Diversity of Old-Croatian Names for Seaweeds and Maritime Nature in the Adriatic Islands
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View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE NAT. CROAT. VOL. 11 No 4 455¿477 ZAGREB December 31, 2002 ISSN 1330-0520 review paper / pregledni rad . UDK 392.91:58 582.26(497.5/210.7) DIVERSITY OF OLD-CROATIAN NAMES FOR SEAWEEDS AND MARITIME NATURE IN THE ADRIATIC ISLANDS ANDRIJA @ELJKO LOVRI]1,MLADEN RAC1 &MARIJAN HORVAT MILEKOVI]2 1Laboratory of Biocenology, Rudjer Bo{kovi} Institute, Bijeni~ka 54, HR-10000 Zagreb 2Croatian Scientific Society for Ethnogenesis Studies, Vile Velebita 9a, HR-10020 Zagreb A. @. Lovri}, M. Rac & M. H. Milekovi}: Diversity of Old-Croatian names for seaweeds and maritime nature in the Adriatic islands. Nat. Croat., Vol. 11, No. 4., 455–477, 2002, Zagreb. By a consistent registering of vernacular names for algae, we have documented 156 marine phytonyms along eastern Adriatic for macroalgae and Zosteraceae, including a half of local syno- nyms between different islands and mainland areas, and 82 names for different marine taxa. There- fore Croatian vernacular names of marine algae are the most numerous within Europe, their rich- ness being subequal to the maximal one for Japanese algae. A minor amount of these marine phy- tonyms are Romanic loans (1/5 to 1/3), half of them are of Slavonic origin, and the rest are pre-Ro- mance-non-Slavic archaisms of early Liburnian and Proto-Indo-European origin. The poorest stock of algal names occurs in the Dalmatian mainland with 9 Shtokavian phytonyms, and the more abundant Chakavian ones we have registered in the islands: the richest ones in southeastern Krk with 79 marine phytonyms, 25 in Rab, 19 in Dugi Otok, 15 in Vis, 12 in @irje island, and the poor- est are Mljet and Lastovo islands and the Velebit coast with 3–5 marine phytonyms. Keywords: ethnobotany, phytonyms, algae, Adriatic, seashore, islands, Slavic, Romanic, Liburnian A. @. Lovri}, M. Rac & M. H. Milekovi}: Raznolikost starohrvatskog nazivlja za alge i za po- morsku prirodu na jadranskim otocima. Nat. Croat., Vol. 11, No. 4., 455–477, 2002, Zagreb. Sustavnim popisom je kod nas na isto~nom Jadranu nadjeno 156 morskih fitonima za makroalge i Zosteraceae, od ~ega su polovica sinonimi izmedju raznih otoka i kopna, a ostalih 82 fitonima se od- nose na posebne morske svojte. Zato su kod nas imena morskih alga bogatija negoli igdje u Europi i podjednako brojna kao u najbogatijem svjetskom nazivlju za alge u Japanu. Tek manji dio toga hrvat- skog nazivlja za alge su posudjeni romanizmi (1/5–1/3), polovica su ~akavski nazivi, a ostalo pred- romansko-neslavenski arhaizmi liburno-ilirskoga i praindoeuropskog podrijetla. Kod nas je najsiro- ma{nije {tokavsko nazivlje alga na kopnenim obalama, najvi{e do 9 fitonima. Bogatije je ~akavsko na- zivlje alga na otocima: najvi{e je 79 morskih fitonima na jugoisto~nom Krku, pa 25 na Rabu, 19 na Dugom otoku, 15 na Visu, 12 na @irju, a najmanje (3–5) velebitska obala, Mljet i Lastovo. Klju~ne rije~i: etnobotanika, fitonimi, alge, Jadran, obala, otoci, slavenski, romanski, Liburni Croatian Natural History Museum, Demetrova 1, Zagreb, Croatia 456 Lovri}, A. @. et al.: Croatian names for seaweeds INTRODUCTION There have been very few ethnobotanical studies on vernacular phytonyms in Croatia, and what there have been are not in conformity with international stan- dards. Within southeastern Europe, Croatian vernacular phytonyms are known ve- ry little, when compared with extensive recent studies in surrounding countries: e.g. in Slovenia (BARLE, 1937, etc.), in Serbia (SIMONOVI], 1959), and Greece (HEL- DREICH et al., 1980). The first and almost the only survey of Croatian vernacular phytonyms so far is the very old list by [ULEK (1879) covering most of the southern Slavs, and among them also Croatian phytonyms. In southwestern Croatia (related to the current paper) [ulek listed some rare Chakavian names of some Mediterra- nean plants mostly from the mainland coast of the eastern Adriatic, but for the ma- jority of islands up to recently, with few exceptions (Cres and Bra~), insular phyto- nyms were hardly known. After 1965, during our successive field studies of vege- tation across Croatia and some adjacent countries, with the collected herbarium specimens (deposited mostly in Herb. ADRZ), we included the vernacular names too, if available in the nearby villages. So far, in 4700 collecting sites, we have regis- tered about 11,000 documented phytonyms mostly from the Kaykavian and Chaka- vian dialects previously in short supply, and the whole is now being prepared for print in a detailed ethnobotanical survey (Croatian Ethnobotanical Glossary). A pre- liminary selection of terrestrial phytonyms and zoonyms from Krk island was re- cently presented by MILEKOVI] &LOVRI] (1998), from Trogir and Ka{tela coast by MILEKOVI] et al. (1998), and for Kaykavian phytonyms in northwestern Croatia by LOVRI] (1997b), LOVRI] &RAC (1997). As the most original advance in Croatian phytonyms, we offer here an exhaus- tive survey of vernacular names for seaweeds, because they were till now nearly unknown in Croatian ethnobotany, particularly as compared with the extensively studied marine zoonyms of eastern Adriatic (cf. VINJA, 1986). Croatian vernacular names for Adriatic algae so far were mostly neglected, because during Yugoslavia the official presumption prevailed that all Croats are continental Slavs coming from the inland Carpathians, and therefore they cannot have original old names for sea- weeds or other marine notions. In fact, around Europe the richest marine phyto- nyms are known on the Atlantic coastline, and the poorest algal onomastics occur on the shores of eastern Europe (GAVAZZI, 1974): all other Slavs along the shores of Montenegro, Bulgaria, Ukraine, Russia, and Poland mostly do not have specific vernacular phytonyms for marine algae, except for some neologism calques. Due to this analogy, neither botanists nor linguists have registered algal phytonyms in the eastern Adriatic, and this paper is the first consistent and detailed survey of ver- nacular names for algae along the Croatian coast and Adriatic islands. Prior to this there existed only a preliminary ethnographic survey by GAVAZZI (1974) on the tra- ditional use of the phytobenthos around European coasts, including also 5 marine phytonyms (sea-grasses) from the Dalmatian mainland. Recently LOVRI] (1997a) pub- lished a detailed botanical survey of 362 marine plants from the Velebit Channel, to which he also provisionally added the local vernacular names of the main frequent algae. This previously marginal subject has turned into the richest store of marine Nat. Croat. Vol. 11(4), 2002 457 phytonyms along the European seashores, and this unexpected diversity stimulated us to carry out detailed field studies of algal vernacular names across the eastern Adriatic. We have interviewed many indigenous fishermen and other local older people correlated with the benthos, from Kvarner Gulf to the southernmost Dalma- tian islands, and present paper presents the main results of this examination. METHODS In our experience, the natural onomastics of the islands is usually the poorest in their main towns, for several reasons. Only few of the citizens work in nature, some are recent immigrants, and also the original Chakavian tongue in the insular capital is badly conserved, with Italian influences in preceding centuries, and recent Yugo- slav (Shtokavian) variants in 20th century, both of which partly eliminated the tra- ditional domestic vocabulary. The original natural onomastics of the Adriatic is the richest in the internal hamlets of each island, and for maritime items in the old marginal ports of traditional fisheries. Thus we obtained the richest names for sea- weeds, invertebrates, and maritime nature in Ba{ka on Krk island, Lopar on Rab, Bo`ava on Dugi Otok, Komi`a on Vis, Brna on Kor~ula, and along the mainland shores chiefly in the ports of Trogir, Bigova (Tra{te) at Tivat, etc. Previously, the noting of vernacular names of plant taxa i.e. their phytonyms had been a marginal activity of botanists and linguists, but in 20th century, detailed scientific studies on vernacular phytonyms became an essential topic of specialists in the new discipline of ethnobotany, studying the multiple correlations of field vegetation and of local ethnocultures. Recently consistent international standards and complex methods for these interdisciplinary studies have developed: the know- ledge of vernacular phytonyms requires an insight into local dialects, and also a botanical documentation of each plant name by the herbarium specimen of related taxon, or at least a recognizable photographic record with international Latin na- mes, the exact locality (village) is obligatory, and informant's name is recommend- able. Invalid indications are: an approximate notation of field phytonyms i.e. a fal- sification of them made to conform to the official language, or a pure lingual re- gistration without any biological documentation; as of recent years, both of these have become unacceptable in ethnobotanical scientific standards. After the pioneer lists of [ULEK (1879), no consistent ethnobotanical study on Croatian vernacular phytonyms was published, and then Croatian vernacular phytonyms and ethnobo- tany were mostly neglected. During 20th century in Croatian phytonyms an abun- dant production of artificial neologisms and translation calques prevailed, mostly from Latin and German: such innovations are useful in education, but they are not a topic of ethnobotany. This innovative trend in Croatian botany was best elabora- ted by [UGAR (1977). During Yugoslavia (1918–1990), instead of scientific ethnobotany in botanical no- menclature, up to recently a political approach often prevailed, and onomastic stud- ies outside the official Shtokavian language, especially from any pre-Slavic tongues, were suspect and often precluded. Many dialectal phytonyms (Kaykavian, Chaka- 458 Lovri}, A. @. et al.: Croatian names for seaweeds vian, Ikavian etc.), used by 92% of rural Croats, were often rejected as irregular and not registered because they did not fit in with the ideology of that time.