PECULIAR ITEMS IN THE VOCABULARY OF OLD BELIEVERS IN POLAND

Old Believers’ dialect in contemporary Poland can be regarded as the western part of the Russian Dialectal Old Believers’ Area in the Baltic States. It was formed in the 18– 20th centuries on the basis of some Pskovian dialects. In recent years, it has been strongly influenced by Polish, predominantly in vocabulary, but also in syntax and phonetics. Nevertheless, the dialect is of great value itself, since it contains many diverse strata of its linguistic system, where some linguistic peculiarities can be found. Some of them are specific only to the dialect at issue, others correlate it with other tongues with respect to temporal and spatial perspective. Among the peculiarities there are archaic forms unknown in other Russian dialects, peculiar innovations based on Russian or Polish linguistic items. One of the very important phenomena in the dialect under discussion and in Russian dialects in the Baltic States is a significant number of words which are consonant with Polish lexical items (provisionally called „Polonisms” in the paper), and with Byelorussian as well. Some of them are absent in Russian „continental” dialects. This situation supports the above-mentioned thesis of the existence of the Russian dialectal Old Believers’ area in the Baltic States and Poland, and of the Byelorussian linguistic influence in forming the area. Many of the peculiarities, however, are present in some Russian dialects, mainly in those contiguous to the area in the vicinity of Pskov, Smolensk and Briansk.