Volapük movement edit
The Volapük movement is, or was, a movement for the adoption of Volapük as an international language.
Pioneer times edit
Johann Martin Schleyer created Volapük in 1879. His first articles on Volapük were published in a catholic magazine Sionharfe which, since 1878 so used to publish articles regarding the problem of the international language. In 1879 Schleyer published his booklet Entwurf einer Weltsprache und Weltgrammatik (The Project of the world Language and World Grammar) as a supplement to Sionharfe, which is regarded as the first official Volkapük text. Initial reactions were very positive and thanks to the good acceptance of the language (which still wasn't called ˝Volapük˝) among the specialists it quickly obtained support mainly in Austria-Hungary, Germany and, although to the lesser extent, in the United States.
The first complete grammar and dictionary were published in 1880 and then Schleyer created the name ˝Volapük˝ (i.e. World Language). Sionharfe still was the main medium of spreading the language, but there was need to create a proper organ for it and in 1881 Schleyer started the two language periodical Weltspracheblatt-Volapükabled (The World Language Journal). There were also articles and a basic course published in the United States, as well as in other periodicals in Europe. The first lectures on Volapük were in Vienna.
Spreading of the movement edit
For some time after the first publications by Schleyer in 1879 there was very little adherents and the language was known only as far as Vienna. There was aso very little supporters outside the German speaking world, in which there were about 500 adherents in 1882. The same year Stenographisches Sontagsblatt published a Volapük supplement. The first Volapük club appeared in Alberweiler, Baden-Württemberg on May 11, 1882. After that, the clubs appeared in Vienna and Switzerland.
On September 12, 1882 occured the first meeting of the volapükists, which numbered some seventy people.