Abstract:
A nation that does not develop its written language properly
cannot reach the highest level of mental development" -
this quote is from the famous letter of the nine Georgian scientists,
which was published in 1915 in the "People's Newspaper~
N305. Ivane Javakhishvili also signed the letter with the title
"About the Georgian dictionary". According to the authors, the dictionary was the necessary and most important tool that would
contribute to the enrichment of the language. The letter
describes the plan, which, among other things, meant updating
the terminology. Giorgi Kazbegi – the chairman of the Society for
Spreading Literacy among Georgians – was upset by this letter
and the program later published as a book.
Kazbegi considered the creation of bilingual dictionaries to
be the first need, and according to Ivane Javakhishvili, the dictionary
cannot be perfect if we do not work on reviving the Georgian
dictionary material. "How will the compiler of your dictionary
translate these words барабан, Иммунитет, Галерея and
many others, if he has not studied these terms from ancient Georgian
writing? " Does each one makes it up? Then what will be
the significance of such fabricated terms?" Ivane Javakhishvili's
reply to Kazbegi is interesting, along with other points of view,
in that it contains his points of view about the principles of terminological
work. Here and in his other works, Ivane Javakhishvili's
attitude towards artificial terms is clearly visible.
Nevertheless, Ivane Javakhishvili cooperated with the compilers
of the first technical terminological dictionary - Sitkvari -
and gave them some advice. In the Introduction to the dictionary,
they thank Ivane Javakhishvili: "We consider it our duty to
thank Prof. Ivane Javakhishvili, who gave us appropriate help
and explanation for each of our appeals~. At the time, When the
Nikoladze group was excessively criticized by some Georgian
scientists, Ivane Javakhishvili collaborated with them, although
it is also clear that he was essentially in favor of a different terminological
work. It is true that he never and nowhere expressed
a similar point of view about the Nikoladze and their associates,
that Georgian terms are not suitable for bringing Europe
closer or that an international term is more acceptable than a
Georgian one, but, in general, he was against the establishment of artificially created terms, because he thought that correspondents
of a new concepts had to be found in Georgian sources.
He wanted to create a full-fledged ready-made base for Georgian
terminology work from materials collected from all kinds of
literature.
