Latvians’, Latgalians’ and Russians’ Paremias about Life

Jeļena Koroļova, Dr. philol., researcher, associate professor
Centre of Cultural Research
Institute of Humanities and Social Sciences
Daugavpils University, Latvia
e-mail: jelena.korolova@du.lv

Oksana Kovzele, Dr. philol., researcher
Centre of Cultural Research
Institute of Humanities and Social Sciences
Daugavpils University, Latvia
e-mail: oksana.kovzele@du.lv

ABSTRACT

The paper presents the analysis of 95 Latgalian and Russian paremias (proverbs, sayings, comparisons, and idioms), the bulk of which are proverbs. The entire corpus of the Russian paremias analysed contains more than 7,000 units. All of them were recorded by Jeļena Koroļova in the period 1977–2018 from the Old Believers of Latgale (they appeared in Latgale after the Church Schism of 1666) and in the period 1970–2015 – from the Orthodox living in Pytalovo (that territory was part of the first Latvian Republic from the 1920s to the 1940s). In order to compare them with Latvian proverbs, folklore collections, phraseological dictionaries, the dictionary compiled by Bernadeta Opincāne, as well as works of the Latvian folklorist Elza Kokare have been used. Modern Latgalian proverbs have been collected in recent years by Oksana Kovzele.
In the research development, the techniques of comparative paremiology have been used to determine the existence of the two nations’ traditions in the comparative aspect.
Paremias, proverbs above all, reflect the interaction of cultures and languages in the religious, national and regional aspects. The interaction of cultures in the sphere of the existence of paremias is of a two-sided nature. Borrowed proverbs testify to the fact that culture is a unifying factor for different ethnic groups living in the same state. The origins of popular conceptions of philosophical understanding of life should be sought either in Christianity or in the mythological views of ancient people.

Keywords: proverbs, paremias, variants, feature, adjective, comparisons, dialectal words

PDF

How to cite:
Koroļova, J., Kovzele, O. (2019). “Latvians’, Latgalians’ and Russians’ Paremias about Life.” Journal of Comparative Studies 12 (41), 10–25.