Editing Old Church Slavonic (section)

==History==
It is generally held that the language was standardized by two Byzantine missionaries, [[Cyril and Methodius|Cyril and his brother Methodius]], for a mission to [[Great Moravia]] (the territory of today's eastern Czech Republic and western Slovakia; for details, see [[Glagolitic alphabet]]).{{sfn|Huntley|1993|pp=23}} The mission took place in response to a request by [[Great Moravia]]'s ruler, Duke [[Rastislav of Moravia|Rastislav]] for the development of Slavonic liturgy.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Spiesz|first1= Anton|last2=Caplovic|first2=Dusan|last3=Bolchazy|first3=Ladislaus J.|title=''Illustrated Slovak History: A Struggle for Sovereignty in Central Europe''|year=2006|publisher=Bolchazy-Carducci Publishers, Inc.|isbn=978-0-86516-426-0|page=22}}</ref>

As part of preparations for the mission, in 862/863, the missionaries developed the [[Glagolitic alphabet]] and translated the most important prayers and [[liturgical book]]s, including the ''[[Aprakos|Aprakos Evangeliar]]'', the [[Psalter]], and the [[Acts of the Apostles]], allegedly basing the language on the [[Slavic languages|Slavic dialect]] spoken in the hinterland of their hometown, [[Thessaloniki]],{{Efn |[[Slavs]] had invaded the region from about 550 CE.{{Sfn |Curta|2006|p=214 | ps =: "At the emperor's request, Constantine and his brother started the translation of religious texts into Old Church Slavonic, a literary language most likely based on the Macedonian dialect allegedly used in the hinterland of their home-town, Thessalonica."}}}} in present-day [[Greece]].

Based on a number of archaicisms preserved until the early 20th century (the articulation of [[yat]] as {{IPAslink|æ}} in [[Boboshticë]], [[Drenovë]], around Thessaloniki, [[Razlog dialect|Razlog]], the [[Rhodopes]] and [[Thracian dialect|Thrace]] and of [[yery]] as {{IPAslink|ɨ}} around Castoria and the Rhodopes, the presence of decomposed nasalisms around Castoria and Thessaloniki, etc.), the dialect is posited to have been part of a macrodialect extending from the [[Adriatic Sea|Adriatic]] to the [[Black Sea]], and covering southern Albania, northern Greece and the southernmost parts of Bulgaria.{{sfn|Duridanov|1991|pp=527}}

Because of the very short time between [[Rastislav of Moravia|Rastislav]]'s request and the actual mission, it has been widely suggested that both the Glagolitic alphabet and the translations had been "in the works" for some time, probably for a planned mission to [[First Bulgarian Empire|Bulgaria]].{{sfn|Huntley|1993|pp=23 [Skepticism about this has centred around the speed with which everything was done, apparently no more than a year having passed between the request and the mission, a short time for the creation of an excellent alphabet plus the translation into a Slavonic language, using this new alphabet, of at least the Gospels. The only response has been that Constantine's philological interest might have led him to 'play' with an alphabet before this.]}}<ref>{{cite book|title = The Early Medieval Balkans, A Critical Survey from the Sixth to the Late Twelfth Century |last = Fine | first = J. |  year = 1991 | publisher = [[University of Michigan Press]] |pages=113–114|isbn = 0-472-08149-7|quote=Since Constantine and Methodius were able to have both language and translations ready so promptly, they must have been at work upon this project for some time prior to Rastislav's request. If so, presumably their efforts had been originally aimed at a future mission for Bulgaria. This also would explain why Old Church Slavonic had a Bulgaro-Macedonian base; this dialect was well suited as a missionary language for Bulgaria.}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=Hupchick|first=Dennis|title=The Balkans: From Constantinople to Communism|year=2002|publisher=Palgrave Macmillan|location=New York|isbn=978-1-4039-6417-5|pages=42}}</ref>

The language and the Glagolitic alphabet, as taught at the Great Moravian Academy ({{langx|sk|Veľkomoravské učilište}}), were used for government and religious documents and books in [[Great Moravia]] between 863 and 885. The texts written during this phase contain characteristics of the West Slavic [[vernacular]]s in Great Moravia.

In 885 [[Pope Stephen V]] prohibited the use of Old Church Slavonic in Great Moravia in favour of [[Latin]].{{Sfn |Alexander|2005|p= [https://books.google.com/books?id=lVBB1a0rC70C&pg=PA310 310]}} King [[Svatopluk I of Moravia|Svatopluk I of Great Moravia]] expelled the Byzantine missionary contingent in 886.

[[Seven Apostles of Bulgarian Orthodox Church|Exiled students]] of the two [[equal-to-apostles|apostles]] then brought the Glagolitic alphabet to the [[First Bulgarian Empire|Bulgarian Empire]], being at least some of them Bulgarians themselves.<ref>Kiril Petkov, The Voices of Medieval Bulgaria, Seventh-Fifteenth Century: The Records of a Bygone Culture, Volume 5, BRILL, 2008, {{ISBN|9004168311}}, p. 161.</ref><ref>("This great father of ours and light of Bulgaria was by origin of the European Moesians whom the people commonly known as Bulgarians…"-Kosev, Dimitŭr; et al. (1969), Documents and Materials on the History of the Bulgarian People, Sofia: Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, p. 54)</ref><ref>(The Voices of Medieval Bulgaria, Seventh-Fifteenth Century, East Central and Eastern Europe in the Middle Ages, 450-1450, Kiril Petkov, BRILL, 2008, ISBN 9047433750, p. 153.)</ref> [[Boris I of Bulgaria]] ({{reign | 852 | 889}}) received and officially accepted them; he established the [[Preslav Literary School]] and the [[Ohrid Literary School]].<ref>{{cite book|url= https://books.google.com/books?id=29BAeKHwvuoC&pg=PA43 |title= Encyclopedia of the Languages of Europe|isbn= 978-0-63122039-8|last1= Price |first1= Glanville |date= 2000-05-18|publisher= Wiley}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|url= https://books.google.com/books?id=fWp9JA3aBvcC&pg=PA51 |title= The Blackwell Companion to Eastern Christianity|isbn= 978-1-44433361-9 |last1= Parry|first1= Ken|date= 2010-05-10|publisher= John Wiley & Sons}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=QwNlKqyNC7EC&pg=PA58 |title= Interaction and Isolation in Late Byzantine Culture|isbn= 978-1-85043944-8|last1= Rosenqvist |first1= Jan Olof|year= 2004|publisher= Bloomsbury Academic}}</ref>
Both schools originally used the Glagolitic alphabet, though the [[Cyrillic script]] developed early on at the Preslav Literary School, where it superseded Glagolitic as official in [[First Bulgarian Empire|Bulgaria]] in 893.{{Sfn |Curta|2006|pp= 221–22}}<ref>''Silent Communication: Graffiti from the Monastery of Ravna, Bulgaria''. Studien Dokumentationen. Mitteilungen der ANISA.  Verein für die Erforschung und Erhaltung der Altertümer, im speziellen der Felsbilder in den österreichischen Alpen (Verein ANISA: Grömbing, 1996) 17.  Jahrgang/Heft 1, 57–78.</ref><ref>"The scriptorium of the Ravna monastery: once again on the decoration of the Old Bulgarian manuscripts 9th–10th c." In: ''Medieval Christian Europe: East and West. Traditions, Values, Communications''. Eds. Gjuzelev, V. and Miltenova, A. (Sofia: Gutenberg Publishing House, 2002), 719–26 (with K. Popkonstantinov).</ref><ref>Popkonstantinov, Kazimir, "Die Inschriften des Felsklosters Murfatlar". In: ''Die slawischen Sprachen'' 10, 1986, S. 77–106.</ref>

The texts written during this era exhibit certain linguistic features of the vernaculars of the [[First Bulgarian Empire]]. Old Church Slavonic spread to other South-Eastern, Central, and Eastern European Slavic territories, most notably [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[Bohemia]], [[Lesser Poland]], and principalities of the [[Kievan Rus']] – while retaining characteristically [[Eastern South Slavic]] linguistic features.[[File:Archive-ugent-be-973E9242-B062-11E1-9EF1-99BDAAF23FF7 DS-375 (cropped).jpg|thumb|284x284px|Example of the Cyrillic alphabet: excerpt from the manuscript Vidin Miscellany, written in Middle Bulgarian, 1360<ref>{{Cite web |title= Bdinski Zbornik [manuscript] |url= https://lib.ugent.be/viewer/archive.ugent.be:973E9242-B062-11E1-9EF1-99BDAAF23FF7#?c=&m=&s=&cv=30&xywh=-810,-1,7145,4335 |access-date= 2020-08-26|website= Lib | publisher = U Gent}}</ref>|alt= ]]Later texts written in each of those territories began to take on characteristics of the local Slavic vernaculars, and by the mid-11th century Old Church Slavonic had diversified into a number of regional varieties (known as ''recensions''). These local varieties are collectively known as the [[Church Slavonic language]].<ref>{{cite book|url= https://books.google.com/books?id=D-FRM9isW8AC&pg=PA185 |title= Speech, Memory, and Meaning |isbn= 978-311021910-4 |last1= Gasparov |first1= B|year= 2010|publisher= Walter de Gruyter }}</ref>

Apart from use in the Slavic countries, Old Church Slavonic served as a liturgical language in the [[Romanian Orthodox Church]], and also as a literary and official language of the princedoms of [[Wallachia]] and [[Moldavia]] (see [[Old Church Slavonic in Romania]]), before gradually being replaced by [[Romanian language|Romanian]] during the 16th to 17th centuries.

Church Slavonic maintained a prestigious status, particularly in [[Russia]], for many centuries{{spaced ndash}}among Slavs in the East it had a status analogous to that of Latin in [[Western Europe]], but had the advantage of being substantially less divergent from the [[vernacular]] tongues of average parishioners.

Some Orthodox churches, such as the [[Bulgarian Orthodox Church]], [[Russian Orthodox Church]], [[Serbian Orthodox Church]], [[Orthodox Church of Ukraine|Ukrainian Orthodox Church]] and [[Macedonian Orthodox Church – Ohrid Archbishopric]], as well as several Eastern Catholic Churches, still use [[Church Slavonic language|Church Slavonic]] in their services and chants.<ref>Тодорова-Гергова, Светлана. [https://bnr.bg/hristobotev/post/101445975/za-bogoslujenieto-na-savremenen-balgarski-ezik Отец Траян Горанов: За богослужението на съвременен български език], Българско национално радио ″Христо Ботев″, 1 април 2021 г.</ref>