In 1826, Józef Franciszek Królikowski published a guidebook aimed at young people. Its 50-word title began as follows: Simple Rules of Polish Style for Those Wishing to Write Polish Clearly, Succinctly, Correctly, Smoothly, and Honestly, Expressed in Practical Examples, with Various Ideas Regarding the Language…. It advised:
The purity of the language relies on using truly Polish expressions; the nature, customs, and true spirit of the language; and ensuring that their syntax and composition correspond to models used by the best writers.
Trans. MB
His book also contained a glossary of ‘barbarisms’ (loaned foreign expressions) and their Polish equivalents. An ‘actor’ was defined simply as a działacz (activist), a ‘garde-robe’ – szatnica (small cloakroom), a ‘toilet’ (formerly a room where ladies would get ready to go out) – gotowalnia (preparation room), a ‘rival’ – spółubiegacz (co-contestant), and ‘emigration’ – wywędrowanie (roaming).
The adaptation of terms into Polish also made for some quaint-sounding compound words: ‘slippers’ were cichostępy (‘quiet walkers’); ‘antipodes’ – przeciwnodzy (‘upsidedowners'); a ‘schlafrock’ (the German for dressing gown) – zatulnik (enveloper); ‘octave’ – ośmina (‘eightsie’); and ‘parapet’ – przedpiersień (breastplate). Many of these proposed words were accepted into the language, e.g., wymówka for ‘excuse’, owoc was preferable to frukt (fruit), and wynalazek for ‘invention’. Fascinatingly, according to Królikowski, a szalka (bowl) became known as a filiżanka (cup), then that word changed to czarka (cup) a hundred years later, but soon returned to the former elegant, dainty word that many consider one of the prettiest in the language.
The author stressed that, if anyone neglected the purity and sincerity of the language, they could not love it. However, ‘a good father conscientiously educating his children […] should not be imprudently zealous’, as expelling all foreign words ‘might confuse the logic of the language’ (trans. MB). Therefore, words whose Polish equivalents could not convey the full meaning needed to be kept. Take books, for example: if we consider the French word exemplaire (copy), none of the Polish words that attempted to replace it (e.g., odcisk [impression], odpis [transcript], przepis [rewrite], kształt [form], or wizerunek [image]) were able to express the very physicality of a book. The same was true of ‘perspective’ and ‘microscope’, which could not be replaced by dalekowidz (which translates as ‘far-sight’, even though it looks to the future) and drobnowidz (literally a ‘small viewer’, even though small details are more clearly visible under a microscope). Much also depends on the context of the words: piramidy looks better than ostrosłupy egipskie (‘Egyptian pyramids’), and mathematicians ought to use the word punkt (‘point’), while kropka (‘full stop/period’) should be reserved for writing.
What to call a Polish parasol?