Authors

Margaret Dimitrova¹;  ¹ St. Kliment Ohridski University of Sofia, Bulgaria

Discussion

 In the seventeenth century, a disruption in the conservative language of the church emerged in Bulgarian milieux: for the first time after the initial period of medieval Slavonic writing, sermons were composed in the Bulgarian vernacular. They were based on adaptations of medieval texts written in the archaic and conservative language of the orthodox church. These vernacular texts became very popular amongst priests and monks because they were understandable for the flock. Still, in the eighteenth century, a return to the conservative church language was explained with the strive to make the style of preaching higher in contrast to the everyday speech. Thus, new hybrid forms were preferred in which Church Slavonic elements were combined with vernacular ones. As a matter of fact, a certain membrane  did not allow for inclusion of any vernacular elements, for instance the vernacular forms for the Future Tense and the definite article were avoided. On the other hand, the frequency of the different bookish elements was not the same, for instance, the vernacular casus generalis was preferred to the instrumental and locative cases, da-constructions to the infinitive. Thus, the writers searched for a balance of the literary and vernacular elements in order to achieve a higher style of the Church sermons and historiographical texts, on the one hand, and on the other, to make these texts understandable and memorable and to meet the needs and expectations of the believers who did not master Church Slavonic.