Belapeireren lexiko garbia

Abstract

Belapeire, vicar general of Soule, wrote his catechism (Catechima laburra, 1696) in an affordable, clear Basque, with a carefully chosen vocabulary and without resorting to unnecessary loanwords. This article has two parts. The first, and longest one, is a collection of usual loanwords in Soule texts of seventeenth and eighteenth centuries that Belapeire declined to use. It is a supplement to my Belapeireren Hiztegia (lexicographical work, part of my PhD Thesis) and is a kind of dictionary of loanwords that the author did not use, including the best "Basque" solutions he adopted. The rejection of many loanwords is evident in the second half of the catechism, which is a translation of the celebrated Bishop Bossuet's French catechism. For example, the Souletin author will write nahi ükhen to translate desirer; he will not use desiratu, verb documented in almost all northern texts of that time. In the second part of the article, much shorter than the first, I analyze the Souletin adaptation of the paragraphs Belapeire took from Materre's Catechism: our writer, careful and slightly purist, rejected many loanwords of the Labourdin text.