History of the Slovak language
[1] According to this theory, Slovak is the remnant of the Proto-Slavic language spoken in the Middle Danube region before the great migration of the Slavs.
This hypothesis is based on Nestor's Primary Chronicle and was supported by Matej Bel and several notable members of the movement, like Pavel Jozef Šafárik, Anton Bernolák and Ľudovít Štúr.
Most modern scholars oppose the opinion about the Slavic homeland being in the Middle Danube, but the theory was revived in the 20th century by the Russian linguist Oleg Trubachyov.
[2] The opinion about the late integration is not compliant with the current state of knowledge about the development of Slovak dialects from Proto-Slavic.
Trávníček explained unique features of Central Slovak dialects by later differentiation, Vážný, by expansion from the south.
[3] Trávníček's attempt to explain the origin of Slovak from Proto-Czech-Slovak is now thought to be erroneous, and the creator of the theory abandoned it already after World War II.
[5] Rudolf Krajčovič suggests three phases of development:[6] This theory was proposed by a Slovak linguist Martin Pukanec.
Slovak preserved a difference between dz/z (from Proto-Slavic */dj/ */gtj/), i.e. medźa (medza, a boundary), vítäź (víťaz, an elite warrior, a winner) whereas both phonemes were transformed to ź in old Czech and dź in old Polish.
The different process of contraction oje → oe → ô probably resulted also to the characteristic neuter adjective ending -ô (i.e. dobrô vs. dobré).
[18] The partial preservation of g in the phonetic system allowed Slovak to adopt g in later loanwords, for example gombík (a button).
[19] Dual forms were recorded mostly in documents from Western and partially from Central Slovakia, but their usage in the 15th–16th centuries was limited to words that naturally come in pairs (ears, eyes, etc.)
The vocative merged with the nominative, but it has been preserved in archaic forms of some words related to family, e.g. otec → otče, syn → synu, kmotor → kmotre (O father/son/godfather) and to address God: Boh → Bože, Ježiš → Ježišu, Kristus → Kriste (O God/Jesus/Christ).
[22] The earliest written records of Slovak are represented by personal and place names, later by sentences, short notes and verses in Latin and Czech documents.
[24] The Old Church Slavonic became the literary and liturgical language, and the Glagolitic alphabet the corresponding script in Great Moravia until 885.
The use of Old Church Slavonic in Great Moravia was prohibited by Pope Stephen V in 885; consequently, Latin became the administrative and liturgical language again.
Very few written records of Old Slovak remain, mainly from the 13th century onwards, consisting of groups of words or single sentences.
Examples include crali (1113) > kráľ, 'king'; dorz (1113) > dvorec, 'court'; grinchar (1113) > hrnčiar, 'potter'; mussenic (1113) > mučeník, 'martyr'; scitar (1113) > štítar, 'shieldmaker'; zaltinc (1156) > zlatník, 'goldmaker'; duor (1156) > dvor, 'courtyard'; and otroč (1156) > otrok, 'slave, servant'.
In 1294, the monk Ivanka from Kláštor pod Znievom wrote: "ad parvam arborem nystra slowenski breza ubi est meta".
Vitaj svaté božie cělo, jak si na svatem križu pnelo, pro člověče spasenie.
According to the contemporary Pan-Slavic views, the Slavic nation consisted of four tribes, the Czechoslovak, the Polish, the Russian and the Illyrian (Southern Slavs).
The original language, he claimed, is closer to Slovak, with Czech allegedly losing its beauty due to contact with German.
After the suppressing of the Hungarian Revolution of 1848, Kollár got an approval of the government in Vienna to use "Old Slovak" as an administrative and educational language.
My fojt Gal i boženíci, mister Andreas, Benediktus Nozer, Martin Messer, Zighel a jinší boženici vyznavame všem, ktož toto bude čisti a neb čtuce uslyše, (...) I jest nam Boh pomohol, že jsme učinili uplnou umlovu z Niklošem Polakem i z jeho synen Martinem a Miklošem Noskem a dal jest nam Polak summu penez 67 zlatych v zlate uhorskej vahy za ty všicky braky tisove, co mali činiti z bratrem našim z Hanesom Frolichem a o jinše všicky veci, což mali v jedno činiti.
zastupiti od Gloza s Tešina, tak, že ma Polak teho prazen byti.After the defeat of the Turks near Vienna in 1683, many Slovaks gradually emigrated to the Lower Lands, territories in present-day Hungary, Serbia (later to Croatia and Bulgaria), and Romania was depopulated after the Turkish occupation.
Matej Bel in the introduction to the Gramatica Slavico-Bohemica (1745) of Pavel Doležal compares Slovak with other recognized languages.
Bernolák's language was used by Slovak Catholics, especially by the writers Juraj Fándly and Ján Hollý, but Protestants still wrote in Czech in its old form used in Bohemia until the 17th century.
[32] The new standard respected etymological principles instead of Štúr's phonetic-phonological transcription and used a Slovak orthography closer to other Slavic languages, especially Czech.
[33] The Martin period lasted from the abolishment of the Slovak national and cultural institution Matica slovenská until the foundation of Czechoslovakia in 1918.
In contrast with older works including those published in Czechoslovakia, the standard had an official character and was approved and recommended by the Ministry of Education led by Slovak minister Ivan Dérer.
The standard was inspired by the official ideology of Czechoslovakism and tried to align both languages by the codification of numerous Czech words and forms not existing in Slovak.
