Polish Literary Language in the Ruthenian Lands of the 16th–17th Centuries: the Concept of A. Martel

Abstract

The article analyses the state of the Polish literary language in the Ruthenian lands of the 16th–17th centuries and substantiates conclusions concerning the influence of Polish civilisation on Ukrainian linguistic consciousness of the period. The paper presents the concept of Antoine Martel – a polyglot Slavist and professor at the University of Lille – whose scholarly legacy significantly influenced the development of Slavic studies. At the same time, attention is given to Martel’s debatable thesis about the conscious withdrawal of educated Ukrainians of the Renaissance era from the creation and assimilation of their own literary language under the influence of aesthetically and functionally accomplished Polish literary models, particularly the texts of Jan Kochanowski.

Martel’s ideas are examined within the framework of scholarly debates that acknowledge the erudition and academic competence of the French Slavist but also put forward a number of logical and analytical counterarguments. The article refers to the criteria by which world Slavists and Martel’s contemporaries assessed his scholarly work. Special emphasis is placed on the necessity of correlating linguistic and literary tendencies in cultural development with the sociocultural context of the epoch, on viewing linguistic influences as a nonlinear process that presupposes the dialogical nature of cultures, and on the need to analyse a wide and representative corpus of texts.

Consequently, the complex issue of contacts among the literary languages of the Slavic nations gave rise to polemics among eminent scholars, in which concepts, methods of textual analysis, and historical-cultural arguments were articulated.