Nazwy roślin w zbiorach Michała Fedorowskiego i Elizy Orzeszkowej

Abstract

The paper deals with the response of Michał Fedorowski to Rostafinski’s questionnaire, published at the end of the 19th century. The text (published in the journal „Etnobiologia Polska” by Graniszewska, Leśniewska, Mankiewicz-Malinowska and Galera) includes all the answers provided by Fedorowski (supplemented with scientific names of plant parts – only those that were present in the attached herbarium), as well as a photograph of his signature (his name had previously been spelt as Federowski in scientific publications). The material in the collection is of extreme interest to linguists who investigate plant names of Lithuanian Rus’. The collection covers similar areas which Eliza Orzeszkowa investigated and described in Ludzie i kwiaty nad Niemnem [People and Flowers on the Neman River]. In this paper, I suggest a comparison of the plant names used in both collections, which complement each other. I also draw attention to additional aspects of the use of plants described by Fedorowski and the data which may be employed to describe features of the Polish language used at that time.