Rocznik Orientalistyczny/Yearbook of Oriental Studies

Terms of impoliteness, rudeness and profanity are segments of vocabulary which old Chinese dictionaries, glossaries or encyclopaedias are not introducing in their full varieties. For this reason it is a kind of rarity when one finds a bunch of expressions apparently of vernacular origin, and it is even more extraordinary that they are not only listed in Chinese but being a part of a bilingual glossary included in the largest Chinese military compilation, the Wu Bei Zhi (i 武備志), they are provided with their Middle Mongolian translations. The author presents a study introducing the related vocabulary from both sides of the glossary and alongside he analyses the likeliness of their actual use by the time of compilation from the point of view of historical pragmatics.

The present paper considers the novel O?on-o?ak bala sak ("Quite a Long Childhood" or "A Long, Long Childhood") by Mostay / Mostaj Karim or Mustay Karim, if transliterated from Russian (1919-2005), a prominent Bashkir writer, poet, publicist and playwright, whose contribution to the Bashkir literature has been honoured with the title of the People's Poet of the Republic of Bashkortostan. Apart from the fact that the work under consideration is within the scope of the author's current research, the reason for choosing exactly this piece of M. Karim's literary work is that it is perhaps the first and best known example of an autobiographic novel written in Bashkir. This fact in turn implies that this novel is a valuable object of linguistic and cultural research.

The paper investigates the geographical denominations of Western lranian dialects, largely functioning also in the place-names, hydronyms, and oronyms of the area. The relevant lexical material, when taken together and approached as a system, opens larger possibilities for adequate analysis: the paradigm and internal ties of the constituent units become more visible and more clear revealing many otherwise unseen tendencies and peculiarities, particularly regarding the origin of given terms or groups of lexemes within the system. Moreover, as a mirror, it can detect various areal characteristics - first of all lexical and phonetic - of a language or language group in a particular territory. ln other words, it can reveal not only the features of linguistic development in diachrony, i.e. in time, but also in diatopy, i.e. in space.

The Hebrew Bible has long been translated into the Karaim language. Such translations are important for Karaim rituals and help to preserve the Karaim language, which has recently become endangered. Although the language of these translations shows some common features, the translations of different Karaim varieties show some differences, as well. Therefore, the present study analyses part of a translation of the Tanakh into Karaim that was published in Crimea in 1841. The language of the so-called Gozleve Bible is Crimean Karaim, an extinct Eastern variety of Karaim that belongs to the Kipchak (North-Western) group of the Turkic languages. As such, typical Kipchak features are expected to have been preserved in written Crimean Karaim sources. However, the language of this translation also shows Oghuzic characteristics. Thus, this study will demonstrate some specific linguistic characteristics of the Oghuz branch of Turkic as well as their distribution throughout the Book of Leviticus in the Gozleve Bible. Specifically, it will focus on the phonetical, morphological, and lexical features.

Once flourishing in the early medieval India, the materialist Carvaka/Lokayata tradition of philosophy vanished centuries ago leaving mere bits from their foundational sutra, and from a few commentaries thereon. These are scattered in the works of their opponents, hence the winding path to reconstructing the Carvaka/Lokayata thought necessarily begins with evaluating the reliability of the source material. This paper deals with the problem of the brief account of two interpretations of the Carvaka/Lokayata aphorism: 'from these, consciousness', recorded by the 8th-century Buddhist authors Śantarak�ita and Kamalaśfla in the Lokâyata-parfk$a Chapter XXII of the Tattva-sańgraha(-pañjika), critically edited by the author of the present paper.

After the collapse of the Democratic Republic of Azerbaijan in April 1920, the Azerbaijani intellectual and political elites suffered repressions from the Bolshevik authorities. The most prominent figures had to leave the country fearing for their lives. Among them was the renowned journalist, publicist and head of the Musavat party - Mehemmed Emin Resulzade. Fearing the Bolshevik expansion westwards, Polish authorities strived to weaken and destroy the Soviet Union's integrity. Their goal was to create a "sanitary cordon" of independent states between Poland and Bolshevik Russia. Thanks to the direct financial support from the Polish government, the political emigration from Azerbaijan, Georgia, North Caucasus and other states published their magazines and newspapers. In the second half of the 20th century, there was a political rapprochement between Turkey and the Soviet Union. As a result, the political situation of anti-Soviet emigration worsened. Therefore, the main burden of Azerbaijani emigration, headed by Resulzade, moved over the Vistula. The Polish period was very important for the publishing activities of the whole Azerbaijani emigration, represented by Resulzade. He mainly contributed to anti-Soviet press, tied to the Promethean movement, but not only. The author will present here rarely known Resulzade articles on other topics. The article also presents his book in Polish Azerbaijan in its Fight for Independence.

The purpose of this article is to establish a frame for arranging and classifying observations relating to the indigenous knowledge and oral traditions of the San people of southern Africa, mainly in Namibia. Oral literature of the San people serve, therefore, as a valuable source for re-constructing and reinforcing a positive collective identity of their history and cultural diversity. Several forms of expression such as folklore, poems, plants' names and personal narratives will be provided.

The science of lexicography with its focus on etymology reaches back to ancient times; the history of Tibetan dictionaries is almost as old as the written language itself. About 1,200 years ago, the wish to translate the Buddhist scriptures in Sanskrit initiated the compilation of the first bilingual dictionary. lt provides Tibetan synonyms for Sanskrit terms and is written in Tibetan script. lt was compiled and used by monks who worked as scholars and translators. Throughout the following centuries, Tibetan dictionaries have been compiled, and, as will be shown, this happened for various reasons. As the Tibetan language is not yet fully explored, new dictionaries for Tibetan are still being worked on. One of these is under preparation in Munich; it will be the focus of the main part of this article. As the paper addresses a wider audience and not specifically scholars of Tibetan studies, l will situate Tibetan lexicography within a broader context, commencing with a brief introduction into the Tibetan script and language followed by a survey on the development of Tibetan lexicography and dictionaries. Then, the paper introduces the Wörterbuch der tibetischen Schriftsprache, an ongoing long-term project at the Bavarian Academy for Sciences and Humanities in Munich.

This article is a supplement to Nemeth (2015), in which the absolute and relative chronology of the 18th and 19th century Karaim sound changes was presented with the aim of reconstructing how Middle Western Karaim evolved into its two well-known Modern Western Karaim dialects. Most of the conclusions formulated in Nemeth (2015) are further confirmed in the present article, while a few have been slightly modified.

Tunisian women folk songs have not found themselves among those subject matters enjoying a large amount of interest on the part of scholars, although attitudes in academic circles towards this area of folklore differ. Recently, however, a gradual increase of interest in folk songs can be noticed. Researchers have become aware of the importance of exploring folk songs both with respect to their contents and language. Hopefully this will lead to an increase in scholarly research in this field.

lt seems to be of great importance to collect all possible data which will finally allow us to write the chapter of the history of Sanskrit literature which has never been thoroughly written, namely the one concerning the literary activity of lndian women. lt is high time to notice the presence of Sanskrit literature written by them and to try to understand their place and role in the world of Sanskrit culture dominated by men writers, however not exclusively. Every piece of information we are still able to gather makes the picture more complete and deepens our knowledge. The present article is devoted to Svati Tirunal Ambadevi Tampuratti of Cemprol Kottaram (1890-1928), the authoress from the Kingdom of Travancore, composing both in Sanskrit and her mother tongue, Malayalam.

In their handling of colour, Tibeto-Burman languages of the Himalayan region show multiple lexical similarities to one another as well as apparent influences from more dominant languages such as Hindi, Nepali, Tibetan, and Chinese. As an understudied family, Tibeto-Burman languages also serve as an important site to explore modern colour theory and conceptualisation. Outlier languages in the Tibeto-Burman family that do not appear to follow either traditional or revised versions of Brent Berlin & Paul Kay's theories are of particular significance. This survey provides a systematic review of the existing literature and a baseline of comparative colour terminology for these generally vulnerable and often endangered languages.

An attempt to create a written Mongolian language based on the Cyrillic script is linked to the missionary activities of Archbishop Nil (1799-1874) among the Buryat Mongols. On his initiative, several Christian liturgical books were translated into Mongolian and printed in St. Petersburg. However, Nil and his assistants did not take into account the discrepancy between written and spoken Mongolian language and transcribed every letter of the Mongolian written language with corresponding Cyrillic letters and thus did no in any way make the texts closer to the spoken language.

Japanese literature has been known in Poland at least since the end of the 19th century, when first translations were made of Japanese prose and poetry (although via English or other languages). I consider the first translation made directly from Japanese into Polish language a short story by Kikuchi Kan, entitled Tusz ('Ink'), published in April of 1939, in a monthly magazine "Echoes from Far East." In the same magazine we can find also many examples of stories and poetry written not by Japanese, but by Polish authors, fascinated with Japan and its culture. Works by the same authors: Maria Juszkiewiczowa, Aleksander Janowski, Antoni Kora, Leon Rygier, Remigjusz Kwiatkowski and others were published also in other newspapers and magazines, and as separate novel books. While some short mentions about the earliest translations may be found in books on Japanese literature and contacts between Poland and Japan, novels, stories and poems written originally by Polish authors inspired by Japan are now all but forgotten. Hardly any of them were published again after World War II and they are not to be found in regular libraries. In the present paper I concentrate on the forgotten jewels of Polish prose (and to some extent poetry and drama) based on Japanese themes, published before World War II.