Jagić on Maretić

• Main Author: Mirko Peti
• Format: Article
• Language: Croatian
• Published: Institut za hrvatski jezik i jezikoslovlje 2008-01-01
• Series: Rasprave: Časopis Instituta za Hrvatski Jezik i Jezikoslovlje
• Subjects: Jagić; Maretić; Croatian philology
• Online Access: http://hrcak.srce.hr/file/55775
• ISSN: 1331-6745; 1849-0379

Aside from work on his main philological activities, Jagić, as the editor of the Archive and leading Croatian philologist of his time with an international reputation, very diligently kept abreast of all happenings in the area of Slavic studies both in Croatia and abroad. He had a compelling need not only to be informed about everything but also to express his own critical judgement. He would frequently polemize with those whose opinions he disagreed with. As a result many of Jagić’s reviews of books and treatises of leading Slavicists of the time came into being, mostly published in the Archive. Not only would he courteously outline a book, but in those reviews Jagić also exposed his own evaluation, and explicated his own opinion about solutions to particular issues. Among those who Jagić wrote about frequently in his reviews of new books was Tomo Maretić, a leading Croatian philologist at the turn of the 19th century. Since both Jagić and Maretić are exceptional personalities in Croatian philology in their own ways, and since their works overlap, supplement or oppose each other in many elements, it will be interesting and useful for Croatian philology to analyze what the elder thinks about the younger, and how he evaluates him in materials available today. Such an analysis could not only somewhat clarify the picture of Maretić as a philologist, but also clarify the picture in terms of important issues in Croatian philology of the time.