BTLH – Banco de textos para pesquisa em lingüística histórica

Abstract

In this paper data from the eighteenth and the first half of the nineteenth century written Brazilian portuguese are presented. These data belong to the BTLH, a data-base which has been assembled at UFMG since 1992, the purpose of which is to prepare linguistic material for diachronic research. The texts dealt with may be classified as notarial non-literary prose. Contrarily to what has been believed up to now this kind of non-literary prose presents rich material for historical linguistic research in various levels: fonological, morfological, lexical and syntatctic. Some problems related to the validity of the use of this kind of source for linguistic research are also briefly discussed.