The Slavic Language in Medieval Austria

Research project P 14569 The Slavic Language in Medieval Austria Georg HOLZER 26.6.2000 The project will be dealing with the Slavic language spoken in medieval Austria. This language is known to us mainly owing to Germanized names, which are recorded in documents or used still today: names of places, waters and persons. This Slavic, in its vocabulary, word formation, formation of names, and phonetics, is to be registered as wholly as possible in its historical development and geographical (dialectal) distribution and is then to be studied from the viewpoint of genetic linguistics, etymology, and onomastics. But also research in the fields of the history of settlement in Austria as well as of the history and geography of the German dialects in Austria can profit by the results of the project. The project aims at a manual to be written by the applicant, having for subject the Slavic language in medieval Austria; this manual shall both put this field of knowledge on a new basis and serve as an introduction to it. The following topics are to be dealt with extensively and thoroughly: 1) The history of Slavic settlement and presence in Austria and the Slavic-German language contact with its social and sociolinguistic implications, including the relationship of the Slavs to the Avars, the germanization, the missions among the Slavs, and the like. 2) Informations on Slavs in Austria contained in chronicles, annals, and documents in chronological ordering, including literal quotations, references, and historical, philological, and linguistic comments. 3) Geography and history of the Slavic language spoken in Austria considered in the framework of Slavic genetic linguistics and Common Slavic historical dialectology, chiefly in the fields of phonetics, vocabulary, word formation, and formation of names. 4) Rules and principles of germanization of Slavic names in Austria that can be used as a means for determining the chronology of borrowings, provided with rich onomastical material, in the first place that quoted in documents. 5) The problem of dialectological classification of the Documents of Freising (do they originate from Austria?) and of the Kiev Leaflets (do they originate from the Balaton region?) and of their connection with the Slavic language in Austria. 6) Bibliography.

In the course of the great Slavic expansion the Slavs settled also in the eastern part of today`s Austria. Therefore, from the 7th century until the late Middle Ages the Slavic language was spoken in the eastern part of Austria, and places, waters, mountains, and fields got Slavic names. From the 8th century on there immigrated from the west Bavarians, who adopted many of the Slavic names. Their German dialect more and more displaced the Slavic language so that the latter - except in the south of the Austrian Federal territory - finally became extinct. The extinct Slavic language in Austria is, however, accessible to us and can be investigated owing to the Germanized names. The project aimed at describing such Slavic names and making them available for linguistic research. One of the results of the project is a glossary of the Slavic words, recorded in the onomastic material of Lower Austria and Vienna, which is written by the co-worker. This glossary will be published and can also serve as basis for further onomastic and linguistic research. One valley of Lower Austria has been thoroughly investigated concerning its Slavic names by the leader of the project, and the results were published in the project leader`s book "Die Slaven im Erlaftal". This study, paradigmatic in some parts for the whole eastern part of Austria, has also clearly shown that the Slavic dialects in the eastern part of Austria have been transitional dialects between Czech and Slovene, which filled the geographic gap between these two languages. They developed on the spot directly from Proto-Slavic. The results of the project work are important for Slavic comparative historical linguistics, for onomastics, and for the investigation of Slavic settlement in Austria as well as of Slavic-German language contact with its social and sociolinguistic implications. The positive reception of the project by the public has shown that onomastic subjects with its both "local historical" and "multicultural" aspects are especially well suitable for making publicity for a philology like the Slavic one and for gaining understanding for its existence and subsidy from the public authorities.