Holy Cross Sermons

Holy Cross Sermons

The Holy Cross Sermons ( _pl. Kazania świętokrzyskie), so called after the Holy Cross Monastery in Poland's Holy Cross Mountains (Polish: "Góry Świętokrzyskie") where they had originally been housed: dating from the 14th century, they are the oldest extant manuscripts of fine prose in the Polish language.

The sermons, on the occasions of Church holy days, comprise fragments of five texts and one complete sermon (for St. Catherine's Day); written on parchment, they had been cut into thin strips and used to reinforce the binding of a 15th-century Latin manuscript.

In 1831 they had been taken to St. Petersburg, Russia, where they were accidentally discovered in 1890 by the renowned professor of Polish language, Aleksander Brückner. They came back to Poland in 1925. During World War II the Holy Cross Sermons were taken for safekeeping to Canada. They are now preserved at the National Library in Warsaw, Poland.

The photocopy of the Sermons may be seen on The Digital National Library Polona ( [http://www.polona.pl/dlibra/doccontent2?id=197&from=&from=generalsearch&dirids=1 electronic version of the Holy Cross Sermons] ).

The Holy Cross Sermons language is older than the manuscript, which is a copy of the original sermons from the end of 13th century (approximately). It is very archaic, sometimes very close to the Proto-Slavic, e.g. in:

1) Hard stem declention of the pronoun "*tъnъ" 'this one': Nom. sg. "ten", Gen. sg. "togo", Dat. sg. "tomu";

2) Aorists and Imperfects:

- 1 sg. aor. "widziech" = Lat. perf. "vidi" (PSl. "*vidĕti" 'to see, to look', "*vidĕχъ" 'I saw, I looked (at); I have seen, I have looked (at)'),

- 3 sg. aor. "postawi" = Lat. perf. "posuit" (PSl. "*postaviti" 'to place', "*postavi" 'he/she/it placed, has placed'),

- 3 pl. aor. "pośpieszychą się" = Lat. perf. "venerunt" (PSl. "*pospĕšiti" 'to go, to go somewhere', "*pospĕšišę" 'they went, they went somewhere, they went out'),

- 3 sg. impf. "biesze" = Lat. impf. "erat" (PSl. "*byti" 'to be', "*bĕaše" 'he/she/it was'),

- 3 sg. impf. "siedziesze" = Lat. impf. "sedebat" (PSl. "*sĕdĕti" 'to sit', "*sĕdĕaše" 'he/she/it sat, was sitting').


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