I know, i was just quoting the press release i received from warhorse about the e3 alpha stage 0.4
and that i guess, the original name in bohemian maps is Samopše i do believe though.
Well, in one of the early videos/builds they used “SAMPOSE” and then apologized for it claiming that the correct spelling will be used in the game.
They tried again and Samopesh came out.
I don’t blame them, I am sure they will be able to find a team member without dysgraphia in the end.
How different is medieval czech from the current language?
It is very different. The Czech language started to be used as the main written language of the court few decades before the game takes place (replacing latin / spoken Czech was the main language also before). At about the time of the game, the Orthographia bohemica was written, basically codifying the medieval Czech.
During Hussite wars, the Czech language became synonymous for the Catholic church with heresy, reformation, and later also protestantism (after all, Luther came century later and didn’t come up with much new compared to Hus). At this time, there was not only huge number of writings made in Czech, but the Bretheren also aimed at gaining universal education (both in Czech and German) notwithstanding gender, class.
After the Czechs lost heir part in the 30 years war following the Battle of White Mountain, the Catholic church wanted no only to turn the 95% Reformed/Protestant Czech lands to Catholicism (i.e. either become Catholic, or leave or be killed - 2/3 of population loss at that time), but the church also actively worked in order to destroy most of what was written in Czech - simply because for them it was the language of heresy. For the next 200 years, the Czech language became increasingly the language of the people in the countryside and poor townsfolk.
At the turn of 18th/19th century when the Czech national revival came up and the language again became widely used also among new economical elites (as the German nobles that were put in place after the 30 years war lost their importance due to industrial revolution) the old Czech was not so much revived, as it was transformed. The 19th century Czech was however a bit cumbersome so it became a bit different (simpler) in the 20th century again.
I think that it is easier for contemporary Czechs to read contemporary Slovaks than medieval Czech.
One other interesting fact is that during the Hussite wars, many Czech Catholic priests and monks went to the area of Balkans which had huge impact on the evolution of languages there. Thus for example contemporary Slovenian is to some extent more similar to medieval Czech language that the contemporary Czech is.
Interesting question.
I made some searching and I might have found an answer. Though I am not a linguist so anyone is free to disagree with me and correct me.
Czech language of 15. century (that is time of Václav IV and also Jan Hus) was quite different but not that much that we could not understand it.
I found some text written by Jan Hus and I was able to (with some difficulties) understand it.
It is hard to say how well I would be able to understand spoken form, though,
What I also learned is that Jan Hus was (or it is assumed) trying to reform written czech. Which he slowly succeded in (post mortem).
Also it is said that Jan Hus used in his preaching more “live” words than were commonly used. He also started using more czech words instead of german and latin.
So if we were to encounter Jan Hus in the game we could expect some differences in his speech, I assume.
My conclusion - Czech WAS different but it was not completely alienated language from the modern czech. I did not find any written text except that written by Jan Hus who apparently wrote differently. So there could be some difficulty with commonly written texts. But now I am just speculating.
Bonus: Another interesting fact is that during Hussite movement the czech made it beyond Czech borders. Mostly into Slovakia where even offical documents were made in czech.
Later in 16. century czech made even into Poland and was for a time spoken in roayal court.
Hope this is helpfull
If anyone knows more about this topic feel free to add or correct my msitakes.
Hopefully this is all accurate, because I may jot it down for a future video… it contains something about the hussite wars, that is all for now
I’ll double check the info of course.
So if they were to put medieval Czech in the game you wouldn’t really appreciate that. It’s interesting how a language can be repressed over centuries only to reappear later. Though admittedly it would be easier if you spoke German because Czech might just as well be Elvish
i personally would be fine, with whatever warhorse wanted. if medieval czech was the language used during 1403, use it… it needs to all be accurate to the era. All I was doing was quoting how they were calling the village. I didn’t really want to stir up any argument
Using authentic czech from that time period would be imho pretty difficult.
I think best way is to use modern czech with archaisms. Which I belive is Warhorse’s plan.
But this is far from the Horse riding, isn’t it ?
yes… very much so we’ve definitley moved off- topic.
I am a bit lost, how does preaching entire mass in Czech language and quoting bible in Czech language mean “using more Czech words instead of german and latin”?
From strictly linguistic point of view, yes, German is easier than Czech.
On the other side, it would be hard to imagine that the Czech philosophy would survive if it would share the same language with German. I.e. the Czech philosophy has always tended towards personal freedom - both religious and political, while German always went the other way (e.g. compare Nietzsche and Masaryk).
I am a bit lost, how does preaching entire mass in Czech language and quoting bible in Czech language mean “using more Czech words instead of german and latin”?
From what I have learned, it seems that some words were preffered in latin or german form. And Jan Hus started to use czech equivalents of these words.
He also eradicated archaisms in his preachings.
Well yes except Kant, Hegel, Humboldt and to some extent Weber… wait a minute. I think you are generalizing a bit to much. Except for an old grumpy man and a guy who had his brain turned into Swiss cheese by syphilis there isn’t a majority of German philosophers rejecting personal freedom.