The paper is an article of reflection which aims to critically analyze the concept of success as viewed from an individual’s perspective as well as through the lenses of others. Historically and socially dependent norms and values regulating psychological and sociological approaches to success and failure are also considered and their personal and social consequences examined. Against this background the postwar concepts of a successful language learner and a successful language teacher are examined from both diachronic and synchronic perspectives. A model with six stages is proposed, the function of which is to estimate their approximate duration as well as to identify criteria adopted in order to distinguish between success and failure in particular periods. Terminology, drawn from the philosophy of law, relating to norms and expectations is presented to examine methodological issues in evaluation and assessment. Implications for language teacher education are also considered.

In this short text, I examine the usage of the Lycian word tabahaza, highlight its possible Anatolian cognates, such as the Hittite nēpiš- ‘heaven’ and the Cuneiform Luwian tappaš- ‘id.’, analyze and address the problems arising from this connection, while also reconstructing the intermediate phases between Proto-Indo-European, as well as other proto- and attested languages, in relation to the development of the form in question.

Erazm Rykaczewski’s Dokładny słownik polsko-angielski… (1851) was the first Polish- English dictionary. As well as English equivalents for Polish headwords, it offered a rich selection of Polish illustrative examples paired with their English counterparts to provide the user with information on the way the headwords are used in context. While making a bilingual dictionary requires fluency in both languages, Rykaczewski’s knowledge of English was somewhat less than perfect. In the light of the above, how he compiled the volume’s English side remains largely unresolved. This paper empirically tests the hypothesis that he drew on the works of other lexicographers. The research methodology was twofold. Firstly, Fleming and Tibbins’s Royal dictionary (1844-1845) was examined to ascertain whether it formed a part of Rykaczewski’s background material and, if so, to what extent. Secondly, English examples of usage unrecorded in the Royal dictionary were verified against Google Books, a gigantic corpus of texts, to identify potential sources.

The paper discusses a group of eleven words with similar phonetic shapes and somewhat similar semantics: jagu-, jak- ‘to come near’; jan- ‘to turn back’; jaguk, jakȳn ‘close, near’; jāk, jān ‘side’; jāna- ‘to sharpen’; jaŋak ‘cheek’; jaŋy ‘new’; and jaka ‘edge’. All have been suspected to belong to the same family, at the heart of which, most probably, would be the verbal root *jā-. Some of the problems associated with this idea were known previously, whereas some are newly identified here. The paper considers various constraints and proposes a scheme centred around *jā ∼ *ja- ‘to be near, …’, which may or may not be connected to MaTung. daga ‘id.’ and Mo. daga- ‘to follow’.