Raštai II: Tikriniai Vardai

Antanas Salys (1902–1972) was among the most distinguished Lithuanian linguists of his generation, renowned for his work on Lithuanian dialects, onomastics, and Baltic etymology. This volume, the second in his posthumous collected writings series, gathers decades of scholarly essays on Lithuanian proper names — a domain of critical importance for Lithuanian national and cultural identity. The sections on surname Lithuanianization (especially the Vilnius region Polish-to-Lithuanian equivalence tables) and on calendar names document the intersection of linguistic survival, Catholic naming tradition, and political identity under successive occupations and in diaspora. Published in Rome in 1983, when Lithuania remained under Soviet occupation, this volume represents the Lithuanian exile scholarly community's commitment to maintaining rigorous academic production independent of Soviet ideological control.

For the Lithuanian diaspora, works like this served as authoritative references for families seeking to recover or authenticate Lithuanian forms of surnames altered under Polish, Russian, or German administration. The volume's onomastic data — thousands of name forms across regions and historical periods — constitute an irreplaceable record of Lithuanian naming culture spanning the medieval Grand Duchy through the twentieth century. Its presence in a Detroit heritage school archive reflects the role of such institutions as custodians of diaspora intellectual heritage, connecting community members to the scholarly work produced by Lithuanian academics in Rome, Chicago, and other centers of exile scholarship.

Diaspora scholarly publication: Lithuanian Catholic Academy of Sciences and Arts (Rome) preserved and disseminated major Lithuanian linguistic scholarship outside Soviet-occupied Lithuania, ensuring continuity of academic Lithuanian studies in exile. Funded partly by Lietuvių Fondas (Lithuanian Fund), a diaspora community endowment organization.