Reflections of man’s work in the coastal toponymy of the North-Dalmatian islands

Abstract

The sudden fall in the population in the North-Dalmatian iglands and its growing age, numerous activities coming as a result of the human work and presence on the eoast are endangered. The consequences of such a situation tre reflected in language and imperil the survival ol names in some lexical fields. After his research work and making use of the data already existing in literature the author tries to systematize the toponymic material collected on the very litotoral — the contact between the sea and the coast. In his procedure the author does not start from geographical objects as bearers of motivation in the origin of names, but from the disposition of the coast for certain activities, and he places his material into several femantic groups. The activities that left the deepest traces in the population of the islands have been chosen, such as fishing, cattle breeding, navigation, transport and building. Agriculture has been left aside, because the toponyms of that kind are connected exclusively with the inlad of tle islands. In addition, the author points to the difficulties arising from the fact that semantic fields are often assimilated, Which happens either for formal reasons (the lack of understanding) or those pertaining to the contents (the ignorance of the functions of referents), which leads sometimes to a wrong interpretations of names. To reduce such mistakes to the minimum, and for other reasons as well, it would be necessary to collect a maximal number of data in this field. In that way the basic needs of our culture will be met and such a place in the toponymical reasearch it deserves in liguistics secured.