Aleksey Aleksandrovich Shakhmatov (5 June 1864 – 16 August 1920) was an outstanding Russia

Russia

Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...

n philologist

Philology

Philology is the study of language in written historical sources; it is a combination of literary studies, history and linguistics.Classical philology is the philology of Greek and Classical Latin...

 credited with laying foundations for the science of textology

Textual criticism

Textual criticism is a branch of literary criticism that is concerned with the identification and removal of transcription errors in the texts of manuscripts...

.

Biography

Born in Ivangorod

Ivangorod

Ivangorod is a town in Leningrad Oblast, Russia, situated on the right bank of the Narva River by the Russian-Estonian border, west of St. Petersburg. Population: The town is known for the Ivangorod fortress....

, Shakhmatov was brought up by his uncle near Saratov

Saratov

-Modern Saratov:The Saratov region is highly industrialized, due in part to the rich in natural and industrial resources of the area. The region is also one of the more important and largest cultural and scientific centres in Russia...

. He went to a public school in Moscow

Moscow

Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...

 and developed interest for Old Russian

Old East Slavic language

Old East Slavic or Old Ruthenian was a language used in 10th-15th centuries by East Slavs in the Kievan Rus' and states which evolved after the collapse of the Kievan Rus...

 language and literature at an early age. At the age of 16, his articles started to appear in the most authoritative journal of Slavic studies of that time - Archiv für slavische Philologie.

Shakhmatov furthered his education at the Moscow University (1883–1887), later delivering lectures in the same institution. His first monograph

Monograph

A monograph is a work of writing upon a single subject, usually by a single author.It is often a scholarly essay or learned treatise, and may be released in the manner of a book or journal article. It is by definition a single document that forms a complete text in itself...

, published in 1886, examined the language of ancient Novgorod charters. In 1891 he became so enthusiastic about zemstvo

Zemstvo

Zemstvo was a form of local government that was instituted during the great liberal reforms performed in Imperial Russia by Alexander II of Russia. The idea of the zemstvo was elaborated by Nikolay Milyutin, and the first zemstvo laws were put into effect in 1864...

 that he gave up his scholarly pursuits for three years and held a minor administrative office in his native village.

In 1894 Shakhmatov returned to Moscow and won great acclaim for his Ph.D.

Doctor of Philosophy

Doctor of Philosophy, abbreviated as Ph.D., PhD, D.Phil., or DPhil , in English-speaking countries, is a postgraduate academic degree awarded by universities...

 dissertation, entitled Studies in the Sphere of Russian Phonetics. Five years later, he was admitted to the Russian Academy of Sciences

Russian Academy of Sciences

The Russian Academy of Sciences consists of the national academy of Russia and a network of scientific research institutes from across the Russian Federation as well as auxiliary scientific and social units like libraries, publishers and hospitals....

, and over the following years became one of the most reputable academicians. He revived the Academy's linguistic periodicals, edited the academic dictionary of Russian language

Russian language

Russian is a Slavic language used primarily in Russia, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. It is an unofficial but widely spoken language in Ukraine, Moldova, Latvia, Turkmenistan and Estonia and, to a lesser extent, the other countries that were once constituent republics...

 and was elected to represent the Academy at the State Council of Imperial Russia

State Council of Imperial Russia

The State Council was the supreme state advisory body to the Tsar in Imperial Russia.-18th century:Early Tsars' Councils were small and dealt primarily with the external politics....

 and Imperial State Duma

Duma

A Duma is any of various representative assemblies in modern Russia and Russian history. The State Duma in the Russian Empire and Russian Federation corresponds to the lower house of the parliament. Simply it is a form of Russian governmental institution, that was formed during the reign of the...

.

In 1909, Shakhmatov moved to work in the St Petersburg University as a professor. By that time, he had been elected doctor honoris causa by the Charles University, Berlin University, Polish Academy of Sciences

Polish Academy of Sciences

The Polish Academy of Sciences, headquartered in Warsaw, is one of two Polish institutions having the nature of an academy of sciences.-History:...

, and many other scholarly societies.

1917 Revolution

Shakhmatov participated in the Commission for the Study of the Tribal Composition of the Population of the Borderlands of Russia

Commission for the Study of the Tribal Composition of the Population of the Borderlands of Russia

The Commission for the Study of the Tribal Composition of the Population of the Borderlands of Russia was set up in February 1917 by Sergey Oldenburg under the auspices of the Russian Academy of Sciences...

 set up in February 1917. He also helped prepare sweeping reforms

Reforms of Russian orthography

The reform of Russian orthography refers to changes made to the Russian alphabet over the course of the history of the Russian language.- Early Changes :...

 of Russian orthography

Russian orthography

Russian orthography is formally considered to encompass spelling and punctuation . Russian spelling, which is quite phonemic in practice, is a mix of the morphological and phonetic principles, with a few etymological or historic forms, and occasional grammatical differentiation...

, which would be implemented by the Bolshevik

Bolshevik

The Bolsheviks, originally also Bolshevists , derived from bol'shinstvo, "majority") were a faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party which split apart from the Menshevik faction at the Second Party Congress in 1903....

s in 1918. Shakhmatov refused to leave Petrograd for the West, a fatal decision that led to his premature death from malnutrition in 1920. The Academy subsequently cherished his memory and instituted a special Shakhmatov Prize, to be awarded "for the best works in source science, textology and linguistics".

Research

Shakhmatov is best remembered for having pioneered textological research of early Russian chronicle

Chronicle

Generally a chronicle is a historical account of facts and events ranged in chronological order, as in a time line. Typically, equal weight is given for historically important events and local events, the purpose being the recording of events that occurred, seen from the perspective of the...

s, notably the Primary Chronicle

Primary Chronicle

The Primary Chronicle , Ruthenian Primary Chronicle or Russian Primary Chronicle, is a history of Kievan Rus' from about 850 to 1110, originally compiled in Kiev about 1113.- Three editions :...

. He established with a great degree of precision the stages of evolution of that key document, even attempting to reconstruct the postulated proto-version of Nestor

Nestor the Chronicler

Saint Nestor the Chronicler was the reputed author of the Primary Chronicle, , Life of the Venerable Theodosius of the Kiev Caves, Life of the Holy Passion Bearers, Boris and Gleb, and of the so-called Reading.Nestor was a monk of the Monastery of the Caves in Kiev from 1073...

's chronicle. His research proved seminal for subsequent generations of historians.

Shakhmatov was also responsible for publication and pioneering studies of minor or derelict Slavic languages. His studies of Slavic etymology

Etymology

Etymology is the study of the history of words, their origins, and how their form and meaning have changed over time.For languages with a long written history, etymologists make use of texts in these languages and texts about the languages to gather knowledge about how words were used during...

 revolved around the idea of close contacts and influences between the ancient Slavs and Celt

Celt

The Celts were a diverse group of tribal societies in Iron Age and Roman-era Europe who spoke Celtic languages.The earliest archaeological culture commonly accepted as Celtic, or rather Proto-Celtic, was the central European Hallstatt culture , named for the rich grave finds in Hallstatt, Austria....

s, a hypothesis that was subsequently discarded. Shakhmatov was so ken, that the prekmurian language, what today speak in the Prekmurje

Prekmurje

Prekmurje is a geographically, linguistically, culturally and ethnically defined region settled by Slovenes and lying between the Mur River in Slovenia and the Rába Valley in the most western part of Hungary...

 and Vendvidék is Celtic extraction, inasmuch as apply to the ü and ö characters. But this is gross error, as the prekmurian a slovene variant language, and the ü, ö characters also other slovene dialects apply, such as the Prlekija dialect, partway also the Carantian-Slovene dialect. But the Hungarian nationalists was employ to the Shakhmatov-teory against the Slovenes and on the magyarization

Magyarization

Magyarization is a kind of assimilation or acculturation, a process by which non-Magyar elements came to adopt Magyar culture and language due to social pressure .Defiance or appeals to the Nationalities Law, met...

 in the Slovene March

Slovene March (Kingdom of Hungary)

The Slovene March or Slovene krajina was the traditional denomination of the Slovene-speaking areas of the Vas and Zala County in the Kingdom of Hungary from the late 18th century until the Treaty of Trianon in 1919...

.