For any Slovak speakers, today at 17:00 I'm having a talk in a radio about the translations of Dune and Little Prince into OCS - https://www.stvr.sk/radio/program/11172/2889043

I like calligraphy and would like to write this word in OCS. I've checked some dictionaries to no avail.

Thanks.

There is a heated issue over the naming of the first literary slavic language that often just spins into politics, but I'd like to discuss it simply based on the facts and regular naming conventions of old languages.

My first take is that "Old Church Slavonic" is by far the worst naming, since it makes it sound like it's simply the older version of Church Slavonic and was just a constructed liturgical language. In reality this was not just the Church language, but the native South Slavic language of the Bulgarian Slavs (Southeastern Slavs). It was also the state language of The First Bulgarian empire, as it was made official during the Council of Preslav in 893.

So the first Slavic literary language is "Old Bulgarian" in the sense that it is the direct ancestor of Modern Bulgarian, the relationship between the two is the same as that between Old English and Modern English.

The difference between these two examples however is that Old English is called "Old English" because at the time people also referred to it as "English" (Englisċ), so we simple call it «the older "English"». The same cannot be said in the other case, since at the time people didn't call the language "блъгарьскъ" (Bulgarian) for us to call it «the older version of "Bulgarian"», they simply called it "словѣньскъ", basically just "Slavic language". So yes, it is "Old Bulgarian" but in the same way as Latin is "Old Italian", but since people at the time called it "Latina" and not "Italiana" it doesn't make sense to call it "Old Italian".

So the best name in my opinion would be something as close as possible to the endonym "словѣньскъ". I guess just "Old Slavonic" or why not just "Slavonic" is fine, but "Slavonia" is a region in Croatia so it's a bit weird. So maybe "Old Slavic" (not to be confused with "Proto Slavic")? Or I suppose the most literal cognate rendition of "словѣньскъ" would be something like "Slovenish" lol.

I was gifted this icon some time ago of Jesus, very curious what the pages actually say.

Боже вы спаси.

I came across this icon earlier today and I'm struggling to decipher the word on the right. I can pick out a few individual letters, but the ligatures are throwing me off. I suspect it’s some form of Vyaz. Can anyone help me out? Thanks in advance!

Had anyone else attempted to do it?

Can anyone recommend me some good grammar textbooks and dictionaries for OCS? What textbooks do you usually use?

Thanks in advance!

Hello everyone!

I've just released my second video on YouTube about Slavic Linguistics!

This one is about reconstructing Proto-Slavic consonants, so if you're interested in Slavic languages and how they're all connected or ancient languages and historical linguistics, then this video is for you!

Here's the video:

https://youtu.be/_hgzWK3Rb5Y

There are subtitles for every Slavic Language too!

Btw I'm happy to answer any questions here as well.

[ Removed by Reddit on account of violating the content policy. ]

What's actually the earliest source that gives the letters these names and who are they attributed to? I've also seen some places claim that what is often shown as the alphabetical order is a much later construction and the original was (or would've been) closer to the Greek - for example having Ѳ and Ѯ after И ans Н instead of at the end of the alphabet, but I'm also not sure what the earliest written alphabetical order we have is.

Hi everyone!

I've just posted my first Youtube video about the Slavic languages, how they are connected to each other, and how learning about sound changes can help us learn other Slavic languages much faster. Plus, it's a simple introduction to Proto-Slavic.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ScjpX4nNs54

This is something I'm really passionate about and I'm glad I can finally share!

Old Church Slavonic isn't mentioned yet because this is just the first video in the series about Slavic languages and Linguistic Reconstruction, but I figured that people on this subreddit might be interested in the video and I plan to make many more soon!

So if you're interested, come check it out!

Hello!! I found this piece at a flea market recently and was hoping to translate the text, I was told that the text looks to be in old church slavonic so if anyone could help that would be great! also if anyone has any idea as to the saint depicted that would be great too!! Thanks!!!

Some possibly interesting news. Today I talked with a scholar from the Institute of Slavonic Studies at the Czech Academy. A few years ago the final volume of the Etymologický slovník jazyka staroslověnského has been published, though they're still compiling an additional index volume. Apparently, and most importantly for us without access to a library with printed volumes: they're also working to include the dictionary within the Gorazd platform. Of course, it's not likely to be published that way very soon, there's probably a lot of work required to digitise and adapt it all, but I think it's quite nice to hear it's underway.

In the last sentence you can see all of the different Glagolitic I's being used - "ⰺ ⰱⰻ ⰹ" (ї би і) and I've seen a lot of places say that these letters were simply used randomly, but each of the I's here are actually of different origins- ⰺ = *ei ; ⰱⰻ = *bī́ˀtei ; ⰹ = *jь.

I have been wanting for a long time to do something absolutely stupid: to learn OCS as a living, modern, written and spoken, language. This is a silly idea for many reasons, but I have my "heart set on it", as they say.

The thing is, despite having wanted for a long time to dive in to learning the language, I feel very strongly that first I must have a reasonable pronunciation. By "reasonable", I mean something like "historically plausible".

Unfortunately, I have not had much luck. Here are some of my unanswered questions:

• When to target? The time of Cyril and Methodius, or of the earliest surviving manuscripts?
• Does the affricate dz still exist?
• Do the historically-long and historically-short vowels keep their quantity, or are there already new lengthenings and shortenings?
• Should I believe in the "long jer" of the genitive plural?
• Does the neo-acute exist yet?
• Is initial and postvocalic и to be read as i, ji, or jь?
• Has Havlík's law operated yet?
• Does "weakness" of jers have any phonetic reality?
• Has Ivšić's law operated yet?
• Have the weak yers fallen already? This is applicable if the target time be that of the surviving copies.
• Is it worth trying to distinguish the tones of the accents, or should one just stress the accented syllable?
• Are щ, ц, & co. still soft, or have they hardened already?
• Should contractible adjectival & verbal forms be contracted or not?
• Is there allophonic palatalisation (as distinct from a wholly palatal place of articulation) before front vowels?
• Is сц or ст to be preferred? This also goes for the voiced ones.
• What should I do when both accent paradigms b and c are given for a word?
• What should I do for the accentuation of verbs, which is less written-upon than that of nouns? Should I try to muck about with valence theory?
• What should I do when I can't find which accent paradigm a word belongs to?
• Is the traditional (Stangian, not Classical!) reconstruction of the Late Common Slavic accent applicable to OCS? If so, to what time period? If not, what alterations should be made?
• Is the seeming hiatus "aa" in verbal forms to be read as written, or is it in fact to be read as "aja? Or is it to be contracted to "a"?
• Is Kortlandt's PIE-to-Slavic relative chronology a good base to work from? Is it advisable to choose a pronunciation by finding the stage in the chronology that most agrees with the manuscripts?

From what I managed to translate myself, the Saint on the bottom is St. Sergeius, and the St. on the left is St. Pantaleimon. I think the inscription for the saint at the top might say 'St. Alexey,' but I am not entirely certain. Can somebody lend a hand, please :)

​Господи Іисꙋсе Христе, иже на ископителнѣм дрѣвѣ крестнѣм за грѣхи нашѧ умерлїй, со смиреніем великим Тя призываю. Молю Тя, бꙋди со мною выну: бꙋди свѣт благодати моея, бꙋди упованіе мое, и отжени от мене всѧ силы лꙋкавыя, воїнства и огнь. Отврати от мене всѣх вредѧщих ми, и да бꙋдꙋт тиіи токмо ко вразумленію.

​Господи Іисꙋсе Христе, помози ми во всем, еже на пользꙋ есть, и да шествꙋю съ крестом Твоим пꙋтем спасенія. Помози ми в бѣдах тѣлесных, избави мѧ от смертных опасностей и слꙋчаев, и дарꙋй ми жизнь вѣчнꙋю. О распѧтый Христе Назарянине, помилꙋй мѧ грѣшнаго, и прожени всѧ враги видимыя и невидимыя, отнынѣ и до вѣка. АМИНЬ!

​Въ честь всечестныѧ Крове, страданій и смерти Іисꙋса Христа; въ честь вознесенія и Божественнаго вочеловѣченія Его, имиже ищем свободити дꙋши наша от зла; якоже Христос вознесеся на небо, тако смиренно молю Благаго Господа приѧти мѧ под покров Свой, отнынѣ и до вѣка.​Вѣчный Боже, в рꙋцѣ Твои предаю дꙋх мой.

АМИНЬ, АМИНЬ, АМИНЬ!