The Language Policy of Different States on Settlement Names
in the Territory of Present-day Transcarpathia in the 20th Century
Sándor DOBOS
Tivadar Lehoczky Social Sciences Research Centre /
Ferenc Rákóczi II Transcarpathian Hungarian Institute (Ukraine) / University of Debrecen (Hungary).
(bdobossandor@gmail.com; lti@kmf.uz.ua)
Keywords:
Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, the first Czechoslovak Republic, the Kingdom of Hungary, the Soviet Union, Ukraine, language policy, Transcarpathia, place names.
Transcarpathia is the western region of Ukraine, officially called Закарпатська область/Zakarpatska oblast. Its administrative centre is Uzhgorod and the official language is Ukrainian. It is a multi-ethnic territory. According to the Ukrainian census data of 2001, the population of Transcarpathia is about 1 254 614 people. The majority of the population is Ukrainian (80.5%). We can also find people of several other nationalities: Hungarians, Russians, Romanians, Ruthens, Slovakians and some others. The largest national minority is the Hungarian community, about 151 516 Hungarians (12.1% of the population).
The territory of present-day Transcarpathia was the part of the Kingdom of Hungary from the very beginning of the 11th century (1000) to the end of the First World War(1919). After the First World War, during the 20th century several territorial and governmental changes occurred in the Carpathian Basin which caused such a situation that the region was ruled over by different states. According to different treaties, the territory of present-day Transcarpathia was attached to the following states: to the first Czechoslovak Republic, to the Kingdom of Hungary, to the Soviet Union and finally to Ukraine.
The governmental changes had influences on the status and the development of Hungarian and other languages in the region. There were periods when the Hungarian language was official and there were ones when other languages got official status and Hungarian became a regional-minority language. Thus, we can conclude that during the 20th century the Hungarian language became a pluricentric language.
The change of the status of Hungarian and other languages had a strong effect on the settlement names in the territory of present-day Transcarpathia as well. The authorities of each state ruling over the region always revised and regularized settlement names in accordance with their own political and ideological purposes. The main principle usually was to give settlements such official names that were established on the language or languages which had official status in the region. As a result, settlement names have been changed about five times in the region:
1) The first official regularization of settlement names took place between 1898 and 1912 when the territory of present-day Transcarpathia belonged to the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy and Hungarian was the official language in the region.
2) The second one was during the period between the two World Wars, when the region was integrated to the first Czechoslovak Republic (1919–1938). At that time in the region Czeh and Rusyn/Ruthene were the official languages while Hungarian became a regional-minority language.
3) The names of the settlements were modified for the third time when the region became part of Hungary again (1938–1944). In that period, in the region Hungarian got official status once again and Rusyn/Ruthene was kept as an official language as well.
4) After the Second World War the settlement names were changed again, for the fourth time, when the territory of present-day Transcarpathia was attached to the Soviet Union (1945–1991). At that time Russian and Ukrainian were the official languages while Hungarian became a regional-minority language for the second time.
5) The fifth changing of settlement names began after the collapse of the Soviet Union, when the region became part of the independent Ukraine (1991). In the region Ukrainian preserved its official status and Hungarian still remained a regional-minority language.
The subject of the given presentation is to show the language policy of different states on place names in the territory of present-day Transcarpathia during the 20th century based on the study of the above mentioned regularizations of settlement names and the change of the status of Hungarian and other languages in the region.