DiG 29 (2021), 19–36 DOI 10.

1515/dialect-2021-0002

Sources in historical dialectology

Barbara Bába

Abstract
Any scholarly description of Hungarian dialects may only be possible for the time
period after the settlement of the Hungarian-speaking population in the Carpathian
Basin. Research in historical dialectology has primarily focused on the phonological
characterization of 11th-14th century conditions, while in terms of sources, scholars
have so far relied primarily on early data related to tribes’ names, historical data rec-
orded in charters, today’s dialects, as well as evidence provided by related languages
and elements borrowed from others. My paper sets out to establish the value of vari-
ous sources in historical dialectology in view of our current knowledge in language
history and calls attention to related methodological pitfalls. As most of these source
types may also greatly contribute to the better understanding of the history of other
languages, these methodological issues are relevant not only for Hungarian historical
linguistics and dialectology but also more generally.
The research and writing of this essay has been supported by the University of Debrecen
and the MTA Premium Postdoctoral Research Program, Eötvös Loránd Research Network.

Keywords
Historical dialectology, historical phonology, language history.

1 Introduction
Any scholarly description of Hungarian dialects may only be possible for the time
period after the settlement of the Hungarian-speaking population in the Carpathian
Basin at the turn of the 9th and 10th centuries. Studies in historical dialectology
have focused primarily on the phonological characterization of the 11th–14th cen-
tury conditions despite the fact that studying dialectal phenomena in terms of his-
torical phonology is made harder by numerous factors. The phonological orienta-
tion of such works in the field of historical dialectology is due to the fact that early
data, as a result of them being remnants, are suitable for morphological studies only
to a limited extent and are absolutely unsuitable for syntactic examination.
Hungarian research in historical dialectology has so far relied primarily on
early data related to tribes’ names, historical data recorded in charters, today’s
dialects, as well as evidence provided by related languages and loan elements.
20 Barbara Bába

This paper reviews the value of various sources in historical dialectology (regard-
ing the 11th–14th century) in view of our current knowledge of language history
and calls attention to related methodological pitfalls. As most of these types of
sources also greatly contribute to the better understanding of the history of other
languages, these methodological issues are apparent not only in Hungarian his-
torical linguistics and dialectology but also have more general relevance.

2 The source value of tribal names, elements from related languages and
loan words
It is probably due to the lack of a large quantity of localized data and the difficulties
involved with their assessment that in certain cases when designating the focal
points of phonological changes studies in Hungarian historical dialectology did
not primarily rely on evidence provided by early historical data, but rather on the
phonological features found in the tribal name records of Constantine (cf. Hoff-
mann et al. 2017: 40–41), and in relation to that, various ideas connected to the
settlement of tribes (cf. Bárczi 1958: 53). Thus, for example, Géza Bárczi argues
that due to the fact that we can find the sound ü [y] in the name of only one tribe
(i.e., Kürtgyarmat) in Constantine’s work, the use of the labial ü instead of i can
be associated with the dialect of this tribe. As researchers indicated the region of
the Dráva meeting the Danube as the place of settlement of the Kürtgyarmat tribe,
Bárczi locates the center of the i > ü labialization in this area (Bárczi 1958: 53).
Based on similar principles, he associates the center of the i > ë [e] opening (low-
ering) with the area of the Megyer tribe, i.e., the central part of the country (1958:
40, 1967/2002b: 149). These ideas continued to be in use in the past half a century
in scholarly publications in the fields of historical linguistics and historical dialec-
tology. However, the phonological conclusions of the argument rely on uncertain
suppositions (and one or two linguistic data at most) and we have mostly only
indirect evidence regarding the original place of settlement of the tribes. Thus we
may rely on rather uncertain and controversial evidence provided by toponyms
related to tribes and the use of these clues in themselves may serve as a foundation
for the description of phonological dialectal differences typical of the era to a lesser
extent only. This is further complicated by the fact that the etymological explana-
tion of the tribes’ names are uncertain and the concept of the tribe may also be
interpreted in multiple ways (Bárczi 1963/1975: 73–74, Kristó 2003: 52, Rácz
2006: 9). Thus the review of former arguments is still urgent despite the fact that
the conclusions drawn from them, sometimes with the involvement of other, truly
relevant data may be confirmed again.
Besides the data related to tribes’ names used as sources in studies in historical
dialectology, scholars have often considered it important to take into account ele-
ments from related languages and loan words when discussing the chronological
 Sources in historical dialectology 21

aspects of certain phonological oppositions. For example, the parallels from related
languages may be used in the case of the duality of the fil ~ fül ‘ear’ lexeme; besides
the early historical records showing only the illabial form, it also confirms the pri-
macy of the illabial form that in languages related to Hungarian, for example, in
Vogul, the lexeme also has an illabial version (Vogul pil ‘ear’, Benkő 1957: 17,
UEW. 370).
Loan elements may also serve as useful starting points as sources in historical
dialectology in connection with the i ~ ü opposition. According to Loránd Benkő,
our Turkic loan words prior to the Conquest indicate that already at this time dia-
lects using the i sound and the ü sound were opposing each other (Benkő 1957: 69).
He argues that in the Turkic loan words from the era, the Turkic palatal labial vow-
els (i.e., the ö [ø] and ü sounds) have a dual correspondence in Hungarian language:
such lexemes, for example, as ökör ‘ox’, körte ‘pear’, kökény ‘blackthorn’, szűcs
‘furrier’, etc. were most probably borrowed by communities using the dialect with
the ü sound, while the idő ‘time’, kék ‘blue’, etc. words by those with a dialect using
i (Benkő 1957: 69). Dezső Juhász also adds that those dialects that were in closer
contact with the western Old Turkic dialects were probably more prone to labiali-
zation and borrowing loan words containing ö, as the ö sound existed in Western
Old Turkic (Juhász 2018: 318). When assessing the labial and illabial forms of
common nouns of an ancient or Turkic origin, however, we should also keep in
mind that in this period in certain dialects ü might have only represented a variant
of i depending on the phonetic environment, thus its phoneme status in terms of this
era is uncertain (cf. E. Abaffy 2003: 124, Gerstner 2018: 110).

3 The source value of contemporary dialects in historical dialectology

It is one of the basic tenets of historical dialectology that in contemporary dialects
the different chronological phases of various phenomena may be found side by
side due to the different rate and direction of historical changes in dialects (cf.
Bárczi 1958: 14, Juhász 1997: 7). Therefore, contemporary dialects may represent
an important source for research in historical dialectology. It may also be due to
this fact as well as the lack of a large quantity of localized historical data and the
difficulties involved in their evaluation that scholars have strongly built on the
attributes of contemporary dialects in studies of Hungarian historical dialectology
and historical linguistics from the second half of the 20th century. This was the
case especially when they attempted to describe the regional differences in the
phonological status of earlier centuries.
Due to the sources identified in recent decades, however, such a large amount
of localized historical data has become available that also enables the reconstruc-
tion of linguistic conditions of early centuries and at the same time also makes
the review of retrospective analyses possible. Meanwhile, it may also be a result
22 Barbara Bába

of these types of studies that in a given case they may address the contradiction
between the historical and contemporary data and may explain them as well. For
this, however, we need a multifaceted approach to historical data in the process
of which certain methodological problems also need to be considered (see below).
At the same time, certain methodological barriers may also come up in connec-
tion with the use of contemporary data in the process of assessing and comparing
the historical and contemporary records. Thus, for example, as a result of changes
in phonological oppositions or due to settlement history or migration processes,
the linguistic phenomena found in contemporary dialects may be used for the lo-
calization of certain early dialectal features only with limitations. In many ways,
however, today’s dialectal data may provide real guidance for studies in historical
dialectology. To illustrate this, in the following I introduce various phenomena in
the study of which the contemporary dialectal data may provide an authentic
source for historical dialectology. At the same time, I would also like to call atten-
tion to those cases when there may be severe concerns regarding the utilization of
these data in historical dialectology.
3.1 Data related to contemporary dialects may be used reliably, for example, when
we wish to reconstruct the different phases of a particular process of change. Géza
Bárczi, for example, notes in connection with the expansion of labialization from
the end of the word that it is illustrated not only by data in historical linguistics but
also by the use of the ö sound (as opposed to the sound ë pronounced in other dia-
lects) that was stuck on a weaker, i.e. an earlier phase of development in some of
today’s dialects (in Slavonia or Abaúj County’s Füzér district). In these areas the
use of ö occurs only in unstressed syllables (Bárczi 1958: 49, Imre 1971: 135).
3.2 We may also rely on current dialectal data in cases when we set out to estab-
lish the relative chronology of various phenomena in historical dialectology. An-
tal Horger, for example, argues that contemporary dialectal data in Somogy
County confirm that the use of ö in this area is an older phenomenon than the
dropping of l (which resulted in the lengthening of the preceding vowel). In those
words in which there was an l after the ö sound within the same syllable, today
we find ő [øː] in the former position of ö in the examined regions; for example,
főmönt (as opposed to the standard felment ‘went up’ form), főhő (as opposed to
the standard felhő ‘cloud’ form) (Horger 1933: 101). And this is possible only if
the ü > ö , ë > ö changes took place earlier than the dropping of l.
3.3 Data related to contemporary dialects may sometimes provide clues even in
the case of orthographic issues from earlier centuries. For example, when assess-
ing examples related to the i ~ ü opposition, the early data including the iu, yw,
yu, (more rarely) iv, iw, yv letter combinations pose a problem, as the sound equiv-
alent of these combinations could be both ü, ű [yː] and i‿ü [i‿y] for example, the kis
 Sources in historical dialectology 23

‘small’ adjective could sound in the following records as küs, kűs, ki‿üs alike:
1331>1358: Kyusida (KMHsz. 1: 157), 1327: Kywssorlow (Gy. 3: 243). We can-
not consider diphthongs as options in this case because the kis ‘small’ lexeme
cannot be found in today’s dialects with a long vowel (cf. ÚMTsz. 3: 359–360),
which is an important circumstance because the i‿ü diphthongs transformed into a
long í [iː], ű [yː] vowel. Thus in the case of kis, the ü sound of the relevant letter
combination is most likely.
3.4 Géza Bárczi and Erzsébet E. Abaffy also relied on evidence provided by
contemporary dialects when establishing the center of the i > ü labialization. They
highlight that the strongest trend to use the ö sound emerging as a result of the
use of ü (the ü > ö shift) is encountered mostly in Baranya and Somogy Counties
as well as around Szeged (Bárczi 1967/2002b: 156, E. Abaffy 2003: 324). Loránd
Benkő argues that several signs indicate that the southeastern part of the Trans-
danubia region (Baranya, Somogy and partly Tolna counties) was a region widely
using the ü sound (Benkő 1957: 73). These findings, however, cannot be con-
firmed based on the historical data available to us at present (Bába 2019). Thus
the linguistic phenomena identified in today’s Hungarian dialects cannot always
be used in themselves as evidence for the localization of particular early dialects.
Thus the consideration of the contemporary dialectal status of a phenomenon
when discussing chronological and linguistic geographical features from the 11th–
14th centuries may only provide additional information. Such combinative and
comparative studies are more reliable in the case of later ages, when examining
the dialectal conditions of the 17th–19th centuries.

4 Data in linguistic records

From the 11th century on, the primary and direct source materials of studies in
historical dialectology have been represented, besides some other points of orien-
tation, by data found in linguistic records. The source value of data in linguistic
records in historical dialectology, however, may vary significantly.
Loránd Benkő argues that one of the main obstacles for using linguistic records
is that “we have no such records (except for some short texts of a few words or
lines) that would reveal a completely uniform and consistent linguistic status”
(Benkő 1957: 37). For example, a charter dated 1193 and confirming the assets of
Crusaders of Székesfehérvár indicates numerous phonetic fluctuations, thus data
provide examples not only for the i ~ ü opposition but also the o [ou] ~ ó [oː] (for
example humerou, could at the time sound like humero [humerou] ~ Aldo cut, at
the time probably pronounced Áldó-kút [aːldoː kuːt]), ëü [ey] ~ öü [øy] (for exam-
ple, keures bocor, at the time probably pronounced këüres bokor [keyrɛʃ bokor] ~
Chergou, at the time probably pronounced Csergöü [ʧɛrgøy]), ëü [ey] ~ é [eː] (for
example, Ferteu, at the time probably pronounced Fertëü [fɛrtey] ~ fertes, at the
24 Barbara Bába

time probably pronounced Fertés [fɛrteːʃ]) phonological (or possibly orthographic)

dualities (Benkő 1957: 37–39, Kenyhercz 2016: 11). The spatial and temporal dif-
ferences of the development and changes in the extensive diphthong system present
in our language in the 11th-12th centuries can also be seen even within one linguistic
record: the azah, meneh ~ gisnav, feu, ferteu remnants of the Founding Charter of
Tihany (1055), for example, indicate the survival of the syllable-ending ɣ [ɣ] sound
and its vocalization and diphthongization in other cases (Benkő 1957: 76).
The fluctuations seen in certain linguistic records may, according to Benkő de-
rive from the mixture of the writer’s own linguistic status and the written standard,
the fluctuations in the writer’s own linguistic status, and the combined presence of
the linguistic status of different individuals (Benkő 1957: 37–44). When using data
from early charters, we need to keep these considerations in mind as well.
4.1 The normative rules emerging explicitly mostly after the turn of the 15th and
16th centuries resulted in the mixed linguistic status of several Hungarian linguis-
tic records (Bárczi 1967/2002a: 16, Kiss 2018: 362). This is related to the fact
that the emerging literary norm can only partly suppress the author’s own linguis-
tic status in most of the cases, which results in numerous fluctuations, and in sev-
eral cases even hypercorrection (Benkő 1957: 39–42). Benkő argues that these
normative traditions become more dominant also in grammar and orthography
from the 16th century onwards (i.e., in connection with the appearance of a grow-
ing intellectual layer) (cf. Korompay 2003: 579).
4.2 Although the standardization of the Hungarian written vernacular started in
the 16th century according to Jenő Kiss, he argues that the beginning of this long
process is represented by “the appearance of Hungarian written culture. As writ-
ten language has not only a conserving but also a model role that promotes com-
pliance with standards” (Kiss 2018: 362). And in this sense he considers the pe-
riod prior to the 16th century to represent an antecedent to the standardization of
written language (Kiss 2018: 361).
Although Géza Bárczi argues that the development of a uniform written language
from a phonological and morphological perspective is delayed in the period prior to
the 16th century, he still believes that at the end of the era there are two language
versions emerging that point towards linguistic uniformization phonologically. One
of these is the type he refers to as the “monastic language”, of which the use of ö is
strikingly typical despite the fact that they were especially the areas using ö that came
under Turkish rule in the 16th century and thus codices reflecting this linguistic fea-
ture were destroyed in the highest number. This does not mean that Bárczi himself
would argue that at this time already we could talk about established language types
using ö representing the norm, as the codices using ö themselves were not uniform
in this respect, what is more, different levels of the use of ö are represented in them.
He still believes, however, that these linguistic records may indicate the spreading
 Sources in historical dialectology 25

of the use of ö in monastery language (Bárczi 1963/1975: 189). Lea Haader draws
similar conclusions in connection with the corrections from illabial to labial often
present when copying codices. She argues that the proportion of these modifications
stand as witness to the slow changes in the more original illabial status (Haader 2009:
64). The other process, specifically affecting the writing of remnants, according to
Bárczi was related to the royal chancellery, which developed a uniform sound mark-
ing system in its own practice, what is more, it also strived for the unformization of
word forms. This latter finding, however, is not supported by Bárczi with specific
examples (Bárczi 1963/1975: 189).
Based on our knowledge of historical linguistics, however, we may conclude
not only which features became popular in remnants due to traditions in writing
in a given era, but in some cases it may also be deducted what those phenomena
are that do not appear in written sources especially because of the contemporary
written traditions. Thus, for example, evidence from our linguistic records indi-
cate that in the 14th–16th centuries it was not a tradition to mark the é [eː] > i‿ë [i‿ë]
shift, even though we may find examples for this from the western part of the
Hungarian language area already from the end of the 14th century (e.g., Ecsér
1391: Echyer, Cs. 3: 48). Thus it is probable to a certain extent that at the time
this form was already a living dialectal variation, but the scribes either did not
find these suitable for the written text (Bárczi 1963/1975: 188) or the literate peo-
ple were not aware of the particular dialectal phenomenon.
4.3 At the same time, however, in terms of the era prior to the appearance of a
more significant intelligentsia, we might as well suppose that the written corpus
created by a few literate people shows much more consistency, unity than the
products of later ages (cf. Benkő 1980: 81). And as such, some degree of uni-
formity resulting from those learned could already be characteristic of linguistic
records from the 11th–14th century.
Dezső Juhász writes that the expertise of officials at the chancellery and the
scribes at places of authentication (were places issuing and authenticating charters
at major religious centers) is also visible in the use of the templates of different
text types (Juhász 2018: 315–316). Géza Érszegi and Imre Szentpétery also men-
tion the manuals including the formulas used in charters and the books teaching
people how to edit charters. Their use was necessary as such a collection “enabled
the chancellery to issue charters with identical formulas in identical cases, saving
on the work related to writing the text again.” (Érszegi 1998: 41, cf. Szentpétery
1942: 405, 410). Juhász argues that those able to write also encountered the dif-
fering language use of different regions, and among others it was this linguistic
experience and the use of templates based on written traditions that together re-
sulted in the fact that early written documents reflect the living language through
some kind of a filter (Juhász 2018: 315–316).
26 Barbara Bába

4.4 Besides those mentioned above, such factors could also contribute to the lin-
guistic fluctuations of the same author that are independent of the developing
written tradition. The dualities created this way may come, for example, from the
fluctuations present in the given type of dialect as well. It is a natural feature of
linguistic changes that old and new phenomena co-exist for a while as synchro-
nous variations within the same dialect (Benkő 1957: 14). What is more, the sim-
ultaneous presence of linguistic phenomena is certainly present in the language
use of the individual (e.g., the scribe of the charter) as well. The fluctuations (that
also appear in the texts) derive not only from dualities of the author’s own dialect
but may also be due to the mixture of dialect types used at his different places of
residence (Benkő 1957: 37).
4.5 Besides those mentioned above, the mixed linguistic features of our linguistic
records are in many cases due to the fact that manuscripts and documents often
did not survive in their original form, thus we may consider the mixture of the
linguistic status of different people and even different eras in them. This issue is
crucial also in the case of our early records and the originality of the record is also
an important factor in the case of the products of legal written documents; this is
because a significant part of our charters from the 11th and 12th centuries have
survived only in the form of subsequent copies, translations or forgeries, which,
of course, has a major influence on their source value in historical dialectology
(cf. Benkő 1980: 20–22, Bárczi 1963/1975: 186).
To what extent the linguistic material of the copied record represents a mixture
cannot be separated from the question as to what degree those copying or translating
the documents capitalized on the opportunity for changes. In this sense we can iden-
tify major differences between the copiers of both charters and codices. With regard
to the charters, Szentpétery comments on the scale of intervention by the hands of
the copier: he argues that they paid most attention to the accuracy of copied charters
in papal transcripts but places of authentication (loca credibilia) also issued more
accurate translations than what is revealed by the practice of the royal chancellery
(Szentpétery 1942: 402, 419, Kenyhercz 2016: 14, Hoffmann et al. 2018: 29).
Of course, it is not a negligible detail either how often the given manuscript
was copied by a different person as it seems plausible that the more authors left
their mark on a linguistic record, the more diverse it became linguistically (Szent-
pétery 1942: 410). As for these modifications and fluctuations, we also know that
they primarily appear in terms of phonology (and orthography) (Benkő 1957: 43,
Kenyhercz 2016: 10). According to Róbert Kenyhercz, the frequency of differ-
ences of a phonological nature may also be related to the fact that such dualities
probably did not cause any problems when issuing, copying, and later using these
charters as these were not considered to be differences that would have under-
mined the legal authenticity of the charters even to a minor extent (Kenyhercz
2016: 13). That differences not influencing the legal credibility of the charter were
 Sources in historical dialectology 27

disregarded when checking the copies is also well exemplified by the fact these
differences may be found not only in the spelling of Hungarian remnants but also
in the Latin text itself (Kenyhercz 2016: 16).

5 Data in charters that have not survived in their original form

Thus the association of data in charters that have not survived in their original form
(i.e., forged, interpolated, and copied, transcribed charters) with a certain date is ra-
ther uncertain (Kenyhercz 2016: 9) and therefore their more detailed study is a must
not only for the purposes of identifying the chronological layers of the charter in
question but also to be able to describe the dialectal differences typical of the era.
When studying the labial-illabial opposition those data should receive special atten-
tion as the early labial form of the Geletnek settlement name in the Founding Charter
of the Abbey of Garamszentbenedek (1075/+1124/+1217: aliis tribus villis, scilicet
Goznucha, Gelednuk et Kerestur, Gy. 1: 444, DHA. 1: 218). The Gelednuk (at the
time it could probably be pronounced as gelednük [ɡɛlɛdnyk]) form according to
György Györffy and Melinda Szőke cannot be linked to the 11th century, it was
added to the text only as a result of a later interpolation (DHA. 1: 216, 217; Szőke
2015: 98–99). The labial modification of the föld and telek lexemes is probably also
the consequence of transcription in the following toponyms: +?1248 >1393: Che-
panfelde (at the time probably pronounced as csépánfëlde [ʧeːpaːnfeldɛ]),
+?1248>1402: Chepanfulde (at the time probably pronounced as csépánfölde
[ʧeːpaːnføldɛ]) (KMHsz. 1: 74); 1257/1390/1454: Cheh Thelek (at the time probably
pronounced as csehtelek [ʧɛhtɛlɛk]), 1257/1390/1494: Chehtelewk (at the time prob-
ably pronounced as csehtelök [ʧɛhtɛløk]) (Gy. 3: 511). Thus these examples remind
us that in the case of describing dialectal differences of a phonological nature certain
data from these types of charters cannot be associated with the date of creation of
the original charter.
A lexical example related to the village ‘village’ geographical common noun
may also be used here. The historical etymological dictionary of the Hungarian
language (TESz.) indicates an 11th-century source as the first occurrence of the
falu geographical common noun (the Charter of Garamszentbenedek from 1075)
but we know that this charter was forged during the 13th century with the interpo-
lation of various passages. As for the Sárófalu and Mikolafalu names of the
founding charter of the abbey (1075/+1124/+1217: Saroufalu, Mikolafalu,
KMHsz. 1: 188, 238), we also know that their falu geographical common noun is
probably the result of a later interpolation, thus the first authentic record of falu
may actually be quoted only from the 13th century (even though the word itself is
from the Finno-Ugric language, a lexeme with an ancient origin) (Gy. 1: 418,
Szőke 2010: 99–100). The chronological features of the emergence and spreading
28 Barbara Bába

of a given linguistic phenomenon play a major role in historical dialectology be-

cause we might explore the dialectal features of certain synchronous sections only
in relation to them, while naturally the description of the history of regional at-
tributes cannot be separated from the temporal dimension either.

6 The source value of data

As an additional cross-reference when specifying the source value of historical
data in historical dialectology, we should also discuss the bases on which the dif-
ferent data may be qualified as either being of a reliable or uncertain source value.

6.1 The source value of data from the perspective of linguistic geography
When assessing data related to linguistic geography, we need to consider the un-
evenness of the territorial distribution of sources (e.g., the poor resources of the
Transylvania region), which may easily make the testimony of linguistic geo-
graphical data uncertain (Tóth 2016: 13). This means specifically that the lack of
certain data in the examined area does not necessarily entail the lack of the lin-
guistic phenomenon itself but it is naturally related to the source attributes also.
It is not only the lack of data in certain regions that may be misleading when
describing the regional characteristics of dialectal phenomena but also the abun-
dance of data in other regions. Nyitra County, for example, appears as a center in
early centuries when studying the regional spreading of both the use of ü (instead
of i) and the use of í [iː] (instead of é [eː]). The familiarity with the source attrib-
utes of the county, however, should stop us from considering the area as the focal
point of the phonological changes mentioned. To see this it is enough to compare
the data of the southern parts of the central region of the country with the number
of data in Nyitra County. The quantity of data in Bodrog, Csanád and Csongrád
counties combined do not make up half of data in Nyitra County, even if the size
of Nyitra County is only a small portion of the territory of the three others. These
factors are mostly related to extralinguistic, historical and settlement history-re-
lated issues.
Beyond the incidental survival of charters, the source value of certain data in
linguistic geography may also be related to their quality as common nouns and
proper names. The presence of Hungarian remnants in Latin-language charters is
explained differently by different researchers and as a result they may not have
the same weight as linguistic geographical data when studying the spreading of
certain linguistic phenomena. As we know, the appearance of the Hungarian ver-
sion of proper name remnants in the text (beyond the use of European norms) is
mostly related to the role of charters as legal securities but the use of common
nouns and common noun structures of the mother tongue can hardly be explained
 Sources in historical dialectology 29

with such a role. István Hoffmann argues that the appearance of Hungarian rem-
nants in the texts may be the result of a psycholinguistic situation caused by the
circumstances of the creation of charters in which the linguistic consciousness of
notaries kept moving between two languages all the time. This meant that in the
wording of charters, besides recording the names indispensable for the charter in
Hungarian, some other elements also entered the text. Beyond the sometimes con-
scious attitude of the scribe of the charter, the linguistic disturbance of the writer
could also play a role in this (Hoffmann 2004: 13, Szentgyörgyi 2014: 84–85).
Therefore, when studying the source value of Hungarian-language remnants
in linguistic geography, it emerges as a central question whose language use these
Hungarian linguistic elements reflect. The idea that the remnants found in charters
might as well characterize the language use of the issuing authority first appeared
in Hungarian publications on historical dialectology in the works of László Papp.
Papp argues in connection with the remnants of the original charters as well that
they may be typical linguistically of the chancellery of the issuing authority or a
notary of the chancellery, and he is especially skeptical about the usability of
transcriptions in historical dialectology (Papp 1959: 6, cf. Juhász 2018: 314).
It is especially important in connection with this issue that the socio-onomastic
value of toponymic remnants and proper name place-indicating elements may not
be assessed the same way. The toponymic records are entered into charters using
the language of the given community due to the legal function of the documents;
thus we might suppose that in most cases they reflect the language use of the
community in question well, as this was in their interest. According to Géza Bár-
czi, this is related to the fact that the drafters of the charter “wanted to avoid the
possibility of disputing the identification of the toponym in the case of a possible
legal dispute by preserving the local forms” (Bárczi 1947: 89). The assumption
that the toponymic elements derive from local language and name use is ex-
plained also by the circumstance that information regarding the places and their
denominations were obviously provided by locals to the officials charged with
the survey (Bárczi 1947: 88, Hoffmann 2004: 14).
As opposed to this, the elements indicating a place in Hungarian geographical
common nouns appear in the role of Latin type-indicating lexemes as well (for
example, the patak ‘brook’ geographical common noun in the following: 1263:
est iuxta quendam potok, qui wlgariter Scorinpotok nominatur, ÁÚO. 11: 529)
thus we might suppose that they reflect the language use of the writer of the char-
ter (which could, of course, be the same as that of the community). This assump-
tion is also substantiated by the fact that those words that are the result of the less
conscious behavior or mistakes of the scribes (and these are factors that need to
be considered in connection with common noun records) may be considered as
the linguistic imprints of the scribes of charters (Hoffmann 2004: 15). László
Hadrovics, when examining the Hungarian common nouns in Latin charters,
30 Barbara Bába

highlights that in the border districts of charters related to the area of Croatia and
Slavonia numerous geographical common words are recorded in Hungarian (for
example, séd ‘spring, brook’), which, however, are not typical at all as loanwords
in areas with a Slavic majority and they also appear only rarely as parts of topo-
nyms. Hadrovics explains this phenomenon by arguing that these elements could
mostly be added to the Latin texts administratively and this possibility (i.e., the
linguistic “intervention” of the drafter of the charter) might be assumed also in
the case of border districts of Hungarian language areas (Hadrovics 1970: 236,
Hoffmann 2004: 52). Thus scholars rightfully highlight the interconnectedness
between recording geographical common noun remnants and the language use of
charter drafters and on-site officials (who interviewed locals about the names of
important boundary marks).

6.2 The source value of data from a chronological perspective

As from the 4,419 royal charters including Hungarian remnants only 198 are as-
sociated with the 11th and 12th centuries, while the remaining 4,221 charters are
from the 13th century (Solymosi 2006: 206–207), when specifying the chronolog-
ical features of certain linguistic phenomena, the most obvious solution is to spec-
ify their relative chronology instead of the absolute one.
The chronological unevenness of the charters also greatly distorts the chrono-
logical distribution of data; this is well indicated by the close to 35,000 records
of the historical phonology and orthography database built at the Department of
Hungarian Linguistics at the University of Debrecen (see Fig. 1).

Fig. 1. The chronological distribution of data in the historical phonology and orthography
database built at the Department of Hungarian Linguistics at the University of Debrecen.

Due to the fact that the distribution of the charters is disproportionate across var-
ious centuries, when establishing chronological features the relative occurrence
of the different variants might prove to be the most successful in the different
 Sources in historical dialectology 31

periods. When studying the i ~ ü opposition, for example, we can witness the
growth of data with the ü sound in terms of their absolute frequency, however,
when considering all data (both with i and ü) and their relative proportions, the
stagnation of data using ü seems to be more probable (see Figs 2a and 2b).

Fig. 2a. The absolute frequency of the use of the ü sound (instead of i).

Fig. 2b. The relative frequency of the use of the ü sound (instead of i).

The uneven chronological distribution of charters and the linguistic data included
in them (besides the problematic nature of comparability) may influence the re-
sults of studies in historical dialectology also in the sense that at the time when
toponymic data are already available in a higher number certain processes of
sound change might have already ended. Thus, for example, one of the types of
labialization occurring in Hungarian may be explained with the dropping of the β
(or v) sound. Based on toponymic data, this type of labialization probably oc-
curred so early that we cannot find persuasive data pairs for this duality, only the
forms using ü resulting from this change (for example, 1247: Kued, probably pro-
nounced: küed [kyed] at the time Gy. 3: 434, 1319: Tuys, probably pronounced:
tüis [tyis] at the time, Gy. 2: 188) appear in a higher number among early data.
32 Barbara Bába

7 Questions of historical orthography influencing studies in dialectology

As it was typical of the orthography of the 11th–14th centuries in general that one
sound could be represented by several letters, while one letter could be used as a
sign for several sounds, it seems obvious that the discussion of orthographic is-
sues of the time is in most cases inseparable from the examination of phonological
dialectal phenomena. The exploration of possible links between the closing diph-
thongs of some of today’s dialect types and old Hungarian diphthongs, for exam-
ple, is difficult due to the contemporary written traditions, which was character-
ized primarily by monophthongous marking (Benkő 1957: 76).
It is a major obstacle when studying both the i ~ ü, and ë ~ ö oppositions that in
the early Old Hungarian Era (the 11th–14th centuries), the sound value of the letters
i and y could be i and ë, while that of u could be ü (and among many others) even
ö; thus it is difficult to decide whether the forms using i and ü or those with ë and ö
stand in opposition to one another (Benkő 1957: 73–74, E. Abaffy 2003: 326).
The orthographic inconsistency also generally characterizing the era acts as
another primary obstacle to studying the í ~ é opposition, indicating the lack of
the one letter = one sound principle. This manifests itself in the fact that the mark-
ing of the í [iː] and é [eː] sounds often corresponds in the era to the relevant short
sounds (Korompay 2003: 289).

8 Conclusion
The larger than ever data set available now may greatly contribute to the scholarly
review of early dialectal phenomena of the Hungarian language from a regional
and chronological perspective. This factor does not only provide better insights
into the phenomena themselves but may also lead to such methodological find-
ings in historical dialectology as the ones we have recently seen in dialectometry.
What we see is that earlier in dialectological studies, due to the lack of a large
number of data, phenomena of a smaller scale and more isolated in the sound
system were more in the foreground when exploring historical issues. As opposed
to this, the dialectometric analyses of Fruzsina Sára Vargha that build on an ade-
quate amount of data emphasize the role of frequent phonetic phenomena of a
larger scale not only when specifying the fault lines between dialects but also
when studying the historical connections between them (Vargha 2017: 108).
At the same time, there are numerous phenomena that justify a more cautious
approach to source materials and results derived from them for the description of
early dialectal phenomena from the 11th-14th centuries. Several such research con-
siderations and methodological requirements can be specified for this purpose that
may have a key significance in the description of features related to historical dia-
lectology.
 Sources in historical dialectology 33

It is an important consideration, for example, in the study of early dialectal

phenomena that the heterogeneity of even the early (11th-14th century) sources
could be shaped by the written traditions prevailing to varying extents at the time.
In connection with the mixed linguistic condition of sources, we may argue this
way despite the fact that the adaptation to a stronger written tradition may be
considered an especially influential factor from the turn of the 15th-16th centuries
only. The emphasis on this guideline could be important when describing espe-
cially frequent linguistic phenomena. When discussing the regional attributes of
the early labial-illabial opposition, for example, the data from areas abundant in
labial records (e.g., Nyitra County) should be examined from multiple perspec-
tives. The area of Nyitra County is in fact a region that shows strong illabiality in
later periods. Thus it is also possible that the former labiality may be related to
some kind of a written tradition.
It is obvious, of course, that we cannot fully eliminate all the complicating fac-
tors, however, I believe that with such methods as the consideration of the fre-
quency and chronology of data relative to one another, we may get closer to reliable
results. At the same time, the detailed analyses of sources that have not survived in
their original form from the perspective of historical linguistics and historical topo-
nymy could also contribute to the more differentiated treatment of data (e.g., Szőke
2015, Kovács 2018). The in-depth philological analyses of these types of charters
may in many cases contribute to making studies in historical dialectology (and
within this historical phonology and orthography) more precise and accurate.

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Barbara Bába  University of Debrecen  Hungary  baba.barbara@arts.unideb.hu