--- In cybalist@..., george knysh <gknysh@...> wrote:
> On the same approach
> principle I would call the speech of Polotsk "Old
> Belarusan". Does Zalizniak include it into the area of
> his "Krivichian" reconstructions?
The only material records of Krivichian at our disposal are birch
bark inscriptions from Novgorod, Pskov, Staraja Russa and
thereabouts. More or less prominent Krivichian influence can be
traced in some Standard Old Russian (= your Kievan koine; by the way,
this term, as a less confusing, is indeed used by some linguists,
including Zalizniak) documents from Smolensk and Polotsk areas, but
this evidence is rather scarce and doesn't help detect any
differences between the Krivichian of Polotsk and the Krivichian of
Pskov and Novgorod (Novgorodian koine).
>== Now
> as to "Old Russian". I may have to modify some of this
> after having a look at Zalizniak, but at the moment
> here's my take.
By the reasons discussed aboce, Zalizniak compiled a description (in
a fashion of a classical historical grammar) of what he calls 'Old
Novgorodian dialect'. The main reasin he uses such a neutral term
rather than 'Krivichian' is tend to abstract from the issues of
Krivichian in the broad sense. I'm not sure what dialect was spoken
in Suzdal'.
> Could we then state that in 1100 and earlier the
> language of Novgorod was "Old Russian
Whay not, but it was definitely not the Old Russian of the Ve,tic^i
and Radimic^i territory. Two Old Russians would be inconvenient.
I'm inclined to think it makes sense to use a general term as Old
Russian (let's treat Russian as an adjective from Rus' :) ) or any
other politically correct equivalent (eg, East Slavic) when there's a
need to designate a whole set of dialects sharing some specific
features (a _real_ need as to linguistics), and more precise terms
when one speaks of specific dialects (Krivichian) or koines
(Kievan/Novgorodian). I feel comfortable with the statement like
'RusIskaja PravIda is written in Kievan koine' (instead of
conventional Old Russian). I'm still not sure it's written in Old
Ukrainian, though :).
Sergei