This book is a comprehensive study of the Germanic loanwords in Proto-Slavic. It includes an investigation of all Germanic words that were borrowed into Proto-Slavic until its disintegration in the ...early ninth century. Research into the phonology, morphology and semantics of the loanwords serves as the basis of an investigation into the Germanic donor languages of the individual loanwords. The loanwords can be shown to be mainly of Gothic, High German and Low German origin. One of the aims of the present study is to clarify the accentuation of Germanic loanwords in Proto-Slavic and to explain how they were adapted to the Proto-Slavic accentual system. This volume is of special interest to scholars and students of Slavic and Germanic historical linguistics, contact linguistics and Slavic accentology.
In this article, the author reviews the evidence supplied by loanwords for the nature of contacts between the Proto-Slavs and their Germanic neighbours, i.e. the Goths and various western Germanic ...peoples. Germanic loanwords in Proto-Slavic can be divided into a limited number of semantic fields: power and warfare, technological terminology, money and trade, words for containers (boxes, cases etc.), Christian terminology and words regarding land holdings. Technological and Christian loanwords are probably of western Germanic origin, while the other semantic categories appear to contain Gothic as well as western Germanic loanwords. Adapted from the source document
