Comparative-historical method in Slavic linguistics and Alexander Vostokov’s philological intuitions

Abstract

The article is devoted to the estimation of Alexander Vostokov’s (1781-1864) contribution to the formation and development of the Slavic philology as a scientific discipline. In the foundation of the research there is the analyses of Vostokov’s work “Judgement about the Slavic language”, which has become the result of the scientist’s study the oldest Russian manuscript “Ostromir Gospels”. Vostokov devised a new method for the Slavic philology, which is used to call comparative-historical in modern science. The scientist gave the beginning of Old Church Slavonic and Old Russian written monuments scientific researching. Thanks to Vostokov’s discoveries, there has been formed the basis of Russian comparative-historical linguistics.

Keywords

• Alexander Vostokov
• comparative-historical method
• Slavic philology
• Old Church Slavic
• Church Slavonic
• Old Russian