“Stare” i „nowe” w polskiej terminologii prawnej 1 poł. XIX w. : na przykładzie terminologii dotyczącej rozwodów

The old and the new terms in the Polish legal terminology of the first half of the 19th century, exemplified by the divorce terminology

The authors present the changes in the Polish legal terminology of the first half of the 19th century and illustrate them with the matrimonial law terms. The period was chosen because of undergoing transformations of the state and its legal system at the time - the decline of the Nobles’ Commonwealth, the formation of The Duchy of Warsaw and the introduction of the Napoleonic Code as the common law on its territory. The legal tradition of the Nobles’ Commonwealth was no longer maintained and people started to adjust previous terminology to the conceptual system of the French law. The fact that matrimonial law was reformed three times in the first half of the 19th century, i.e., in 1807, 1825 and 1836 and was adjusted to the expectations of the Catholic Church also influenced the lexicological transformations of the divorce terms. The discussed period is also important because some Latin terms had been removed from legal and administrative Polish language and were replaced with the native ones, since the Age of Enlightenment. One can observe the process of Polonization of legal vocabulary in the replacement of the old Latinism separacja (separation) with the expression rozdział/rozłączenie co do stołu i łoża (separation from bed and board) and also with the omittance of the borrowings from French language. The newly introduced terms such as rozwiązanie małżeństwa (dissolution of a marriage) or prefixal formation unieważnienie (małżeństwa) (annulment (of marriage)) met the requirements for native words. Nevertheless the influence of French can be still seen in some formations such as rozwiązanie małżeństwa przez rozwód [French: la dissolution du marriage par le divorce] (dissolution of a marriage with a divorce) or żądać/żądanie rozwodu [French: demander le divorce, demande en divorce] (to demand a divorce/a demand of a divorce). When compared with the original French words, Polish legal terminology of the time is far from being perfect since there are many variants of terms derived from different chronological levels of Polish language.