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Knaanic (also called Canaanic, Leshon Knaan or Judeo-Slavic) is an extinct West Slavic Jewish language, formerly spoken in the lands of the Western Slavs, notably the Czech lands, but also the lands of modern Poland, Lusatia and other Sorbian regions. It became extinct in the Late Middle Ages.

The language is sometimes referred to as Judeo-Czech,^[1] though the term is a misnomer as during the Knaanic language's formation the Czech language did not yet differ from the Western Slavic language that gave birth to modern Czech, Polish or Slovak languages^[2].

The name comes from the land of Knaan, a geo-ethnological term denoting the Jewish populations living east of the Elbe river (as opposed to the Ashkenazi Jews living to the West of it, or the Sephardi Jews of Iberian Peninsula). ^[3] As such, the land is often simply translated as Slavonia, or Slavic Europe. ^[4]

The term might in turn be related to ancient Canaan (Hebrew כנען "kəna'an"). The use of a name derived from Canaan for a Slavic language spoken by a Jewish peoples living in a Slavic region is an indication to the Canaanite origin of Hebrew language (and people) as perceived by the speakers themselves and/or surrounding Slavic people, probably as relayed to them by Bibilical mythology.

The language became extinct some time in the Middle Ages, possibly due to expansion of the Ashkenazi culture and their own Yiddish language based on German. This hypothesis is often backed up with a large number of Yiddish loanwords of Slavic origin, many of which were no longer in use in Slavic languages themselves at the time of the Ashkenazi expansion. These are believed to be loaned from Knaanic rather than from Czech or Polish language. Another hypothesis voiced by Paul Wexler argues, that Knaanic is indeed the direct predecessor of Yiddish and that the language became later Germanized. ^[5] Alternatively, the Knaanim, that is the people speaking the Judaeo-Slavic languages were to be the main factor in changes within the Yiddish language. ^[6] Such views are in contrast with Max Weinreich's theories, who argued that the Slavic loanwords were assimilated only after the Yiddish was already fully formed.^[7][8]

A possible early example of Knaanic is a 9th century letter for a Jewish community of Ruthenia. ^[3] One of the very few commonly-accepted examples of Knaanic are inscriptions on coins minted for Mieszko the Old and Leszek the White, two Polish rulers of 12th and 13th century. The latest evidence of usage of the language (written with Hebrew script) come from 16th century.

See also

• Ashkenazi
• Czech language
• Jewish languages
• Slavic languages
• Knanaya

References

• (Czech) Bondyová, Ruth (2003) (in Czech). Mezi námi řečeno. Jak mluvili Židé v Čechách a na Moravě (Between us: language of Jews in Bohemia and Moravia). Society of Franz Kafka. ISBN 80-85844-88-5.   The book documents languages used by Jews in the Czech lands during 12–20th century. Review in Czech, pages 28–33.

1. ^ (English) Knaanic. Retrieved June 13, 2006, from Ethnologue: Languages of the World, fifteenth edition. SIL International. Online version.
2. ^ (Czech) various authors; Petr Karlík, Marek Nekula (2002). Jana Pleskalová. ed. Encyklopedický slovník češtiny. Prague: Nakladatelství Lidové noviny. pp. 604. ISBN 80-7106-484-X.  
3. ^ ^{a b} (Polish) various authors; Szymon Datner (1983). Witold Tyloch. ed. Z dziejów Żydów w Polsce. Warsaw: Interpress. pp. 6. ISBN 83-223-2095-7.  
4. ^ (English) Max Weinreich; Paul Glasser, Shlomo Noble , Yivo Institute for Jewish Research (corporate). History of the Yiddish Language. 1. New Haven: Yale University Press. pp. 525. ISBN 0300108877.  
5. ^ (English) Paul Wexler (2002). Two-tiered relexification in Yiddish: The Jews, Sorbs, Khazars and the Kiev-Polessian dialects. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. ISBN 3-11-017258-5.  
6. ^ (English) Mark Louden (2000). "Contact-induced phonological change in Yiddish: Another look at Weinreich's riddles". Diachronica (John Benjamins Publishing Company) 17 (1): 85–110.  
7. ^ for instance (English) Max Weinreich (1956). "Yiddish, Knaanic, Slavic: The basic relationships". For Roman Jakobson: Essays on the occasion of his sixtieth birthday, 11 October 1956.. The Hague: Mouton. pp. 622–632.  
8. ^ History of the Yiddish Language, op.cit., pp. 727

• History of the Yiddish Language, Max Weinreich, 1980, ISBN 0-226-88604-2