Origins

The Slovenian language is an Indo-European language. It belongs to the family of Slavic languages, namely its south-western branch. As with all Slavic languages, Slovenian derived from Proto-Slavic, which later produced the Old Church Slavic language. Slovenian and Slovakian are the only two languages that preserved the 'slav' in their names as a sign of origin.

Official Language

Slovenian is the official language of Slovenia. Slovenia was historically dominated by other states such as Austria, Hungary, Italy and Serbia, where there are ethnic Slovenian groups living today. As a result, Slovenian was declared official at a regional level in some parts of Hungary, Austria and Italy. Since Slovenia joined the EU in 2004, Slovenian joined the EU’s official languages.

Varieties

Slovenian is a language with many regional dialects. Linguists have so far determined about 48. They are mutually intelligible to different extents, making some more differentiated and less intelligible for capital-city speakers, for instance. Linguistic varieties are also detected within the Slovenian communities outside the national borders, in Hungary, Italy and Austria.

Brief History

Slovenian traces its history back to the Proto-Slavic language, which gave birth to Old Slavic. Old Slavic is the language that served as the basis for the future development of most Slavic languages.

The first written documents in Slovenian are considered the Freising Manuscripts, dating from the 10th to the 11th Centuries. Experts claim that these are the earliest Slavic written documents.

In fact, the real literary Slovenian did not emerge until the 16th Century, thanks to Reformation writers and efforts to establish national identity. At the time when Slovenia was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, German was the official language and the language of the elite, while Slovenian was the vernacular – the language of the people.

During World War II, Slovenia was once again divided, this time between Italy, Hungary and Germany. Each state tried to impose its own language on the part of territory annexed. After World War II, Slovenia was joined with United Yugoslavia, and forced to adopt the official language of the state, Serbo-Croatian.

Today, Slovenian has more living speakers than ever. It finally has the chance to freely establish itself as an independent language with its own history, art, culture and the right to further develop.

Did you know?

Slovenian is a Slavic language, but it suffered the strong influence of German, as for many long years German was the official language and Slovenian the vernacular one, due to the fact that today's Slovenia was included in the Austro-Hungarian Empire.

Slovenian is among the few Slavic languages which have preserved the dual number in their grammar systems (the other is Bulgarian).

Slovenian and Slovakian are the only terms containing the 'slav' radical in the state and language name up to the present day.