PRIMARY CONCEPTUALIZATION OF THE EARTH AS A NATURAL PHENOMENON IN THE ENGLISH AND GERMAN TEXTS OF THE HEROIC EPIC

In this study, the process of conceptualization is considered as a process of perception and organization of the surrounding world, as a reflection of this process in the concepts and as the formation of concepts. The study of conceptualization of the land as a natural phenomenon within the framework of this article is a clarification of the verbalization of the concept of «land» in the language. In this paper, two related languages are compared: English and German. The material for the study were the texts of the English and German heroic epic. A comparative analysis of the meanings of lexemes, representing the primary conceptualization in the English and German texts of the heroic epic, established the specificity of the primary conceptualization of the earth as a natural phenomenon. Previously, lists of search words in modern English and German were compiled to find the corresponding concepts in the translation and the original of the text being studied. In addition to those lexemes that have survived in modern English and have parallels in other Germanic languages, as in the German language, such lexemes have also been found that are not preserved, although they are presented in the texts. For the analysis of the primary conceptualization of the earth in the texts of the heroic epos in the comparing languages, such frameworks as: Earth – Soil, Earth – Land, Earth – Object, Earth – Surface, Earth – Space. In the English texts of the heroic epic, the high frequency of the representation of the earth as a surface and as a space is equal high. The representation of the Earth as a land is often displayed. The conceptualization of land as soil is rarely found in English texts. In the German texts of the heroic epic we state the high frequency of the representation of the Earth as Space and Earth as land, objects. Less common is the representation of the frames Earth – Surface and Earth – Soil. Frame Earth – Soil in English and German texts has a primary representation in the form of fertile soil, arable land, and the frame Earth – Land, Earth – Object through primary conceptualization in the form of a shore. In English texts there is a primary conceptualization of the Earth – Land as a cape, caves, islands. In the German texts – in the form of a beach. Primary conceptualization of the Earth – Surfaces is presented in English and German texts in the form of contrasting the earth with the sky. In English texts we can see a coastline, a bottom, a battlefield, a solid foundation. Frame Earth – The space in texts in the comparing languages is formalized by primary conceptualization in the form of toponyms. But in English texts the primary conceptualization of the Earth – Space is mapped as the earths – hardness, the creations of God, the Earth world.