in a large degree of closeness to each other, which is found in the structure of the word, the use of grammatical categories, the structure of the sentence, semantics, the system of regular sound correspondences, and morphonological alternations. This closeness is explained by the unity of the origin of the Slavic languages ​​and their long and intense contacts with each other at the level of literary languages ​​and dialects.

The long-term independent development of the Slavic peoples in different ethnic, geographical and historical-cultural conditions, their contacts with various ethnic groups led to the emergence of differences of a material, functional and typological nature.

According to the degree of their proximity to each other, Slavic languages ​​are usually divided into 3 groups:

• East Slavic,
• South Slavic
• West Slavic.

The distribution of Slavic languages ​​within each group has its own characteristics. Each Slavic language includes in its composition a literary language with all its internal varieties and its own territorial dialects. Dialectal fragmentation and stylistic structure within each Slavic language are not the same.

Branches of Slavic languages:

In addition to these languages, polyvalent languages, that is, speakers (like all modern national literary languages) both in the function of written, artistic, business speech, and in the function of oral, everyday, colloquial and stage speech, among the Slavs there are also "small" literary, almost always brightly colored dialect languages. These languages ​​with limited use usually function along with national literary languages ​​and serve either relatively small ethnic groups, or even separate literary genres. Such languages ​​also exist in Western Europe: in Spain, Italy, France and in German-speaking countries. The Slavs know the Ruthenian language (in Yugoslavia), the Kaikavian and Chakavian languages ​​(in Yugoslavia and Austria), the Kashubian language (in Poland), the Lyash language (in Czechoslovakia), etc.

In a rather vast territory in the basin of the Elbe River, in Slavic Labs, the Polab Slavs lived in the Middle Ages, who spoke the Polab language. This language is a severed branch from the Slavic language "tree" as a result of the forced Germanization of the population that spoke it. He disappeared in the 18th century. Nevertheless, individual records of Polabian words, texts, translations of prayers, etc. have come down to us, from which it is possible to restore not only the language, but also the life of the disappeared Polabyans. And at the International Congress of Slavists in Prague in 1968, the famous West German Slavist R. Olesch read a lecture in the Polabian language, thus creating not only literary written (he read from typescript) and oral forms, but also scientific linguistic terminology. This indicates that almost every Slavic dialect (dialect), in principle, can be the basis of a literary language. However, not only Slavic, but also another family of languages, as shown by numerous examples of early-written languages ​​of our country.

Methods for the classification of Slavic languages

The first printed information about the Slavic languages ​​was usually given in a list, i.e. transfer. This is what the Czech J. Blagoslav did in his grammatical work on the Czech language in 1571 (published only in 1857), in which he notes Czech, then "Slovene" (probably Slovak), to which he also referred the Croatian language, then follows Polish language; he also mentions southern (possibly Church Slavonic), "Mazovian" (in fact, the Polish dialect), "Moscow" (ie Russian). Yu. Krizhanich, comparing in the XVII century. some Slavic languages, spoke about the proximity of some of them in relation to each other, but did not dare to classify them. "List classifications" of Slavic languages, i.e. an attempt to distinguish them by enumeration and thereby distinguish them from other Indo-European languages ​​are also characteristic of the 18th century, although they are occasionally found in the 19th century as well. So, in 1787-1789. by order of Empress Catherine in St. Petersburg, a two-volume book "Comparative Dictionaries of All Languages ​​and Dialects" was published - an attempt to collect information about all the languages ​​of the world known by that time and to give in parallel given lists of words in them. It is important for us that among “all languages ​​and dialects” there were 13 submitted here a list of Slavic languages ​​(“adverbs”): the words there are given “1 - in Slavic, 2 - Slavic-Hungarian, 3 - Illyrian, 4 - Bohemian, 5 - Serbski, 6 - Vendski, 7 - Sorabski, 8 - Polabski, 9 - Kashubski, 10 - Polski, 11 - Little Russian, 12 - Suzdalski "+ 13" in Russian "; "Slavic-Hungarian" is Slovak, "Vendski" is one of the Serbolic languages, "Suzdal" is a social jargon! F. Miklosic in "Morphology of Slavic Languages" (1852) gives languages ​​in this order: a) Old Church Slavonic, b) Novo-Slovenian (Slovenian), c) Bulgarian, d) Serbian (and Croatian), e) Little Russian, or Ukrainian (and Belarusian ), f) Great Russian, g) Czech (and Slovak), h) Polish, i) Upper Sorbian, d) Lower Sorbian; but without Polabian and Kashubian.

Classification by J. Dobrovsky.

Attempts to classify Slavic languages ​​on a scientific basis date back to the beginning of the 19th century. and are associated with the name of the founder of Slavic philology J. Dobrovsky. For the first time, Dobrovsky gave the list of Slavic languages ​​and dialects in 1791-1792. in the book "History of the Czech Language and Literature", published in German. There was no classification here yet. He singled out the "complete" Slavic language and listed its dialects, including Russian, "Polish with Silesian", "Illyrian" with Bulgarian, "Rac-Serbian", Bosnian, "Slavonian" (dialects of the historical region of Slavonia in Croatia), “Dalmatian and Dubrovnik”, Croatian with Kajkavian, with “Wind” (Slovenian), “Czech with Moravian, Silesian and Slovakian”, Lusatian. In the second edition of this book (1818) and especially in his main work on the Old Slavonic language according to its dialects (Institutiones linguae slavicae dialecti veteris, 1822) Dobrovsky for the first time presents a scientific classification of Slavic languages, dividing them into two groups (each with 5 languages ):

• A (eastern): Russian, Church Slavonic (Slavica vetus), "Illyrian", or Serbian, Croatian, Slovenian, or "Vindish" ("in Extreme, Styria and Carinthia");
• B (Western): Slovak, Czech, “Vendian Upper Lusatian” (= Upper Sorbian) and “Vendian Lower Lusatian” (= Lower Sorbian), Polish.

J. Dobrovsky relied on 10 signs of phonetic, derivational and lexical properties, compare:

In the future, signs 3 (l-epenteticum), 4 (combinations,) and 6 (combinations,) will be regularly, up to the present day, used by researchers when comparing three subgroups of Slavic languages. Other signs will remain unclaimed, for example, the prefix ros-, which is also characteristic of the East Slavic languages, in particular, for Ukrainian (rozum ‘mind’). In addition, the classification lacks several languages ​​- Ukrainian, Kashubian, Bulgarian.

Views on classification after J. Dobrovsky.

Soon after Dobrovsky, the largest Slavic scholar of the 19th century took up the classification of Slavic languages. P.Y.Shafarik. In the book "History of Slavic Languages ​​and Literatures" (1826) and especially in the famous "Slavic Antiquities" (1837) and "Slavic Ethnography" (1842), he, following Dobrovsky, presented a two-component classification of "Slavic dialects":

• 1) southeastern group: Russian, Bulgarian, "Illyrian" (Serbian, Croatian, Slovenian);
• 2) north-western group: "Lechitsky" (Polish, Kashubian), Czech (Czech, Moravian, Slovak), Polabian (+ Upper and Lower Sorbian).

Of the 10 signs of Dobrovsky, Shafarik used only two phonetic ones - no. 3 and no. 4, the rest were considered insignificant. But he added the following sign: the loss of [d] and [t] before [n] in the southeastern and preservation - in the western type ϖ ν? Τι - vadnouti ‘wither’. It is significant that the creator of the “genealogical tree” hypothesis, A. Schleicher, applied it to the Slavic languages. So, outlining the development of the northeastern branch of Indo-European languages ​​(1865), he proposed the following scheme for the differentiation of Slavic languages:

Here the western group is opposed to the combined southern and eastern. There are no Slovak, Kashubian, Belarusian languages, but Ukrainian is reflected along with Great Russian. Two-component classifications suffered from large generalizations, the omission of certain languages, and, moreover, were based on the minimum number of linguistic distinctive features. Here is a summary table of the most important two-component classifications of the Slavic languages ​​of the 19th century, to see how far the three-component classification that replaced them has gone:

Reading the given table horizontally and vertically, it is not difficult to establish which languages ​​and how are reflected in one or another classification; a dash (sign -) can signal that the author did not know about the existence of this or that language, or considered it an adverb (dialect) of a larger language and so on.

Three-component classification model and its disadvantages.

The two-component classification is being replaced by a three-component classification. Doubts about the two-component classification proposed by J. Dobrovsky were expressed by A. Kh. Vostokov, pointing out that the Russian language, according to a number of its characteristics, occupies an independent position between the southern and western languages. We can say that it is to Vostokov that the idea of ​​the three-component division of the Slavic languages ​​goes back, later supported by M.A.Maksimovich (works in 1836, 1838, 1845), N. Nadezhdin (1836), the Czech F. Palatsky (1836), etc. Maksimovich developed Vostokov's idea, highlighting the western, southern (or trans-Danube) and eastern branches. Palatsky, focusing on the geographical principle, divided the Slavic languages ​​into southwestern (= South Slavic), northwestern (= West Slavic) and East Slavic. This classification model was consolidated throughout most of the 19th century. In her statement, a special role was played by I. I. Sreznevsky (1843).

Based on historical and ethnographic (common historical destinies of individual groups of Slavic peoples, common material and spiritual culture, etc.) and linguistic criteria, he proposed to distribute Slavic "dialects" as follows:

• 1) Eastern dialects: Great Russian, Ukrainian;
• 2) southwestern dialects (= South Slavic): Old Church Slavonic, Bulgarian, Serbian and Croatian, "Horutan" (= Slovenian);
• 3) northwestern dialects (= West Slavic): Polish, Polabian, Lusatian, Czech and Slovak.

I. I. Sreznevsky classification used to date. However, some changes have been made to it, for example, in terms: instead of "adverbs" - languages; in the names of subgroups - East Slavic, South Slavic and West Slavic, respectively; the Belarusian language is included in the East Slavic language, and Kashubian in the West Slavic language.

However, this classification has been criticized. The fact is that the material of each Slavic language or dialect is quite diverse and does not always fit into the framework of classifications, which, as a rule, are based on taking into account only a few - usually phonetic - signs by which languages ​​are included in one or another subgroup. Outside the classification principles are numerous linguistic features that bring together languages ​​traditionally attributed to different subgroups. Such signs are often simply not taken into account.

The isogloss method and its role in the classification of dialects and languages.

Only in the twentieth century. the procedure for identifying linguistic parallels using the isogloss method began to take shape. This method is formulated as establishing on a linguistic (dialectological) map the lines of distribution of a particular linguistic phenomenon in order to determine the degree of proximity between dialects and dialects within individual languages ​​and between languages ​​- within individual linguistic subgroups or groups. The isogloss method, applied to linguistic material at all levels (i.e., to phonetic, grammatical, lexical), makes it possible to more clearly define the place and relation to each other of related languages, which may lead to a revision of some provisions of the traditional classification. O.N. Trubachev (1974) justly wrote about this in his time, pointing out the inadequacy of the three-component classification, which weakly takes into account the original dialectal fractionality of the Proto-Slavic language:

• “1) West Slavic, East Slavic and South Slavic language groups were consolidated for the second time from components of very different linguistic origins,
• 2) the original Slavia was not a linguistic monolith, but its opposite, i.e.<…>complex set of isogloss "

According to some experts, within the East Slavic subgroup, Russian and Ukrainian are more distant from each other, while Belarusian occupies, as it were, an intermediate position between them (there is also, however, an opinion that the Belarusian and Russian languages ​​are very close). Be that as it may, but some features bring Belarusian closer to the Russian language (for example, Akane), others - with Ukrainian (for example, the presence of a long-past tense in both languages). It has long been noted that the Ukrainian language has a number of features that unite it with the South Slavic languages ​​(especially with their western part), for example, the inflection of verbs 1 l. pl. h. present tense: write-mo ‘we write’, pratsyu-mo ‘we work’, etc. - cf. South Slavic Serbian-Croatian write-mo, sake-mo, slovenian. piše-mo, dela-mo, etc.

Methods based on phonetic and derivational material

Attempts, on the basis of some signs, to establish in which direction the development of the speech array took place after the disintegration of the Proto-Slavic language, do not stop to this day. The latest hypothesis on this issue belongs to the Belarusian Slavist FD Klimchuk (2007). He analyzes the phonetic development in modern Slavic languages ​​and dialects of a number of elements in the ancient words singled out especially for these purposes - ten, black grouse, wild, quiet and smoke. This is how these words appear in phonetic transmission:

In accordance with this, the Slavic dialect continuum splits into two zones - northern and southern. To prove this, it is necessary to formulate the conditions and trace the form in which the selected phonetic elements were realized in specific Slavic languages ​​and dialects. This is about

• a) realization of consonants [d], [t], [z], [s], [n] before etymological [e], [i];
• b) on the distinction between vowels [i] and y [s] or their fusion in one sound.

In the northern zone, the consonants [d], [t], [z], [s], [n] in the indicated position are soft, in the southern zone they are hard (ie velarized or unrelarized, often called semi-soft). The vowels [i] and y [s] in the northern zone retained their quality, in the southern zone they merged into one sound. In the languages ​​of Proto-Slavic, Old Slavonic and book Old Russian of the early period, the vowels [i] and y [s] differed from each other, representing two independent sounds. The consonants [d], [t], [z], [s], [n] before the etymological [e], [i] in these languages ​​were pronounced “semi-soft”. In other words, they were solid but unrelarized. The Proto-Slavic model of realization of consonants [d], [t], [z], [s], [n] before [e], [i] has survived only in some regions and microregions of Slavia - in many dialects of the Carpathians and the upper reaches of the river. San, sometimes in Polesie, as well as in the northern and southern parts of Russia. In a significant part of the dialects of the Slavic languages ​​of the northern zone, the soft consonants [d], [t] passed respectively into,. This phenomenon was named tsekanya-zekanya.

Studying the distribution of more than 70 suffixes of nouns over the Slavic territory, as well as conducting a group analysis of the geographical and ichthyological (the name of fish and everything associated with them) vocabulary, A.S. Gerd and V.M. Mokienko (1974) identified on this basis four Slavic areas opposed to each other:

• 1) West-East Slavic - South Slavic;
• 2) West-East Slavic + Slovenian - South Slavic (except Slovenian);
• 3) East Slavic - West South Slavic;
• 4) North Slavic and West South Slavic - East South Slavic (Bulgarian and Macedonian).

A quantitative method based on phonetic and morphological features.

In the twentieth century. another approach to the study of the ways of the disintegration of the Proto-Slavic language and the establishment of the degree of closeness of the Slavic languages ​​to each other is formed. This approach is called quantitative or statistical. The Pole Y. Chekanovsky was the first to use it in relation to Slavic material in 1929. On the basis of a list provided to him by T. Ler-Splavinsky of several dozen phonetic and morphological signs characteristic of various regions of Slavia, Chekanovsky compiles a special table indicating the presence ~ absence of such signs in a particular language, after which, using special statistical techniques, it establishes an index of proximity between languages.

Serbo-Luzhian languages ​​occupy a central place in the range of West Slavic languages. The Polabian language is closer to Czech and Slovak than to Polish. Chekanovsky also comes to the conclusion that there were deep connections between the Lehite languages ​​and the North Great Russian dialects. Moreover, the author believes that the future East Slavic massif, under the influence of the Avar raids, broke away from the northern one, which united both Western and Eastern Slavs.

Before the arrival of the Hungarians in the Pannonian lowland (end of the 9th century), the western and southern Slavs formed a wide belt stretching from north to south (up to the Balkans). The expansion of the Hungarians separated the western and southern Slavs. Traces of past ties in the form of common features are noted in the language of Czechs and Slovaks, on the one hand, and in Slovenian dialects, on the other. And in the South Slavic massif itself, there was a division into a western branch (Slovenian, Serbo-Croatian) and an eastern branch (Old Slavonic, Bulgarian, and later Macedonian). Chekanovsky believed that his conclusions should shake the existing opinion about the straightforwardness of dividing the Proto-Slavic into three massifs.

The method of lexico-statistical modeling.

A qualitatively new turn marks the appearance in 1994 of the monograph by AF Zhuravlev "Lexical-statistical modeling of the system of Slavic linguistic kinship" (based on his doctoral dissertation, defended in 1992). For the first time, the author turns to the Proto-Slavic lexical material, which in terms of quantity is hundreds of times greater than the phonetic and morphological signs traditionally used to determine the linguistic relationship. There is a significant difference between these two categories of features: if phonetic and morphological features evolve mainly by displacing some elements by others, then the development of the dictionary proceeds mainly through the accumulation (cumulation) of more and more new words. In addition, the author rightly considers vocabulary to be more stable over time than phonetics and morphology, and this refers to the vocabulary of its most ancient layer. Zhuravlev makes a continuous selection of the first 15 issues of the "Etymological Dictionary of Slavic Languages" edited by O. N. Trubachev (up to the word * lokacь 'puddle, pothole on the road') - only 7557 positions (headwords), while he avoids post-Slavic, book and some other categories of words that were absent in Proto-Slavic times. An interesting statistics of the Proto-Slavic vocabulary, preserved in the analyzed Slavic languages ​​and dialects, was found:

It should be noted that the data presented was, to a certain extent, influenced by such a factor as the completeness or incompleteness of the collected vocabulary in a particular language (as, for example, for Polabian - an extinct language and known only from records and written monuments).

Taking into account the derived indices of genetic proximity, the Russian language, for example, is characterized by the following connections:

• a) within the East Slavic subgroup: North and South Great Russian dialects are lexically closer to Belarusian than to Ukrainian;
• b) outside the East Slavic subgroup, the statistical similarity of the Proto-Slavic lexical heritage of the North Russian dialect is closer to the Serbo-Croatian language,
• c) while the South Great Russian dialect is addressed to Polish,
• d) the Russian language as a whole at the level of the Proto-Slavic vocabulary is closer to Polish
• e) and to the Serbo-Croatian.

The difference between the results obtained by phonostatistical and lexical-statistical methods is found, for example, in the qualifications of languages ​​with the highest degree of similarity: in the first case, at the language level, these are Czech and Slovak, and in the second, Serbolic. Zhuravlev is inclined to believe that such a discrepancy is primarily due to the difference in the reference material - phonetics and vocabulary, and in the inconsistency and in the unequal pace of their historical development. At the same time, both approaches allow us to conclude that the West Slavic group as a whole demonstrates its inhomogeneous, i.e. heterogeneous character. In this regard, the idea is expressed that the practice of the initial division of the Proto-Slavic into western and eastern massifs and further into eastern and southern or western and southern should give way to other, more complex and multidimensional relations.

Traditional classification with some up-to-date data

As you can see, the totality of some features dismembers the Slavic linguistic array in one direction, the totality of others in the other. Moreover, within the intended zones themselves, linguistic and dialectal isoglosses can be distributed in different directions, depriving the subgroups (western, southern and eastern) of the known genetic classification of more or less clear boundaries, - on the contrary, outlining them as intersecting with each other, then as entering into each other, then in the form of isolated situations, which turned out to be torn off from the main array, etc. All this suggests that both the Proto-Slavic speech massif and the massifs formed after its disintegration were characterized by constant quality - the initial dialectal fractionality, the absence of clear boundaries between local speech arrays, their mobility, etc.

Taking into account the achievements of the isogloss method, quantitative analysis of the proximity of languages ​​and dialects, and also taking into account the situations of linguistic continuity, etc., the traditional three-component classification of Slavic languages ​​can now be schematically represented as follows:

East Slavic:

South Slavic:

West Slavic:

Thus, the problem of classification of Slavic languages ​​has not been finally solved. It is believed that its decision will depend on the compilation of the All-Slavic Linguistic Atlas (OLA), the question of which was raised at the I International Congress of Slavists in Prague in 1929.Since 1961, a Commission on OLA has been working at the International Committee of Slavists, which includes specialists on linguistic geography and dialectology of all Slavic and a number of non-Slavic countries. The material is collected in 850 Slavic (usually rural) settlements, including in some resettlement territories. For this purpose, a questionnaire was compiled, including 3 454 questions - on phonetics, grammar, vocabulary and word formation. The distribution of features is studied and they are plotted on a map (the principle applies: one feature - one map), while paying attention to isoglosses and their beams, i.e. clusters.

Since 1965, the Institute of the Russian Language named after VV Vinogradov Russian Academy of Sciences in Moscow regularly publishes collections of research and materials under the general title "General Slavic Linguistic Atlas. Materials and Research ”, and in 1988 the first issue of the atlas appeared, devoted to the reflexes of the yat (* e) on the modern Slavic territory. Words with reflexes of the specified vowel are given in transcription. For the first time, it is possible to see, for example, a word and its transmission in transcription in all its phonetic subtleties on the vast territory inhabited by modern Slavs.

As an example, let us give the Proto-Slavic word * celovekъ 'person' and see in what pronunciation forms it actually appears in different Slavic areas (the stroke "means that the syllable following it is stressed): clovjek - clouk - clajk - c'lo" vek - c'lo "vik - šlo" vik - co "vek - c'ojek - cojak - cvek - coek - clov'ek - cala" v'ek - colo "v'ik - c'ila" v'ek - cuek - c'elo "v'ek - c'olo" v'ek - š'ila "v'ek - cu? ov'ek, etc., etc.

What does such a linguo-geographic distribution of this word show? And the fact that in reality a word in the process of historical development undergoes serious phonetic changes. What is left of the phonetic elements that made up the Proto-Slavic word * celovekъ? Only one element turned out to be stable - the final one - k, while the first element appears now in a hard, now in a soft form, then generally turns into a sibilant ([s],) or a sibilant ([š], [š ']) ; [e] is saved somewhere, but somewhere it goes into [i], [o], [a] or disappears altogether. The twist and fate of subsequent vowels and consonants. This method shows us how the same word actually lives in different Slavic areas. From this, we can conclude how complex phonetic and other processes are and how difficult it is for scientists to track them and classify their results for specific purposes. Nevertheless, the three-term genetic classification of Slavic languages, which has already become classical, is still actively used by researchers.

Slavic languages ​​are related languages ​​of the Indo-European family. More than 400 million people speak Slavic languages.

Slavic languages ​​are distinguished by the similarity of the structure of the word, the use of grammatical categories, the structure of the sentence, semantics (semantic meaning), phonetics, morphonological alternations. This closeness is explained by the unity of the origin of the Slavic languages ​​and their contacts with each other.
According to the degree of closeness to each other, the Slavic languages ​​are divided into 3 groups: East Slavic, South Slavic and West Slavic.
Each Slavic language has its own literary language (a processed part of the common language with written norms; the language of all manifestations of culture) and its own territorial dialects, which are not the same within each Slavic language.

Origin and history of Slavic languages

Slavic languages ​​are closest to the Baltic languages. Both are part of the Indo-European family of languages. From the Indo-European proto-language, the Balto-Slavic proto-language first emerged, which later split into Pro-Baltic and Proto-Slavic. But not all scientists agree with this. They explain the special closeness of these proto-languages ​​by the long-term contact between the ancient Balts and the Slavs, and they deny the existence of the Balto-Slavic language.
But it is clear that from one of the Indo-European dialects (Proto-Slavic), the Proto-Slavic language was formed, which is the ancestor of all modern Slavic languages.
The history of the Proto-Slavic language was long. For a long time, the Proto-Slavic language developed as a single dialect. Dialect variants appeared later.
In the second half of the 1st millennium AD. e. the early Slavic states began to form on the territory of Southeast and Eastern Europe. Then the process of dividing the Proto-Slavic language into independent Slavic languages ​​began.

The Slavic languages ​​have retained significant similarities among themselves, but at the same time, each of them has unique characteristics.

Eastern group of Slavic languages

Russian (250 million people)
Ukrainian (45 million people)
Belarusian (6.4 million people).
The writing of all East Slavic languages ​​is based on the Cyrillic alphabet.

Differences between East Slavic languages ​​and other Slavic languages:

vowel reduction (akane);
the presence of Church Slavisms in the vocabulary;
free dynamic stress.

Western group of Slavic languages

Polish (40 million)
Slovak (5.2 million)
Czech (9.5 million people)
The writing of all West Slavic languages ​​is based on the Latin alphabet.

Differences between West Slavic languages ​​and other Slavic languages:

In Polish, the presence of nasal vowels and two rows of sibilant consonants; fixed stress on the penultimate syllable. In Czech, there is a fixed stress on the first syllable; the presence of long and short vowels. The Slovak language has the same features as Czech.

Southern group of Slavic languages

Serbo-Croatian (21 million people)
Bulgarian (8.5 million people)
Macedonian (2 million people)
Slovenian (2.2 million people)
Written language: Bulgarian and Macedonian - Cyrillic, Serbo-Croatian - Cyrillic / Latin, Slovenian - Latin.

Differences between South Slavic languages ​​and other Slavic languages:

In the Serbo-Croatian language - free musical stress. In the Bulgarian language - the absence of cases, a variety of verb forms and the absence of an infinitive (unopened verb forms), free dynamic stress. Macedonian - the same as in Bulgarian + fixed stress (no further than the third syllable from the end of the word). Slovenian language - many dialects, the presence of a dual number, free musical stress.

Writing of Slavic languages

The brothers Cyril (Constantine the Philosopher) and Methodius were the creators of Slavic writing. They translated liturgical texts from Greek into Slavic for the needs of Great Moravia.

Prayer in Old Church Slavonic
Great Moravia is a Slavic state that existed in 822-907. on the Middle Danube. In its best period, it included the territories of modern Hungary, Slovakia, Czech Republic, Lesser Poland, part of Ukraine and the historical region of Silesia.
Great Moravia had a great influence on the cultural development of the entire Slavic world.

Great Moravia

The new literary language was based on the South Macedonian dialect, but in Great Moravia it acquired many local linguistic features. It was later developed further in Bulgaria. In this language (Old Slavonic), a rich original and translated literature was created in Moravia, Bulgaria, Russia, and Serbia. There were two Slavic alphabets: Glagolitic and Cyrillic.

The most ancient Old Church Slavonic texts date back to the 10th century. Since the XI century. more Slavic monuments have survived.
Modern Slavic languages ​​use Cyrillic and Latin alphabets. The Glagolitic alphabet is used in Catholic worship in Montenegro and in several coastal regions in Croatia. In Bosnia, for some time, in parallel with the Cyrillic and Latin alphabet, the Arabic alphabet was also used (in 1463, Bosnia completely lost its independence and became part of the Ottoman Empire as an administrative unit).

Slavic literary languages

Slavic literary languages ​​did not always have strict norms. Sometimes the literary language in the Slavic countries was a foreign language (in Russia - Old Slavonic, in the Czech Republic and Poland - Latin).
The Russian literary language has had a complex evolution. He absorbed folk elements, elements of the Old Slavonic language, was influenced by many European languages.
In the Czech Republic in the 18th century. dominated by the German language. During the period of national revival in the Czech Republic, the language of the 16th century was artificially revived, which at that time was already far from the popular language.
The Slovak literary language developed on the basis of the folk language. In Serbia until the 19th century. the Church Slavonic language prevailed. In the XVIII century. the process of rapprochement of this language with the folk began. As a result of the reform carried out by Vuk Karadzic in the middle of the 19th century, a new literary language was created.
The Macedonian literary language was finally formed only in the middle of the 20th century.
But there are also a number of small Slavic literary languages ​​(micro-languages) that function along with national literary languages ​​in small ethnic groups. These are, for example, the Polissya micro-language, Podlaski in Belarus; Rusyn - in Ukraine; Wichsky - in Poland; Banat-Bulgarian micro-language - in Bulgaria, etc.

Slavic countries are states that have existed or still exist, with most of their population of Slavs (Slavic peoples). The Slavic countries of the world are those countries in which the Slavic population is about eighty to ninety percent.

And which countries are Slavic?

Slavic countries of Europe:

But still, to the question "the population of which country belongs to the Slavic group?" the answer immediately suggests itself - Russia. The population of the Slavic countries today is about three hundred million people. But there are other countries in which Slavic peoples live (these are European states, North America, Asia) and speak Slavic languages.

The countries of the Slavic group can be divided into:

• West Slavic.
• East Slavic.
• South Slavic.

The languages ​​in these countries originated from one common language (it is called Proto-Slavic), which once existed among the ancient Slavs. It was formed in the second half of the first millennium AD. It is not surprising that most of the words are consonant (for example, Russian and Ukrainian are very similar). There are also similarities in grammar, sentence structure, phonetics. This is easy to explain if we take into account the duration of contacts between the inhabitants of the Slavic states. The lion's share in the structure of the Slavic languages ​​is occupied by Russian. Its speakers are 250 million people.

Interestingly, the flags of the Slavic countries also have some similarities in color, in the presence of longitudinal stripes. Is this somehow related to their common origin? Most likely yes than no.

Countries in which Slavic languages ​​are spoken are not so numerous. But still, the Slavic languages ​​still exist and flourish. Several hundred years have passed! This only means that the Slavic people are the most powerful, persistent, unshakable. It is important that the Slavs do not lose the originality of their culture, respect for their ancestors, honor them and keep traditions.

Today there are many organizations (both in Russia and abroad) that revive and restore Slavic culture, Slavic holidays, even names for their children!

The first Slavs appeared in the second or third millennium BC. Of course, the birth of this mighty people took place in the region of modern Russia and Europe. Over time, the tribes mastered new territories, but still they could not go far from their ancestral homeland (or did not want to). By the way, depending on the migration, the Slavs were divided into eastern, western, southern (each branch had its own name). They had differences in their way of life, agriculture, and some traditions. Nevertheless, the Slavic "core" remained intact.

A large role in the life of the Slavic peoples was played by the emergence of statehood, war, mixing with other ethnic groups. The emergence of separate Slavic states on the one hand greatly reduced the migration of Slavs. But, on the other hand, from that moment on, their mixing with other nationalities also fell sharply. This allowed the Slavic gene pool to firmly establish itself on the world stage. This affected both the appearance (which is unique) and the genotype (hereditary traits).

Slavic countries during World War II

The Second World War brought great changes to the countries of the Slavic group. For example, in 1938 the Czechoslovak Republic lost its territorial unity. The Czech Republic ceased to be independent, and Slovakia became a German colony. The next year the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth came to an end, and in 1940 the same happened with Yugoslavia. Bulgaria sided with the fascists.

But there were also positive aspects. For example, the formation of anti-fascist trends and organizations. A common misfortune has rallied the Slavic countries. They fought for independence, for peace, for freedom. Especially such movements have gained popularity in Yugoslavia, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia.

The Soviet Union played a key role in the Second World War. The citizens of the country selflessly fought against the Hitler regime, against the cruelty of German soldiers, against the Nazis. The country has lost a huge number of its defenders.

Some Slavic countries during the Second World War were united by the All-Slavic Committee. The latter was created by the Soviet Union.

What is Pan-Slavism?

The concept of Pan-Slavism is interesting. This is the direction that appeared in the Slavic states in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. It had the goal of uniting all the Slavs of the world on the basis of their national, cultural, everyday, linguistic community. Pan-Slavism promoted the independence of the Slavs, praised their originality.

The colors of Pan-Slavism were white, blue and red (the same colors appear on many flags of countries). The emergence of such a trend as Pan-Slavism began after the Napoleonic wars. Weakened and "tired", the countries supported each other in difficult times. But over time, they began to forget about Pan-Slavism. But at the present time there is again a tendency to return to the origins, to the ancestors, to the Slavic culture. Perhaps this will lead to the formation of the neopanslavist movement.

Slavic countries today

The twenty-first century is a time of some kind of discord in relations between the Slavic countries. This is especially true for Russia, Ukraine, and the countries of the European Union. The reasons here are more political, economic. But despite the discord, many residents of countries (from the Slavic group) remember that all the descendants of the Slavs are brothers. Therefore, none of them wants wars and conflicts, but only want warm family relations, as our ancestors once had.

SLAVIC LANGUAGES, a group of languages ​​belonging to the Indo-European family, spoken by over 440 million people in Eastern Europe and North and Central Asia. Thirteen currently existing Slavic languages ​​are divided into three groups: 1) the East Slavic group includes Russian, Ukrainian and Belarusian; 2) West Slavic includes Polish, Czech, Slovak, Kashubian (which is spoken in a small area in northern Poland) and two Lusatian (or Serbolic) languages ​​- Upper Sorbian and Lower Sorbian, common in small areas in eastern Germany; 3) the South Slavic group includes: Serbo-Croatian language (which is spoken in Yugoslavia, Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina), Slovene, Macedonian and Bulgarian. In addition, there are three dead languages ​​- Slovinian, which disappeared at the beginning of the 20th century, Polabian, which became extinct in the 18th century, and Old Church Slavonic - the language of the first Slavic translations of the Holy Scriptures, which is based on one of the ancient South Slavic dialects and which was used in divine services. in the Slavic Orthodox Church, but was never an everyday spoken language ( cm... OLD SLAVONIC LANGUAGE).

In modern Slavic languages ​​there are many words in common with other Indo-European languages. Many Slavic words are similar to the corresponding English ones, for example: sister - sister,three - three,nose - nose,night - night and etc. In other cases, the general origin of the words is less obvious. Russian word see akin to Latin videre, Russian word five related to German fünf, latin quinque(cf. musical term quintet), Greek penta, which is present, for example, in a borrowed word pentagon(lit. "pentagon") .

An important role in the system of Slavic consonantism is played by palatalization - the approach of the flat middle part of the tongue to the palate when pronouncing a sound. Almost all consonants in Slavic languages ​​can be both hard (non-palatalized) and soft (palatalized). In the field of phonetics, there are also some significant differences between the Slavic languages. In Polish and Kashubian, for example, two nasalized (nasal) vowels have survived - ą and ERROR disappeared in other Slavic languages. Slavic languages ​​differ greatly in stress. In Czech, Slovak and Lusatian, the stress usually falls on the first syllable of a word; in Polish - the penultimate; in Serbo-Croatian, any syllable except the last one can be stressed; in Russian, Ukrainian and Belarusian, the stress can fall on any syllable of the word.

All Slavic languages, except Bulgarian and Macedonian, have several types of declension of nouns and adjectives, which vary in six or seven cases, in numbers and in three genders. The presence of seven cases (nominative, genitive, dative, accusative, instrumental, local or prepositional and vocative) testifies to the archaism of the Slavic languages ​​and their closeness to the Indo-European language, which supposedly had eight cases. An important feature of the Slavic languages ​​is the category of the verb form: every verb refers to either the perfect or the imperfect form and denotes, respectively, either a completed, or lasting or repetitive action.

The habitat of the Slavic tribes in Eastern Europe in the 5-8 centuries. AD expanded rapidly, and by the 8th century. the common Slavic language spread from the north of Russia to the south of Greece and from the Elbe and the Adriatic Sea to the Volga. Up to 8 or 9 c. it was basically a single language, but gradually the differences between territorial dialects became more noticeable. By the 10th century. there were already predecessors of modern Slavic languages.