Po šumama i gorama... raznolikost i distribucija naziva za šumu u hrvatskim govorima

Abstract

The article describes and discusses the dialectal variation of words for ‘forest’ in Croatian. Apart from widespread nouns like gora, boška and šuma, the words drmun, lug, husta, loza, grm, umejak, kolinjak, gušć, ograde, drveća, les, živica, dubrava, kiće, grmlje, krč and gaj have all been attested as the basic word for ‘forest’ in one or more Croatian dialects. The article offers a detailed overview of the geographical distribution of these words based on fieldwork carried out in a recent large collaborative fieldwork project and on the existing dialectological literature. The geographical distribution of the Croatian words for ‘forest’ is visualized with the help of four maps. The article further discusses the origin of the words for ‘forest’ and their role in toponymy, as well as factors that may have played a role in the rise of the present day distribution of the lexemes.