Universität zu Köln

Bunčić, Daniel ORCID: 0000-0002-1090-8907 (2023). On the etymology of diacritics in general and the origin of the Czech diacritics in particular. Slavia: Časopis pro slovanskou filologii, 92 (4). pp. 385-424. CEEOL. ISSN 0037-6736

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Abstract

This paper demonstrates that diacritics have their own etymologies, just like words. They are created according to certain mechanisms (based on iconicity, from letters, from deletion marks, or from disam¬bigu¬a¬tion marks), and when they are borrowed from one language to another, both their form and their function stay the same or change according to general rules and as necessitated by the concrete borrowing situation. However, the authors of hypotheses about the origin of the Czech diacritics do not take this into account. There¬fore, all the hypotheses put forward so far about possible sources of the dot (the later háček) and the stroke (čárka) are evaluated anew (viz., marks in earlier Czech texts, the i tittle, Hebrew, Glagolitic, the Greek acute, the Latin apex, and Old Irish). It turns out that the seemingly most far-fetched idea is by far the most plausible: The Czech diacritics were borrowed from Old Irish.

Item Type:	Journal Article
Creators:	Creators Email ORCID ORCID Put Code Bunčić, Daniel daniel.buncic@uni-koeln.de orcid.org/0000-0002-1090-8907 180993930
URN:	urn:nbn:de:hbz:38-755338
DOI:	10.58377/slav.2023.4.01
Journal or Publication Title:	Slavia: Časopis pro slovanskou filologii
Volume:	92
Number:	4
Page Range:	pp. 385-424
Date:	2023
Publisher:	CEEOL
ISSN:	0037-6736
Language:	English
Faculty:	Faculty of Arts and Humanities
Divisions:	Faculty of Arts and Humanities > Fächergruppe 5: Moderne Sprachen und Kulturen > Slavisches Institut
Subjects:	Language, Linguistics Other languages
Uncontrolled Keywords:	Keywords Language graphematics; orthography; Jan Hus; De Orthographia Bohemica; háček; caron; čárka; acute accent; apex; overdot; Old Irish; Glagolitic; Hebrew English
Related URLs:	Publication
Refereed:	Yes
URI:	http://kups.ub.uni-koeln.de/id/eprint/75533