Suprasl Lexicon

Suprasl Lexicon [Супрасльський лексикон; Supraslskyi leksykon]. A 4,000-word Church Slavonic-Polish dictionary titled Leksykon syrech slovesnyk slavenskii (Lexicon or Slavonic Glossary) that was printed in 1722 at the Basilian monastery in Suprasl near Białystok, Poland. It was intended for use by the clergy. Its Church Slavonic content was based almost entirely on Pamva Berynda’s lexicon. Its Serbian-Bulgarian orthography was modernized, however, stresses were changed, and Volhynian-Polisian pronunciation was introduced (eg, the confusion of rě/ry/ri/rы, rja/ra, ы with y/i, and ě with y). As a result, erroneous Polish versions of Berynda’s Ukrainian definitions of words occurred. The lexicon was reprinted with few changes as an appendix in a book on moral theology in Pochaiv in 1751 and 1756, and separately in 1804. It was used by Yosyp Levytsky in the compilation of his Slavonic-Polish dictionary (1813).

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 5 (1993).]