Borrowed Buddhist vocabulary of the Buryat Language:­ a Perspective from History and Linguistics

Introduction. The article is devoted to Buddhist terms, which represent a significant layer in the lexical system of the Buryat language. The borrowed Buddhist vocabulary of the Buryat language is the result of the enteringprocessof Buddhist terms into the Buryat language taken place over centuries. It was not stable, it, like any process, had periods of decline and activity.  Of course, borrowing of Buddhist terms is a consequence of the development of Buddhist ideas. The main purpose of the study is to describe the features of borrowed Buddhist terms, which are the result of an inextricable connection between the process of their appearing in the Buryat language and the history of Buddhism popularization among the Mongolian–speaking peoples. The objectives of the study include: 1) justification of intensification periods of entering the Buddhist terms into the lexicological system of the Buryat language against a historical background; 2) a brief historical and linguistic description of periods of the mass appearance of the Buddhist terms; 3) identification of the peculiarities of the semantics of individual borrowings belonging to different periods of borrowing and different donor languages. Results. Based on the historical and linguistic facts, the authors justify the validity of the allocation of periods of appearing of Buddhist terms associated with periods of intensive development of Buddhism. The study showed that in the first period of borrowing Buddhist terms of the Buryat language, their guides were the Sogdian and Uighur languages: from Sanskrit and Tibetan they fell into Sogdian, then into Uighur. It was only after Uighur that they appeared in the Mongolian languages through the old-written Mongolian language. In the second period, Buddhist terms came directly from the Tibetan language to the Buryat language, in some cases the Mongolian language was the intermediary. The third period of intensification of the appearance of Buddhist terms is characterized by the revival of previously borrowed words. The authors conclude that the features of Buddhist terms depend on the donor language, while the roads along which they came to the Buryat language also play an important role: directly or through an intermediary language, orally or in writing.

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