Old orthographies, grammars and handbooks of Polish language
The nearly 700-page-long Polnische Grammatik… (= Polish grammar for Germans who wish to learn Polish well, supplemented with a small etymological dictionary), written by a librarian and bibliographer, philologist, linguist, lexicographer and editor, is composed of two sections, namely Polish grammar and a small etymological dictionary. Each of them has its own pagination. The grammatical part is made of 22 chapters, where the author discusses Polish letters, syllables and pronunciation; orthography; etymology (inflected and uninflected parts of speech); syntax and prosody. The grammatical section is followed, despite what the title declares, by a quite extensive Polish-German dictionary. It is a nest dictionary, i.e. entries are prepared based on common etymological nests. The author adds grammatical information to the entries. Samuel Bandtkie wanted the dictionary to serve teaching and self-teaching purposes. Like Johann Christoph Adelung, the author used the Latin terminology in his work. There were four editions of the study: 2nd edition Wrocław 1815; 3rd edition Wrocław 1818; 4th edition Wrocław 1824. All successive editions were released in Wrocław and additionally contained Tirocinium, a part with exercises. Polnische Grammatik… was ordered by Wilhelm Gottlieb Korn’s bookshop and publishing enterprise in Wrocław. Originally, the bookshop commissioned Bandtkie to prepare a new revised edition of Deutsch-Polnische Grammatik (1770) by Johann Christian Krumbholz. However, it did not rule out the possibility of writing a completely new one. Bandtkie chose the latter option.
Go to grammarVorbott der Polnischen Sprachkunst. Goniec gramatyki polskiej (= The messenger of Polish grammar), written by a translator, lexicographer, teacher and lawyer, is a 190-page-long textbook specialised in only one branch of language, namely grammar. Maciej Gutthäter-Dobracki addressed this textbook to the youth just starting to learn Polish, which means that it is a course for beginners. Therefore, the author does not present the whole grammar but limits himself to morphology, which is not discussed thoroughly either. He handles inflected parts of speech only. Dobracki provides full inflectional paradigms, yet reduces the commentary and rules as much as possible. It was an intentional procedure for two reasons. Firstly, as he emphasised himself, he did not want to overburden the students with an excessively difficult material, and secondly, he worked on a textbook for advanced learners, which covered the entire course in grammar.
In his study, Dobracki applies terminology in national languages (German and Polish). Although he was criticised for that, Goniec gramatyki Polskiej won recognition among the contemporary authors of textbooks for learning foreign languages (e.g. Georg Schlag). Despite that, Dobracki’s work did not gain popularity and was never republished.
Go to grammarPolnische Teutsch erklärte Sprachkunst… Gramatyka polska, Niemieckim językiem wyrażona (= Polish grammar explained in German) by Maciej Gutthäter-Dobracki, a translator, lexicographer, teacher and lawyer, is an extensive, 566-page-long, study of Polish grammar containing lots of rules, exceptions and commentaries on grammatical phenomena in Polish. Dobracki wrote his work as a more advanced course in Polish grammar, which covered all branches of grammar, namely orthography (with elements of phonetics and correct spelling), prosody, etymology (currently, morphology with elements of word formation), and syntax. The author’s intention was to teach sophisticated Polish and therefore his dry grammatical lectures are illustrated with examples from Polish literature and use no colloquial language or common expressions.
Like Justus Georg Schottel, he introduced terminology in national languages (Polish and German) to his textbook, although he did not fully resign from the Latin grammatical terminology as he mentions it aside Polish and German terms. Dobracki’s Gramatyka polska…, although appreciated by the contemporary authors of textbooks of Polish, did not gain popularity and was not republished. This could have been a consequence of the reader being overburdened with numerous rules, exceptions and commentaries, as well as references and comparisons to Latin grammar.
Go to grammarTwo extensive articles by Jan Nepomucen Kamiński Czy nasz język jest filozoficzny? (= Is our language a philosophical one?) and Wywód filozoficzności naszego języka (= An argument on the philosophical nature of our language) were included in two first volumes of Haliczanin, a literary quarterly published in Lviv, in 1830. These are theoretical, philosophical discussions on language, which represent the 19th-century inspired linguistics. Both are written in an elevated intricate style and the discussions are conducted in accordance with deductionism, which is underlain by unclear and false premises that lead to untrue judgments on selected words.
The author focuses on discussing the etymology and meaning of randomly juxtaposed words, often his own neologisms, based on significant, in his opinion, wyrobek (a root), that is combinations of sounds: je, ju, ja and się, referring to the existence, being, the human I, being “evidence of the highest philosophical nature of language.” For instance, the following are words containing wyrobek je, the most important one as it occurs in the verb jest (is): istota (being) (spelled also with reference to the form jest as jestota), istność, iściwość, istliwość, jestestwo, istnieć, iścieć, iściwy, isty, jąć, po-jąć, po-jętliwy, po-jętny, po-jemliwy, jemny, po-jemny, po-jętliwość, po-jętność, je-dno, w-idno, w-jedno, w-jé (something in-je), po-w-je, w-jedza (knowledge), and the use of a hyphen in the spelling of some of them is supposed to highlight the significant wyrobek.
Kamiński associates the philosophical nature of Polish not only with the pronunciation of sounds, their combinations or entire words but also with the graphic representation of individual letters, assigning meanings to their shapes. Meanings determined based on free associations are ascribed also to selected morphological categories, e.g. the system of grammatical cases. Kamiński is interested also in the issues falling into the scope of the theory of literature and therefore he proposes a redefinition, based on his own philosophical approach, of terms such as poezja (poetry), proza (prose), rym (a rhyme), miara (a measure).
Go to grammarGramatyka współczesnej polszczyzny kulturalnej (= Grammar of the contemporary cultural Polish) (1st edition: 1939), as intended by its author, Zenon Klemensiewicz, was supposed to be a popular science publication addressed to non-professionals. The synthetic, merely 180-page-long, work was divided into the following chapters: Nauka o głosce (Sound science) (phonetics and phonology), Nauka o wyrazie (Word science) (morphology: word formation and inflection as well as semantics and etymology), and Nauka o zdaniu (Sentence science) (syntax in classical terms). Each of them is composed of paragraphs and ends with supplementary bibliography. The author does not use specialised terminology, makes his lecture clearer by illustrating it with numerous tables, and gives attention to proper language use.
The publication enjoyed high popularity, it was reprinted in 1946, and released twice in 1947. In 1952, it was retitled: Podstawowe wiadomości z gramatyki języka polskiego (Rudiments of Polish grammar) and published as an academic textbook. There were as many as 15 editions of this version, also after the author’s death. The last one was released in 2001.
Go to grammarGrammatyka dla szkół narodowych (= Grammar for national schools) by Onufry Kopczyński has been an unprecedented work in the history of the Polish grammatical thought since the 15th c. Although it is not the first Polish grammar written in Polish (Walenty Szylarski was earlier), it is the 18th-century study by the Piarist that has exerted the greatest influence on the grammatical terminology applied to this day. The publication of the school grammar written by the order of the Commission of National Education was spread over years and the work itself was divided into sections corresponding to the successive levels of language education of pupils (grammar for the 1st, 2nd and 3rd class, respectively). An integral element of the text is the so-called notes for teachers and Układ grammatyki dla szkół narodowych z dzieła skończonego wyciągniony (= A system of grammar for national schools drawn from a complete work), which is a summary, released in 1785.
The arrangement of the content presented in the initial three parts of the textbook was subordinated to its educational goal rather than (like e.g. in the so-called posthumous grammar book by Kopczyński) to individual language subsystems. Therefore, the grammarian, who also had extensive teaching experience, first discussed introductory issues and then developed them in textbooks for older classes. It is also worth emphasising that the main object of the description is Polish and Kopczyński’s work is treated as a groundbreaking textbook of Polish; the description provided there is in fact comparative since Polish grammar is continuously compared to the Latin one.
Go to grammarThe 1790 edition of Johann Christian Krumbholz’s work is composed of his two books published earlier, namely Kurzgefasste und deutliche Deutsch-Polnische Grammatik (= A short and concise German-Polish grammar) and Deutsch-Polnisches Tirocinium (= A German-Polish phrasebook). They were both released anonymously in 1775. The first book comprises German-Polish grammar and a Polish-German dictionary. The original dictionary was published in Bojanowo probably as early as in 1769 and was addressed to the local school pupils. The original grammar, in turn, was released ca. 1770. The latter textbook, Tirocinium…, published in Wrocław in 1775, is grammatical exercises and a hundred school phrases drawn from Latin grammar and translated into Polish with vocabulary and grammatical formulas explained. The first joint edition of both textbooks comes from 1783. That and successive editions, in accordance with the author’s intention, were used and printed together and under his name. All joint editions of Kurzgefasste und deutliche Deutsch-Polnische Grammatik and Deutsch-Polnisches Tirocinium were published by Wilhelm Bogumił Korn in Wrocław and republished in 1783, 1790, 1794, and 1797. In the relevant literature, Krumbholz’s work is usually mentioned under a shortened, given its content, title Kurzgefasste und deutliche Deutsch-Polnische Grammatik. It implies that it is only a grammatical study, while in fact it contains, apart from grammar, a dictionary and exercises with phrases – three originally separate textbooks merged into one.
Go to grammarGramatyka języka polskiego (= Polish Grammar) by Adam Antoni Kryński of 1897 may not be a revolutionary work but it is undoubtedly a groundbreaking one. It is one of the first textbooks where the historical-comparative method was employed and one of the last textbooks that are chiefly practical. In his work, the author focuses on three main branches. These are: I. Głosownia (Phonetics and phonology), II. Fleksja, czyli nauka o odmianach (Inflection, or the science of conjugation and declension), III. Pisownia (Spelling). An index of the explained words can be found at the end of the study.
The educational character of the work as well as the accessible and comprehensible form of the description imply that the textbook was intended mainly for youth from the very beginning. In Przedmowa (Preface) to the second edition of 1900, the author indicates that the addressee is more mature youth, perhaps university students. The textbook went down in history as a very good one, which thoroughly describes mainly inflection in the Polish language of the late 19th c. and its history. In many cases, diachronic information prevailes over synchronic one.
Kryński’s textbook closes the “grammar writing” period in the history of the Polish linguistic thought. The contemporary Polish linguistics can be said to have begun at that time. Although the work does not represent descriptive or historical linguistics yet, is constitutes the basis for the studies of researchers such as Jan Rozwadowski, Jan Łoś, and Stanisław Szober.
Go to grammarУчебник польскаго языка. Przewodnik do praktycznej nauki języka polskiego dla Rossyan (= A guide to practical learning of Polish for Russians) by Tomasz Kurhanowicz was addressed to those who could already speak Polish. It was, in today’s terms, a textbook for advanced learners. It is composed of three major sections: the first one with the title in Russian Азбука польская разделенная на буквы гласныя и согласныя (= The Polish alphabet divided into vowels and consonants), the second one being a selection of texts describing the history of Poland (Wybrane podania kronikarskie dla wprawy do czytania po polsku (= Selected chronicle tales for developing the skill of reading in Polish)), and the third one demonstrating the output of Polish poets from the Renaissance to the 19th century (Przykłady poezji (= Examples of poetry)). Grammatical information is provided in part one, often as a comment on longer statements in Polish.
In order to familiarise the Russian recipient with the rules of Polish grammar, Kurhanowicz points to the common features of both languages on the one hand (e.g. the number of cases, endings of plural adjectives, with the exception of nominative, accusative and instrumental -emi), and to differences between them on the other hand (e.g. the scope of usage of the regular inflection forms of adjectives: in Russian этотъ человек добр, but in Polish – ten człowiek jest dobry (it is a good man), the use of personal pronouns with verbs: in Russian я был, in Polish – byłem (I was), the verb ending indicating the person or the ablative case: in Russian coзданный Богом – stworzone od Boga (created by God)).
The selection of texts incorporated in the guide (including translations and explanations of difficult words into Russian, e.g. równość (equality) or Rzeczypospolita (Commonwealth)) serve the purpose of both language skills training and familiarisation with the Polish history, literature and culture.
Go to grammarWegweiser zur Polnischen vnd Deutschen Sprache... (= A guide to Polish and German), written by a Polish and German preacher in St. Christopher church in Wrocław and rector of the Polish School in Wrocław, is made of 124 unnumbered leaves (248 pages) in total. Michael Kuschius’s work is first of all an alphabetical German-Polish-Latin dictionary supplemented with a merely 19-page-long Polish grammar book. The dictionary part is a text in three columns and covers ca. 5,500–5,700 alphabetically ordered entries lacking any grammatical information or labels. Their source language is German. For many entries, the author provides two, three, or even four equivalents in Polish. The publication of a dictionary with an alphabetical order of entries was a groundbreaking moment in the Silesian lexicography and it was Kuschius that initiated and implemented the project. The grammatical section of Wegweiser… is to a large extent declension and conjugation patterns with no commentary. Occasional trite grammatical information can be found.
As has been determined to date, there was only one edition of Wegweiser… It was supposed to be used chiefly in the school where the author of the study held the function of rector.
Go to grammarGramatyka polska (= Polish grammar) by Jan Łoś is in fact the first historical grammar of Polish, richly illustrated with examples from relics. It was addressed to students, secondary school teachers, enthusiasts of Polish, representatives of the intelligentsia. Gramatyka polska is composed of three parts released at intervals: I. Głosownia historyczna (Historical phonetics and phonology), II. Słowotwórstwo (Word formation) and III. Odmiennia (fleksja) historyczna (Historical inflection). There is Słowo wstępne (Preface) and a list of abbreviations at the beginning and an index of Polish words at the end of each of them. Each section is divided into chapters. The author commented on some difficult issues that were insufficiently characterised or were studied only then, and provided the latest findings of scholars. For instance, in the case of verb aspect, he went back to the first references to it in the 16th-century grammar books and then presented the standpoints of successive grammarians until the study by Sigurd Agrell of the early 20th c. and Stanisław Szober of 1923.
Gramatyka polska was appreciated by linguists for its subject matter and abundance of examples excerpted from relics, which illustrate individual findings of the author.
Łoś intended to release also the fourth part of Gramatyka polska, syntax, but his plans failed due to his death. However, the scholar left his study of syntax in Gramatyka języka polskiego (= Grammar of Polish), written in collaboration with Tytus Benni, Kazimierz Nitsch, Jan Rozwadowski, and Henryk Ułaszyn in 1923, and the discussion on historical syntax in Krótka gramatyka historyczna języka polskiego (= A short historical grammar of Polish) of 1927.
Go to grammarGrammatica seu institutio Polonicae linguae in qua etymologia, syntaxis & reliqae partes omnes exacte tractantur; in usum exterorum edita (=Polish grammar or rules, where etymology, syntax, and other elements are thoroughly discussed; published for foreigners) was released in Georgius Forster’s publishing house in 1649. Its author, Franciscus à Mesgnien Meninski, came from Lorraine.
The principal text of the treaty is divided into nine chapters: De Litteris earumque pronuntiatione (On letters and their pronunciation), De Nomine (On the noun), De Pronomine (On the pronoun), De Verbo (On the verb), De Participio (On the participle), De Adverbio (On the adverb), De Praepositione (On the preposition), De Coniunctione (On the conjunction), De Interiectione (On the interjection), De Syntaxi (On syntax). The system of grammatical cases (7) described in the grammar book responds, which should be considered the author’s achievement, to the needs of the Polish inflectional system. Meninski divides words in accordance with the Latin model (like Pierre Statorius-Stojeński before him and Sigismund Kotzer after him) into eight parts of speech. However, he does not provide their definitions and their names can be inferred only from the titles of individual sections of the treaty. In the inflection of the noun and the verb, he mentions three patterns for each and illustrates them with numerous examples. Against the earlier Gdańsk grammar books, this work stands out by a special chapter dedicated to syntax. The discussion on syntax begins with presenting ways of addressing the interlocutor(s), including the use of titles.
The contemporary researchers mention Meninski’s grammar among the best ones.
Go to grammarEnchiridion Polonicum oder Polnisches Hand=Buch. Enchiridion Polonicum lub Podręcznik języka polskiego (= Enchiridion Polonicum or a textbook of Polish) by Jan Moneta, a Lutheran preacher and translator, is an over 400-page-long study comprising several sections constituting a full course in Polish. They include: a short Polish grammar, a few useful phrases, Polish proverbs explained in German, a list of German and Polish words (in fact, a German-Polish dictionary with entries in an alphabetical order), a form with titles, a template of letters, and merchant dialogues.
Published in Gdańsk, Enchiridion… enjoyed high popularity not only there but also in Toruń, Warsaw, Leszno, Jelena Góra, Leipzig and, in the second half of the 18th c., even in the faraway Wrocław, where Daniel Vogel, a Wrocław teacher in Maria Magdalena Gymnasium, elaborated it anew. Beginning from its fifth edition of 1786, Moneta’s textbook was released under a changed title Polnische Grammatik (= Polish grammar). It was used in schools in Pomerania and Silesia until as late as the early 19th century. It was considered to be the best course in Polish for nearly 100 years.
Go to grammarPolnisches Lesebuch, Lexikon und Sprachlehre für die ersten Anfänger (= A Polish storybook, lexicon and grammar for beginners) by Krzysztof Celestyn Mrongowiusz is composed of three independent parts: a storybook (titled: Polnisches Lesebuch), a dictionary (Kleines Polnisches Handwörterbuch), and a grammar book (Kurzgefaßte Polnische Sprachlehre für Deutsche). In the long title of his work, Mrongowiusz argues that it is addressed to both learners of Polish and those who wish to learn or master German. The content of the study does not, however, confirm this declaration: the analysis has shown that it is dedicated to Germans learning Polish. In the first of 12 chapters of Polnische Sprachlehre…, titled Von den Buchstaben und ihrem Laute (On letters and their sounds), Mrongowiusz shares his comments on Polish spelling and phonetics with the reader, in chapter two, titled Classification…, he enumerates parts of speech, which are discussed in successive chapters (III–XII).
Polnische Sprachlehre… is a reliable and, as for the end of the 18th c., a relatively modern compendium of the knowledge of the Polish language. Mrongowiusz systematises and complements the earlier theories, polemicising with some of them.
Go to grammarJózef Mroziński was a well-educated extremely talented soldier. After one of the military campaigns in which he took part, he wrote a text entitled Oblężenie i obrona Saragossy, w latach 1808 i 1809, ze względem szczególniejszym na czynności korpusu polskiego (= The siege and defence of Saragossa in 1808 and 1809 with a particular focus on the operations of the Polish Corps), which was published in 1819. Mroziński’s work was evaluated positively by the editor of Pamiętnik Warszawski (Warsaw Diary), Feliks Bentkowski, and since its language was far from perfect, Bentkowski communicated his critical remarks to the author and thus inspired him to work on his Polish and grammar.
Mroziński took up the study of Polish grammar books. As he did not find answers to the questions that bothered him there, he reached for grammar books of other European languages. The outcome of the works was the publication of Pierwsze zasady grammatyki języka polskiego (= The first rules of Polish grammar) in 1822. This textbook differed from earlier studies. The author did not want to learn inflectional patterns, he wished to explore the phenomena present in the language based on observations of its sound layer and inflection. He tried to discern dependencies between alternations occurring in words and their inflection. For the first time, he pointed to the difference between a letter and a sound.
His innovative approach to the subject was criticised by the linguists of that time. Mroziński responded to the critical opinion in 1824 writing Odpowiedź na umieszczoną w Gazecie Literackiej recenzję dzieła pod tytułem: Pierwsze zasady gramatyki języka polskiego (= A response to the review of the study titled “The first rules of Polish grammar” published in Gazeta Literacka (Literary Gazette)). The response was almost 300-page-long, while Zasady was nearly 100-page-long. After the publication of Pierwsze zasady gramatyki, and in particular Odpowiedź na recenzję…, he was acclaimed an authority. Although he was invited to participate in the works of the commission for orthography by Towarzystwo Warszawskie Przyjaciół Nauk (Warsaw Society of the Friends of Science), his ideas were not understood.
It was not until decades later that the precursory works by Mroziński were truly recognised by linguists. His scientific thought was referred to by Jan Niecisław Baudouin de Courtenay, a precursor of structural linguistics. Roman Jakobson called Mroziński “the general linguist”.
Go to grammarThe over 400-page-long work by Carl Friedrich Müller, Vollständige, deutliche und nach Art der Lateinischen Grammatic des Herrn Professor Langens, eingerichtete Pohlnische Grammatica (= A complete clear Polish grammar modelled on Professor Langen’s Latin grammar), a teacher of Polish in Królewiec gymnasium, is an extensive study of Polish grammar characterised by abundance of content. Basically, the study is made of two sections: orthography and grammar. The discussion on orthography, which has merely 12 pages, provides the author's comments on the pronunciation of selected sounds, consonant clusters, at times syllables. He comments in particular on the sounds or sound clusters that distinguish Polish from other languages. The grammatical section is divided into five parts: I. name, II. verb, III. particles, IV. syntax, V. prosody.
Müller’s grammar book is a study which, apart from the dry matter of Polish grammar, contains many trivia concerning language behaviours of Poles, changes occurring in Polish, as well as diatopic and diastratic variations of Polish. The information is incorporated in the description of grammatical issues rather than gathered in one place. Müller’s work was not republished, which might evidence its lack of popularity among recipients. The detailed description, saturation with rules and exceptions, and application of grammatical terminology obviously did not facilitate its reception.
Go to grammarOrtografija polska (= Polish orthography) by Stanisław Murzynowski is a short dissertation on orthography of four or five pages, depending on the edition. It is placed at the beginning of the Protestant translation of the New Testament published in parts in Królewiec in the period 1551–1553. This work is made of three sections: introduction, a list of letters, and explanations with examples and comments on the relation between spelling and pronunciation. Murzynowski introduced 51 graphemes corresponding to Polish sounds. He provided separate markings of soft and hard consonants, e.g. labials: [b] and [b’], [p] and [p’], [w] and [w’], which were placed together in Jan Seklucjan’s primer (to which he obviously referred) signalising only the necessity to mark soft variants. He did not distinguish soft velars [k’] and [g’] separately, yet the examples illustrating the pronunciation of [g] included sługa (a servant), jego (his) with [g] and zginął (he was killed), nogi (legs) with [g’]. He treated also [h] and [x] as one but there are no errors in print as regards the spelling with h. Murzynowski tried to systematise the spelling of dorsal consonants [ś], [ź], [ć]. He even introduced a new character ɀ derived from Latin for the sound [ź] and used it also in the digraph dɀ, and employed s with two overdots and ċ, i.e. c with an overdot to mark [ś] and [ć], respectively, in the first edition. This enabled him to clearly distinguish sounds [ż] and [ź], [ś] and [š] as well as [ć] and [č]. Murzynowski proposed also a method of marking clear and slanting vowels differing from that applied in most prints. In Ortografija…, he adopted the convention of acute accent for slanting rather than clear vowels [a], [e], [o]. He justified it with the fact that slanting vowels were less frequent. Murzynowski used also the letter j to mark non-syllabic [i].
Murzynowski’s orthography book has some features of a humanistic study. The translator introduces the terms litery || figury (letters || figures) instead of the German words buchstaby || buksztaby, preserves the term punctowany (accented). The word wokalisz (a vowel) is an interesting term which, according to the author, comprised only oral vowels: a, e, i, o, u, y (choć z punktem, choć przez punktu pisane (written either with or without an accent)). He probably classified nasal vowels as accented vowels.
Go to grammarTraktat o ortografii polskiej (= Treaty on Polish orthography) by Jakub Parkosz, written circa 1440, is known from its later copy (of 1460 or 1470). It was printed for the first time in 1830. It is the first study dedicated entirely to the issues of Polish spelling. The text is divided into two parts: a foreword (by another author) and the proper treaty. The proper treaty is composed of a Latin text with Polish examples and the Polish rhyming alphabet. Parkosz’s propositions are based on the Latin alphabet, which is common in Poland. The source of inspiration was Jan Hus’s orthography book. The author of the treaty adopted a rule that one character should correspond to one sound. For instance, he suggested that long vowels be distinguished from short ones by doubling letters (e.g. long [ā] as aa), soft consonants from hard ones with the shape of letters (e.g. [b’] as b with a rounded bowl, [b] as b with a square bowl).
Although Parkosz’s proposals have never been applied in practice, the relic is an extremely valuable source of knowledge of the 15th-century Polish language (e.g. of the Old Polish vowel length, pronunciation of nasal vowels, or Lesser Polish pronunciation of the consonant cluster chv- as f-). The treaty was familiar to the author of first printed Polish orthography book, Stanisław Zaborowski, who also referred to it.
Go to grammarThe 128-leaf-long work titled Schlüssel zur Polnischen und Teutschen Sprach (= The key to Polish and German) by Jeremias Roter, a teacher of Polish in Wrocław and a deacon in Powidzko, is consistent with the trend of combining various branches of the knowledge of language in one textbook, which prevailed until the mid-17th c. Such an integration was normally accompanied by the dominance of one branch, and in the case of Schlüssel…, the main content of the textbook is Polish grammar. It is supplemented with phrases, prayers, templates of letters, names of days of the week, months, seasons of the year, and church holidays, which adds a practical character to Roter’s textbook. The principal part of Schlüssel…, grammar, is composed of three sections: orthography, etymology and syntax. The last, fourth, section of the work is entitled Phraseologia (Phraseology) and presents forms of address, example questions and answers needed to communicate at the market, templates of letters, and expressions related to time. The author used, without indicating the source, grammar books by his two predecessors: Nicolaus Volckmar and Pierre Statorius-Stojeński.
Schlüssel… is the first grammar book of Polish in Silesia. Roter applies there polonised Latin terminology, which was an unquestionable progress in the early 17th c. There were several editions of the work (the last one in 1706), apart from Wrocław also in Poznań and Gdańsk, which undoubtedly proves its popularity. The author dedicated his textbook to Germans learning Polish and Poles learning German. He substantiates the need to publish Schlüssel… with the necessity to speak Polish in Silesia.
Go to grammarThe orthographic studies by Jan Seklucjan were included in catechism books (1547, 1549: Krótka a prosta nauka czytania i pisania języka polskiego (= A short and simple instruction on reading and writing in Polish)), had a practical character, and were modelled on analogous German and Czech works. The applied terminology is a polonised version of German terms: buchstab from German Buchstabe (a letter, sound, font), it can be usually found in the plural form: buchsztaby || buksztaby, similarly to głośniki and nieme – terms for vowels and consonants, respectively, being partial calques of the corresponding German words, namely Lautbuchstaben (Cf. Laut (a voice, sound)) and Stumme Buchstaben, stummen Buchstaben (Cf. stumm (dumb)). In the catechism book of 1447, Seklucjan enumerated as many as 11 vowels (głośniki), namely: a, â, ą, e, ę, i, o, u, ü, w, y, which included also w and – useless in Polish – â, ü.
A graphic distinction of clear and slanting vowels was important for Seklucjan. Clear vowels [a], [e], [o] were to be accented, whereas slanting ones were not. This proposition is partly convergent with the Cracow convention but extended not only onto clear [a] but also onto other vowels which occurred alongside slanting ones, i.e. [e] and [o]. However, the author does not comply with the rule in the catechism book. He distinguishes [ę] and [ǫ], yet the scope of their usage sometimes differs from the today’s one. The spelling of [i] and [y] and the examples provided in the orthography book do not raise any doubts, but in print, like in the manuscript tradition, sounds [i] and [y] are not sufficiently distinguished, the spelling does not comply with any rule. There are also no examples of non-syllabic i in Nauka czytania. As regards the consonant system, the spelling of consonant series [š], [s], [ś] and [ž], [z], as well as [c], [č] in the catechism book itself is the most interesting. The spelling of the series [š], [s], [ś] is not stabilised, letters are multifunctional, some spellings reveal Masurian influences in the author’s pronunciation. J. Seklucjan distinguishes voiced [γ] and unvoiced [x] although he does not mention the latter sound in his orthography book. As a general rule, he resigns from describing soft consonants.
Go to grammarPierre Statorius-Stojeński, a French settled in Poland, a co-author of the Brest Bible, wrote the first Polish grammar Polonicae grammatices institutio. In eorum gratiam, qui eius linguae elegantiam cito & facile addiscere cupiunt (= A lecture on Polish grammar. For the use of those who wish to learn the refined language quickly and easily), published in Maciej Wirzbięta Royal Printing House in Cracow in 1568. It is written in Latin, modelled on Latin textbooks and grammatical categories, and dedicated to foreigners residing in Poland. Its practical purpose makes the author pay attention to specific issues without an extensive theoretical foundation for them yet with the use of empirical data derived from colloquial Polish and quotations from written sources, mainly from the piece by Mikołaj Rej Wizerunk własny żywota człowieka poczciwego (= The Image of a Good Man’s Life). The textbook contains information about: 1) pronunciation of sounds (called letters) and their combinations, 2) parts of speech, such as nouns (and adjectives), pronouns, verbs and participles, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions and interjections. These are sections devoted chiefly to phonetics and inflection with some comments on word formation and lexis. Specific solutions are adopted from the Latin model, e.g. the division into three declensions (masculine, feminine and neuter), six inflectional cases, two numbers (singular and plural). The inability to divide a word into the inflection stem and the ending results in identification of ca. 150 noun paradigms. Stojeński proves to be a good observer as he manages to distinguish, with few errors, seven conjugations based on present tense endings: I. -uję (żałuję (I regret)), II. -yję (ryję (I engrave)), III. -eję (leję (I pour)), IV. -oję (stoję, roję się (I stand, I swarm)), V. -ę after a consonant (piszę (I write)), VI. -am (szukam, sypiam (I seek, I sleep)) and VII. -em (rozumiem (I understand)).
Go to grammarGrammatica Polono-Italica abo sposob łacny nauczenia się włoskiego języka… (= Polish-Italian grammar or how to learn Italian easily…) by Adam Styla is a textbook of Italian written in Polish. The author occasionally puts single sentences in Latin. Examples are provided in Latin with Polish equivalents. The textbook is made of three principal sections: the first one concerns orthography and phonetics, the second, which is the most extensive, covers parts of speech, and the third discusses syntax. The arrangement of grammar reminds classical textbooks (e.g. by Donat), the model of which is followed by Styla. He begins his lecture with the most general content and continues with more detailed issues. The textbook is complemented with numerous warnings, which are supposed to draw the reader’s attention to the most common errors. Styla set himself the goal of writing a study which would make learning Italian easier to Poles, of making its content, unlike in older works, as comprehensible and accessible as possible. He assumed that his work would enable the readers to learn Italian by themselves, without a teacher’s help. Styla should be included in the group of pioneers of the Polish grammatical thought. He explained Italian grammar thoroughly in his mother tongue applying the 16th-century terminology when it was commonly believed that only Latin could serve as the language of science. He uses Latin names of the discussed grammatical terms but he usually provides also their Polish equivalents and defines them.
Go to grammarStanisław Szober, a linguist and teacher, wrote many grammar books, most of which were intended for primary school and gymnasium pupils. He also published three different grammar books, albeit under the same title Gramatyki języka polskiego (= Polish grammar books). The first edition was released in parts in the period 1914–1916 and was addressed mainly to secondary school teachers. The second one was published in 1923 as a university textbook. The third, completely revised and uncompleted, was to be an academic textbook and a summa of the knowledge of the contemporary Polish language. Two out of four planned volumes of the last Gramatyka... were published in 1931.
The object of the analysis and description in Gramatyka… of 1923 is the literary Polish language. The explanations related to the history of language were limited to the issues which might have been useful for comprehending the facts from the contemporary Polish language and served the purpose of complementing the psychological interpretation. Gramatyka… is composed of the following sections: Nauka o głoskach (Sound science), Nauka o znaczeniu wyrazów (Word meaning science), Nauka o budowie wyrazów (Morphology science), Nauka o odmianie wyrazów (Word inflection science), Nauka o zdaniu (Sentence science).
It was an independent, modern and well-thought university textbook comprehensively covering the knowledge of the contemporary literary Polish language. Its value and popularity is evidenced by the fact that the third edition of the textbook compiled by Witold Doroszewski, Szober’s student, was republished as many as nine times until 1971.
Go to grammarPublished in 1770, Początki nauk dla narodowej młodzieży, to jest Grammatyka języka polskiego ucząca, a tym samym pojęcie obcych języków, jako łacińskiego, francuskiego, włoskiego i innych ułatwiająca (= Beginnings of education for the Polish youth, or a grammar book teaching Polish and thus facilitating the comprehension of foreign languages, such as Latin, French, Italian and more) was a revised (slightly shorter) version of a more extensive grammar book prepared by Walenty Szylarski at the request of Towarzystwo Literatów w Polszcze Ustanowionego dla Wydawania Książek Najlepszych i Najbardziej Użytecznych (The Society of Literary Men Established in Poland for Publishing the Best and the Most Useful Books). The work is divided into four sections: I. Ortografia (Orthography), II. Etymologia (Etymology), III. Syntaxis (Syntax), IV. Prosodia (Prosody). It is preceded by Wstęp do gramatyki (Introduction to grammar) and a preface (Do czytelnika (To the reader)). The primary lecture is accompanied by comments (the author calls them words of caution). The grammatical description of Polish that emerges from Początki… does not deviate from the descriptions known from earlier grammar books in terms of general rules. The author is given credit for breaking with the practice of writing Polish grammar books in foreign languages, selecting the mother tongue as a tool of description, and addressing it to the Polish youth. With his grammar book, Szylarski joined the stream of the Enlightenment discussion on the Polish language and its role in the life of the society. In the introduction and lecture on grammar, he refers to the idea of common grammar by juxtaposing general rules with the linguistic convention. Szylarski’s grammar book is also a valuable source of knowledge of the Polish language of the 2nd half of the 18th c. and the theoretical standard applicable at that time.
Go to grammarCompendium linguae Polonicae in gratiam iuventutis Dantiscanae collectum (= A compendium of Polish for Gdańsk youth) by Nicolaus Volckmar is the first Gdańsk Polish grammar book the editio princeps of which was released in the city lying on the river Motława in 1594. The researchers of the history of the Polish language considered the study derivative and dependent on Polonicae grammatices institutio (= Lecture on Polish grammar) by Pierre Statorius-Stojeński. However, these opinions were revised over time. Although Volckmar took over the general arrangement of the material and numerous examples from his predecessor, he was not uncritical in doing so and selected some of the examples illustrating the discussed phenomena by himself, in particular where his language standard did not overlap Stojeński’s one.
Compendium… can be divided into two principal sections: one concerning orthography and partly phonetics and the other one discussing the generally defined word science (parts of speech, inflection and word formation). Nevertheless, the absence of a separate chapter on syntax is striking. Hence, the division is very close to the arrangement of the lecture on grammar adopted in popular textbooks of Latin signed with the name Aelius Donatus. This is probably the model from which Volckmar drew the idea to present his lecture in the form of questions and answers, which are characteristic mainly of Ars Minor. This teaching style is known also from catechism books, which might have additionally influenced the Gdańsk teacher.
Volckmar distinguishes three declensions of nouns and, guided by Latin patterns, he enumerates eight grammatical cases. Depending on the present tense indicative first person ending, he divides verbs into three conjugations: -am (e.g. czytam (I read)), -ę (e.g. proszę (I ask)) and -iem (e.g. rozumiem (I understand)).
Volckmar’s textbook arose from practical needs of the multicultural Gdańsk, the citizens of which were politically and economically tied with the Commonwealth, a large part of which was inhabited by speakers of Polish. Therefore, as a general rule, the author of Compendium… avoids any theoretical discussions and focuses on ensuring the greatest possible clarity and functionality of the textbook. However, he makes an interesting comment in the preface, where he quite explicitly divides language into two parts: vocabulary and grammar. His new textbook was to serve the purpose of mastering the latter component.
Go to grammarThe work Compendiosa linguae Polonicae institutio in gratiam exterorum, qui recte ac facile linguam Polonicam addiscere cupiunt (= A concise lecture on Polish grammar for foreigners who wish to learn Polish properly and easily) by Jan Karol Woyna, released in Latin in Gdańsk in 1690, is the first (preserved) Polish grammar written by a Pole. The author sets himself the goal to create a textbook facilitating the process of learning Polish by foreigners and calls his study “książeczka niewielkich rozmiarów, ale wielkiej użyteczności” (a book of small size but great usefulness). What deserves noting is the fact that Woyna’s grammar book does not rely much on the works by his predecessors: Pierre Statorius-Stojeński, Jeremias Roter, Nicolaus Volckmar, Franciscus à Mesgnien Meninski, Sigismund Kotzer. At the end of the 17th c., the study was the basic textbook of Polish in the Academic Gymnasium Danzig. The arrangement of content is traditional and very clear. The principal part of the textbook was divided into three sections titled Orthographia (Orthography), Etymologia (Etymology ) and Syntaxis (Syntax), which were supplemented with Onomasticum and grammar tables. Clear classifications and abundance of examples are unquestionable advantages of Woyna’s grammar book. It must be also added that the starting point for the discussions and formulation of rules in the analysed work is Latin, which serves as the basis for explaining individual language phenomena: by analogy or through presentation and emphasis of differences. There are occasional references to German. It should be noted that there is absolutely no Polish grammatical terminology, which was present even in earlier works.
Go to grammarOrtographia seu modus recte scribendi et legendi Polonicum idioma quam utilissimus (= Orthography, or the most useful method of writing and reading in Polish correctly) by Stanisław Zaborowski comes into existence when printing houses begin to release books in Polish. Its publication was justified with the need to standardise the disorderly and chaotic orthography. Zaborowski was familiar with the Jakub Parkosz’s work, references to it are noticeable in the structure and content of the study. Contrary to his predecessor, like Jan Hus, he ascribed the function of differentiating the phonematic value of letters to diacritics. They served the purpose of distinguishing, in writing, slanting vowels from clear ones, nasal vowels from oral ones, [y] from [i], soft vowels from hard ones, rustling consonants from hissing ones, [ł] from [l], and [ř] from [r] (e.g. he suggested that [ć] be written as c̈, c̄̇, c̄, [č] as ċ). The work is a valuable source of knowledge of the Polish language of the early 16th century. The orthography proposed by Zaborowski was original, mature, based on uniform criteria, and it covered the basic oppositions of Polish sounds. However, in comparison to the spelling used at that time, it was too revolutionary. What Polish orthography owes to Zaborowski is the differentiation of clear vowels from narrow ones by means of diacritics, a stroke in ł, an overdot in ż, an acute accent to mark soft consonants. The standardisation of Polish spelling in the 16th century is credited to printers.
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