Title: Innovation in Tradition
Description: This study explores the history of the language of a manuscript known as Tönnies Fonne's Russian-German phrasebook (Pskov, 1607). The phrasebook is not, as many scholars have assumed, the result of the efforts of a 19-year-old German merchant, who came to Russia to learn the language and who recorded the everyday vernacular in the town of Pskov from the mouths of his informants. Nor is it, as other claim, a mere compilation by him of existing material. Instead, the phrasebook must be regarded as the product of a copying, innovative, meticulous, German-speaking professional scribe who was acutel.
Subjects: Russian language, Textbooks for foreign speakers, Low German, German language, Conversation and phrase books, Language and languages, English, FOREIGN LANGUAGE STUDY, German, Low German language, Glossaries, vocabulaires, Glossaries, vocabularies, Language arts
People: Tönnies Fenne (active 1607-1609)
Time periods: 1300-1700