# История на македонския език



## Orlin

Здравейте! Добре ми е известно, че това е изключително спорен въпрос. Ще представя общоприетата позиция в България, която и аз поддържам: македонският език възниква през 1944-45 г., когато е създаден първият му стандарт, а някои дори са склонни да посочват точна дата и място: 2 август 1944 г., манастир "Св. Прохор Пчински", посочва се и като първи "паметник" на този език вестник "Нова Македония". Извинявам се, ако това е обидно за някого, това е само общоприетото *в България*, където аз живея, и естествено проявявам пристрастие по патриотични причини спрямо това гледище, освен това у нас дори и днес самостоятелността на македонския език се оспорва от някои.
Интересно ми е какво се твърди по този въпрос в Македония и в трети страни - кога точно се поставя началото на македонския език според различните източници и кои са основните моменти в развитието му.
Предварително ви благодаря.


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## vandaman

Здраво,Орлин-Многу ми е мило дека ова прашање го постави на овој форум затоа што на многу други форуми се изначитав глупости од секаков вид.За жал, јас лично не сум стручен но според мене лично главниот проблем е настанат не со кодификацијата на македонскиот туку со кодификацијата токму на бугарскиот јазик. Доколку Бугарската држава ги кодифицирала западнобугарските дијалекти, тогаш можеби денес не би го имале тој проблем. Источните бугарски и западните македонски дијалекти доволно се разликуваат за да формираат два различни јазика-иако се разбира дека се сродни по многу нешта. Во Македонија прашањето за самостојноста на македонскиот јазик никој нормален не го оспорува-и тоа не само од политички причини. На интернет има доволно сајтови за стручни анализи за сличностите и разликите помеѓу двата јазика


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## sokol

(I'll reply in English as I have only passive knowledge of Bulgarian and Macedonian, but I can read both your posts. )

First and foremost - it is clear that from 1944 onwards there was a Macedonian language.
I know that in Bulgaria many consider Macedonian a language installed by politics in 1944, and that previously there hadn't been a Macedonian language - this is even, more or less, the majority view (and possibly even shared by Bulgarian linguists: that I don't know); and some even today do not accept Macedonian as a language in its own right.
I'd like to point out that this thread should not be about politics - but about linguistics. 

So, to keep the linguistic point of view: Macedonian was standardised during and after World War II; Macedonian _*was*_ written before 1944 - but even among western linguists there's a controversy from which year onwards one should speak of Macedonian as a separate language: some give even the late 19th century as the beginning of the Macedonian movement, others claim that Macedonian language (as a language separate from Bulgarian) only developed in the early 20th century, or even only during WWII.

There's only one thing about which there is no doubt: Macedonian was _*not*_ an _*official*_ language before 1944 - it was not recognised by any national authority.
The language spoken in the region of what is today officially called FYROM - Former Yougoslav Republic of Macedonia - was officially called a "Southern Serbian" in the first Yougoslav Republic (1918-1941), and during Bulgarian occupation during WWII I think it was called "Western Bulgarian" (or if not that then _only_ "Bulgarian").

Historically, Macedonian partisans co-operated with Bulgaria in the late 19th and early 20th century in their fight against the Osman Empire (and they were funded by Bulgaria too); and some if not many of those partisans probably had rather a Greater Bulgaria in mind than an independent Macedonia. So it is really difficult to tell from when on we should speak of a "consensus" that the population of modern FYROM would rather be on its own than part of Bulgaria.
(Also, the political point of view of those partisans might not have been representative for the rural population; and also, some or probably many of them were against a Greater Bulgaria.)

The political events anyway would not lead to a clear time and date - as this time in history is very controversially discussed in Bulgaria and Macedonia.
And linguistically, facts are quite clear: before 1944 there was not a Macedonian standard language as we know it today, but there were of course still Macedonian dialects.

Macedonian, as a language, definitely is an *Ausbau* language - a language which only recently received a codification, just as Luxemburgish (Lëtzebuergesch) did; and just as with Luxemburgish we are only sure about the _*terminus post quem*_ (= time and date after which it was a language in its own right), and the _*terminus ante quem non*_ is relatively unclear (= time and date before which said language was not considered a "separate language" by its speakers).
In both cases the _terminus ante quem_ non is probably the early 19th century.

As far as the time in-between is concerned arguments usually involve politics and polemics, and I'd rather not go there. 

Especially as it doesn't really matter as far as politics are concerned: Macedonia is an independent state now, with a fully developed Ausbau-language; and I only wish it would be possible to discuss the history of Macedonian _before 1944_ without any involvement of politics. 

So anyway, I suggest to try and keep the political dimension out of this discussion - and to try and focus on the linguistic one.


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## DenisBiH

When was Bulgarian standardized? And what were historical native and foreign names for the dialects spoken in what is today Bulgaria and Macedonia?


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## sokol

DenisBiH said:


> When was Bulgarian standardized? And what were historical native and foreign names for the dialects spoken in what is today Bulgaria and Macedonia?



_*Which*_ Bulgarian? 
Bulgarian was "newly" codified in the 19th century.
Before, Bulgarian was called "Church Slavonic" for a long time, I don't know when exactly Bulgarians (of the Bulgarian Empire or, later, Bulgarian districts in the Ottoman Empire) began to use the name "Bulgarian" for the _language_. (They certainly used it for their kingdom and its people, but that's a different story.)

Same by the way is true for other Slavic languages (for some "more", for others "less"): names in "ancient" times (and "ancient" might mean before the 19th century) weren't very informative in many cases (take Croatian - it had several names in the course of history, same's true for Slovene, etc. etc.).

Also, the "first" Bulgarian language was not Slavic, but that's yet another story which isn't the topic here (we've had discussions about Old Bulgarian already).


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## DenisBiH

I thought about making the question a bit more concise, but decided against it to see what happens.  I basically meant a Slavic language under that very name - Bulgarian. Not necessarily the modern standard.

Thanks for the answer. 

What is it that says that a certain language existed prior to the time it was codified? Is it the name, being in regular use among the population for their native dialect(s)? Is it the literary corpus?


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## Orlin

DenisBiH said:


> I thought about making the question a bit more concise, but decided against it to see what happens.  I basically meant a Slavic language under that very name - Bulgarian. Not necessarily the modern standard.
> 
> Thanks for the answer.
> 
> What is it that says that a certain language existed prior to the time it was codified? Is it the name, being in regular use among the population for their native dialect(s)? Is it the literary corpus?


 
Koliko ja znam, mi govorimo o bugarskom jeziku od 7. veka (približno od nastanka bugarske države u 681. god.) i u njegovoj istoriji odlikujemo pretpismeni period (7.-9. vek do prvog pismenog evidentiranja), stari (9.-11. vek), srednji (12.-14. vek) i novi period (od. 15. veka do sada, deli se na raniji - 15.-17. vek i kasniji - od 18. veka). Sadašnji standard je stvoren u 19.-20. veku.


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## DenisBiH

Orline pisaću na engleskom čisto zbog nejužnoslavenskih čitatelja. 

That's exactly my line of thinking - a Bulgarian language must have existed prior to it being codified to the latest standard back in the 19th century (historical sources prior to the 19th century mention it, for one). Thus, if we are talking about the history of Macedonian, we must see if it also existed prior to the codification in the 20th century. Obviously, the dialects of modern Macedonian existed, so in my opinion we need to see:

- what were these dialects called, by the natives and outsiders
- whether they perceived those dialects as being a language of its own
- did they have a corpus of written texts and a literary tradition independent of the modern Bulgarian lands
- did they, or do they, have a corpus of oral traditions independent of Bulgarian (this would presumably be hard to ascertain)

And we, in my opinion, must do this for a period of history going further back in past than the Bulgarian national awakening in the 19th century. 

If someone claims Macedonians considered themselves to be Bulgarians (and their language Bulgarian), and unfortunately language, ethnicity, national identity and more often than not, religion are very intertwined in the identity politics of the Balkans, we have to see

- when exactly, in which periods of time did they consider themselves Bulgarians
- who exactly, only the elite, only the priests, or the entire population
- what did this "Bulgarianness" mean to this people in various periods (we know the Ottoman empire had a particular millet system)
- if they did consider themselves Bulgarians, does that mean they considered their language Bulgarian, or did they call it with a different name
- what did the term Macedonian represent prior to the 20th century forming of the modern Macedonian nation and an independent language standard

We can't simply take a point in time just before the creation of the modern Macedonian standard and say that in 1943 Macedonians were Bulgarians and spoke Bulgarian. Maybe so, but since when was this true and for what extent of the population was this true? Elites often promote ideologies (including the ones relating to national and linguistic identity) which may not be fully or even to any significant level accepted by the population itself. 

Here is just one example of how weird the things can get when talking about the past identity of the Balkans peoples.

http://www.rastko.rs/rastko-bl/istorija/corovic/istorija/6_4_l.html
Vladimir Ćorović, Istorija srpskog naroda



> *Upada u oči u XVI veku neobično prošireni pojam Mađedonije u našim krajevima.* U narodnim pesmama u Mađedoniju se računaju Smederevo i Peć. Pomenuti štampar Božidar Vuković kazuje 1519. god. za sebe, da je otačastvom iz Podgorice "u predelima maćedonskim", a posle tako isto govore za sebe i neki pisari iz hercegovačke Zavale, iz Morače, pa i iz Sarajeva. Vuk Karadžić je tvrdio "da su se Maćedonija srpski zvale sve zemlje naroda našega", dok je I. Ruvarac mislio, da je to označavanje stvar sujete, "hoteći da se prave važni i da svoje poreklo dovode iz tako važnih istoriskih mesta, kao što je bila Filipa i Aleksandra Velikoga Maćedonija". Tumačenje je, međutim, mnogo prostije. *Naziv Maćedonije za sve srpske zemlje proširio se od onog vremena, kad je Ohridska crkva obuhvatila pod svojom vlašću sve te oblasti.*


Now, can we agree that at least a part of these particular Macedonians of the 16th century referred to in this passage were not Bulgarians and did not speak Bulgarian? 

Now, this post may be considered somewhat off topic. I personally would disagree with that opinion. If we are to talk about the history of the Macedonian language, I don't see any way of leading a meaningful discussion without tackling these issues. If they are however outside the scope of this forum, I will personally withdraw from further involvement.


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## Orlin

Razmislio sam i čini mi se da bi trebalo tražiti nastanak makedonskog jezika u vreme formiranja makedonske narodnosti/nacije jer je opšti jezik jedan od neophodnih uslova da bismo proglasili neku skupinu ljudi narodnošću/nacijom u šta se bugarskog jezika tiče, vreme formiranja narodnosti i jezika se poprilično poklapaju - istoričari kažu da se sve desilo u 7.-9. veku. Ne znam šta kažu ljudi van Bugarske o vremenu nastanka makedonske narodnosti/nacije.
Nažalost ja nisam stručnjak ni u lingvistici niti u istoriji i zato je moguće da grešim.


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## Outsider

sokol said:


> I'd like to point out that this thread should not be about politics - but about linguistics.
> 
> [...]
> 
> Macedonian, as a language, definitely is an *Ausbau* language - a language which only recently received a codification, just as Luxemburgish (Lëtzebuergesch) did; and just as with Luxemburgish we are only sure about the _*terminus post quem*_ (= time and date after which it was a language in its own right), and the _*terminus ante quem non*_ is relatively unclear (= time and date before which said language was not considered a "separate language" by its speakers).
> In both cases the _terminus ante quem_ non is probably the early 19th century.


The _terminus post quem_ is politically determined, though. The codification (or standardization) of a language are political acts.


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## sokol

DenisBiH said:


> That's exactly my line of thinking - a Bulgarian language must have existed prior to it being codified to the latest standard back in the 19th century (historical sources prior to the 19th century mention it, for one).


Oh yes, certainly. 
Only the date Orlin gave - 7th to 9th century (before first attested written forms) does not quite hold: in the 9th century, when Cyril and Methodius began their Slavic mission, it is commonly believed that Slavic still could and should be considered one language (even though at that time certain dialectal variations already existed).

Differentiation into distinct Slavic languages only began later - difficult to tell for most as there aren't many written documents preserved, and those that are mostly show a more or less "unified" Old Church Slavonic in the first centuries before those began to show more and more individual (regional) influences.
Change and differentiation of Slavic languages certainly happened quicker and earlier in oral tradition than is represented in written documents: Church Slavonic conserved features for some time which already were obsolete in spoken language.

Still, there's of course no doubt that Bulgarian was one of the Slavic languages which developed quite early. The language of Cyril and Methodius in fact was "more or less" Bulgarian, but we should better use the term Old Church Slavonic here - or more precisely, Old Church Slavonic in a South Slavic version.
At this time in history however, as said, the Slavic linguistic unity still wasn't quite broken, and this language was easily understandable to Slavs in Bohemia and Moravia even, so in Western Slavic territory.
To call this South Slavic version of OCS "Bulgarian" would mean to include Serbian, Croatian and even Slovene - there's no need to mention Macedonian here to show that the name "Bulgarian" for OCS just is not correct, linguistically. 

I don't know since when the Bulgarians themselves called _*their*_ Slavic language "Bulgarian": note, this name originally was reserved for the Non-Slavic Old Bulgarian tongue which only died out in the 12th century: the use of "Bulgarian" for the Slavic language must have started then at the earliest, or possibly a century or two later - that I don't know.

Of course nobody, then, spoke of a "Macedonian" language - or if they did then they referred to the Ancient Macedonian tongue, which was either a dialect of Greek or a language closely related to Greek.

The name "Macedonian" for the Slavic language only emerged in the 20th century - to my knowledge some time before 1944 but I am poorly informed about this period in Macedonia; personally, I doubt that anybody used "Macedonian" for the Slavic language in the 19th century (or earlier).

Language names often emerge with religious and political entities, and the first "political" entity in the region of what today is Macedonia (that is, entity which approximately had the same extension and size as Macedonia has now) was the Turkish vilâyet Üsküb (from 1845 onwards): and some historians claim that a vilâyet-patriotism was the first "expression" of Macedonian identity (even though it wasn't called that at the time, I think).

Another one is the Church, and here Macedonians for a very long time belonged to the Bulgarian Church - or more precisely, Ohrid (in Macedonia, of course) was founded by Bulgarian kings, and was considered a Bulgarian Church (contrary to Catholic Christianity, Orthodox sub-divisions of Churches more or less are "national" - there's a Serbian and Bulgarian Orthodox Church as well as a Russian one).
Ohrid was dissolved in the Osman empire in the 18th century - but re-founded in 1870, and put under Bulgarian supremacy; after 1918 it came under Serbian supremacy, and only after World War II finally a Macedonian Orthodox Church was installed (which however is not recognised by other Orthodox Churches - see Wiki).

There's also literature about the Serbian and Bulgarian struggle for supremacy in the Macedonian region (that is, the region of modern FYROM): I've found one in German (Viseslav Raos, Der serbisch-bulgarische Konflikt im Kirch- und Schulwesen in der Eparchie Üsküb, 2006) - and as this is research work done in Vienna it should (in theory ) be free of ideological influence (as one might suspect if it were written in either Bulgaria or Macedonia, where clear political standpoints would make it indeed difficult to leave ideology aside).

I haven't read it, but the summary is interesting enough: obviously, both Serbia and Bulgaria struggled to try and win over the Slavs in today's FYROM (then still under Osman rule) to their nation.

One should never forget that "nations" as we know them only formed in the 19th century - even on the Balkans, even when Serbs and Bulgarians (and of course all the other nations there and arounds, this is even true for Italians and Germans as nations - but here we're dealing with those only ) claim their nations go back to the early Middle Ages: they didn't.

In the Middle ages there existed empires, kingdoms, and the like - but they weren't nations, not by a long way, not in the sense we understand them today.
So the territory of FYROM was more or less a "blank spot" on the map of nations at and around 1850: they were just "Slavs under Osman rule". So while, then, Serbs and Bulgarians already had established their nations respectively at that time (as modern nations - as we know them now), this was not the case in Macedonia: there was no Slavo-Macedonian language by 1850, and there was no Slavo-Macedonic nation.

So both Serbia and Bulgaria tried to win over those "Not-Yet-Macedonians" to their language and their religion - and both failed, which however only became obvious in 1944, the political date when finally Macedonian was recognised officially.
The whole process of this development definitely began much earlier than 1944 - probably before and during the Balkan wars (when Serbian won this territory politically), or probably already in the late 19th century, or possibly only just after World War I.
And during this process it wasn't quite clear at all what the outcome will be.

So again, the point is - it is difficult to say from when on there had been a Slavic Macedonian "language" (and with that "nation", by the terms used in that region, _while - and that's important to mention!! - in Western Culture language and nation are *not* considered being identical and reciprocal_).
I would not say more than that it must have been "some time before 1944".



DenisBiH said:


> Obviously, the dialects of modern Macedonian existed, so in my opinion we need to see:
> 
> - what were these dialects called, by the natives and outsiders
> - whether they perceived those dialects as being a language of its own
> - did they have a corpus of written texts and a literary tradition independent of the modern Bulgarian lands
> - did they, or do they, have a corpus of oral traditions independent of Bulgarian (this would presumably be hard to ascertain)


Ah, Macedonian literature ... another can of worms.
In Western Europe, most treat literature and texts written by Macedonians and in Macedonian (or Bulgarian showing Macedonian dialectisms) before 1944 as "Bulgarian literature", Macedonians would consider them as "Macedonian literature", and Bulgarians again will consider them as "Bulgarian literature".

The language name theoretically should not be of significance, if you take the example of Germany, Switzerland and Austria, or England or USA or any other English speaking nation, or Brazil and Portugal, and so on: Austrians still call their language "German", Americans call theirs "English", and nobody still denies that their national variety of the language exists, nor is there any direct relation made between language and nation.
But we're talking about the Balkans here, and I know that there indeed people think that a language "is" a nation, and a nation "is" a language.

Take Austria for example, another young nation: after World War I the vast majority of Austrians didn't want to be a nation of their own, they wanted to be part of a Greater Germany.
A wish Hitler fulfilled, after which Austrians, again by a large majority, decided that this probably wasn't such a good idea after all: the Austrian nation only developed after World War II, but today _*nobody*_ would question the existence of the Austrian nation.

Macedonia of course is also a very young nation, which emerged under completely different circumstances - but it still emerged, and contrary to Austria (we still call our language "German", or "Austrian German" sometimes, or occasionally "Austrian" even - but even then we still see it as part of the German language ) they adopted a language of their own, as on the Balkans it is virtually impossible to be accepted as a nation of your own if you don't have a language of your own.

Evidence for the latter can be found in the other Former Yougoslav Republics, I think not much more about this fact needs to be said. 

And please note: *I am really a complete amateur* when it comes to the history of Macedonian language - I might be wrong concerning several details in what I wrote above; I am only hoping that I got it right for the most part, and of course I'll gladly accept any corrections of mistakes. 



Outsider said:


> The _terminus post quem_ is politically determined, though. The codification (or standardization) of a language are political acts.


Indeed it is.


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## DenisBiH

sokol,

I'll get back to answering your entire (very informative!) post a bit later, but there are a few points I'd like to make.

When talking about modern South Slavic nations and language standards, there are, in my opinion, basically two groups - the "old ones" (Serbs, Croats, Slovenes, Bulgarians) and the "new ones" (Macedonians, Montenegrins, Bosniaks, and possibly Bunjevci but they're another topic). The old vs new in this context refers to the time of the creation of a nation in a modern sense, for the old ones mostly in the 19th, for the new ones mostly in the 20th century. That's some 100 to 150 years of advantage. 

This advantage of a century (and a half) is I believe also visible in the views that the western scholars hold on the subject. Take the view as expressed by you before




> Same by the way is true for other Slavic languages (for some "more", for others "less"): names in "ancient" times (and "ancient" might mean before the 19th century) weren't very informative in many cases (take Croatian - it had several names in the course of history, same's true for Slovene, etc. etc.).


I've heard this line of thinking from Croats as well. It goes, basically, it doesn't matter that the ancestors of modern Croats used different names for their language, what matters is that they formed a common linguistic and literary community, in which the western South Slavic Catholic writers borrowed from each other and used each other's works no matter the dialects they used or the name they used for their own language. And this is an interesting viewpoint.

The problem I see with it is that it is basically retroactive - existence of a single community and a single language in the past is assumed from the fact that it ended up as a single community after the national awakening in the 19th century. The post-19th century situation is somehow applied to pre-19th century situation, and the aberrations are usually explained away by one method or another. This might well work as long as there is no one to contest it, i.e. as long as there are no opposing interpretations of the same historical situation. Where there were, e.g. where Serbian and Croatian nationalism clashed (in B-H for example), or as from your example, where Serbian and Bulgarian nationalism clashed (in Macedonia), there were and are different interpretations. The situation has of course gotten complicated by the advent of the "new ones" and their own nationalist ideologies.

There however has to be some way we can put the various interpretations aside and look at the facts.

Fact is that what is today the Republic of Macedonia (this is the official name used in B-H, thus no FYROM from me) has

- been a sphere of influence of both Serbs and Bulgarians before the Ottoman conquest, and at the time of Ottoman conquest part of the Serbian empire (if I remember correctly)
- under Ottoman rule the name Macedonia was indeed natively used to denote Slavic-speaking lands (refer to the quote above) at one time
- Ottomans had a policy of forming communities based on religion rather than language and ethnicity and this has deeply impacted the population in the Balkans, Orthodox, Catholic and Muslim
- after the Balkans wars at the beginning of the 20th century it was again a region of conflict between Serbs and Bulgarians

It should be obvious to those not acquainted with the situation in the Balkans why is the linguistic situation somewhat controversial. Let's simply look at the sources first, for this entire period.


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## vandaman

sokol said:


> I haven't read it, but the summary is interesting enough: obviously, both Serbia and Bulgaria struggled to try and win over the Slavs in today's FYROM (then still under Osman rule) to their nation.
> So the territory of FYROM was more or less a "blank spot" on the map of nations at and around 1850:


 
I wonder why you restrict the Macedonian language only on the Republic of Macedonia (FYROM if you want). Macedonian is still spoken in all geographical region of Macedonia. (Northern Greece,some parts of Albania, southwest Bulgaria)


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## DenisBiH

sokol,



> Of course nobody, then, spoke of a "Macedonian" language - or if they did then they referred to the Ancient Macedonian tongue, which was either a dialect of Greek or a language closely related to Greek.
> 
> The name "Macedonian" for the Slavic language only emerged in the 20th century - to my knowledge some time before 1944 but I am poorly informed about this period in Macedonia; personally, I doubt that anybody used "Macedonian" for the Slavic language in the 19th century (or earlier).


I think we need to verify this. The quote from Ćorović gives an example of a possessive adjective _maćedonski _applied to a territory in the 16th century. I don't think it's that unreasonable to assume it could also have been applied to a dialect (or a group of dialects) spoken in that territory. But we need to check the sources.




> Another one is the Church, and here Macedonians for a very long time belonged to the Bulgarian Church - or more precisely, Ohrid (in Macedonia, of course) was founded by Bulgarian kings, and was considered a Bulgarian Church (contrary to Catholic Christianity, Orthodox sub-divisions of Churches more or less are "national" - there's a Serbian and Bulgarian Orthodox Church as well as a Russian one).


Yes, and this was reinforced by the Ottoman millet system. Basically  belonging to a particular church or a religion was a major deciding factor in one's 'ethnicity'. May sound strange to some, but it is so.

However, again referring to Ćorović - if Ohrid Church was under Bulgarian domination or ethnically (pro-)Bulgarian in the 16th century, why is it that Macedonian, rather than Bulgarian, name spread to the Orthodox Serbs in modern Serbia, Bosnia-Herzegovina and Montenegro in that period?




> So the territory of FYROM was more or less a "blank spot" on the map of nations at and around 1850: they were just "Slavs under Osman rule". So while, then, Serbs and Bulgarians already had established their nations respectively at that time (as modern nations - as we know them now), this was not the case in Macedonia: there was no Slavo-Macedonian language by 1850, and there was no Slavo-Macedonic nation.


But aren't you falling into the same trap you pointed out (nation=language)? There may not have been a Macedonian nation in the modern sense in 1850, but the people had to have spoken some language.  Unless we assume that people without a 19th century style nation can't have language but rather only dialect(s).

This language (or if you wish, dialect(s)) had to have been called something, possibly it had multiple names. Bulgarian, Serbian, Macedonian?

Btw, here's an example of "clashing ideologies" regarding the status of the Macedonian language, from 1914, printed in "Bosanska vila".

http://www.idoc.ba/digitalarchive/public/serve/index.cfm?fuseaction=form&ElementId=643483



> Od bugarskog osloboćenja na ovamo osobito intenzivno, ali i još mnogo ranije, iz šovinističkih pobuda, njihovi su pismeni ljudi udarili u politiku i s jezikom. Književnn jezik počeli su prilagoćavati što više mogu makedonskom nerečju, a svoj trnovski, koji je jezgro njihova naroda, odbacili su sa evim, pa opet taj hokuspokus nije uspeo, jer da su uzeli sa svim maćedonsko narečje za bugarski jezik, onda bi svi u bugarskoj kraljevini morali učiti taj novi strani idiom, te je za to maćedonski jezik opet ostao bliži srpskom jeziku ne,go bugarskom.



It's been almost 100 years since this was written and people are still discussing the same thing.


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## phosphore

I am ashamed to admit that I am not sure what Orlin actually asked and Google is not of much help with it. I understood he wanted to know what is the view on the development of Macedonian in other countries?

Serbia, as far as I know, completely recognises the independence of the Macedonian language. Serbian linguists also recognise that Macedonian and Bulgarian form a separe group inside the South Slavic group of languages and I think no one argues with that. Macedonian was nevertheless not always consided a language on its own. Before the Second World War it was considered a South Serbian dialect and it was allegedly suppressed. This of course had a political dimension, as previously stated by Sokol and Denis, because Serbia wanted to integrate Macedonian Slavs into the Serbian nation, but the idea was eventually abandoned.

As to the question whether a Macedonian language existed before its standardisation, I think it is misplaced. People certainly spoke various dialects that are now called Macedonian, which could have been called Bulgarian had the course of history been different, but that is completely irrelevant. There is no linguistic criterion which sets apart dialects in a dialectal continuum and that has been repeated over and over a hundred times at least. You may ask for political reasons why Macedonians aren't and couldn't be Bulgarians, but that's out of the scope of this forum.


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## phosphore

DenisBiH said:


> It's been almost 100 years since this was written and people are still discussing the same thing.


 
Is it true that Macedonians shared a similar oral tradition with Serbs?


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## DenisBiH

I think we will have to define what we understand under the term "language" so that we all work with the same definition.

Is it:

a) Dialect with an army and a navy?
b) Dialect with its own literary tradition?
c) Something else?


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## DenisBiH

phosphore said:


> Is it true that Macedonians shared a similar oral tradition with Serbs?




I'm afraid ethnology is not my stronger point. Our Macedonian colleagues may know more. There must have been some sharing though.

Maybe not directly related to your question, but do you know that Ivan Gundulić in the 17th century even referred to Alexander the Great as Lesandro Srbljanin?  Some link between Serbs and Macedonia must have been felt for that to happen.


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## phosphore

DenisBiH said:


> I'm afraid ethnology is not my stronger point. Our Macedonian colleagues may know more. There must have been some sharing though.
> 
> Maybe not directly related to your question, but do you know that Ivan Gundulić in the 17th century even referred to Alexander the Great as Lesandro Srbljanin?


 
Oh, I quoted you just because I read it in the text you posted the link to.

Anyway, I didn't know that. I find it funny how romantic people were in the previous times compared to how ugly the story got later and to where we live now.


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## DenisBiH

phosphore said:


> I find it funny how romantic people were in the previous times compared to how ugly the story got later and to where we live now.



Yep. Here's where Alexander the Great becomes Bosnian.  The mentioned author is the Croatian Antun Vramec, from the 16th century.

Glasnik zemaljskog muzeja, Sarajevo, 1889

http://www.idoc.ba/digitalarchive/public/serve/index.cfm?fuseaction=form&ElementId=397807



> Svi ovi starinari smatraju Slavenima gotovo sve istorijski znamenitije narode evropske i azijske. Lozu im vuku čak od Noja ili lafeta ili barem od vremena vavilonske kule. Za to i zamjenjuju često imena pojedinih naroda slavenskih megju sobom i neslavenskijeh sa slavenskima. Tako je Vramcu Aleksandar Veliki kralj „macedonski ili bosanski", a pisac pomenutog „Nado-danja" priča, da su se Slovinci pokrstili po primjeru „Svatopluka kralja bosanskoga, dalmatinskoga, servijanskoga, hrvatskoga i rašijanskoga".


Sorry for the slight off topic, but it might be informative regarding this talk about Macedonia, the Macedonian language, and identity in the pre-19th century Balkans.


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## sokol

phosphore said:


> As to the question whether a Macedonian language existed before its standardisation, I think it is misplaced. People certainly spoke various dialects that are now called Macedonian, which could have been called Bulgarian had the course of history been different, but that is completely irrelevant. There is no linguistic criterion which sets apart dialects in a dialectal continuum and that has been repeated over and over a hundred times at least. You may ask for political reasons why Macedonians aren't and couldn't be Bulgarians, but that's out of the scope of this forum.


Yes, exactly my point. 
The question indeed has the underlying (and wrong) assumption that the history of Slavic Macedonian language might have political relevance.

Oh, and about romantic stories of Alexander the Great - this was all the rage throughout Europe then, it isn't even a specific of the Balkans.  Of course those Alexander romanticism would have been connected with the region of (then only: Greek) Makedonia (as there wasn't the concept of "Slavic Macedonia" then yet).
(Unfortunately, this Alexander romanticism has been revived there recently, which of course put even more coals on the fire, concerning the debate about the language name with Greece. But this, as well as the Alexander romanticism as such, indeed is off-topic here. )


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## DenisBiH

sokol said:


> Oh, and about romantic stories of Alexander the Great - this was all the rage throughout Europe then, it isn't even a specific of the Balkans.  Of course those Alexander romanticism would have been connected with the region of (then only: Greek) Makedonia (as there wasn't the concept of "Slavic Macedonia" then yet).




Obviously, we disagree. 

Unless you want to say that the area of Sarajevo or Podgorica was considered a part of Greek Macedonia in the 16th century, it's obvious we have a name denoting a Slavic territory. 

By the way, another dominant theme with BCS authors in those days was that the Slavic migrations went in the reversed direction, from the south to the north. Thus Illyrians and ancient Macedonians were actually considered to have been Slavs by the authors back then. It thus went a bit further then a simple Alexander cult, and thus no problem equating Alexander with Serbs, Bosnians etc.


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## phosphore

I've read that at one moment actually all continental Greece was inhabited by Slavs, not only Macedonia. Most of them were however later assimilated leaving only a few toponyms behind them. But in the light of that I find it natural that Macedonia was Slavic and not (only) Greek much before the 19th century.

Back on topic, it would be interesting to see some real history of Macedonian and its dialects. Macedonians, where are you? 

I hope there is such a history, without an introduction where the authors explain how the Macedonian language is very much different from Serbian and Bulgarian and has always been so since the ancient times. Some time ago I started reading a book on Montenegrin where instead of writing about their proper language authors start the story with the Serbian hegemonism and their determination to destroy the heroic and autochtonous Montenegrin language which has been there for centuries and is so naturally strong that it has survived all Serbian suppression and has finally found its freedom and identity. I mean, it makes me really said that in 2010 we still can't have linguistic works without political agenda and such funny visions of language.


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## apmoy70

phosphore said:


> I've read that at one moment actually all continental Greece was inhabited by Slavs, not only Macedonia. Most of them were however later assimilated leaving only a few toponyms behind them. But in the light of that I find it natural that Macedonia was Slavic and not (only) Greek much before the 19th century.


In early 8th c. AD, emperor Nicephorus Logothethes, fraught by the creation of Slavic enclaves (known as «Σκλαβινίες», Sklavi'nies _pl. f._ in the Byzantine world) in Greece (especially in the North), in order to adress the issue of the-how should I post it-"ghettoisation" of Slavs and Avaro-Slavs, imports significant Greek populations from Minor Asia ("ἐκ παντὀς θέματος-ek pan'tos 'θematos, "from every thema" [see the thematic structure of the Byzantine state]) by force, and moves significant Slavic, Avaro-Slavic and Drogubite Slavic populations from Greece to Minor Asia. By doing that, he weakens the Slavic presence in Greece, thus making easier the assimilation, and the Slavs who are transferred to Asia Minor find themselves amidst a flourishing and numerous Greek population. [I apologize for the OT]


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## Orlin

phosphore said:


> Back on topic, it would be interesting to see some real history of Macedonian and its dialects. Macedonians, where are you?
> 
> I hope there is such a history, without an introduction where the authors explain how the Macedonian language is very much different from Serbian and Bulgarian and has always been so since the ancient times. Some time ago I started reading a book on Montenegrin where instead of writing about their proper language authors start the story with the Serbian hegemonism and their determination to destroy the heroic and autochtonous Montenegrin language which has been there for centuries and is so naturally strong that it has survived all Serbian suppression and has finally found its freedom and identity. I mean, it makes me really said that in 2010 we still can't have linguistic works without political agenda and such funny visions of language.


 
Slažem se potpuno da je sve o balkanskim jezicima pod neizbežnim uticajem politike i pretpostavljam da svaki balkanski narod uči "različitu istoriju" balkanskih zemalja i jezika. Ja sam predstavio sve s pozicije nestručnjaka koji je završio odlično bugarsku srednju školu (bez namere za autopromociju) i pitam šta kažu Makedonci o istoriji svog jezika, a takođe kako izgleda taj problem s perspektive stanovnika svih drugih država.


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## DenisBiH

apmoy70 said:


> and the Slavs who are transferred to Asia Minor find themselves amidst a flourishing and numerous Greek population. [I apologize for the OT]



The story then goes on, a number of (possibly those same?) Slavs in Asia Minor entered the service of the Caliphate and converted to Islam.

Not to be completely OT, I agree with Orlin's last comment.


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## sokol

Orlin said:


> Slažem se potpuno da je sve o balkanskim jezicima pod neizbežnim uticajem politike i pretpostavljam da svaki balkanski narod uči "različitu istoriju" balkanskih zemalja i jezika. Ja sam predstavio sve s pozicije nestručnjaka koji je završio odlično bugarsku srednju školu (bez namere za autopromociju) i pitam šta kažu Makedonci o istoriji svog jezika, a takođe kako izgleda taj problem s perspektive stanovnika svih drugih država.


Yes, it would be interesting to know how the history of Macedonian language is taught in Macedonia itself (and here also, what students here in secondary education - which obviously wouldn't be quite scientific but a rough overview  -, as opposed to what is taught at university, in courses for the history of Macedonian language).


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## ilocas2

Hi,

My grandfather is Macedonian, they was living in Greece, roughly 15 km from Greek-Macedonian border. In 1947, when he was 13, the whole family escaped from the civil war to Czechoslovakia. In fact, to speak Macedonian was forbidden and severly punished in Greece. Greeks wanted make Greeks from them. And finally they succeeded. Their relatives an their descendants living in Greece no longer know any Macedonian and they feel like Greeks. Ultimately even my grandfather and his brothers and sisters living in Czech Republic speak or spoked about theirself rather like about Greeks. Obviously it's better to be Greek than Macedonian.

And I have a German geographic atlas publicated in 1916 in Vienna (approbiert vom hohen k. k. Ministerium für Kultus und Unterricht für Mittelschulen und Mädchenlyzeen ) at home and there is a nation map of Europe. Macedonians are determined like Bulgarians on this map. And Greek Macedonia is nationally divided. In the norhtern third along the borders with Serbia and Bulgaria, there are Bulgarians. And in the southern two thirds including Chalkidiki, there are Greeks. The area of today Macedonia is inhabitated by Bulgarians with Albanians along the border with Albania and today Serbia.

This is something from real history, phosphore


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## DenisBiH

Interesting story. Did your grandfather call his Slavic language Macedonian, Bulgarian or something else?


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## ilocas2

DenisBiH said:


> Interesting story. Did your grandfather call his Slavic language Macedonian, Bulgarian or something else?



Macedonian


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