TIPOVIMA ORTOGRAFSKIH NORMI U PISMIMA TURSKOG SULTANA BAJAZITA II DUBROVNIKU

Abstract

The paper examines the most important graphic and orthographic features of the letters of the Turkish Sultan Bayezid II to Dubrovnik, written from 1481 to 1512. The main aim of the research is the attempt to shed light on a copious corpus, significant both for the history of the Serbian language and Serbian literacy in general. The corpus consists of the documents from the Sublime Porte Offices, and the investigation has been conducted firstly through a graphic- orthographic perspective, and then from a linguistic standpoint. The performed analysis showed that the following documents can be distinguished in the excerpted corpus: (1) the ones in which the elements of the Rascian orthographic tradition predominates; (2) the ones in which the elements of Resavian orthographic traditions are more consistently represented; (3) the ones in which an equal relation between the elements of Rascia and Resava orthography are manifested; (4) the ones in which the elements of all three orthographic traditions are mixed: Bosnian-Hum, Rascian and Resavian ones. The secular character of the analyzed documents, the territorial remoteness from the center of the Rascian orthography, as well as of our medieval literacy, Rascian orthography that was considered prestigious in Dubrovnik as early as the second quarter of the 13th c entury, a long w ith t he b ilingualism o f t he w riters and their ignorance of orthographic canons, represent just some of the causes for mixing orthographic norms not only in the documents of Sultan Bayezid II, but also in the extensive works of the Porte’s Offices. The mixing of the Offices’ styles and the inability to isolate documents in which a single writing style would dominate emphasises the significance of investigating the Porte Offices’ documents, with the purpose of arriving at a concrete conclusion on the graphic-orthographic features, along with the linguistic characteristics of this as-of-yet insufficiently investigated medieval juncture in the entire opus of Serbian literacy.