Tinto Maps #4 Poland, Ruthenia, Baltic Feedback

[margustoo]

How I think dialects should look like. (map)

Notes:

• Russian could be separated between North Western dialect (Novgorodian) and North Eastern dialect (Muscovian). Based on sources I have seen I am uncertain how different they were from each other at the game start (14th century). I left it as one.
• Ruthenian should split several centuries after the game start, but during and after the game start it should be ideally 1.
• I followed preexcisting Belarussian and Russian border for Ruthenian and Russian border. But that could (and most likely should) change based on dialectical borders that might be misrepresented on the current map.
• Because Votians spoke language most similar to Estonian, I think it is better to put their language together with Estonian. Although, they could also be split apart into 2 (Estonian and Votic). Similarily Izhorians spoke language that is most similar to Karelian and they should be put together with them or they could be also split into 2 (Karelian and Ingrian). Both of them are currently ahistorically represented by Ingrians, who moved into that are during Swedish rule (17th century).
• Livonian and Southern Estonian should be separate dialects (and in Southern Estonian case also a separate culture) because how old those languages are. They are both older than the Slavic split into West and East Slavic. Southern Estonian is especially unique because they use their own version of Latin alphabet that has letter for sounds that don't excist iin other Finnic languages.
• Veps/Vepsians historically lived mostly between Ladoga and Onega lakes (where they still live nowadays) and their culture streched fair bit south from that area. Strangely in the game Veps are on the other side of the Onega lake and they live in a way smaller area. They should have their own language (Vepsian), but they could also be lumped together with Karelian who spoke most similar language.
• Inclusion of Semigallian and Samogitian languages I am uncertain of. especially in case of Semigallian I don't know how dissimilar it was from Latvian that Latgalians speak.
• Riga was mostly German town. I doubt that Livonian nor even latgallian was spoken more than German.

/edit - I will most likely remake it this map later with more research put into Ruthenian-Russian border and some other things that I mainly mentioned in my notes above.

 

[purplephoton]

View attachment 1218350

Some of the lines match on pretty well, though Smolenskian should stretch a bit further to cover a few locations right across the modern border (they speak the right dialect.
Looks like you've got the Kursk-Orel dialects in Ruthenian with the mixed zone in Ryazanian. I don't hate the compromise, I guess, though I'm not sure that the Kursk-Orel group wouldn't just be better in Southern Russian (Ryazanian).

 

[margustoo]

View attachment 1218351
Some of the lines match on pretty well, though Smolenskian should stretch a bit further to cover a few locations right across the modern border (they speak the right dialect.
Looks like you've got the Kursk-Orel dialects in Ruthenian with the mixed zone in Ryazanian. I don't hate the compromise, I guess, though I'm not sure that the Kursk-Orel group wouldn't just be better in Southern Russian (Ryazanian).

I didn't put too much effort into defining the Ruthenian and Russian border because the borders of cultures most likely have to be changed quite significantly based on everyone's feedback about Russia and additional feedback about Ruthenia. Also, like you know, the border isn't very well defined between those 2. I most likely will review my map later and look into that border in more detail. You might be right that Kursk-Orel dialects could be lumped together with Russian rather than Ruthenian.

 

[Perkunvilkis]

This is a draft of just splitting East Slavic into 3 dialects. Smolenskian being Ruthenian makes Ukrainian look crazy big, would it be better as Russian or Belarusian?

View attachment 1218272

Is the kipchack language in Lithuania proper meant to represent tatars, karaims? Because that is a very nice inclusion for the to live there during the game, but I think they were brought to live around Trakai mainly by the grand Duke Vytautas the Great around 1397 so a bit after the start date.

 

[Streamlet]

How viable is the Novegradian conlang project for Novgorodian dialect names?

Grammar of the Novegradian Language — Names

www.veche.net

Definitely not, since it has fictional sound changes and even some revised history before 1337

This site looks good though: https://www.s-gabriel.org/names/predslava/bbl/

and Wiktionary has a list of a few too: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Category:Old_Novgorodian_given_names

 

[ibvfteh]

How viable is the Novegradian conlang project for Novgorodian dialect names?

Grammar of the Novegradian Language — Names

www.veche.net

On the about page they talk about an imagined scenario when Novgorod republic survives and their language diverge so much, that it is even formed their own branch called North Slavic.

Source provided by @Streamlet is better. And if for some names there are no alternatives, I think it’s better to default to Russian

 

[Polesie Admiral]

How viable is the Novegradian conlang project for Novgorodian dialect names?

Grammar of the Novegradian Language — Names

www.veche.net

Lol you put a strikethrough on the post, btw unrelated, is the balkan feedback going to be done soon? People are loosing their minds over there

 

[SaintDaveUK]

Lol you put a strikethrough on the post,

To make it clear that the idea was abandoned because others came up with better sources

 

[Wildrake]

How I think dialects should look like. (map)

View attachment 1218350

Notes:

• Russian could be separated between North Western dialect (Novgorodian) and North Eastern dialect (Muscovian). Based on sources I have seen I am uncertain how different they were from each other at the game start (14th century). I left it as one.
• Ruthenian should split several centuries after the game start, but during and after the game start it should be ideally 1.
• I followed preexcisting Belarussian and Russian border for Ruthenian and Russian border. But that could (and most likely should) change based on dialectical borders that might be misrepresented on the current map.
• Because Votians spoke language most similar to Estonian, I think it is better to put their language together with Estonian. Although, they could also be split apart into 2 (Estonian and Votic). Similarily Izhorians spoke language that is most similar to Karelian and they should be put together with them or they could be also split into 2 (Karelian and Ingrian). Both of them are currently ahistorically represented by Ingrians, who moved into that are during Swedish rule (17th century).
• Livonian and Southern Estonian should be separate dialects (and in Southern Estonian case also a separate culture) because how old those languages are. They are both older than the Slavic split into West and East Slavic. Southern Estonian is especially unique because they use their own version of Latin alphabet that has letter for sounds that don't excist iin other Finnic languages.
• Veps/Vepsians historically lived mostly between Ladoga and Onega lakes (where they still live nowadays) and their culture streched fair bit south from that area. Strangely in the game Veps are on the other side of the Onega lake and they live in a way smaller area. They should have their own language (Vepsian), but they could also be lumped together with Karelian who spoke most similar language.
• Inclusion of Semigallian and Samogitian languages I am uncertain of. especially in case of Semigallian I don't know how dissimilar it was from Latvian that Latgalians speak.
• Riga was mostly German town. I doubt that Livonian nor even latgallian was spoken more than German.

/edit - I will most likely remake it this map later with more research put into Ruthenian-Russian border and some other things that I mainly mentioned in my notes above.

The point of dialects is to provide flavor names, not to be an actual representation of said dialects, the current setup is ideal for that purpose

 

[ECOWARRIER]

On the about page they talk about an imagined scenario when Novgorod republic survives and their language diverge so much, that it is even formed their own branch called North Slavic.

Source provided by @Streamlet is better. And if for some names there are no alternatives, I think it’s better to default to Russian

Linguist Anatolij Žuravliov suggested there was a now-extinct North Slavic branch and Old Novgorodian was part of it, so that's not just fictional speculations.

Pskov should be named Pleskov (Плесков) because "Pskov" is a Muscovite-influenced name while Pleskov is mentioned with its original name as early as in the 11th century writings. The Pleskovian Republic should also have Pleskovian as a Novgorodian dialect and Skobari (скобари, native Pleskovian Slavs) as the primary culture.

There was also the Rostov-Suzdalj language to the Northeast, I suggest considering it as a unified language for Northeast Slavs (Vologdans, Viatkans, Kostromans, etc.) at that time.

Not for the start date, but I also suggest adding the formation of the Siberiak (or Starožyly) culture during colonization of Siberia, similar to how Brits colonizing North America can become Americans in EU4.

Overall, having a North Slavic language branch and culture group would be neat.

 

[Korsjan Rīkis]

Linguist Anatolij Žuravliov suggested there was a now-extinct North Slavic branch and Old Novgorodian was part of it, so that's not just fictional speculations.

Pskov should be named Pleskov (Плесков) because "Pskov" is a Muscovite-influenced name while Pleskov is mentioned with its original name as early as in the 11th century writings. The Pleskovian Republic should also have Pleskovian as a Novgorodian dialect and Skobari (скобари, native Pleskovian Slavs) as the primary culture.

There was also the Rostov-Suzdalj language to the Northeast, I suggest considering it as a unified language for Northeast Slavs (Vologdans, Viatkans, Kostromans, etc.) at that time.

Not for the start date, but I also suggest adding the formation of the Siberiak (or Starožyly) culture during colonization of Siberia, similar to how Brits colonizing North America can become Americans in EU4.

Overall, having a North Slavic language branch and culture group would be neat.

So that's why in Latvian Pskov is called ''Pleskava'', interesting.

 

[ErnestvonLauenb]

Smolenskian as Belarusian

View attachment 1218284

Calling these Ukrainian and Belarusian is highly anachronistic. During whole timespan of the game White Ruthenia and Ukraine meant only the part of marked areas and were on the same level as Black Ruthenia, Polesia, Podolia, Volhynia etc.
You should rather nane them Southern Ruthenian and Norther Ruthenian. Or just simply both Ruthenia, since I don't think there was much difference between them before split between Polish Crown and Lithuania in 1569.

 

[Cuke]

I disagree with the use of cardinal directions in names as a matter of principle. If the locals couldn't come up with separate names of a subject, then this subject is insignificant and should be merged.
In this case, we do have separate names for multiple variants of Russian, and we should use them.

 

[Kotyk-durkotyk]

If we were to explore this, exactly which cultures would have Ruthenian language and which would have Russian? Particularly where do Smolenskian, Severian, Polatskian lie on the spectrum?

Smolenskian to Russian, Polatskian and Severian to Ruthenian.

Actually Ruthenian (later Ukrainian and Belarusian), Russian and Novgorodian started to emerge from the Old East Slavic in the XIII – XIV centuries around the strongest regional powers – Lithuania, Muscovy and Novgorod respectively (Novgorodian was much later integrated in the Russian).

So I would put Halychian, Volhynian, Ruthenian (Kyivan/Ukrainian?), Severian cultures under Ruthenian language – Ukrainian dialect.

Polesian and Polatskian cultures under Ruthenian language – Belarusian dialect.

Smolenskian, Muscovite, Novgorodian, Pomor under Russian Language.

Also I see a separate Ryazanian culture as a good idea too.

 

[Kotyk-durkotyk]

And here is the book in Ukrainian from 1974 called ‘Acts of the XIV century’ with known Ruthenian documents, acts, agreements, trading contracts etc. from the XIV century:

Грамоти XIV ст.

Not translated, but written as it was originally. There is a link to every paragraph there. And lots of documents have a photo of the original document, that survived to our days.

Still the Church Slavonic had some presence and influence in official and semi-official documents, but it is clear, that in the mid and late XIV century the Ruthenian language was already a separate thing, distinctive from the Old East Slavic or the Church Slavonic.
And much more understandable for modern-day people than the Old East Slavic (of course only if you know how to read it).

That’s why I think, that there should be Ruthenian and Russian languages on the game. Old East Slavic probably had not been actual by that time for decades.

 

[ibvfteh]

And here is the book in Ukrainian from 1974 called ‘Acts of the XIV century’ with known Ruthenian documents, acts, agreements, trading contracts etc. from the XIV century:

Грамоти XIV ст.

Not translated, but written as it was originally. There is a link to every paragraph there.

Still the Church Slavonic had some presence and influence in official and semi-official documents, but it is clear, that in the mid and late XIV century the Ruthenian language was already a separate thing, distinctive from the Old East Slavic or the Church Slavonic.
And much more understandable for modern-day people than the Old East Slavic (of course only if you know how to read it).

That’s why I think, that there should be Ruthenian and Russian languages on the game. Old East Slavic probably had not been actual by that time for decades.

The problem is that if we start to divide based on standards, we will make almost everything that is currently represented as a dialect a separate language.

1. Dialects are for flavour, and for that, we need unique to the dialect names.
2. Unique to the dialect names come from unique to dialect sources.
3. Those sources probably will also include texts, not just names
4. From those texts, we can deduce that dialects are separate languages as it was clearly a separate thing.

Sweedish was a thing in 1225
Middle Low German has been documented in writing since about 1225/34
And Novgorodian is found in birch bark writings, dating from the 11th to 15th centuries
Venetian was first attested in writing in the 13th century.

For all those cases there are quite a lot of sources as I understand

And all of that is not translated. You can also make claims like: How much influence did the German language have on Scandinavian, will that be enough to make it separate from Norwegian?

That's why I think first we need to know the methodology upon which they separate the languages. From my experience, the difference between modern German dialects from the North and the South is much more severe than between modern East Slavic languages. But it also can boil down to when I learned them.

 

[Kotyk-durkotyk]

The problem is that if we start to divide based on standards, we will make almost everything that is currently represented as a dialect a separate language.

1. Dialects are for flavour, and for that, we need unique to the dialect names.
2. Unique to the dialect names come from unique to dialect sources.
3. Those sources probably will also include texts, not just names
4. From those texts, we can deduce that dialects are separate languages as it was clearly a separate thing.

Sweedish was a thing in 1225
Middle Low German has been documented in writing since about 1225/34
And Novgorodian is found in birch bark writings, dating from the 11th to 15th centuries
Venetian was first attested in writing in the 13th century.

For all those cases there are quite a lot of sources as I understand

And all of that is not translated. You can also make claims like: How much influence did the German language have on Scandinavian, will that be enough to make it separate from Norwegian?

That's why I think first we need to know the methodology upon which they separate the languages. From my experience, the difference between modern German dialects from the North and the South is much more severe than between modern East Slavic languages. But it also can boil down to when I learned them.

Agree on consistency.
I just want to point out that having the East Slavic language for the whole 1337 – 1836 period would be a very bad decision. This vould be solved with emerging cultures/languages, but if not, I think something more relevant should be found.
Probably the same situation with Scandinavian, German etc. I would accept any solution they would find the best and consistent.

 

[purplephoton]

Polesian and Polatskian cultures under Ruthenian language – Belarusian dialect.

Polesian should be split imo. Since it roughly matches the area of IRL transitional dialects, it doesn't make much sense to put it in either. I think the norther half of Polesian should be split off and put into Belarusian, while Polesian itself can go into Ukrainian.

 

[Wildrake]

Smolenskian to Russian, Polatskian and Severian to Ruthenian.

Actually Ruthenian (later Ukrainian and Belarusian), Russian and Novgorodian started to emerge from the Old East Slavic in the XIII – XIV centuries around the strongest regional powers – Lithuania, Muscovy and Novgorod respectively (Novgorodian was much later integrated in the Russian).

So I would put Halychian, Volhynian, Ruthenian (Kyivan/Ukrainian?), Severian cultures under Ruthenian language – Ukrainian dialect.

Polesian and Polatskian cultures under Ruthenian language – Belarusian dialect.

Smolenskian, Muscovite, Novgorodian, Pomor under Russian Language.

Also I see a separate Ryazanian culture as a good idea too.

Dividing East Slavic into Ruthenian and Russian is excessive in 1337 and both "languages" were referred the same at the time as "Rus language" both in Polish-Lithuanian documents and Muscovite documents. We can argue that they should be divided because they actually divided later in history, but Project Caesar uses language pretty freely, look at Low German, Rhaeto-Romance and Arpitan, which are technically their own things but presented as dialects at best
Smolenskian is evidenced pretty strongly to evolve into Belarusian, often grouped with Polotskian dialect as one

 

[Dan29067]

The problem is that if we start to divide based on standards, we will make almost everything that is currently represented as a dialect a separate language.

1. Dialects are for flavour, and for that, we need unique to the dialect names.
2. Unique to the dialect names come from unique to dialect sources.
3. Those sources probably will also include texts, not just names
4. From those texts, we can deduce that dialects are separate languages as it was clearly a separate thing.

Sweedish was a thing in 1225
Middle Low German has been documented in writing since about 1225/34
And Novgorodian is found in birch bark writings, dating from the 11th to 15th centuries
Venetian was first attested in writing in the 13th century.

For all those cases there are quite a lot of sources as I understand

And all of that is not translated. You can also make claims like: How much influence did the German language have on Scandinavian, will that be enough to make it separate from Norwegian?

That's why I think first we need to know the methodology upon which they separate the languages. From my experience, the difference between modern German dialects from the North and the South is much more severe than between modern East Slavic languages. But it also can boil down to when I learned them.

I agree that the terms "language" and "dialect" should be better defined (although controversy would exist in any case). The "languages" used in the game are sometimes more similar to language groups, and sometimes they are actual languages. For example, we have "Scandinavian" and "Baltic" languages, but Cisalpine is different from Italian, and Portuguese is different from Spanish (instead of one Iberian language). I think the developers previously mentioned that they didn't want to weaken some dialects by splitting them into full languages. However, since the size of languages already differs greatly, maintaining historical accuracy should be preferable, if it's possible to do so.

As for the difference between a language and a dialect, it is often controversial, but with the inclusion of court and market languages, it can come down to these criteria (which of course could be expanded or revised):

1) Whether the language was or could have been used in government, as the language of administration, laws, or legal documents (e.g., court language).

2) Whether the language was used in commerce, trade, and craftsmanship (e.g., market language).

3) Whether the language was standardized (whatever that means) and has grammars, dictionaries, other linguistic works, and high literature.

It’s hard to find a sphere of life where Ruthenian wasn’t used in the EU5 timeline (except for liturgy). Furthermore, the West Slavic language was recently split into Lechitic and Czechoslovak, so East Slavic should be split too if we want to be consistent.