engleski

South Slavic and Baltic onomastics: similarities and differences

South Slavic, and especially Croatian, onomastics has a special place within the wider Slavic onomastic system. Some basic information will be given on the diversity of hydronymic systems on the South-Slavic territory, mostly according to the distribution of some basic hydronymic appellatives. The complex stratification of Croatian hydronymy has resulted from the accumulated onomastic strata characteristic of diverse ethnolinguistic groups on the territory of present-day Croatia, their centennial coexistence with the Croats, and various types of linguistic interpenetration. The aim of this paper is to point out the similarities and differences between the hydronymic systems on the Baltic and South Slavic territories within the so-called “ Balto-Slavic” framework. A lot has been written about their oldest hydronymic stratum concerning their ethnogenesis and early migrations. In considering the earliest history of the Slavs, the relationship between the Baltic and Slavic languages, as well as a postulation of the existence of a Balto-Slavic etholinguistic community, represents a major problem. This study presents various views of the problem that can be inferred from the hydronymic data. It examines a few basic hydronymic geographical terms that are common to the Baltic and South Slavic languages while trying to determine their diachronic background, as well as their distribution on the historic Croatian territory. The paper intends to outline a short survey of the South Slavic and Baltic hydronymic terms, providing information on their structure and semantics, as well as their reflexes in relevant toponyms. Though onomastics, or in this case hydronymy, cannot by itself give definitive answers to the complex problems of the Slavic and Baltic ethnogenesis, it can certainly help us gain new insights into their prehistory in order to locate their original habitat more precisely.

onomastics; Croatian names; Baltic names; toponymy; hydronymy

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