In the beginning of the 19th century, Swedish was the only official language of Finland, and thus the dominating language in administration and higher education. However, during the latter part of the century, efforts were made to develop Finnish into a language which could be used in every part of society. In 1881, the medical society Suomalainen Lääkäriseura Duodecim was founded with the development of a medical terminology in Finnish as one of its main purposes. In 1885, a medical paper, Duodecim, and a medical dictionary were published. The aim of this study is to illuminate the vocabulary of the dictionary. The articles published in Duodecim about the dictionary during the same time are used to get to know the context into which the dictionary was published. In this study, the medical dictionary published in 1885, Duodecim’in Sanaluettelo Suomen lääkäreille, and relevant articles in Duodecim are examined. Relevant articles are read and summarized. From the dictionary, relevant words are selected. The method is qualitative and grounded theory is used. The discussion in Duodecim is mainly, except for some discussion about minor linguistic errors, about what vocabulary is to be used for such a basic phenomenon as respiration. In the dictionary, the most striking trait is the presence of Finnish translations of almost every anatomic term in Latin mentioned. A fear of loan-words is observed. This has also been seen by other authors. Other words are translated directly from Swedish. Some translations are more like explanations than translations.

From the end of the 19th century, the Old Czech apocryphal story of Joseph (son of Jacob), called Life of Joseph, has not been in the center of the scholars' and editors' attention, and therefore many pivotal philological questions concerning this Old Czech composition have not been satisfactory solved yet. This thesis offers a comprehensive analysis of the Old Czech Life of Joseph in terms of textual criticism and literary history and attempts to bring answers to the main problems of its contextualization. The six extant medieval manuscripts of the Life of Joseph, representing the inherent part of the thesis, are provided with critical edition. The Old Czech Life of Joseph is a late medieval work of an anonymous author and should be dated to the second half or to the end of the 14th century. It is based on a Latin model, namely Historia Ioseph, which was composed in the year 1336 by the Spanish Dominican Alfonso Buenhombre (Alphonsus Bonihominis). The Czech Life of Joseph is the unique vernacular translation of Alfonso's Latin text. This Latin text has not been broadly disseminated. I am aware of the existence of 14 manuscripts, six of which originated in Bohemia and represent the specific Bohemian manuscript branch. The Czech translation is admittedly based on the Latin text related closely to...