Conceptualization of exile as a primary form of punishment in the Old English linguocultural tradition

Abstract

The research aims to reconstruct the EXILE concept in the Old English linguocultural tradition. The research is novel in that it is the first to study the EXILE concept using the material of legal vocabulary of Anglo-Saxon culture during its formation, to reveal its notional content by the systematization of characteristics: punishment, deprivation of rights and freedoms, loss of human appearance, suffering, loneliness, wanderings, miserable existence. As a result, the process of conceptualization of exile taking into account a wide philological and ethno-cultural context has been presented. The authors have identified and described the cultural patterns of behavior deviation from which could lead to the relegation of a representative of any class of Anglo-Saxon society in the 7th-11th centuries to the position of an outcast. The paper studies the linguistic means of expressing all components of the practice of exile, including the naming units for the action itself, the outlaws, their distinctive features, places and circumstances of exile. The analysis of the semantic content of the selected lexemes, their contextual connections has been carried out and the notional content of the EXILE concept has been determined.