Res Humanitariae

The article examines the letters of Kleofas Jurgelionis (1886–1963; Kleopas Jurgelionis, USA – Ray Jurgen), who was a moderniser of Lithuanian poetry, a literary critic, a translator, an editor of periodicals, publicist and lawyer, to Valerija Tysliavienė (1914–1984), who from 1938 to 1940 was a secretary of his newspaper “Tėvynė”, preserved at the Klaipėda University Library (KUB RSS). These letters (1949–1961) are very rich in content, in them the subject themes are abundantly weaved with courtship. This article discusses the topics of Jurgelionis’s letters to Tysliavienė. Taking into account the reasearch into Jurgelionis’s life and creative works and the KUB RSS archive and publications, this article sets out a twofold purpose: to discuss the content of Jurgelionis’s letters to Tysliaviene and to discuss poetry manuscripts and their publications with a textological lens.

This article analyzes the proper use of various meanings of the adjective draugiškas ‘friendly’. It discusses the semantic structure of this adjective and its different interpretation in the Dictionary of Modern Lithuanian Language and in the Dictionary of Lithuanian Language. The semantic structure of the adjective draugiškas has been specified based on the data collected from the Corpus of Modern Lithuanian Language and other sources, the problem of its figurative use is discussed, and its validity from the stand point of proper usage of new meanings such as „safe“, „harmless“, „comfortable“ is evaluated. The data was collected from various functional styles and the conducted survey shows the real use of the modern adjective draugiškas. In addition, it shows that some of the phrases used with this word that are indicated as incorrect by users, are not violating the norms of language use. The appropriateness of new phrases, such as draugiškas restoranas, draugiška kuprinė, is discussed.

Finds of decorated hammers or axes made of elk antler are rather rare in Estonia. One axe comes from the River Pärnu, and another from the Otepää hill-fort and later episcopal castle site. In addition, there are two almost identical hammers: one was a stray find from Harju county, and another was found in the Medieval town of Tartu. The two stray finds have no connected items that would enable their dating. The other two examples originate from contexts that cannot be dated exactly. The aim of this research is to find parallels to help us date the Estonian items, to ascertain the material and tools used for producing these items, and to discuss on the basis of the former, and an analysis of the find contexts, the probable areas of usage and meanings of these items. Although it is not possible to date these antler objects precisely, they probably come from the end of the Estonian Prehistoric period or the Middle Ages: the 11th to the 15th centuries. The function of the items is also not definite. Tools in the shape of a hammer were probably used as hammers. It was not possible to use any axe-shaped object as an axe, so assumptions about their function are still just speculative.