Gramatika hrvatskoga ili srpskoga književnog jezika

Tomislav Maretić (1854–1938), a Croatian linguist, Slavist and leading representative of the Vukovo-Mladograma school, published his major work Grammar and Stylistics of the Croatian or Serbian Literary Language in 1899 in Zagreb (Printed and published by the L. Hartman bookstore). Later, a separate Grammar of the Croatian or Serbian Literary Language was published (third, unchanged edition in 1963, Matica hrvatska, edited by M. Hraste and P. Guberina).

This is the most influential grammar of the Croatian/Serbian language in the first half of the 20th century, the basis of the language norm in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia and the SFRY. Maretić wrote the work exclusively on the basis of Vuk Karadžić and Đuro Daničić, promoting the East Herzegovinian New Štokavian dialect as the only standard, regardless of the Croatian tri-dialect tradition (Čakavian, Kajkavian, Štokavian). That is why it is labeled as "Vuk's purism" and a showdown with the Zagreb philological school.

Structure: introduction, sounds (phonetics and spelling), forms (morphology: nouns, adjectives, verbs, pronouns, etc.), word formation (derivative and compound words), syntax (sentence, cases, compound constructions). It also includes a stylistic addition (antibarbarus) with a list of barbarisms and recommendations.

The grammar is descriptive and normative, with examples from literature (mainly Vuk and Daničić), without a broader inclusion of Croatian literary heritage. It was mandatory in schools and universities for decades, influenced standardization, but was also criticized for neglecting Croatian linguistic specificity (e.g. the Declaration on the Name and Position of the Croatian Literary Language in 1967 indirectly reacts to such norms).

Today it is considered a historical classic of Slavic studies, ideal for studying the development of the Serbo-Croatian language before the separation of standards.