Imiona słowiańskie w antroponimii pogranicza polsko-białoruskiego w XVI i XVII wieku (aspekt strukturalny)

Abstract

The aim of this article is to characterise the Slavonic first names recorded in the anthroponymy of the Polish -Belarusian borderland in the 16th and 17th centuries. The text focuses on the presentation of the names which occurred in their primary function. The analysis emphasises above all their word -forming aspect. The source base is the material that was collected and elaborated in the two -volume Słownik historycznych nazw osobowych Białostocczyzny (authors: Z. Abramowicz, L. Citko and L. Dacewicz).The consequence of the interpretative perspective adopted in the article and indicated in its title is the application of the traditional, though still valued in onomastics, structuralist method. Compared to anthroponyms borrowed from foreign naming systems, especially associated with the Christian trend, represented in the Polish -Belorusian borderland in the 16th and 17th centuries by a multitude of names and a great variety of their forms, the stock of Slavonic names is relatively modest. However, these names constitute an interesting and diverse collection of personal names. Among them, the first names composed of two elements in basic and derivative forms are the most numerous, while single -stem names of appellative origin are attested far less frequently. Taking into account the structural aspect, it can be concluded that some of the first names occurred in full forms, usually in offi cial variants. Colloquial variants, formed as a result of phonetic transformations within word bases, appear rather sporadically. There are also abbreviated forms in the surveyed sources. Forms formed by alternation -paradigmatic derivation or only paradigmatic derivation are few. A popular word‑forming procedure was suffixal derivation. As a result, forms of Slavonic names were formed with suffixes with the element -s(z)-//-ś-, -ch-, -c(z)-, -l-, -ł-, -t-, -n-, -j-, -w- and above all -k-. Among suffixes with the -k- element dominate names with the suffix -ko. Formants were usually added to shortened stems, rarely to full stems. Multistep suffixation was not a very popular procedure in the creation of forms derived from native names. Some derivations from Slavonic names may be homonymous with forms of non -Slavonic names, mostly related to Christianity, which occur in the Polish version and – which is characteristic of the anthroponymy of Podlasie – in the East Slavonic form.