The article describes factors contributing to diachronic lexicographical analysis. These factors are shown using examples of revisions made by Igor Němec (1924–2005), the editor-in-chief of the Old Czech Dictionary (Staročeský slovník), in the drafts of several entries.
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1. Both the oikonym and the anoikonym Ples are explained by means of the dialectal noun ples ,depression in the ground of the river‘. The origin of this noun has not been explained clearly yet. The connection between the toponyms and the appelative enables to explain them from the root *plekt- „to plait“ with the original meaning ,(simple) weir made of plaited branches‘. This meaning has changed later – through the metonymical shift – to the meaning ,area behind the weir‘. 2. Two oikonyms Plesná occuring in two different Bohemian and Moravian regions could be homonyms: the first one is connected with the noun pleso ,lake‘, the other one is supposed (on the basis of the oldest forms of this noun) to be of a different origin which is not clear: the hitherto stated motivation by the root *bliz- ,near‘ is not probable.
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The paper deals with the peripheral Czech lexeme sluzej ʻbridge beamʼ. This word was analyzed in the journal Naše řeč as early as in 1923. The current paper corrects the assumption of the author at that time that the noun was adopted from another Slavic language in relatively recent times, and confirms its direct borrowing from German in the early modern period. The spelling of this lexeme, however, was different from the one reconstructed by etymologists so far.
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Enantiosemy describes a situation in which a lexical unit acquires opposing meanings as a result of long-term semantic development. In this article, using several examples from Old Czech, I show how the enantiosemic status of words results from the development of lexical units or (sub-)systems. In the first example, the verb ublížit (to harm) has gained (on the background of words blízký, bližní, přiblížit, etc.) negative conceptual content through the systemic usage of the directional meaning of the prefix u-. In another example, the verb odpravit has changed its meaning from ‘to arrange regularly’ to ‘to murder’ during its own complicated semantic development (‘to make sth rightly’ → ‘to punish sb rightly’ → ‘to put sb to death’ → ‘to murder’). Finally, it is shown that the meanings ‘to love’ and ‘to hate’ of the Old Czech verb náviděti have become the result of a double progressive artificially-created opposition to the initial common Slavic nenáviděti – the previous concept, presented both in linguistic and in popular literature on its polysemy, is thus incorrect.
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The writer, translator, Slavist and museum curator Václav Hanka (1791–1861) was, among other things, the author of many poems that are usually evaluated as a more or less successful echoes of folk poetry. We can confront the degree of their “folkiness” with the texts in the collection of folk songs that his father acquired for his own use. This collection represents in itself a remarkable document of contemporary private collecting carried out without higher artistic or scientific ambitions. If we compare Hanka’s poems with the folklore texts in his father’s collection, we can see that the poet appropriately used many of the structural elements of the text that are characteristic of a folk song. Nevertheless, Hanka’s poems remained in their essence entirely in the field of literary creation. This is all the more true if we realise how vague and practically indeterminate the contemporary understanding of folklore was.
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The word “neústrojný” (inorganic) is used in lexicography to describe some Old and Middle Czech lexical units. It designates lexical units with unusual word-formative structure and timelimited usage, as well as those on the boundary of the word-formative system. The contemporary Czech lexicological terms “neologism” and especially “occasional word” are essentially very close to this categorization. In spite of the fact that lexical units described using these terms often disrupt the word-formative system of the given time period, we understand them as peripheral components, as the (unsuccessful) results of intuitive attempts at systemic changes, and as manifestations of the developmental dynamics of the word-formative system.
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This contribution critically deals with the article by Markéta Maturová (in Jazykovědné aktuality 2018) in which she describes several extinct so-called nickname place names in a very superficial and inaccurate way. Moreover, she exploits a bachelor thesis of her student in many details without giving regular bibliographical references.
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The Czech language is endangered neither by geopolitical causes (wars) nor natural ones (cataclysms). The history of Czech shows that its contact with other languages does not endanger the language, because its impact (mainly loanwords) is counterbalanced by the adaptability of the Czech language: both through its inflectional character and the influence of secondary word-formative motivation. The current trend toward unilingual global communication (English) in highly specialized branches (science, military affairs, astronautics, cybernetics) is compensated for by the rich metaphorical feature of technical terms used in a non-terminological way by the whole population. On the other hand, Czech does not benefit from the mechanical introduction of foreign elements into the language, for these elements (e.g. indeclinable attributes, the rejection of forming feminine forms from masculine ones, the ignoring of verbal aspect) break up its inflectional character. However, Czech could be endangered, rather, by its own uneducated users.
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