摘要：The paper deals with authentic written and spoken utterances of ordinary Czech people at the turn of the 19th century as recorded in linguistic works by an outstanding Czech philologist and translator,František Jan Tomsa (1751–1814). After a brief overview of Tomsa’s life and work,it analyses some examples included in some of his books starting with the textbook Elementarwerk der böhmischdeutsch- und lateinischen Sprache (1784). Here,short phrases or two-line mini-dialogues are recorded,originating apparently in the conversations of servants. They are quite authentic materials providing useful information about the manner of speech of these people,but lacking accurate information about when,where and by whom these phrases were uttered. However,this type of information is often provided in other works by Tomsa,namely Von den Vorzügen der čechischen Sprache (1812),Über die Veränderungen der čechischen Sprache (1805) and Über die Bedeutung,Abwandlung und Gebrauch der čechischen Zeitwörter (1804). Here,he is particularly interested in the speech of the inhabitants of villages and small towns,because he deems them less influenced by German. To document this,he not only records from whom,when and on what occasion he heard a particular phrase or word,but often also how old the speaker was or where he or she was born or spent most of their life. With pinpoint precision,written answers of the author’s father Jan Tomsa,a simple peasant ignorant of languages other than Czech,to questions concerning farming and events from his life are recalled,preserving the original orthography and thus bearing a unique testimony to the language of a barely literate Czech rustic of his time. All these records served Tomsa for several purposes,especially as sources of words and idioms to be used in his translations or pedagogical works,and as examples reflecting his conviction that the codification of the new written Czech cannot be based on the classical literature only,but must at least partly take into account the contemporary spoken language. This approach was not adopted by the majority of his contemporaries,but thanks to it we have today in Tomsa’s works an important source of information not only about the manner of speech of ordinary Czech people at the beginning of the National Revival period and the differences between manners of expression in Prague and in the country,but also about the usual topics of conversation,including among others also themes important for the history of agriculture..
关键词：František Jan Tomsa;Czech National Revival;colloquial language;history of Czech language;history of grammatography
