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Livonia

Livonia

:This article is about the region in Europe. For other uses see Livonia (disambiguation). Livonia (disambiguation) from a 1740 map]] Livonia (Latvian: Livonija; Estonian: Liivimaa; German: Livland; Polish: Inflanty; Russian: Лифляндия or Liflandiya) once was the land of the Finnic Livonians, but came in the Middle Ages to designate a much broader territory controlled by the Livonian Order on the eastern coasts of the Baltic Sea in present-day Latvia and Estonia. Its frontiers are the Gulf of Riga and the Gulf of Finland in the north-west, Lake Peipus and Russia to the east, and Lithuania to the south. Livonia was inhabited by various Baltic and Finnic peoples ruled by an upper class of Baltic Germans. Over the course of time some nobles were polonized into the Polish szlachta or russified into the Russian Dvoryanstvo. Beginning in the 12th century Livonia was an area of economic and political expansion by Danes and Germans, particularly by the Hanseatic League and the Cistercian Order. Around 1160 Hanseatic traders from Lübeck established a trading post at the future site of Riga. The Chronicle of Henry of Livonia from the 1220s gives a firsthand account of the Christianization of Livonia, granted as a fief by the Hohenstaufen King of Germany Philip of Swabia to Albert of Buxhoeveden, nephew of the Archbishop of Bremen, who sailed with a convoy of ships filled with armed crusaders to carve out a Catholic territory in the East during the Northern Crusades. Albert founded Riga in 1201, built a cathedral, and became the first Prince-Bishop of Livonia. Thus, from the early 13th century Livonia became a confederation (Livonian Confederation) of lands ruled by the Livonian Order (founded by Albert in 1202, which joined with the Teutonic Knights in Prussia in 1237) and the spiritual territories including the archbishopric of Riga and the bishoprics of Courland, Ösel-Wiek, and Dorpat, where Albert's brother Hermann established himself as the prince-bishop. Dorpat superimposed on present-day national borders, Livonia marked in yellow]] In 1561 during the Livonian War Livonia fell to the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, with Russia recognizing Polish control of Livonia only in 1582. The organization of Livonia in the Commonwealth as of 1598 was:
- Wenden Voivodship (województwo wendeńskie, Cēsis / Wenden)
- Dorpat Voivodship (województwo dorpackie, Tartu / Dorpat)
- Parnawa Voivodship (województwo parnawskie, Pärnu / Pernau / Parnawa) Sweden gained control over the northern Estonian and central Latvian regions of Livonia, including Riga, after fighting the Polish–Swedish War during the 1620s, and incorporated it into the Swedish realm as the dominion Swedish Livonia. The portion of Livonia remaining in the Commonwealth after the Treaty of Oliva in 1660 was known as Polish Livonia, or Inflanty. It consisted mainly of the southern Latvian region Latgale within the Livonian Voivodship with the capital of Daugavpils, or Dyneburg. This division of Livonia was codified in the Treaty of Oliva in 1660. The Russian Empire conquered Swedish Livonia during the course of the Great Northern War and acquired the province at the Treaty of Nystad in 1721. Russia then added Polish Livonia in 1772 during the Partitions of Poland. Livonia remained within the Russian Empire until the end of World War I, when it was split between the newly independent states of Latvia and Estonia. Soviet troops and German Freikorps fought with Latvian and Estonian soldiers over the Balticum teritory, but their attempts were defeated. Livonia remains split between Latvia and Estonia today. The native Livonian language is still spoken in parts of Latvia, but is understood to be fast approaching extinction.

Contemporary culture

Neil Gaiman, in his comic book The Sandman, portrayed the last sinner in Hell as being a 10th century mass murderer from Livonia, who was too proud of the magnitude of his sins to accept forgiveness. : "...but I am Breschau of Livonia! This is my sin!" : "No one cares any more, Breschau. No one remembers. I doubt one mortal in a hundred thousand could even point to where Livonia used to be, on a map."

Livonia (disambiguation)

Livonia may refer to:
- Baltic Livonia, once a Finnic land south of the Gulf of Finland, now divided and constituting southern Estonia and northern Latvia.
- Swedish Livonia a Dominion of the Swedish Realm
- Inflantia a territory of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth
- Livonia, an album by His Name Is Alive Places in the United States called Livonia:
- Livonia, Indiana
- Livonia, Louisiana
- Livonia, Michigan
- Livonia, Missouri
- Livonia, New York
- Town of Livonia
- Village of Livonia (Not to be confused with the differently-spelled Lavonia, Georgia, United States.)

1740

Events

- May 31 - Friedrich II comes to power in Prussia upon the death of his father, Friedrich Wilhelm I.
- October 20 - Maria Theresia of Austria inherits the Habsburg hereditary dominions (Austria, Bohemia, Hungary and present-day Belgium). However, her succession to the Holy Roman Empire is contested widely because she is a woman.
- December 16 - Friedrich II of Prussia invades the Habsburg possession of Silesia, starting the War of the Austrian Succession.
- By the act of English parliament, alien immigrants (including Huguenots and Jews) in the colonies receive British nationality
- Adam Smith enters Balliol College, Oxford
- George Whitefield founds the Bethesda Orphanage
- The song "Rule Britannia" is first performed at Cliveden

Births

- March - Johann van Beethoven, German musician and father of Ludwig van Beethoven (d. 1792)
- June 2 - Marquis de Sade, French author (d. 1814)
- August 14 - Pope Pius VII (d. 1823)
- August 23 - Emperor Ivan VI of Russia (d. 1846)
- September 29 - Empress Go-Sakuramachi of Japan (d. 1813)
- Juan Andres, Spanish Jesuit (d. 1817)

Deaths

- January 5 - Antonio Lotti, Italian composer (b. 1667)
- January 27 - Louis Henri, Duc de Bourbon, Prime Minister of France (b. 1692)
- February 6 - Pope Clement XII (b. 1652)
- April 23 - Thomas Tickell, English writer (b. 1685)
- May 31 - King Friedrich Wilhelm I of Prussia (b. 1688)
- June 1 - Samuel Werenfels, Swiss theologian (b. 1657)
- June 6 - Alexander Spotswood, British governor of Virginia Colony
- June 17 - William Wyndham, English politician (b. 1687)
- October 5 - Johann Philipp Baratier, German scholar (b. 1721)
- October 20 - Charles VI, Holy Roman Emperor (b. 1685)
- October 28 - Anna I of Russia (b. 1693)
- December 20 - Richard Boyle, 2nd Viscount Shannon, British military officer and statesman (b. 1675) Category:1740 ko:1740년 simple:1740

Latvian language

Latvian (latviešu valoda), sometimes also referred to as Lettish, is the official state language of the Republic of Latvia. There are about 1.4 million native Latvian speakers in Latvia and about 150,000 abroad. Latvian belongs to the Eastern Baltic sub-group of the Baltic language group in the Indo-European language family, and it is neither Germanic nor Slavic. Of the Baltic languages, only Latvian and its closest relative Lithuanian remain. However, while related, the Latvian and Lithuanian vocabularies vary greatly from each other and are not mutually intelligible. Latvian is an inflective language with several analytical forms, three dialects, and German syntactical influence. There are two grammatical genders in Latvian. Each noun is declined in seven cases: nominative, genitive, dative, accusative, instrumental, locative, and vocative.

History

Latvian emerged as a distinct language in the 16th century, having evolved from Latgalian and assimilating Curonian, Semigallian and Selonian on the way. All of these belong to the Baltic language group. The oldest known examples of written Latvian are from a 1530 translation of a number of hymns made by Nicholas Ramm, a German pastor in Riga.

Classification

Latvian is one of two living Baltic languages (with the other one being Lithuanian), a group of its own within the Indo-European language family. The Latvian and Lithuanian language have retained many features of the nominal morphology of the proto-language, though in matters of phonology and verbal morphology they show many innovatiosn, with Latvian being somewhat more innovative than Lithuanian. The closest ties the Baltic languages have are with the Slavic and Germanic languages.

Orthography

Historically, Latvian was written using a system based upon German phonetic principles. At the beginning of the 20th century, this was replaced by a more phonetically appropriate system, using a modified Latin alphabet consisting of 33 letters. Latvian spelling has become one of the most perfect Latin script-based spelling systems in the world: Latvian graphemes correspond almost perfectly to the phonemes while observing the morphemic structure of the word. The Latvian alphabet lacks the letters q, w, x, y, but uses letters modified by a number of diacritic marks:
- A macron over the vowels a, e, i, u, signifying a long vowel (ā, ē, ī, ū, and historically also ō);
- A caron over c, s and z, signifying palatalization (č, š, ž);
- A comma under or over some consonants signifying a "palatal" variant (ģ, ķ, ļ, ņ, and historically also ŗ); Ō is only used to write some variants of vernacular of eastern Latvia, and also in the related Latgalian language. It has not been used in the official Latvian language since the 1940s. The diphthongs (ai, au, ei, ia, iu, ui, ua, oi) are written (ai, au, ei, ie, iu, ui, o, oj). Every phoneme has its own letter (with the exception of dz and dž, which are nevertheless uniquely identifiable, and the two sounds written as e), so that you don't have to guess how to pronounce a word when you read it. The stress, with a few exceptions, is on the first syllable.

Language and politics

Latvia has had tumultous relationship with Germany, Sweden, Russia and Poland throughout history, and has always been a multicultural country. However during the years of Soviet occupation (1940-1941; 1945-1991) the policy of russification greatly impacted the Latvian language. Through these two periods around 340,000 Latvians — approximately one-third of the population — were deported and otherwise persecuted. Followed by a massive imigration from Soviet republics of Russia, Ukraine, Belarus and others, the ethnic Latvian population was reduced from about 80% in 1935 to 52% in 1989. Most immigrants settled in the country without ever learning Latvian. Today Latvian is the mother tongue for only a little more than 60% of the country's population. After re-establishment of independence in 1991 a new policy of language education was introduced. The primary goals now include integration of all inhabitants against the background of the official state language while protecting and developing the languages of Latvia's minorities. Some scholars believe that these programs may be contributing to the overall decline of the Latvian language. True bilingual education at government expense (primary school only) is available for several minorities. These include Russian, Jewish, Polish, Lithuanian, Ukrainian, Belarusian, Estonian, and Roma schools where Latvian is taught as a second language in the initial stages so as to encourage the attainment of competence in Latvian and ensure each resident of Latvia integrates into the life of the society and is not hindered by lack of proficiency in Latvian. The Law on State Language was adopted on December 9, 1999. Several regulatory acts that refer to this Law have been adopted. The observance of the Law is monitored by the Ministry of Justice State Language Centre.

External links

- [http://www.letonika.lv/ Letonika]
- [http://www.letonika.lv/dictionary/ English-Latvian/Latvian-English dictionary]
- [http://www.websters-online-dictionary.org/definition/Latvian-english/ Latvian English Dictionary] from [http://www.websters-online-dictionary.org Webster's Online Dictionary] - the Rosetta Edition
- [http://www.multitran.ru Russian-Latvian/Latvian-Russian dictionary]
- [http://www.lvavp.lv/ National Agency for Latvian Language Training]
- [http://www.languagehelpers.com/Latvia/TheLatvianAlphabet.html The Latvian Alphabet]
- [http://www.languagehelpers.com Examples of Latvian words and phrases (with sound)]
- [http://www.torontozinas.com Bilingual (Latvian and English) e-zine] Category:Baltic languages Category:Languages of Latvia Category:East Baltic languages ja:ラトビア語

Estonian language

The Estonian language (eesti keel) is spoken by about 1.1 million people, of which the great majority live in the Northern European country of Estonia. Estonian belongs to the Finnic branch of the Finno-Ugric languages. Estonian is thus related to Finnish, spoken on the other side of the Gulf of Finland, and more distantly to the Hungarian language of the Ugric branch. Despite some overlaps in the vocabulary, in terms of its origin, the Estonian language is not related to its nearest western neighbour, Swedish, nor to its southern neighbour, Latvian, nor to its eastern neighbour, Russian, which are all Indo-European languages. One of the distinctive features of Estonian is that it has what is traditionally seen as three degrees of phoneme length: short, long, and "overlong", such that IPA , and are distinct, as are , , and . The distinction between long and overlong is, in practice, as much a matter of syllable stress (involving pitch) as duration. Long and overlong vowels are not distinguished in written Estonian; plosives, however, appear in writing with three "degrees": b,d,g; p,t,k and pp;tt;kk (all unvoiced plosives).

Phonology

There are nine phonemic monophthongs — a e i o u õ [] ä [æ] ö [ø] ü [y] — which have three phonetic lengths. Of these, simple and long are segmentally phonemic, and the third length level is suprasegmentally phonemic and aided by a distinctive tonal contour. The script distinguishes only short and long (marked by vowel doubling). There are 19 segmental diphthongs (Hint 1978), and polysyllablic vowel clusters are also found. There is one series of stops, unvoiced unaspirated, with three phonemic lengths, written b d g, p t k and pp tt kk. The rest of the consonants also have distinctive length, but only short and long are distinguished in writing. As with vowels, two segmental length levels are phonemic, and the third level is suprasegmentally phonemic. For example, for 'n', short 'n' in lina "sheet", half-long 'n' in linna "town's", over-long 'n' in linna "to the town". The latter addition of length is traceable to a grammatical marker
- -han that has elided. The fricatives are s h, added with f š ž z for loans. The other consonants are j l m n r v, plus the allophonic velar nasal in nk and ng. Consonants may be palatalized; this is not spelled out. Palatalization occurs before front vowels. About 0.15% of the vocabulary features fully phonemic palatalization, where palatalization occurs without the front vowel. (The process is similar to that found in Eastern Finnish dialects, where word-final 'i' is elided, leaving the palatalization on the consonant.) Thus, palatalization does not necessarily need a front vowel, and palatalized vs. plain continuants can be articulated. Estonian palatalization is thought to be of Uralic origin, and is different from Russian. In Russian, palatalization causes some affrication and necessarily features a palatal approximant/fricative offglide, which is not the case in Estonian. The stress is on the first syllable; however, international loanwords and over-long consonants may alter this pattern.

Vocabulary

Although Estonian and English languages are of completely different origins (leaving out the highly controversial Nostratic and Proto-World language theories), one can identify many similar words in the two languages. This is primarily due to the fact that Estonian language has borrowed nearly one third of its vocabulary from Germanic languages, including about 15% of the total number of word roots in modern Estonian which were borrowed from Middle Low German (Low Saxon) during the period of German rule in Estonia.

Proposed origin	No of word roots	Period	Examples
Nostratic (hypothetical)	130?	15 000 – 10 000 BC	mi(na), si(na), vesi, tabama, arbuma, puur, poeg, päkk, keel, pelgama, süva, vedama, üks
Uralic	120	5000-4000 BC	ala, üla, esi, taga; see, too, kes, mis, ei; minema, tulema, tundma, ujuma, pelgama, kaduma, mõskma; puu, kuusk, kõiv, murakas, suvi, päev, kaja, kuu, lumi, soo, juga, kala, küü, sisalik; keel, kõrv, luu, maks, põlv, põsk, silm, muna, neelama, pala, sulg, kõrv; tuli, süsi, suusk, nool, sõudma, punuma, vask, vöö; elama, koolma, vägi, nimi, sala, naine; kaks, viis
Finno-Ugric	270	4000 -3000 BC	aju, üdi, hing, pea, pii, sapp, vats; aru, jää, koit, voor, paju, pihl, kask, mari, pohl, kamar, rebane, nugis, siil, utt, hiir, püü, mõtus, vares, pääsuke, säga, säinas, särg, täi, kusilane, koi; koda, küla; põlema, küdema, pada, leem, või, väits, vestma, sau; sõba; kolm, neli, kuus; nõid, ise, ilm; talv, sügis, iga; isa, poeg, küdi, kond; valge, hahk, uus, sepp
Finno-Permic	50-140	2500 -1500 BC	kõht; kõri; säär; koobas, põrm, sõnnik; peda(jas), kuslapuu, oks, pähkel, kiud, peni, orav, kotkas; rehi, kuduma, amb, mõla, õng; äi, äike; parem, vana; lõuna; meel
Finno-Volgaic	100-150	1500 -1000 BC	selg, koon, käpp, vaim; kevad, täht, järv, haab, saar, tamm, vaher, sarapuu, õlg, lehm, siga, pett, jahvatama, kurg, kurvits, parm, sääsk; keema, hiilgama, käis, piir; vene; lell; jumal; aher, jahe, kõva, süva; kargama, pesema, püsima, lüpsma
Finno-Lappic	130 - 150	1000 – 500 BC	vihm, sammal, org, vili, põõsas, põud, õnn, veli, ime, luule, taga, tõsi, nälg, küll
Baltic-Finnic	600 - 800	500 BC – 800 AD	põder, oja, udu, hobu, mänd; kõne, sõna; aeg, eile; laps, rahvas, linn; nuga, king; julge
Estonian and unknown	appr. 1000		räni, roie, salk, videvik, jäärak, ila, aas, lubi, lõhn, kaan, kesv, ürp + numerous onomatopoetic-descriptive words
Artificial	50-60		veenma, roim, laip, kolp, relv, ese, süüme, mõrv, ulm, siiras, range, sulnis, nõme, taunima, naasma, reetma, embama; eirama, eramu, etlema, kõlar, külmik, meetmed, meene, siirdama, teave, teismeline, teler, üllitis, ärandama, levima, süva(muusika), taies, rula
Proto-European loans (hypothetical)	appr. 50	5000 – 3000 BC	higi, huul, koib, kõrv, kube, külg, liha, lõug, nahk, rind, selg; mägi, mets, neem, nõmm, oja, org, saar, soo; ahven, haug, koger, koha, rääbis, siig, vimb; jänes, konn; helmes
Indo-European and Indo-Iranic loans	20 - 45	3000 – 1000 BC	mesi, sool, osa, sada, põrsas, varss, sarv, puhas, vasar
Proto-Baltic and Baltic loans	100 - 150	1500 – 500 BC	hammas, hani, hein, hernes, hõim, oinas, puder, põrgu, ratas, seeme, sein, mets, luht, sõber, tuhat, vagu, regi, vill, veel, kael, kirves, laisk
Proto-Germanic and Germanic loans	380	2000 BC – 13th century	agan, ader, humal, kana, kaer, rukis, lammas, leib, põld; aer, mõrd, laev, noot, puri; : kuld, raud, tina; sukk, katel, küünal, taigen; kuningas, laen, luna, raha, rikas, vald; kalju, kallas, rand; armas, taud, kaunis, ja
Old Slavic loans	50-75	10th – 13th century	aken, sahk, sirp, turg, teng(elpung), pagan, papp, raamat, rist, kasukas
Proto-Latvian loans	40	6th- 7th century	kanep, lääts, magun, udras, kõuts, palakas, lupard, harima, kukkel, vanik, laabuma, kauss, mulk, pastel
Low German loans	750	12th – 16th century	kool, neer, ribi; kruus, torm; kõrvits, peet, salat, petersell, münt, köömen, loorber, palm, tamm, roos, ploom; hunt, köök, kruubid, kringel, pannkook, pekk, prantssai, sült, vorst, õli, tärklis, pruukost, kruus, pann, pütt, korv, lähker, toober, tiik, tuli, lamp, lühter; käärid, teljed, vokk, lõuend, samet, siid, vilt, kuub, kört, loor, müts, muda, mantel, püksid, vammus, nööp; hoov, häärber, kelder, kemmerg, korsten, ruum, saal, tall, haamer, hing, höövel, kellu, kapp, pink, tool, trepp, vall, võlv; jaht, jääger, kants, kütt, laager, lahing, piir, püss, poiss, tääk, vaht; altar, ingel, jünger, psalm, prohvet, salm, preester, troost, pihtima, vöörmünder, piiskop, sant; preili, memm, mats, härra, proua, kelm, narr, naaber, kuller, laat, selts, krahv, saks, arst, plaaster; hangeldama, küürima, tingima, kortel, matt, toll, vaagima, viht, üür, paar, piik, tosin, veerand; näärid, reede, tund, vastlad; ankur, kiil, tüür, praam, madrus, pootsman, kotermann, loots, kipper; kaart, kool, kunst, maaler, maalima, paber, trükkima, uurima, trumm, tantsima, piip, vilepill, pasun; just, topelt, väärt
Swedish loans	140	13th – 17th century	kratt, kroonu, kuunar, julla, pagar, näkk, plasku, plika, solk, tasku, räim, tünder, moor, puldan, tont
Russian loans	350	14th – 20th century	kapsas, tatar, puravik, riisikas, sihvka, kiisu, suslik, kulu, prussakas, tarakan, naarits, soobel, uss; noos, moiva, vobla, mutt; kamorka, putka, sara, lobudik, trahter, koiku, nari, pruss, tökat; hõlst, kamass, kirsa, kombinesoon, kott, puhvaika, marli, pintsak, retuusid, trussikud; kiisel, pontšik, rosolje, rupskid, borš, uhhaa, morss, samagon; batoon, kissell, plombiir, povidlo, šašlõkk, uhhaa; plotski, mahorka, pabeross; mannerg, kopsik; nuut, kantsik, piits, tupik, relss, jaam; kabi, knopka; kasakas, kasarmu, karauul, katelok, kiiver, munder, nekrut, pagun, polk, ranits, sinel, tentsik, utsitama, timukas, rajoon, türm, pops, artell; palakas, haltuura, parseldama, parisnik, siva, tolk, tots, pujään, kitt, tuur, ladna, prosta, sutike; kaanima, kostitama, kruttima, kupeldama
(High) German loans	500	16th – 20th century	larhv, lokk, seitel; kastan, pappel, kirss, jasmiin, jorjen, kartul, tulp, vihk; ahv, auster, kalkun, siisike, miisu, mops, taks, kits, vau, viidikas, nepp, pistrik; klimp, klops, kotlet, kompvek, supp, tort, viiner, soust, vahvel, vürts, vein; jope, kittel, kampsun, kleit, vest, lips, värvel, sall, pluus; kamin, pliit, käär(kamber), sahver, latter, kabel, palat; pult, sohva, leen, kummut, kardin, sahtel; uur, klade, klamber, latern, sihverplaat, silt; opman, oober, tisler, tudeng, velsker, virtin, antvärk, aadlik, kärner, kilter, kutsar, lärm, oksjon, krempel, klatš; krehvtine, hull, liiderlik, napp, noobel, ontlik, plass, tumm, trammis; kleepima, klantsima, mehkeldama, sehkendama, rehkendama, trimpama, pummeldama, praalima, turnima; ahoi, proosit, hurraa, hopp, hallo
Finnish loans	90	19th – 20th century	aare, sangar, harras, jenka, julm, jäik, sünge, tehas, uljas, vaist, vihjama, säilima, kuvama, haihtuma, anastama
Hebrew loans	< 5		jaana(lind), tohuvabohu
Roma loans	<5		manguma

Orthography

Like Finnish, Estonian employs the Latin alphabet, in addition to which the Estonian alphabet contains letters š, ž, ä, ö, ü, and õ. The letters c, q, w, x and y are limited to proper names of foreign origin, and f, z, š, and ž appear in loanwords and foreign names only. Ä, ö, and ü are pronounced similarly to their equivalents in German, the language from which they were originally borrowed. The letter õ denotes IPA , unrounded , or a mid, back, unrounded vowel. (It has a different sound from the same letter in Portuguese. It is similar to the Russian ы and the Vietnamese ơ.) Estonian orthography is essentially phonemic with each phoneme of the language represented by exactly one grapheme. Exceptions to this derive from historical agreements: for example the initial letter 'h' in words, preservation of the morpheme in declension of the word (writing b, g, d in places where p, k, t is pronounced) and in the use of 'i' and 'j'. Also, š and ž are substituted with sh and zh in some written texts. Modern Estonian orthography is based on the Newer Orthography created by Eduard Ahrens in the second half of the 19th century based on Finnish Orthography. The Older Orthography it replaced was created in the 17th century by Bengt Gottfried Forselius and Johann Hornung based on standard German orthography. Earlier writing in Estonian had by and large used an ad hoc orthography based on Latin and Middle Low German orthography. Some influences of the standard German orthography - for example, writing 'W'/'w' instead of 'V'/'v' persisted well into the 1930s.

Grammar

Typologically, Estonian represents a transitional form from an agglutinating language to an inflected language. Over the course of Estonian history, German has exercised a strong influence on Estonian, both in vocabulary and syntax. In Estonian nouns and pronouns do not have grammatical gender, but nouns and adjectives decline in fourteen cases: nominative, genitive, partitive, illative, inessive, elative, allative, adessive, ablative, translative, terminative, essive, abessive, and comitative, with the case and number of the adjective(s) always agreeing with that of the noun (except in the terminative, essive, abessive and comitative, where there is agreement only for the number, the adjective being in the genitive form). Thus the illative for "a yellow house" (kollane maja) — "into a yellow house" is (kollasesse majja). The direct object of the verb appears either in the accusative (for total objects) or in the partitive (for partial objects). The case accusative looks exactly like the genitive. Genitive vs. partitive case opposition of object used with transitive verbs creates a telicity contrast, just as in Finnish. This is a rough equivalent of the perfect vs. imperfect aspect opposition. The verbal system lacks a distinctive future tense (the present tense serves here) and features special forms to express an action performed by an undetermined subject (the "impersonal").

Language example

NURMEKUNNA HÜMN :Karjatades kundikarju, :Süües musti hooramarju, :Leidsin eilse Nurmekunna ma. :Veel ei olnud otsas mõdu, :Veel ei olnud sündind sõdu, :Lembitut, kes liitis Maavalla. :Hingel hakkab veidi valus. :Kuskil laanes, kuskil talus, :Kostab vaikselt vilepilli hääl. :Kuskil nurmel lõhnab mesi. :Tuul toob kokku inimesi, :Hõbedased sõled rinna pääl. :Kostab, justkui löödaks lokku – :Juuaks karudega kokku. :Nurmel mängib vaikselt vilepill. :Karukujud hõbemärgis, :Tuleb tüdruk valges särgis. :Juustesse on põimit rukkilill. :Aga ükskord joodi mõdu, :Mäletati muistseid sõdu, :Lembitut, kes liitis Maavalla. :Hiiekünkal kasvas tamme. :Kuulsin tuleviku samme – :Leidsin homse Nurmekunna ma. :Kõik, mis on ilus, on eilsesse läev. :Jällegi eilseks saab tänane päev. :Kõik, mis siin selles ilus on jääv, :Tagasi homsest toob tänane päev. Lyrics by Tõnu Trubetsky

Numbers

:0 - null :1 - üks :2 - kaks :3 - kolm :4 - neli :5 - viis :6 - kuus :7 - seitse :8 - kaheksa :9 - üheksa :10 - kümme :11 - üksteist :12 - kaksteist :13 - kolmteist :20 - kakskümmend :21 - kakskümmend üks :22 - kakskümmend kaks :29 - kakskümmend üheksa :30 - kolmkümmend :90 - üheksakümmend :100 - (üks)sada :101 - sada üks :110 - sada kümme :112 - sada kaksteist :120 - sada kakskümmend :190 - sada üheksakümmend :200 - kakssada :900 - üheksasada :1000 - tuhat :1000000 - miljon

Reference

Mati Hint. Häälikutest sõnadeni. Valgus 1978, Tallinn.

External links

- An [http://www.eki.ee/cgi-bin/inglise.cgi?if=en Estonian-English dictionary (Institute of the Estonian Language)]
- An [http://www.ibs.ee/dict/ English-Estonian dictionary (Institute of Baltic Studies)]
- An [http://aare.pri.ee/dictionary.html?switch=en Estonian-English-Estonian dictionary]
- Estonica.org article about the [http://www.estonica.org/eng/lugu.html?menyy_id=61&kateg=38&alam=44 Estonian language]
- [http://www.einst.ee/literary/ Estonian literary magazine]
- [http://www.loecsen.com/travel/discover_pop.php?lang=en&to_lang=21&lang-Estonian/ Learn and listen to useful expressions in Estonian]
- [http://www.websters-online-dictionary.org/definition/Estonian-english/ Estonian English Dictionary] from [http://www.websters-online-dictionary.org Webster's Online Dictionary] - the Rosetta Edition Category:Agglutinative languages Category:Estonian culture Category:Finno-Ugric languages Category:Languages of Finland Category:Languages of Estonia ja:エストニア語 nb:Estisk språk

Polish language

Polish (język polski, polszczyzna) is the official language of Poland. Polish is the main representative of the Lechitic branch of the Western Slavic languages. It originated in the areas of present-day Poland from several local Western Slavic dialects, most notably those spoken in Greater Poland and Lesser Poland. Polish was once a lingua franca in various regions of Central and Eastern Europe, mostly due to the political, cultural, scientific and military influence of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. Although no longer having as great an influence outside of Poland, due in part to the dominance of the Russian language, it is still sometimes spoken or at least understood in western border areas of Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania as a second language.

Outside Influence

Polish has been influenced by contact with foreign languages (foremost Latin, Czech, French, German, Italian, Old Belarusian, Russian and recently it has been virtually bombarded by English, especially American English language elements). Many words have been borrowed from German as a result of heavy contact with Germans and the German language. This process has been going on since medieval times. Examples include szlachta (from German Adelsgeschlecht=nobility), rachunek (Rechnung=account), ratusz (Rathaus=town hall), burmistrz (Bürgermeister=mayor; word used only for mayors of smaller cities), handel (Handel=commerce), kac (Kater=hangover), kartofel (Kartoffel=potato; this word is dialectal: most Poles use the word 'ziemniak' for potato, but both words are understood anywhere), cukier (Zucker=sugar), kelner (Kellner=waiter) and malarz (Maler=painter; also the word 'malować' has entered Polish as the verb "to paint"). This is especially true of the regional dialects of Upper Silesia. There are also several words of French origin in the language, most likely dating from the Napoleon era, such as ekran (écran=screen), rekin (requin=shark), meble (meuble=furniture), fotel (fauteuil=armchair), plaża (plage=beach) and koszmar (cauchemar=nightmare). Some place names have also been adapted from French, such as the two Warsaw boroughs of Żoliborz (joli bord=beautiful riverside) and Mokotów (mon coteau=my cottage), as well as the suburb of Żyrardów (from the name Girard, with the Polish suffix -ów attached to form the town's name). Other words are borrowed from other Slavic languages, for example "hańba" and "brama" from Czech. When borrowing international words, Polish often changes their spelling. For example, the Latin suffix spelled '-tion' in English corresponds to '-cja'. To make the word plural, -cja becomes -cje. Examples of this include "inauguracja" (inauguration), dewastacja (devastation), konurbacja (conurbation) and konotacje (connotations). Also, the digraph 'qu' becomes 'kw' (kwadrat=quadrant; frekwencja=frequency). Since 1945, as the result of mass education and mass migrations (which affected several countries after the Second World War, with Poland being an extreme case) standard Polish has become far more homogeneous, although regional dialects persist, particularly in the south and south-west in the hilly areas bordering the Czech and Slovak Republics. In the western and northern territories, resettled in large measure by Poles from the territories annexed by the Soviet Union, the older generation speaks a dialect of Polish characteristic of the former eastern provinces.

Classification

The Polish language is the most widely-spoken of the Slavic language subgroup of Lechitic languages which include Kashubian (the only surviving dialect of Pomeranian language) and the extinct Polabian language. The three languages, along with Upper and Lower Sorbian, Czech and Slovak, belong to the West branch of Slavic languages. To English ears, it sounds virtually indistinguishable from Russian, and indeed the two languages have a very similar grammar; however, Polish and Russian speakers cannot understand each other without training due to a very different vocabulary. In other words, to a speaker of one, the other sounds to them about how the first stanza of the poem Jabberwocky would sound to an English-speaker.

Geographic distribution

Polish is mainly spoken in Poland. In fact, Poland is one of the most homogenous European countries in terms of its mother tongue, as close to 97% of Polish citizens declare Polish as their mother tongue. After the Second World War the previously Polish territories annexed by the USSR retained a large amount of the Polish population that was unwilling or unable to migrate toward the post-1945 Poland and even today ethnic Poles in Lithuania, Belarus, and Ukraine constitute large minorities. In Lithuania 9 percent of the population declared Polish to be their mother tongue. It is by far the most widely used minority language in the Vilniaus Apskritis (Vilnius region) (26% of the population, according to the 2001 census results), but it is also present in other apskritis. In Ukraine, Polish is most often used in the Lwów and Łuck regions. Western Belarus has an important Polish minority, especially in the Brześć and Grodno regions. There are also significant numbers of Polish speakers in Australia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Brazil, Canada, Czech Republic, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Israel, Kazakhstan, Latvia, New Zealand, Romania, Russia, Slovakia, UAE, the UK and the United States. In the U.S. the number of people of Polish descent is over 9 million, see: Polish language in the United States, but most of them do not use Polish in their everyday communications. According to the United States 2000 Census, 667,414 Americans of age 5 years and over reported Polish as language spoken at home, which is about 1.4% of people who speak languages other than English or 0.25% of the U.S. population.

Dialects

It has several dialects that correspond in the main to the old tribal divisions; the most significant of these (in terms of numbers of speakers) are Great Polish (spoken in the west), Little Polish (spoken in the south and southeast), Mazovian (Mazur) spoken throughout the centre and east of the country, and Silesian spoken in the southwest. Mazovian shares some features with the Kashubian language, whose remaining speakers (53.000, according to 2002 Census) live around the city of Gdańsk near the Baltic Sea, predominantly to the west of the city. There are also several, now mostly extinct, regional dialects of Polish, including the Warsaw dialect. Small numbers of people in Poland also speak Belarusian, Ukrainian, and German as well as several varieties of Romany.

Phonology

Orthography

The Polish alphabet is based on the Latin alphabet but uses diacritics such as kreska (graphically similar to acute accent), superior dot and ogonek. Polish orthography also includes seven digraphs: Note that although the Polish orthography is mostly phonetic, some sounds may be written in more than one way:
- as either h or ch
- as either ż or rz (though rż denotes a cluster)
- as either u or ó
- some soft consonants as either ć, dź, ń, ś, ź, or ci, dzi, ni, si, zi Unlike in English, if consonants are doubled in script, it means that they are also doubled in pronunciation, for example: wanna , not ('bathtub'); motto , not .

Grammar

Polish is often said to be one of the most difficult languages for non-native speakers to learn; of course, this depends on one's native language. While difficult for English speakers, it is relatively easy for speakers of Russian and other Slavic languages. It has a complex gender system with five genders: neuter, feminine and three masculine genders (personal, animate and inanimate). There are 7 cases and 2 numbers. Nouns, adjectives and verbs are inflected, and both noun declension and verb conjugation are highly irregular. Every verb is either perfective or imperfective. Verbs often come in pairs, one of them imperfective and the other perfective (usually imperfective verb plus a prefix), but often there are many perfective verbs with different prefixes for single imperfective words. Tenses are: Movable suffix is usually attached to verb or to the most accented word of sentence, like question preposition. Sometimes the sentence may be emphasised with a particle -że- (-ż). So what have you done ? can be:
- Co zrobiliście?
- Coście zrobili?
- Cóżeście zrobili? (It could be derived from Cóż zrobiliście? which actually sounds odd and is not used) All the above examples show inflected forms of the verb "zrobić" for the subject "you" informal plural ("wy"). However, it is of note that none of the above examples include the subject itself. The inclusion of the subject is not necessary here because Polish is a pro-drop language. This means that a subject does not need to be used with an inflected verb. Instead, the reader or listener can tell which subject is implied through the type ending on the verb. This is different for each pronoun in Polish with the exceptions of on/ona/ono (he/she/it) which all have the same verb ending as each other and oni/one (they - of a group including male humans/they - of a group of people or things not including male humans) which also have the same verb ending as each other. Because the subject can be dropped, if the subject is used with an inflected verb it places the emphasis of the sentence on the subject. Of the above three examples, a native speaker would not include the subject in the middle sentence and would be unlikely to include a subject in the last one. The below examples show how the subject could be included in such sentences, where possible:
- Co wy zrobiliście?
- Coście zrobili? (a native speaker would not use a subject here)
- Co wyście zrobili? (this example places the stress strongly on "you" -- "wy"+ście)
- Co żeście zrobili? (this example includes the use of the że- particle - considered very colloquial) Past participle depends on number and gender, so 3rd person, singular past perfect tense can be:
- zrobił (he made/did)
- zrobiła (she made/did)
- zrobiło (it made/did)

Word order

From Wikibooks' Polish Language Course. Basic word order in Polish is SVO, however it is possible to move words around in the sentence, and to drop subject, object or even sometimes verb, if they are obvious from context. These sentences mean the same ("Ala (Alice) has a cat"):
- Ala ma kota
- Ala kota ma
- Kota ma Ala
- Ma Ala kota
- Kota Ala ma
- Ma kota Ala Yet only the first of these sounds natural in Polish, and others should be used for emphasis only, if at all. If a question mark is added to the end of those sentences they will all mean "does Ala have a cat?"; an optional 'czy' could be added to the begining but native speakers don't use it. The first is usually used as a reassuring question (really, Ala has a cat?). The fourth would be used as a standard question (does Ala have a cat?) If apparent from context, you can drop the subject, object or even the verb:
- Ma kota - can be used if it's obvious who is being talked about
- Ma - answer for "Czy Ala ma kota?" ("Does Ala have a cat?")
- Ala - answer for "Kto ma kota?" ("Who has a cat?")
- Kota - answer for "Co ma Ala?" ("What does Ala have?")
- Ala ma - answer for "Kto z naszych znajomych ma kota?" ("Which of our friends has a cat?") Note the marker "czy" which is used to start a yes/no question, much as the French use "est-ce que". There is a tendency in Polish to drop the subject rather than the object and you rarely know the object but not the subject. If the question was "Kto ma kota ?" (who has a cat ?), the answer should be "Ala" alone, without a verb. In particular, "ja" (I) and "ty" (you, singular), and also their plural equivalents "my" (we) and "wy" (you, plural), are almost always dropped.

Conjugation

Conjugation of "iść" ("walking" in Present Continuous):
- Ja idę – I am walking
- Ty idziesz – You are walking
- On/ona/ono idzie – He/she/it is walking
- My idziemy – We are walking
- Wy idziecie – You are walking (Plural)
- Oni/one idą – They are walking ("Oni" masculine, "one" feminine or neuter)

Vocabulary

Singular:
ja - I
ty - you
on - he
ona - she
ono - it
Plural:
my - we
wy - you (Plural)
oni - they (mixed group, both men and women)
one - they (group of only women and children or things) pies - dog
krowa - cow
świnia - pig
mucha - fly
osa - wasp
pszczoła - bee
drzewo - tree
kwiat - flower
Anglia - England
Szkocja - Scotland
Walia - Wales
Irlandia - Ireland
Wielka Brytania - Great Britain
Zjednoczone Królestwo - United Kingdom
Niemcy - Germany
Japonia - Japan
Stany Zjednoczone Ameryki - The United States of America
Francja - France
Hiszpania - Spain
Wenezuela - Venezuela
Polska - Poland
Polak - Pole
polski - Polish
Konstantynopolitańczykowianeczka - a little girl from Constantinople (the longest word in Polish)

Notes

¹ You can hear the voice samples by clicking on the Polish example (ogg format).

External links

- [http://slownik.web-monkeys.com/ słownik polski - polish dictionary]
- [http://www.polishgrammar.com/ 1,000 free multi-choice Polish grammar drills online]
- [http://www.polish-dictionary.com/ Basic English-Polish Dictionary]
- [http://www.polish-translations.com/PolishTranslation/ Articles about Polish Language]
- [http://www.ethnologue.org/show_language.asp?code=pol Polish language on Ethnologue]
- [http://www.fdicts.com/dictlist1.php?k1=75 All free Polish dictionaries]
- [http://sjp.pwn.pl/ PWN Polish-Polish Dictionary]
- [http://www.websters-online-dictionary.org/definition/Polish-english/ Webster's Online Polish-English Dictionary]
- [http://www.dict.pl Polish-English dictionary]
- [http://www.anglik.net/polish.htm Free Polish Translation]
- [http://www.poltran.com/ Online translation Polish<->English]
- [http://golem.umcs.lublin.pl/users/ppikuta/lessons/less0.htm Polish language course]
- [http://www.langsites.com/Polish.htm Polish On-line]
- [http://seelrc.org:8080/grammar/pdf/compgrammar_polish.pdf A Concise Polish Grammar, by Ronald F. Feldstein (110-page 600-KB pdf)]
- [http://polish.slavic.pitt.edu Univ. of Pittsburgh: Polish Language Website] Category:Languages of Poland Category:West Slavic languages ko:폴란드어 ja:ポーランド語 th:ภาษาโปแลนด์

Finnic

Finnic (Fennic, sometimes Baltic-Finnic) may refer to languages similar to Finnish spoken close to the Gulf of Finland, i.e., the Balto-Finnic subgroup of the Finno-Ugric languages or, alternatively, a larger subgroup that also includes the Sami languages. In modern Finnish and Estonian usage, the term 'Finnic' may also refer to what are perceived as culturally related ethnic groups, i.e., the settled peoples speaking Balto-Finnic languages, traditionally living in Karelia, Ingria, Estonia, Finland, northernmost Norway and northern Sweden, and their farmer-hunter culture. The term 'Finnic peoples' can be used in this way to establish a contrast to the 'Slavic peoples' ('Slavs'), the 'Baltic peoples' ('Balts'), and the 'Germanic peoples' ('Germanics'), and Turkic peoples' ('Turks'), but also to the more distantly akin, and historically nomadic, Sami people. According to the Estonian [http://www.suri.ee/ Fenno-Ugria Foundation][http://www.suri.ee/r/index.html], the areas of historical settlement by indigenous Finnic peoples include (from South to North):
- Livonians (coastal areas of the Gulf of Riga)
- Estonians (south of Gulf of Finland)
- Votians (near River Narva and River Inger)
- Ingrians (south-east of Gulf of Finland – River Narva – River Neva – Lake Ladoga)
- Vepsians (south-west of Lake Onega)
- Karelians (north-east of Gulf of Finland – Lake Ladoga – Lake Onega)
- Finns (north of Gulf of Finland) It is debated[http://www.sgr.fi/ct/ct51.html] whether the Chudes (mentioned by Jordanes 550 A.D.) were an unidentified Finnic tribe or whether a Finnic group might be considered to be the original Chudes. It has also been considered whether Russian chud (чудь) is borrowed from Sami or vice versa.

History

There exist different theories on the pre-history of the farming Finnic peoples. According to earlier established theories, agricultural Finnic peoples were believed to have inhabited parts of what are now the Baltic countries before the first millennium. Perhaps due to the Germanic and Slavic migration period, or for other reasons, they were thought to have migrated into the inland of present-day Finland and Karelia in the first millennium. Since the 1970´s, this theory has been considered obsolete: serious indications of such migration do not exist. Archaeological record suggests instead a continuity of settlement from the Stone Age to the first millennium, and the modern linguistics agree. In the first centuries of the second millennium the Finnic groups reached Northern Sweden, where their descendents today speak Meänkieli. A larger immigrant wave swept northern Scandinavia in the 16th–18th centuries, spanning to Lake Vänern in the south and to the Arctic Sea in the north. While their descendants in the rest of Scandinavia have assimilated, they remain as a distinct minority in northern Norway, where they recognize themselves as Kvens or Kvener. The oldest known document recorded in a Finnic language dates from 13th century Novgorod. The birch bark document, discovered during archaeological excavations in 1957, was written in a Finnic language, using early Cyrillic alphabet, and has been interpreted as a pagan incantation for lighting. However, it is impossible to determine the Finnic dialect represented in then Novgorod, although some characteristics point towards the Olonetsian/Ludian/Vepsian area, or, perhaps, a hypothetical East Finnic Koine language used in or near Old Novgorod.

Livonians

The Livonians are the indigenous Finnic speakers who since ancient times populated the shores of the Gulf of Riga adjacent to the Indo-European Balts. The Livonians spoke the Livonian language, randakeel ("coast-language"), and referred to themselves as the raandalist ("coast dwellers"). By the 19th century most Livonians had assimilated with the Baltic Latvians. In the 20th century they experienced both a brief cultural revival and Stalinist extermination. Like many other Finnic tribes, the Livonians were farmers, livestock-breeders and fishermen. Like the Karelians of the Karelian Isthmus, they occupied an area of international importance in ancient times, the trade route along River Düna/Daugava. They had close trading contacts with Gotland in the West, the Kievan Rus in the East, and Ingrians/Karelians in the North. Before christianization they were one of the more developed cultures of the Baltics. The Northern Crusades led to the establishment of Riga at the estuary of River Daugava. The subjection of the Livonians is traditionally dated to 1201 and 1206. Subsequently, Livonia was settled by the more numerous Baltic tribes Curonians, Semigallians, Latgallians and Selonians (later formed Latvian nation), and the Livonians were gradually assimilated. There are many traces of Livonian language in Latvian place-names and in the Livonian dialects of Latvian language. Livonians have however not completely disappeared. They were able to retain an identity, based on fishing, distinct from that of the Latvians in the inland villages. In addition, the coastal Livonian settlements were cut off by forests and marshlands, and they had closer relations with the island of Saaremaa. The world wars of the 20th century were significant setbacks. In both world wars, Livonians who hadn't already fled to Gotland were evacuated, and the some of those who returned were in 1949 deported to Siberia. Others had to leave their villages when the Soviet Union made its Baltic coastline (its Western border) a "closed border area" where no one was allowed to live. Nevertheless, Livonian culture prospered in the Latvian Republic of the interwar years. Livonian song festivals were important manifestations, and the Livonian language became an optional subject in schools in 1923. A national awakening and desire to develop the Livonian ethnic culture was spurred by the Finnish promotion of closer ties with the kindred Finnic peoples. With Glasnost a Livonian Cultural Society was founded in Latvia, and since then a revival of the old language and culture is in progress. The Latvian government has created a cultural historic protected territory, Līvõd Randa, (Livonian Coast) in the area around Kolka where some of remaining Livonians live. Category:Ethnic groups of Europe Category:Finnic peoples Category:Indigenous peoples of Europe ko:리보니아인

Livonian Order

The Livonian Brothers of the Sword (Latin Fratres militiae Christi, literally the "brothers of the army of Christ"), also known as the Christ Knights, Sword Brethren or The Militia of Christ of Livonia, was a military order organized in 1202 by Albert of Buxhoeveden, bishop of Riga (or Prince-Bishop of Livonia), and composed of German "warrior monks". Their rule was primarily based on that of the Knights Templar. From its foundation the Order tended to ignore its supposed vassalage to the bishops. In 1218 the bishop asked the Danish king, Valdemar II, for assistance — but Valdemar instead arranged a deal with the Brotherhood and conquered the north of Estonia. The Brotherhood's headquarters were at Viljandi (Fellin) in Estonia, where the walls of the master's castle are still standing. Other strongholds included Cesis (Wenden), Sigulda (Segewold) and Aizkraukle (Ascheraden). The commanders of Viljandi (Fellin), Kuldiga (Goldingen), Aluksne (Marienburg), Tallinn (Reval), and the bailiff of Paide (Weissenstein) belonged to the 5-member entourage of the Order's master. The Brothers were all but annihilated by the Lithuanians and Semigallians at the Battle of Šiauliai in 1236. In the following year, however, the Brotherhood was incorporated into the Order of Teutonic Knights. From that point on, they were in all respects (rule, clothing and policy) an autonomous branch of the Teutonic Order, headed by their own Master (who was de jure subject to the Order's Grand Master). Between 1237 and 1290 they conquered all of Courland, Livonia and Semigallia. In 1346 the Order bought the rest of Estonia from Valdemar IV Atterdag, King of Denmark. When the Teutonic Order fell into decline, following its defeat by the Poles at Tannenberg in 1410 and the secularization of its Prussian territories in 1525, the Livonian Knights managed to maintain an independent existence. Two years after the outbreak of the Livonian War, however, they suffered a decisive defeat by Russian troops in the Battle of Ergeme in 1560. The Livonian Order then sought protection from the Polish king Sigismund II Augustus, who already in 1557 had intervened in a war between the bishop of Riga and the Brothers. After coming to an agreement with the Polish king and his representatives (especially Mikołaj 'Czarny' Radziwiłł), the last Master, Gotthard Kettler, secularized the Order and converted to the Lutheran Church. In the southern part of the Brothers' lands he created the Duchy of Courland and Semigallia. Most of the remaining lands were seized by Poland-Lithuania. The north of Estonia was taken back by Denmark and Sweden.

Masters of the Livonian Order

- Wenno (von Rohrbach?) 1204–1209
- Volquin (von Naumburg?) 1209–1236

Masters of Livonia (within the Teutonic Order)

- Hermann Balk 1237–1238
- Dietrich von Grüningen 1238–1242
- Dietrich von Grüningen 1244–1246
- Andreas von Stierland 1248–1253
- Anno von Sangershausen 1253–1256
- Burchard von Hornhausen 1256–1260
- Werner von Breithausen 1261–1263
- Konrad von Mandern 1263–1266
- Otto von Lutterberg 1266–1270
- Walther von Nortecken 1270–1273
- Ernst von Rassburg 1273–1279
- Konrad von Feuchtwangen 1279–1281
- Wilken von Endorp 1281–1287
- Konrad von Herzogenstein 1288–1290
- Halt von Hohembach –1293
- Heinrich von Dinkelaghe 1295–1296
- Bruno 1296–1298
- Gottfried von Rogga 1298–1307
- Conrad von Jocke 1309–1322
- Johannes Ungenade 1322–1324
- Reimar Hane 1324–1328
- Everhard von Monheim 1328–1340
- Burchard von Dreileben 1340–1345
- Goswin von Hercke 1345–1359
- Arnold von Vietinghof 1359–1364
- Wilhelm von Vrymersheim 1364–1385
- R. von Eltz 1385–1389
- Wennemar Hasenkamp von Brüggeneye 1389–1401
- Konrad von Vietinghof 1401–1413
- Diderick Tork 1413–1415
- Siegfried Lander von Spanheim 1415–1424
- Zisse von Rutenberg 1424–1433
- Franco Kerskorff 1433–1435
- Heinrich von Bockenvorde 1435–1437
- H. Vinke von Overbergen 1438–1450
- Johann Osthoff von Mengede 1450–1469
- Johann Wolthuss von Herse 1470–1471
- Bernd von der Borch 1471–1483
- Johann Fridach von Loringhofe 1483–1494
- Wolter von Plettenberg 1494–1535
- Hermann Hasenkamp von Brüggeneye 1535–1549
- Johann von der Recke 1549–1551
- Heinrich von Galen 1551–1557
- Johann Wilhelm von Fürstenberg 1557–1559
- Godert (Gotthard) Kettler 1559–1561

Baltic Sea

The Baltic Sea is located in Northern Europe, from 53 deg. to 66 deg. north latitude and from 20 deg. to 26 deg. east longitude. It is bounded by the Scandinavian Peninsula, the mainlands of Northern Europe, Eastern Europe, Central Europe, and the Danish islands. It drains into the Kattegat by way of the Öresund, the Great Belt and the Little Belt. Kattegat then continues in the Skagerrak into the North Sea and the Atlantic Ocean. The Baltic Sea is linked to the White Sea by the White Sea Canal and directly to the North Sea by the Kiel Canal. Kiel Canal

Name

The first one to name it the Baltic Sea was Adam of Bremen and he seems to have based it on a large island, Baltia, mentioned by Xenophon and located in northern Europe.

Etymology

It is possibly connected to the Germanic belt, a name used for some of the Danish straits, while others claim it to be derived from Latin balteus (belt). From this use, Baltic has been applied to the Baltic countries. Another proposed derivation from the Indo-European root [http://starling.rinet.ru/cgi-bin/response.cgi?single=1&basename=/data/ie/piet&text_number=+129&root=config
- bhel] meaning white, shining seems speculative.

The name in other languages

The Baltic Sea is known by the equivalents of "East Sea", "West Sea", or "Baltic Sea" in different languages:
- In the Germanic languages except English East Sea is used: Danish (Østersøen), Dutch (Oostzee), German (Ostsee), Norwegian (Østersjøen), and Swedish (Östersjön); in addition, Finnish, a Balto-Finnic language has calqued the Swedish term as Itämeri, disregarding the geography; the sea is west of Finland.
- In another Balto-Finnic language, Estonian, it is called the West Sea (Läänemeri).
- Baltic Sea is used in English; in Latin (Mare Balticum) and the Romance languages French (Mer Baltique), Italian (Mar Baltico), Romanian (Marea Baltică) and Spanish (Mar Báltico); in the Slavic languages Polish (Morze Bałtyckie or Bałtyk), Kashubian (Bôłt), and Russian (Baltiyskoye Morye (Балтийское море)); and in the Baltic languages Latvian (Baltijas jūra) and Lithuanian (Baltijos jūra). ; Notes # [http://www.lysator.liu.se/runeberg/nfbb/0435.html] (in ).

Geophysical data

The Baltic Sea is a brackish inland sea, the largest body of brackish water in the world. The fact that it does not come from the collision of plates, but is a glacially scoured river valley, accounts for its relative shallowness.

Dimensions

The Baltic sea is about 1610 km (1000 mi) long, an average of 193 km (120 mi) wide, and an average of 55 m (180 ft, 30 fathoms) deep. The maximum depth is 459 m (1506 ft, 251 fathoms), on the Swedish side of the center. The surface area is about 377,000 sq km (145,522 sq mi) and the volume is about 21,000 cubic km (3129 cubic mi). The periphery amounts to about 8000 km (4968 mi) of coastline. [http://www.envir.ee/baltics/geograph.htm] These figures are somewhat variable because a number of different estimates have been made.

Icing in winter

The Baltic sea is iced in winter, except for the deepest regions in the center. Ice begins in the Gulf of Bothnia in October or November. Fast ice, attached to the shoreline, develops first, rendering the ports unusable without the services of icebreakers. Level ice, ice sludge, pancake ice or rafter ice form in the more open regions. The gleaming expanse of ice is similar to the arctic, with wind-driven pack ice and ridges up to 15 m, and was noted by the ancients. The degree of icing depends on whether the winter is mild, moderate or severe. Severe winters ice even the regions around Denmark and southern Sweden, leaving open only a relatively small extent south of Gotland. The ice reaches a maximum extent in February or March. By June it is gone.

Hydrography

The Baltic Sea is effluent through the Danish straits; however, the flow is complex. A surface layer of brackish water discharges 940 cubic km per year into the North Sea. Due to the difference in salinity, a sub-surface layer of more saline water moving in the opposite direction brings in 475 cubic km per year. It mixes very slowly with the upper waters, resulting in a salinity gradient from top to bottom, with most of the salt water remaining below 40 to 70 m of depth. The difference between the outflow and the inflow comes entirely from fresh water. More than 250 streams drain a basin of about 1.6 million square km, contributing a volume of 660 cubic km per year to the Baltic. They include the major rivers of north Europe, such as the Oder, the Vistula, the Neman and the Neva. Some of this water is polluted. Additional fresh water comes from the difference of precipitation less evaporation, which is positive. Despite the influx of salt water in the lower levels, the Baltic is still more of a lake or river than a sea. Tides are negligible. Wave height in calm weather varies between 2 and 3 m. Violent and sudden storms often sweep the surface, due to large transient temperature differences and a long reach of wind.

Salinity

Salinity is much lower than in the ocean, varying from 0.1 percent in the north to 0.6-0.8 percent in the center. Below 40-70 m, it can be as much as 1.5-2.0 percent. A lateral salinity gradient also exists from most saline in the northern Kattegat to least saline in the Northern Gulf of Bothnia. The most saline water remains on the bottom, creating a barrier to the exchange of Oxygen and nutrients, fostering totally different maritime environments.

Regional emergence

The land is still emerging from its subsident state, which was caused by the weight of the last glaciation. Consequently, the surface area and the depth of the sea are diminishing. The uplift is about eight millimetres per year on the Finnish coast of the northernmost Gulf of Bothnia .

Geographic data

Subdivisions

The northern part of the Baltic Sea is known as the Gulf of Bothnia out of which the northernmost part is referred to as the Bay of Bothnia. Immediately to the south of it lies the Sea of Åland. The Gulf of Finland connects the Baltic Sea with St. Petersburg. The Northern Baltic Sea lies between the Stockholm area, southwestern Finland, and Estonia. The Western and Eastern Gotland Basins form the major parts of the Central Baltic Sea. The Gulf of Riga lies between Riga and Saaremaa. Bay of Gdańsk lies east of the Hel peninsula on the Polish coast and west of Sambia in Kaliningrad Oblast. Bay of Pomerania lies north of the islands of Usedom and Wolin, east of Rügen. Bornholm Basin is the area east of Bornholm and Arkona Basin extends from Bornholm to the Danish isles of Falster and Zealand. Between Falster and the German coast lie the Bay of Mecklenburg and Bay of Lübeck. The westernmost part of the Baltic Sea is the Bay of Kiel. The three Danish straits, the Great Belt, the Little Belt and The Sound (Öresund) connect the Baltic Sea with the Kattegat bay and Skagerrak strait in the North Sea. The confluence of these two seas at Skagen on the northern tip of Denmark is a visual spectacle visited by many tourists each year.

Land use

The Baltic sea drainage basin is roughly four times the surface area of the sea itself. About 48% of the region is forested, with Sweden and Finland containing the majority of the forest, especially around the Gulfs of Bothnia and Finland. About 20% of the land is used for agriculture and pasture, mainly in Poland and around the edge of the Baltic sea proper, in Germany, Denmark and Sweden. About 17% of the basin is unused open land with another 8% of wetlands. Most of the latter are in the Gulfs of Bothnia and Finland. The rest of the land is heavily populated.

Demographics

About 85 million people live in the Baltic drainage basin, 15 within 10 km of the coast and 29 within 50 km of the coast. Around 22 million live in cities, defined as centers of over 250,000. 90% of these are concentrated in the 10 km band around the coast. Of the nations containing all or part of the basin, Poland includes 45% of the 85 million, Russia 12%, Sweden 10% and the others (see below) less than 6% each.

Geologic history

The Baltic Sea somewhat resembles a riverbed, with two tributaries (the Gulf of Finland and Gulf of Bothnia). From geological surveys it has become apparent that there was a river in the area prior to the Pleistocene: the Eridanos. Multiple glaciations in the Pleistocene scooped out the river bed into the sea basin. By the time of the last, or Eemian interglacial (MIS 5e), the Eemian sea was in place. From that time the waters underwent a geologic history summarized under the names listed below. Many of the stages are named after certain marine animals (e. g., the Littorina mollusk) that are clear markers of changing water temperatures and salinity. The factors that determined the sea’s characteristics were the submergence or emergence of the region due to the weight of ice and subsequent isostatic readjustment, and the connecting channels it could find to the North Sea-Atlantic either through the straits of Denmark or at what are now the large lakes of Sweden, and the White Sea-Arctic Sea.
- Eemian sea, 130,000-115,000 BP
- Baltic ice lake, 12,600-10,300 BP
- Yoldian sea, 10,300-9500 BP
- Ancylus lake, 9500-8000 BP
- Mastogloia sea 8000 BP-7500 BP
- Littorina sea, 7500-4000 BP
- Post-littorina sea 4000 BP-current

Prehistory

History

At the time of the Roman Empire, the Baltic Sea was known as the Mare Suebicum or Mare Sarmaticum. Tacitus in his AD 98 Agricola and Germania described the Mare Suebicum, named for the Suebi tribe, during the spring months, as a brackish sea when the ice on the Baltic Sea broke apart and chunks floated about. The Sarmatian tribes inhabited Eastern Europe and southern Russia. Jordanes called it the Germanic Sea in his work the Getica. Since the Viking age, the Scandinavians have called it "the Eastern Lake" (Austmarr, "Eastern Sea", appears in the Heimskringla and Eystra salt appears in Sörla þáttr), but Saxo Grammaticus recorded in Gesta Danorum an older name Gandvik, "-vik" being Old Norse for "bay", which implies that the Vikings correctly regarded it as an inlet of the sea. (Another form of the name, "Grandvik", attested in at least one English translation of Gesta Danorum, is likely to be a misspelling.) In addition to fish the sea also provides amber, especially from its southern shores. The bordering countries have traditionally provided lumber, wood tar, flax, hemp, and furs. Sweden had from early medieval times also a flourishing mining industry, especially on iron ore and silver. Poland had and still has extensive salt mines. All this has provided for rich trading since the Roman times. In the early Middle Ages, Vikings of Scandinavia fought for power over the sea with Slavic Pomeranians. The Vikings used the rivers of Russia for trade routes, finding their way eventually all the way to Black Sea and southern Russia. Lands next to the sea's eastern shore were among the last in Europe to be converted into Christianity in the Northern Crusades: Finland in the 12th century by the Swedes, and what are now Estonia and Latvia in the early 13th century by the Danes and the Germans (Livonian Brothers of the Sword). The powerful German Teutonic Knights gained control over most of the southern and eastern shore of the Baltic Sea, while fighting the Poles, the Danes, the Swedes, the Russians of ancient Novgorod, and the Lithuanians (latest of all Europeans to convert to Christianity). Later on, the strongest economic force in Northern Europe became the Hanseatic league, which used the Baltic Sea to establish trade routes between its member cities. In the 16th and early 17th centuries, Poland, Denmark and Sweden fought wars for Dominium Maris Baltici (Ruling over the Baltic Sea). Eventually, it was the Swedish empire that virtually encompassed the Baltic Sea. In Sweden the sea was then referred to as Mare Nostrum Balticum (Our Baltic Sea). In the 18th century Russia and Prussia became the leading powers over the sea. Russia's Peter the Great saw the strategic importance of the Baltic and decided to found his new capital, Saint Petersburg at the mouth of the Neva river at the east end of the Gulf of Finland. There was much trading not just within the Baltic region but also with the North Sea region, especially the eastern England and the Netherlands: their fleets needed the Baltic timber, tar, flax and hemp. During the Crimean War a joint fleet of Britain and France attacked Russian fortresses by bombarding Sveaborg that guards Helsinki and Kronstadt that guards Saint Petersburg and destroying Bomarsund in the Åland Islands. After the unification of Germany in 1871, the whole southern coast became German. The First World War was fought also on the Baltic Sea. After 1920 Poland returned to the Baltic Sea, and Polish ports of Gdynia and Gdańsk became leading ports of the Baltic. During the Second World War Germany reclaimed all of the southern shore and much of the eastern by occupying Poland and the Baltic states. In 1945 the Baltic Sea became a mass grave for drowned people on torpedoed refugee ships. As of 2004, the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff remains the worst maritime disaster of all time, killing (very roughly) 9,000 people. In 2005, a Russian group of scientists found over 5,000 airplane wrecks, sunken warships, etc., (mainly from the Second World War) lying in the bottom of the sea. After 1945 the sea was a border between conflicted military blocks: in case of military conflict in Germany, in parallel with a Soviet offensive towards the Atlantic Ocean, communist Poland's fleet was prepared to invade Danish isles. In May 2004, the Baltic Sea became almost completely a European Union internal sea when the Baltic states and Poland became parts of the European Union, leaving only the Russian metropolis of Saint Petersburg and the exclave of Kaliningrad Oblast as non-EU areas. The Baltic Sea starts to get very rough with the October storms. These winter storms have been the cause of many shipwrecks, for example, the sinking of the ferry M/S Estonia en route from Tallinn, Estonia to Stockholm, Sweden in 1994 that claimed the lives of hundreds. But thanks to the cold brackish water where the shipworm cannot survive, the sea is a time capsule for centuries-old shipwrecks. Perhaps the most famous one is the Vasa.

Biology

Vasa Approximately 100,000 square km of the bottom, ¼ of the total area, are a variable dead zone. The more saline and therefore heavier water remains on the bottom, preventing Oxygen distribution to it. Mainly bacteria grow there, digesting organic pollutants and releasing hydrogen sulfide. The bloom of algae is visible from the air. Since most oceanic species use the bottom for various purposes, which is denied over much of the Baltic, the ecology differs from that of the Atlantic. The low salinity of the Baltic sea has led to the evolution of many slightly divergent species, such as the Baltic Sea herring, which is a smaller variant of the Atlantic herring. The benthic fauna consists mainly of Monoporeia affinis, which is originally a freshwater species. The lack of tides has affected the marine species as compared with the Atlantic.

Economy

Construction of the Great Belt Bridge (1997) and Oresund Bridge (1999) over the international waterway of the Danish Straits limited the Baltic Sea to the middle-sized vessels. In meantime, the Baltic Sea is the main trade route for export of Russian oil. Many of the neighboring countries are rather concerned about this, since a major oil leak would be disastrous in the Baltic given the slow exchange of water, and the many unique species. The tourism industries, especially in economies dependent on tourism like for example in northeastern Germany, are naturally very concerned. Shipbuilding is practiced in many large shipyards around the Baltic: Gdańsk, Szczecin in Poland, HDW in Kiel, Germany, Karlskrona and Kockums in Malmö, Sweden, and Rauma, Turku, Helsinki in Finland and Klaipėda in Lithuania. There are several cargo and passenger ferry operators on the Baltic Sea, such as Silja Line, Polferries, Viking Line, Tallink and Superfastferries.

Countries

Main article: Baltic Sea countries Countries that border on the sea:
- Denmark
- Estonia
- Finland
- Germany
- Latvia
- Lithuania
- Poland
- Russia
- Sweden Countries that are in the drainage basin but do not border on the sea:
- Belarus
- Czech Republic
- Norway
- Slovakia
- Ukraine

Islands and Archipelagoes

Main article: List of islands in the Baltic Sea
- Åland Islands (Finland, autonomous)
- Bornholm (Denmark)
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Name

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The name in other languages

Geophysical data

Dimensions

Icing in winter

Hydrography

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Regional emergence

Geographic data

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Demographics

Geologic history

Prehistory

History

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Economy

Countries

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