Historical sciences 85

Short Report THE CALENDAR VOCABULARY AS A STUDY relations of the Samoyeds and Yenisseys it may be SOURCE OF ANCIENT CULTURAL- supposed the following peculiarities of the origin of LINGUISTIC CONTACTS OF SIBERIAN the names for conceptions “spring”, “winter” in the (TO THE PROBLEM Samoyed (Selkup) and the Yenissey () languages: OF THE ORIGIN OF THE WORDS “SPRING”, 1) The words “winter”, “spring” had been bor- “WINTER»IN THE SELKUP AND THE KET rowed by native speakers from each other during the LANGUAGES) period of the existence of Samoyed and Yenissey lin- Kolesnikova V. guistic communities. [email protected] 2) The words “winter”, “spring” had been bor- rowed by native speakers from each other after the Different ethnic groups had been living, mov- disintegration of indicated linguistic communities (or ing, assimilating on the territory of Western one of them). for a long time. Economic and cultural contacts be- 3) The words “winter”, “spring” have been tween representatives of these groups had been arising borrowed by native speakers not from each other, but during many years. The relations and the two-way from another source. influence of two peoples – the Samoyeds and Yenis- It is known that there are many words in seys (ancestors of modern Selkups and Kets) - is one Selkup and Ket borrowed from other, unrelated lan- example of such contacts. Samoyed-yenissey lexical guages. For example, words from Russian and Turkic equivalents demonstrated by some researchers may be have been fixed in the . A whole given as the results of their relationship [1]. The corre- number of common words of Ket and Chinese have spondence between some words there is in languages been revealed as well [3]. The hypothesis about the of the modern Selkups and Kets too. The words connection of the Yenissey and the Tibetan-Chinese “spring”, “winter” belong to such words. There are languages, based on the study of similar words, has some different opinions about the origin of these been supported by many authors [6]. The famous re- words in the Selkup and Ket languages. Therefore it is searcher of aboriginal Siberian languages A.P. Dulzon reasonable to analyse peculiarities of the forming of has noted the correspondence between the words of the names for conceptions “spring”, “winter” in these the Ket and the Hun languages in addition [7]. languages. The observed lexical equivalence and corre- 1) Spring spondences are the basis for the supposition about the The used the word Ytid (ödeD available contacts between native speakers of above and other phonetic variants), the used the stated languages. There is the opinion about the con- word yed' for the conception “spring”. The famous nection between the Kets and the Chineses, the Kets hungarian researcher Haidu P. supposed, that the and the Huns, (in addition between the Kets and selkup word has been borrowed from the Yenissey American Indians too), etc. [7] languages: nen. djotti, selk. ödeD < ket. Yed (spring) From the other side there is the supposition [2]. that the Samoyed and the Yenissey had the common The prominent researcher of the Yenissey lan- ancient ancestral home situated in the south Siberia guages Joki A. expressed the same opinion, that the [8]. There is the idea about the single ancient cultural- samoyed words with the meaning “spring” has been linguistic community of Selkups and Kets [6]. borrowed from the Yenissey languages, there are the It is possible to think about possible ancient following correspondence at that: selk. öd əD - ket – contacts not only between the Yenissey (Kets) and yed’,yedi - tib. – dpyid [2]. Tibetans, Chineses, Huns, but between the Samoyeds The well known researcher K. Bouda has the and these three peoples. Therefore the words “winter”, opposite view on the borrowing direction, namely: yen. “spring” in Samoyed (and in Yenissey) could be bor- yed(i); kott. iji - spring < sam. ytid [3]. rowed from languages of Tibetans, Chineses, Huns. 2) Winter 4) The above mentioned words “winter”, The words with the meaning “winter” were “spring” are unrelated. fixed in the Samoyed and the Yenissey languages. There is the assumption that the Samoyed There is the supposition, that the selkup kä, ke, kam. word roots with the meaning “winter” (selk. k ə, khä had been borrowed from Yenissey. From the E. kamas. khä) have nothing to do with the yenissey root Levi’s point of view there are the equivalents: ket. *g əte – “winter” [4]. kete, kott. k ēti, tib. dgun [2]. Some researchers ex- So, the research of the calendar names with the press the contrary idea: the yenissey root had been meaning “winter”, “spring” in Samoyed (Selkup) and borrowed from the Samoyed language [4, 5]. Yenissey (Ket) are connected with some different and Thus, contradictory linguistic data concerning sometimes conflicting conclusions. the borrowing processes of words “spring”, “winter” Thus, it is impossible to identify the true origin in the Samoyed and the Yenissey languages have been of calendar names in above mentioned pre-literate demonstrated above. Concerning some opinions about languages on the basis of only linguistic data. The

EUROPEAN JOURNAL OF NATURAL HISTORY №3 2010 8694 86 Historical sciences forming of words with the meaning “winter”, “spring» 3. Bouda K. The Yenissey Language. Genealogical can be found out by means of the integrated approach. and morphological study // Anthropos. – V. 52. – This approach consists in the synthesis of many dif- 1957. – 134 P. ferent techniques and data, concerning: linguistic, eth- 4. Starostin S.A. Protoyenissey reconstruction and nographical, historical, philosophical etc. This ap- proach covers both the Samoyed (Selkup) and the external relations of the Yenissey languages Yenissey (Ket) (and other peoples). It means the de- // Ket collection. – Leningrad: Science. – 1982. – tailed study of the vocabulary, semantic, phonetic, pp. 144-237 borrowing and other processes in languages of these 5. Polyakov V.A. Methods of the lexic nomination peoples, the comparative research of their social and in the Yenissey languages // Novosibirsk: Sci- economical structure, of the material culture traits, of ence. – 1987. – pp. 66-80 the thinking type, of the territorial and climate life 6. Ivanov V.V., Toporov V.N., Uspenskiy B.A. peculiarities, the investigation of the ancient relations between the pre-literate Siberian peoples and the Preface // Ket collection. Linguistics. – M., 1968. - analysis of many other facts. This method will permit pp. 5-14 to understand the true origin of indicated words. So, 7. Dulzon A.P. Huns and Kets // Siberian branch of the research of calendar names in the Selkup and the the USSR Academy of Science Bulletin. – Novosi- Ket languages causes the general study of many-sided birsk: Science. – 1968. - №11. – pp. 137-142 ancient cultural-linguistic contacts of many Siberian 8. Prokofyev G.N. Turukhan -Samoyed indigenous peoples. // Ethnography. – Moscow-Leningrad: State pub-

lishing house. – 1926. – book VI. – pp. 96-103 References 1. Kostyakov M.M. Yenissey-samoyed lexical groups // Soviet Finnougristic. – XX. – 1984. - № ABBREVIATIONS 3 - pp. 199-206 yen. –Yenissey 2. Toporov V.N. The bibliography kam. – Kamass // Ket collection. – Moscow: Science. – 1969. – pp. kot. - Kot 243-283 nen. - Nenets sam. - Samoyed selk. - Selkup tib. - Tibetian

EUROPEAN JOURNAL OF NATURAL HISTORY №3 2010