Vladislav Illich-Svitych
Soviet linguist (1934–1966)
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Vladislav Markovich Illich-Svitych (Russian: Владисла́в Ма́ркович И́ллич-Сви́тыч, also transliterated as Illič-Svityč; 12 September 1934 – 22 August 1966) was a Soviet linguist and accentologist. He was a founding father of comparative Nostratic linguistics and the Moscow School of Comparative Linguistics.
12 September 1934
Vladislav Illich-Svitych | |
|---|---|
Владислав Иллич-Свитыч | |
 | |
| Born | Vladislav Markovich Illich-Svitych 12 September 1934 Kyiv, Soviet Union (now Ukraine) |
| Died | 22 August 1966 (aged 31) |
| Education | Moscow State University |
| Occupation | Linguist |
| Scientific career | |
| Institutions | RAN Institute for Slavic Studies |
Academic advisors | Samuil Bernstein |
Notable students | Vitaly Shevoroshkin |
Biography
Of Polish Jewish descent,[1][2] Illich-Svitych was born in Kyiv. In 1941, he and his parents moved to Chkalov and later to Moscow. His father, Mark Vladislavovich Illich-Svitych (1886–1963), worked as a bookkeeper. His mother, Klara Moiseevna Desner (1901–1955), was chief director of puppet theater in Orenburg.[3]
He resuscitated the long-forgotten Nostratic hypothesis, originally proposed by Holger Pedersen in 1903.
Death
Vladislav Illich-Svitych died in an automobile accident on 22 August 1966, in the Shchyolkovsky District to the north-east of Moscow. According to the official version, he was embarking on a field trip to collect data on the Hungarian dialects of the Carpathians (which would be south-west of Moscow).
This version was disputed by Aharon Dolgopolsky, who blamed Soviet bureaucracy for the early death of his young colleague. According to him, as Illich-Svitych was not a Moscow native, he required a special residence permit allowing him to reside in the capital, which, like many Soviet citizens in the 1960s, he was not able to secure. As a result, he had to live in a tiny room in a small village close to the city limits, and commuted to the institute daily by car. According to Dolgopolsky, it was actually on a return trip from the institute that Illich-Svitych had his fatal accident, he presumed from being lost in thought behind the wheel.[4]
His death prevented him from completing the Comparative Dictionary of Nostratic Languages, but the ambitious work was continued by his colleagues, including Sergei Starostin and Vladimir Dybo.[5]
Illich-Svitych was buried at the Obraztsovskoye Cemetery in the Shchyolkovsky District of the Moscow Region. A phrase in the Nostratic language is engraved on his tombstone.[6][7]
Selected publications
- Nominal Accentuation in Baltic and Slavic, translated by R. L. Leed and R. F. Feldstein, Cambridge, London 1979: the MIT Press. (originally edited in Russian in 1963)