The category of reflexivity in the Turov Gospel of the 11th century: theoretical and methodological approaches in the context of Wackernagel’s law

Authors

  • Ryhor U. Serykau Yakub Kolas Institute of Linguistics of the Centre for Belarusian Culture, Language and Literature Research of the National Academy of Sciences of Belarus, 1 Surganava Street, 2 building, Minsk 220072, Belarus

Keywords:

encyclitics, bivalence, contact postposition, postpositional distant model, prosodic unity, correspondent verb, Wackernagel’s law, encyclitics ranks

Abstract

Based on the Turov Gospel of the 11th century manuscript, the features of the written transmission of the reflexive enclitic с\ in the few surviving verb forms are analysed. The presence of bivalent enclitics related to two verbs in the ancient Common East Slavic text is noted. This phenomenon of archaic syntax is compared with identical phenomena in modern West Slavic languages, including Polish. Within the scope of the law of enclitic ranks developed by J. Wackernagel, the functioning of the reflexive enclitic с\ as part of prosodic units is characterised. The questions regarding the reasons for the agglutination of the reflexive enclitic with the verb, as well as the rearrangement of enclitics are raised. It is asserted that the first written monuments of literary and non-literary types consistently reflect the speech features of the Eastern Slavs.

Author Biography

  • Ryhor U. Serykau, Yakub Kolas Institute of Linguistics of the Centre for Belarusian Culture, Language and Literature Research of the National Academy of Sciences of Belarus, 1 Surganava Street, 2 building, Minsk 220072, Belarus

    PhD (philology), docent; doctoral student at the department of Slavic studies and language theory

References

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Published

2025-12-04

Issue

No. 3 (2025): Journal of the Belarusian State University. Philology

Section

Linguistics

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How to Cite

[1]
Serykau, R.U. 2025. The category of reflexivity in the Turov Gospel of the 11th century: theoretical and methodological approaches in the context of Wackernagel’s law. Journal of the Belarusian State University. Philology. 3 (Dec. 2025), 89–94. DOI:https://doi.org/10.33581/2521-6775-2025-3-%p.