The Ostrogothic Historian Jordanes as Regarded from the Linguo-Historical Viewpoint

Abstract

The article deals with the debatable question of the ethnical identity of the Ostrogothic historian of the VI^th century Jordanes whose main work Getica is in permanentl field of vision both with contemporary historians and linguists. The article keeps to the idea of the advisability of the linguo-historical analysis of Getica carried out on the interdisciplinatory basis and aimed at obtaining some new information confirming Jordanes’ Gothic origin. The analysis is concentrated on Jordanes’ clear statement completely indicative of his Gotic origin which in spite of its clarity and only because of its verbal form has been evoking more than a century-long discussion of his Gothic ethnical identity. This statement is analysed on a comparative basis with the regard for Late Latin sources and Gothic Bible testifying to the similarity of their language facts with Jordanes’ manner of writing. The historical foundation of the analysis reveals in some cases a complete coinsidence with the linguistic notions of concept and mentality which are taken into consideration when commenting on Jordanes’ above mentioned statement. With due regard for the notions of concept and mentality the analysis results in substantiating Jordanes’ historically determined manner of writing which serves as proof of his Gothic origin both by birth and language capacity. Historical data concerning some facts of his biography referring to his place of birth and work as a notary in the locations where Latin was spoken enable one to conclude that he could not but know the language of these territories and thus undoubtedly was a bilingual.

Keywords:

Jordanes, historical science, linguistics, the Gotic language, the Latin language, mentality, concept, ethnical identity