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CONTACTS BETWEEN the BALTIC and FINNIC LANGUAGES Uralica Helsingiensia7 CONTACTS BETWEEN THE BALTIC AND FINNIC LANGUAGES Uralica Helsingiensia7 Contacts between the Baltic and Finnic languages EDITED BY SANTERI JUNTTILA HELSINKI 2015 Contents Santeri Junttila (ed.): Contacts between the Baltic and Finnic languages. Uralica Helsingiensia 7. Santeri Junttila Layout, cover Katriina Ketola, Anna Kurvinen Introduction 6 Translations of summaries Simonas Noreikis, Anete Kona, Santeri Junttila Language editor: Uldis Balodis Santeri Junttila Proto-Finnic loanwords in the Baltic languages? ISBN 978-952-5667-67-7 An old hypothesis revisited 12 ISSN 1797-3945 Orders • Tilaukset Petri Kallio Tiedekirja <www.tiedekirja.fi> Vammalan Kirjapaino Oy The Baltic and Finnic Names of the River Gauja 38 Snellmaninkatu 13 <[email protected]> Sastamala 2015 FI-00170 Helsinki Laimute Balode Criteria for Identifying Possible Finnicisms in Latvian Toponymy 49 Uralica Helsingiensia Pauls Balodis Uralica Helsingiensia is a series published jointly by the University of Helsinki Finno-Ugric Surnames of Finnic Origin in Latvia 74 Language Section and the Finno-Ugrian Society. It features monographs and thematic col- lections of articles with a research focus on Uralic languages, and it also covers the linguistic Riho Grünthal and cultural aspects of Estonian, Hungarian and Saami studies at the University of Helsinki. The series has a peer review system, i.e. the manuscripts of all articles and monographs Livonian at the crossroads of language contacts 97 submitted for publication will be refereed by two anonymous reviewers before binding decisions are made concerning the publication of the material. Jan Henrik Holst Uralica Helsingiensia on Helsingin yliopiston suomalais-ugrilaiset kielet ja kulttuurit -oppi- On the theory of a Uralic substratum in Baltic 151 aineryhmän yhdessä Suomalais-Ugrilaisen Seuran kanssa julkaisema sarja, jossa ilmestyy monografioita ja temaattisia artikkelikokoelmia. Niiden aihepiiri liittyy uralilaisten kielten tut- Marja Leinonen kimukseen ja kattaa myös Helsingin yliopistossa tehtävän Viron kielen ja kulttuurin, Unkarin Lithuanian partitive genitive and Finnish partitive kielen ja kulttuurin sekä saamentutkimuksen. in existential sentences 174 Sarjassa noudatetaan refereekäytäntöä, eli julkaistavaksi esitettävien tutkimusten käsikirjoitus annetaan kahden nimettömän asiantuntijan arvioitavaksi ennen kuin lopullinen Maija Tervola julkaisupäätös tehdään. Comparing object case alternation in Finnish and Lithuanian 205 Publishers • Julkaisijat University of Helsinki: Department of Finnish, Finno-Ugrian and Scandinavian Studies • Merlijn De Smit Helsingin yliopisto: Suomen kielen, suomalais-ugrilaisten ja pohjoismaisten kielten ja Agented participles in Baltic and Finnic 246 kirjallisuuksien laitos Finno-Ugrian Society • Suomalais-Ugrilainen Seura Outi Duvallon & Hélène de Penanros Editors • Päätoimittajat Schematic Form as a theoretical tool for the analysis Ulla-Maija Forsberg, Riho Grünthal of prepositions, verbal prefixes and cases in Finnish and Editorial board • Toimitusneuvosto Márta Csepregi, Cornelius Hasselblatt, Magdolna Kovács, Johanna Laakso, Helle Mets- in Lithuanian 272 lang, Matti Miestamo, Irma Mullonen, Karl Paju salu, Janne Saari kivi, Anneli Sarhimaa, Elena Skribnik <www.sgr.fi/uh> List of Contributors 300 The publications are indexed in ARTO data base with the index Urbis. Julkaisut luetteloidaan ja indeksoidaan ARTO-tietokantaan tunnuksella Urbis. INTRODUCTION SANTERI JUNTTILA Proto-Indo-European period. The oldest Finnic loanword strata were Helsinki actively studied by the generations following Thomsen, but unlike his- torical linguistics in more general terms, no breakthrough was made during the Neogrammarian era. The first significant methodological innovation in linguistics af- Introduction ter the Neogrammarian method was the introduction of phonemics and morphophonology by Jan Baudouin de Courtenay, whose ideas were developed further by the Prague school between the World Wars. However, these structuralist ideas did not influence the research of Do we know anything Thomsen did not? Finnic loanwords before 1970. This delay may be due to the lack of interest in diachronic studies by the pioneers of structuralism. Finally, Systematic study of early language contacts between the Baltic and when the late Professor of Germanic philology Jorma Koivulehto in- Finnic languages was introduced by the famous Danish linguist Vil- troduced these ideas they caused a revolution in the research of pre- helm Thomsen in 1869. He was the first scholar of Finno-Ugrian historic language contacts of the Finnic languages. Koivulehto proved languages to reconstruct a chronological succession of language con- convincingly that the contacts between the Finnic and Germanic lan- tacts based on the phonetic properties and distribution of borrowings. guages began at least as early as the Finnic-Baltic ones, and both of Thomsen’s novel method applied the Neogrammarian requirement and them were preceded by an even older layer, a West Indo-European relied exclusively on regular sound correspondences. Looking back at stratum of borrowings to early Proto-Finnic or, alternatively, Western his scholarly contribution, he both initiated the systematic research of Proto-Finno-Ugrian. loanword layers in Finnic and introduced the diachronic dimension to Many of Thomsen’s main conclusions are still valid. Compared Finno-Ugrian studies in general. to that which was available during his era, modern linguists have much Thomsen pointed out that there are two different layers of Baltic larger collections of lexical material of not only Finnic and Baltic but loanwords in the Finnic languages. On one hand, there are numerous especially of the Sámi, Mordvin, and Mari languages at their disposal. Latvian borrowings in Livonian resulting from several centuries of Still, the amount of plausible Baltic etymologies in Proto-Finnic has coexistence. On the other hand, there is a prehistoric Baltic stratum not even doubled since 1890. Thomsen’s argument that there are no covering the Finnic branch as a whole. This earlier layer testifies to a Proto-Finnic traces in the Baltic lexicon has an even more permanent prehistoric change in the geographical distribution of Finnic after this value, since, so far, no such traces have been plausibly demonstrated; Baltic contact. Thomsen assumed in his magnum opus (1890) that the although some have been proposed by several scholars. These pro- contact between the Finnic and Baltic languages took place before posals are examined in more detail in Santeri Junttila’s paper Proto- contact between Finnic and Germanic occurred but later than the con- Finnic loanwords in the Baltic languages? An old hypothesis revisited. tacts between the Indo-Aryan and Finno-Ugrian languages. The lack of early Finnic loanwords in Proto-Baltic is not a methdologi- After Thomsen, researchers have gradually refined the overall cally biased statement, because the phonological structure of the Baltic understanding of Baltic loanwords. Today we know that borrowings borrowings in Finnic reveal a source language other than Lithuanian, from Latvian are wide-spread in Estonian and South Estonian as well, Latvian, or Proto-Baltic. This prehistoric language with its possible although in much smaller quantities than in Livonian. Furthermore, as Finnic borrowings seems to have disappeared without descendants. has been recently argued, the older stratum has a considerably longer A Baltic origin has been proposed for several place names in history than Thomsen assumed and extends back to the Pre-Baltic the Finnic-speaking area since Eemil Aukusti Tunkelo did so in 1899. Contacts between the Baltic and Finnic languages. 6 –11. 7 Uralica Helsingiensia 7. Helsinki 2015. SANTERI JUNTTILA INTRODUCTION However, none of these etymologies is convincing, with just one ex- shared syntactic phenomena were pointed out by Jooseppi Julius Mik- ception. The river name Koiva, Latvian Gauja, seems to belong to the kola (1930). Both of them assumed a Finnic origin for the Baltic traits, ancient Baltic loanword layer of Finnic as proposed by Petri Kallio whereas Lauri Posti (1953) suggested Baltic and Germanic superstrate under the title The Baltic and Finnic names of the River Gauja. This influence behind the main phonological changes in Proto-Finnic. How- etymology is a remarkable breakthrough, because Gauja is situated at ever, since then assumptions of Finnic substrate phenomena in Baltic the old frontier zone between the Finnic and Baltic areas, flowing on have been at least as popular as vice versa. Jan Henrik Holst exam- both sides of the present border of Estonia and Latvia. ines some of the most frequently proposed Finnic substrate features in Toponymic borrowings in the opposite direction have been quite Baltic phonology, morphology, and syntax. His paper On the theory actively studied during the last decades. The Finnic place names in of a Uralic substratum in Baltic scrutinizes ten assumed substrate northern and central Latvia are of a relatively recent origin, though features proposed by Witold Mańczak (1990) who has defended the mostly somewhat older than the major part of Latvian loanwords in hypothesis of Finnic influence behind the split of Proto-Balto-Slavic Livonian. Consequently, they should be connected to the Southern into Baltic and Slavic. After Holst’s critical assessment, none of these Finnic loanword layer in Latvian discovered by Thomsen. This topic features can be considered as convincing. was later revisited by Valdis
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