Skot – wardęga – bydło w polskiej leksyce i onomastykonie

Abstract

In the paper, I describe and analyse the Old Polish synonymous chain skot – wardega – bydlo from the angle of its etymology. The review of examples is mainly intended to illustrate the thesis that the category of proper names in a diachronic perspective developed in close relation with the development of the appellative sphere. It is a secondary category, subordinate in relation to the appellative sphere as proper names were, and continue to be, the building blocks of onyms. A parallel analysis of appellatives and onyms confirms the high word-formative variantive quality of the early stages of the Polish language. On the sidelines of the main considerations, I show to what extent the polysemy of lexemes i.e. words building proper names and the appellative homonymy and homonymy of proper names in these words makes it difficult, indeed sometimes even impossible, to reconstruct the semantic motivation.