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Glagolita, Glagolitza, Glagolites

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(derived from the Slavonic Glagol, a word), "an ancient Slavonic alphabet, principally used in several Roman Catholic dioceses of Istria and Dalmatia, in the psalms, liturgies, and offices of the Church. The use of this liturgy was confirmed to the priesthood by a bull of pope Innocent IV, 1248. Of the antiquity of this alphabet the savans have maintained a great variety of opinions. Dobrowsky laid the foundation of a critical investigation of the subject, and has been followed by Kopitar, Jacob Grimm, Ivan Preis, Schafarik. etc. In former times the invention was sometimes ascribed to St. Jerome; while the Orientals, according to Neale, consider it as a mere corruption and Latinization of the Cyrillic alphabet. According to the recent researches of Schafarik, it was invented by Cyril, and is, consequently, older than what is now called the Cyrillic alphabet (Kyriblliszer), the author of which was bishop Clement of Welitza (died 916). Grimm found in some Glagolitic letters Runic characters. The Glagolitic literature embraces all South Slavic works which are written in the Glagolitic alphabet. According to langsage and form of the letters, two periods may be distinguished — an earlier and a later one. Among the important documents of the earlier period which are still extant are a Glagolitic manuscript of the 11th century, belonging to count Kloz, published by Kopitar under the title Glagolita Clozianus (956 lines,Vienna, 1836); a gospel which in 1736 was brought by J.S. Assemani from Jerusalem to Rome, is preserved there in the Vatican, but is not yet printed; the Abecenarsunm Bulgaricum, at Paris (published in the Nouveau traite de diplomatique [Paris, 1700], and more fully by Kopitar in the Glagolita Cloziasmus); a gospel which Victor Gregorovich, of Kasan, purchased on Mount Athos (fragments in Miklosich's Slavic Library [Vienna, 1857, volume 1]). The resemblance between the language of these documents and the language of the Old-Slavonic documents written in the Cyrillic alphabet, is the greater the more ancient the latter are. The younger period of the Glagolitic literature embraces the translations into the South Slamic dialects of the New Testament by Primus Truber (about the middle of the 16th century), of the whole Bible by Dalmatin (Witten. 1584), of the Augsgburg Confession, of the Catechismes of Luther, etc. In some of these works partly the Glagolitic and partly the Cyrillic alphabet was used." (See Dobrowsky, Cagolitica [Prague, 1807] — who puts the origin of the Glagolitic alphabet erroneously in the 13th century; Hoefler ands Schafarik, Glagolitiche Fragmente [Prague, 1856]; Schafarik, Ueber Ursprung u. Heimath des Glagolitismus [Prague, 1858]; Sillem, Primnns Truber [Erlangen, 1861]. The Glagolitic alphabet is given in Bagster's Bible of Every Land, page 44). — Allgem. Real-Encyklop. s.v.; Neale, Holy Eastern Church, Introduction, 2:823. (A.J.S.)