Nyelvtudományi Közlemények 105. kötet (2008)

Szemle, ismertetések - Riese, Timothy: Serkáli osztják chrestomathia (Sherkal Ostyak Chrestomathy) (szerk. Fejes László) 407

generally written as ä, ő, й, í, is of great interest, his comments on the syntactic section of Schmidt's work convincing. Not yet mentioned are the chapters II.2. A serkáli nyelvtan az osztják nyelvtani vázlatok között (83-84) and II.3. A serkáli nyelvtani jegyzet forrásai (85-109). In this section of the volume Fejes discusses the question which other works on Khanti served as sources and/or influenced Éva Schmidt in her treatment of the Sherkal dialect. For this purpose he proposes a 'list of candidates' and in a comparison between them and Schmidt's book concludes whether or not they influenced her or not. These other works are: (1) Északi osztják kresztomátia (Magdolna Sz. Kispál - Henrietta F. Mészáros, 1970), (2) the review of this latter book by László Honti, Harmut Katz, and Éva Korenchy in NyK 73 (1971), (3) Chrestomathia Samoiedica (Péter Hajdú, 1968), (4) Wolfgang Steinitz's works (above all his Ostjakische Grammatik und Chrestomathie mit Wörterverzeichnis, 1950), (5) Károly Rédei's Khanti grammars (Northern Ostyak Chrestomathy, 1965) and Nord-ostjakische Texte (Kazym-Dialekt) mit Skizze der Grammatik (1968), (6) Eastern Ostyak Chrestomathy (János Gulya, 1966), (7) Generative Phonologie and phonologische Sprachbünde des Ostjakischen und Samojedischen (Hartmut Katz, 1975), (8) other sources, (9) 'traditional' Hungarian grammars, and (10) possible other sources for Schmidt's chapter on syntax. Fejes comes to the conclusion (108) that of the most importance in the formation of Schmidt's grammar were (a) the works of Wolfgang Steinitz, and (b) the criticism of the Északi osztják kresztomátia by Honti, Katz, and Korenchy. Fejes lists the points criticized by these latter in their review and shows how Schmidt studiously avoided the same 'errors'. This is, of course, only conjecture, but at the same time convincing. One could argue that the inclusion of this chapter in the present volume was superfluous. It is true that it is not essential in the same way as the footnotes to Schmidt's grammar or the discussion of her grammar in П.4.2.-11.4.6. are. Nevertheless, I found this chapter to be of great interest. Reading it was to an extent like gaining a glimpse into Schmidt's thoughts and work methods. Since the less curious can safely disregard the chapter, I see no harm and only gain in its inclusion. The final portion of this book is taken up by texts in the Sherkal dialect. These were compiled from Wolfgang Steinitz' works on Khanti (texts 1 through 16) and were complemented by shorter texts chosen from two older books with Sherkal texts published in 1946 and 1949. The latter texts are examples of the Sherkal "literary language" and are given in their original Cyrillic form. In the introduction to this section (137-140) the motives for the text selection and information on the texts written in Cyrillic are given. The texts are followed by a