Difficult to write letters were replaced with a civilian font. These are the letters with minor changes we are using now. A new civil alphabet was written.
But in 1918 another one was produced language reform, which changed the pre-revolutionary Russian language and transformed it into a modern one. What was this reform? What was the pre-revolutionary language in Russia? How was it different from the modern one?
Features of the pre-revolutionary language
The pre-reform alphabet of the Russian language consisted of 35 letters, the modern alphabet - 33.
The alphabet of the pre-revolutionary language included the letters “i” - “i”, “fita” - “ѳ”, “izhitsa” - “ѵ”, “yat” - “ѣ”, but there were no modern “th” and “e”.
The letter “Izhitsa” was not officially abolished; the Decree on Spelling Reform did not say anything about it; it was not remembered, since it was practically no longer used.
Features of the pronunciation of letters in the pre-reform Russian language
Initially they used church names: “az”, “buki”, “vedi”, “verb” and so on. From the end of the 18th century, letters began to be named after Latin ones, and by the end of the 19th century, new names were formed that completely replaced the old ones. The new names of the letters practically coincided with the modern ones, but after the consonants in their names there was not “e” but “e”, for example “be”, “ve”, “ge” and so on, with the exception of the letters “ь” (er), “y” (er), “b” (er), “yati”, “izhitsa” and “fity”. The letter “and” was called “and octal”, and “i” was called “and decimal”, this corresponded to their numerical value in the Church Slavonic alphabet.
The letters “e” and “y” were not included in the alphabet of the pre-revolutionary language only formally, but were used in the same way as now. The letter "th" was called "and with short".
As a result of the reform of the Russian alphabet, “yat”, “fita”, “izhitsa” and “er” (at the end of the word) were excluded from it. What are these letters and why were they removed from the pre-reform alphabet?
"Yat"
The letter is very similar to the symbol that astronomers use to mark the planet Saturn. The letters “ҍ” and “e” were pronounced exactly the same, for example, “wind” and “evening”, but in the word “wind” they wrote “yat”, and in the word “evening” - “e”. This caused enormous difficulties. The letter “yat” was considered the most terrible in the alphabet. Students mechanically memorized the rules for “yat”; mistakes when writing this letter were considered the most serious. Since then, the expression “to know in yat” has developed, which means “very good.”
"Izhitsa"
The letter “Izhitsa” in the alphabet of the pre-revolutionary language was very similar to the Roman numeral “five”. To our ancestors it resembled an inverted whip, which is why the common people had the expression “prescribe Izhitsa,” which meant “give a strong scolding” or “flog.” The letter also caused a lot of inconvenience and made life difficult for students, for example, three words:
- world - meaning “universe”;
- peace - “calmness, silence”;
- myrrh is a fragrant substance.
It would seem that the words are pronounced the same, but they are written differently:
- in the first word they wrote “and with a dot” - peace;
- in the second - “and” - world;
- in the third - “Izhitsa” - miro.
There were many difficulties; many were confused about the rules for writing certain words. Also Pushkin A.S. in 1818 he believed that “Izhitsa” should be abolished, but it was abolished only in 1918.
"Fita"
The modern letter “f” and the pre-revolutionary “fita - ѳ” were in the alphabet in different places, but were pronounced exactly the same. For example, in the pre-revolutionary address directory, people with the surname Fedorov were not placed together, since some were written with the letter “f”, and others with “fita”. Why is that? Trediakovsky V. in 1748 in his article “Conversation about Spelling” explained this by saying that you shouldn’t think at all about where you need to write “f” and where “fitu”, it doesn’t matter, since not everyone studied Latin and Greek languages, and without knowledge of these languages it is impossible to know the difference in these letters. That’s how they wrote it, whatever they want, because still few people understand how to do it correctly.
"Er"
This is the so-called solid sign. Currently it is considered very useful letter, separates the consonant of the prefix from the vowel (entrance, rise). And before the reform, the hard sign was written after hard consonants at the end of all words, for example, oak, rode, dom. "Er" was popularly called a "parasite", "idler", "bloodsucker". In fact, the letter that was written at the end of almost every word consumed, according to scientists, 8% of paper and time. For example, Uspensky L. in the book “A Word about Words” wrote that in one edition of the book (in pre-revolutionary language) “War and Peace” by L.N. Tolstoy. on 2080 pages there were about 115 thousand “er”. If they were all put together and printed in a row, they would take up more than 70 pages. And if you calculate that typing a novel required about 100 working days, then it would take about 4 days for a typist to type only this letter. How much paper was spent on it? It's generally difficult to say. "Er" was the most expensive letter in the world.
Pre-revolutionary language in modern Russia
The fashion for the pre-reform Russian language re-emerged during the perestroika period and in the early 90s. At that time, a lot of pre-revolutionary literature was published, and it was published according to the rules of the old spelling. Websites began to appear on the Internet, completely typed in the old spelling, and articles and publications began to be published.
It has become fashionable to use elements of pre-reform spelling of words in advertising and on signs (and with errors).
Very often, “creative” designers of advertising signs followed a simple principle, without thinking about spelling rules, simply adding the letter “ъ” to the end of the word. This is how newfangled signs appeared, on which in those days they could write “Izhitsa”, for example, for many years the logo “Capital Savings Bank” was displayed on all signs and advertising brochures, although the correct spelling would have been “Capital Savings Bank”. And, unfortunately, there are a lot of such examples.
Fashion has returned, but literacy has not.
And not 33 letters, as it is now. It included the following letters:
| A a | B b | In in | G g | D d | Her | F |
| Z z | And and | І і | K k | L l | Mm | N n |
| Oh oh | P p | R r | With with | T t | U y | F f |
| X x | Ts ts | H h | Sh sh | sch sch | Kommersant | s s |
| b b | Ѣ ѣ | Uh uh | Yu Yu | I I | Ѳ ѳ | Ѵ ѵ |
The names of the letters of the Russian pre-reform alphabet (modern spelling): a, be, ve, ge, de, e, zhe, ze, i, and decimal, ka, el, em, en, o, pe, er, es, te, u , ef, ha, tse, che, sha, sha, er, ery, er, yat, e, yu, I, fita, izhitsa.
As you can see, the alphabet included 4 abolished letters i, ѣ , ѳ , ѵ , but there were no letters e And th. It's interesting that the letter ѵ was not officially abolished; there is no mention of it in the decree on spelling reform.
"Writings" e And th only formally they were not part of the alphabet, but were used in exactly the same way as now. "Writing" th was called “and with a short one.”
Page 13 of the Spelling Index from the book “Russian and Church Slavonic etymology. For average educational institutions/ Comp. L. Polivanov, (6th ed.) - M.: type. M. N. Lavrova and Co., 1879.” It is clear from the text that the letter Izhitsa was officially used only in the word myrrh. This letter was used only to convey the vowel sound [i].
Pronunciation of abolished letters
Thus, for the sound [f] there were two letters - f And ѳ , for the sound combination [ye] there were also two letters - e And ѣ , and for the sound [and] - three letters - And, i And ѵ .
Rules for using abolished letters
- Letter i used before vowels (including before e, e, Yu, I) and before th. And also in the word peace with the meaning universe, to distinguish it from the word peace- peace, silence. The only exceptions were words of the form five-arshin, seven-story and so on.
- Letter ѣ used in .
Poem with ѣ
White, pale, poor demon
The hungry man ran away into the forest.
He ran through the woods,
Had radish and horseradish for lunch
And for that bitter dinner
I vowed to cause trouble.
Know, brother, that cage and cage,
Sieve, lattice, mesh,
Vezha and iron with yat, -
This is how it should be written.
Our eyelids and eyelashes
The pupils protect the eyes,
Eyelids squint for a whole century
At night, every person...
The wind broke the branches,
The German knitted brooms,
Hanged correctly when changing,
I sold it for two hryvnia in Vienna.
Dnieper and Dniester, as everyone knows,
Two rivers in close proximity,
The Bug divides their regions,
It cuts from north to south.
Who is angry and furious there?
Do you dare to complain so loudly?
We need to resolve the dispute peacefully
And convince each other...
It’s a sin to open up bird’s nests,
It’s a sin to waste bread in vain,
It’s a sin to laugh at a cripple,
To mock the crippled...
Prof. N.K. Kulman. Methodology of the Russian language. - 3rd ed. - St. Petersburg: published by Y. Bashmakov and Co., 1914. - P. 182.
- Letter v used in the word mѵ́ ro to distinguish it from words peace And peace, and also, according to tradition, in a few more words Greek origin instead of the letter upsilon (as well as mѵ ro, these are basically words related to the church). By the beginning of the 20th century it was: ѵ Pacoi, ѵ fast, floorѵ oils, Withѵ mvol(only in the sense of a creed), Withѵ nod(although in dictionaries - synod). Derived words from Withѵ mvol And Withѵ nod by the beginning of the 20th century they could not keep ѵ: symbolic, synodal, synodical, synodic. In texts in the Church Slavonic language of the civil press (for example, in prayer books), the range of words written with izhitsa is wider - ѵ ssop, Mѵ ry Lѵ Chinese. In Russian text they look like hyssop, Mѵ Lycian Rivers.
- Letter ъ written at the end of words after consonants and was not read. As opposed to ь at the end of words, which softens consonants. Still officially in the word otexam. Occurs in the word supersensitive. In a word narrow Grotto ordered not to use it. When writing words with a hyphen - in the usual common words ъ was preserved: because of, rear admiral. And when writing borrowed names, ъ could be omitted before the hyphen. (Omitting ъ before the hyphen is Grot’s wish).
Spelling of individual morphemes (prefixes, case endings)
- Prefixes ending in -з (iz-, voz-, raz-, roz-, niz-) before the subsequent s were retained з: story, reason, reconnect. Prefixes without-, through-, through- always had -z at the end: useless, bloodless, tactless, sleepless; too much, beyond the stripe.
- Instead of the ending -ог it was written -ago: red, black.
- Instead of the ending -his it was written -yago: blue, third.
- The ending -ого was used only in the following cases: if the emphasis fell on it: such, lame. And also in the words: one, Togo, this; himself(But samago).
- Instead of the ending -yu there were two endings - the main one and its variant -yu.
- In the feminine and neuter gender, instead of the endings -й, -ь, the endings -ыя, -ія were used: Russian pѣ take off, new chairs. The endings -е, -іе were used with masculine words: new tables, nice houses. When listing words of the feminine and neuter gender, the endings -yya, -iya were used: new pѣ sleep, chairs and dreams. To denote aggregates in which masculine nouns participated, the ending -е, -ie was used: new magazines, books and publications.
- In the feminine gender, instead of “they” they wrote (and in some cases pronounced) “one”. (In other genders - “they”).
- In the feminine gender, the words “one”, “one x”, “one m”, “one mi” were also used. (In other genders - “one”, “one”, “one”, “one”).
- The pronoun “her (her)” in the genitive case was written (and in poetry it could be pronounced) as “her (neya)”, but “her (her)” in the accusative case: He took her the book and gave it away her to her, Her Imperial Majesty, her sad villages .
- The word “sam” was used only when someone did something himself: I ordered it myself. She decided so herself. It just fell. In other cases, instead of the word “sam” they said and wrote “most”. Is this him? - He's the best. When he's atѣ hal? - He's atѣ hal on the very day of Easter. “Most” - true, real. God is truth itself and goodness itself, or truth itself and goodness itself. Say his very words, word for word, authentic. (A very serious mistake when pronouncing these unusual forms of words is to pronounce the ugly “most” instead of the word “most” - this is incorrect. Such errors in stress placement arise from the lack of information about the correct pronunciation).
Foreign words are transferred according to the rules of the grammar of the language from which they are borrowed, unless this contradictsѣ read prosodic dѣ our laziness: Shlag-b aw m, not barrier-um; L wow-ra, not Lu-ara (for au and oi in the words Schlagbaum, Loire are diphthongs); cat-ehizis (κατ-ήχησις), mis- anthrop(μισ-άνθρωπος): a-monarch, Evan-gelie, katihi-zis, mi-zan-trop.
In the prosodic division of words, it is implied that the consonant standing between two vowels goes to the next syllable, for example “mo-narkh”.
"Subtleties of spelling"
- Punctuation. At the end of headings, as opposed to modern spelling, dots were placed. WITH capital letter titles and addresses were written: “Sovereign Emperor”, “Medal in memory of the coronation of THEIR IMPERIAL MAJESES”, “HIGHLY APPROVED”, “Yours Imperial Majesty", "Your Honor."
Changes in pre-revolutionary spelling during the 18th-20th centuries
XVIII-early XIX century
In the middle and second half of the 19th century one can still find such spellings as previous, weaned. Academician Grot calls for replacing them with denominative, previous. And at the beginning of the 20th century you will no longer find forms in textbooks “ previous».
However, not all of Grotto's wishes were implemented in practice. Thus, Grotto prescribed to write hygiene And go. But in practice we met hygiene And hygiene, go And go. (Word go as a variant of the word go also found in Ushakov’s dictionary).
There were variants of spelling words with the sound [j]: major And major, New York And New York, seriously And seriously and many others.
Words with spelling variations in pre-reform spelling was a large number of. These are differences in the spelling of some individual words mid-19th century and early 20th century. And also the difference between the spelling of some words of the early 20th century and modern ones.
By the beginning of the 20th century there were the following words, different from modern spellings: go And go, corridor, official. Nowadays - go, corridor, official. The masculine gender in grammar was called “masculine” - masculine. (IN modern language There are also cases of variations in the spelling of words: diamond And diamond, billiard And billiards, mattress And mattress, zero And zero(But null), tunnel And tunnel(But tunneling)).
Obsolescence
The pre-revolutionary spelling was used for reasons of principle by the White Guards, since the Soviet government in their eyes was illegitimate, therefore, the reform it carried out was also illegitimate. Actively used by white emigrants until the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, in particular, in propaganda leaflets distributed during Civil War in Spain (in contrast, leftist emigrants, in particular former Trotskyists, used a new spelling). The final transition of the majority of emigrants to the new spelling occurred during the Great Patriotic War, partly under pressure from the Germans, who were convinced of the low effectiveness of propaganda associated with the old regime, partly due to the growing number of emigrants of the new wave who grew up under Soviet power and those who did not want to switch to old spelling. But the main (external) reason for the transition to a new spelling is the same as for the Bulgarian pre-reform spelling - the arrival Soviet forces and influence in Europe (the formation of a social camp, according to which “in Bulgaria now everything is like in the USSR”). It is extremely rare that individual relics of the old spelling are still found in emigrant publications (one of bright examples is the work of N. I. Ulyanov, “The Origin of Ukrainian Separatism”, published in the 1970s).
Old spelling in modern Russia
After the events of 1991, the Russian Orthodox Church in Russia began printing reprints of pre-revolutionary editions of spiritual literature. At the same time, you can occasionally find reprints of secular literature, for example, the books “Great Initiates”, “The Royal Children”, “ Dr. Esperanto", etc. On the Internet, entire sites appeared (in addition to individual texts and collections of publications), entirely typed in the old spelling.
Computer fonts
The following fonts support the old spelling:
free- Linux Libertine
- GNU Unifont
- Palatino Linotype
Notes
- Russian grammar, composed by the Imperial Russian Academy. Third edition. In St. Petersburg, Printed in the printing house of the Imperial Russian Academy, 1819, p. 2, paragraph 5 " Letters in Russian languageѣ , slѣ According to general usage, there are thirty-five, whose outline and name are the wordsѣ blowing...»
- Practical Russian grammar, published by Nikolai Grech. Second edition, corrected. St. Petersburg, in the publisher's printing house. 1834. P. 3, paragraph 8. “ Russian alphabet named afterѣ there are thirty-five wordsѣ blowing letters...»
- Russian spelling / Manual compiled on behalf of the Second Department of the Imperial Academy of Sciences by Academician J. K. Grot. - Eleventh edition. - St. Petersburg: Printing house of the Imperial Academy of Sciences (Vas. Island, 9 lines, No. 12), 1894. - P. 2, paragraph 2. “ The Russian alphabet consists of 35 letters...»
- Russian spelling/ Manual compiled on behalf of the Second Division Imperial Academy Sciences Academician Y. K. Grot. - 11th ed. - St. Petersburg: Printing house of the Imperial Academy of Sciences, 1894. - P. 2. “The Russian alphabet consists of 35 letters... The letters i, e get more special purpose using superscripts (th, e), in which they represent other sounds and therefore in this form should also occupy a place in the alphabet"
- Y. K. Grot. Russian spelling. Management. 11th ed., St. Petersburg, 1894, p. 80 (p. 89 in the viewer)
- Encyclopedic Dictionary of Brockhaus and Efron, 1890-1907
- http://kcmamu.livejournal.com/4855.html
- Lives of the saints, in Russian, set out according to the guide of the Chetya-Minea of St. Demetrius of Rostov with additions, explanatory notes and images of saints. Book four. Moscow: Synodal Printing House, 1906. P. 866
- Smirnovsky P. Part 1. Etymology // Textbook of Russian grammar for junior classes of secondary schools. - The twenty-sixth edition, printed without changes from the 25th edition, approved by the Scientists. Com. Min. Nar. Etc. for use as a teaching guide for junior classes secondary educational institutions (dated April 20, 1915, No. 18239). - P. 68, 3rd line from the bottom. (In DjVu format)
- Russian and Church Slavonic etymology. For secondary educational institutions / Comp. L. Polivanov. - M.: type. M. N. Lavrova and Co., 1879.
- Handbook of Russian spelling 1909
- (Etymology 1879)
- Smirnovsky P. Decree. Op. - P. 76.
- Encyclopedic Dictionary. Volume XL. SPb.: Typography Akts. General Brockhaus-Efron. Article "I"
- Generally useful calendar for 1915
- Russian spelling. Decree. Op. - P. 120.
- Dictionary of Church Slavonic and Russian languages, compiled by the Second Branch of the Imperial Academy of Sciences. Volume IV. Saint Petersburg. 1847
- New parallel dictionaries of the languages of Russian, French, German and English in four parts according to dictionaries Russian Academy, French Academy, Adelung, Heinsius, Johnson, Spears, and other Lexicons, was compiled by Philip Reif, Knight of the Russian Order of St. Anne and the Baden Order of the Zähringen Lion. Author of the Grammar of the French-Russian, German-Russian, English-Russian and Etymological Lexicon of the Russian Language. Part one. - Russian dictionary. ...Third edition... Karlsruhe. Leipzig. Saint Petersburg. Paris. 1860. pp. LXXXV-LXXXVI
- Dictionary living Great Russian language Vladimir Dahl. Second edition, corrected and significantly enlarged according to the author's manuscript. Volume four. R-V. SPb.-M.: 1882. P. 498. Article “under”
- Encyclopedic Dictionary. Volume XL. SPb: Typography Akt. General Brockhaus-Efron (Pracheshny lane, No. 6), 1904
- Smirnovsky P. Decree. Op.
- Ozhegov S. I. Dictionary of the Russian language. OK. 57,000 words / Sub. ed. Corresponding member USSR Academy of Sciences N. Yu. Shvedova. - 19th ed., rev. - M.: Rus. lang., 1987. - 750 p.
- Kovalev wrote about the Germans’ dissatisfaction with the emigrants who collaborated with them, who did not know Soviet realities, and therefore their propaganda was ineffective. (See also about the false conspiracy against the overthrow of Soviet power in the USSR, organized by the NKVD). But in the end, it should probably be argued that the reasons for the fall of the old Russian spelling in Europe were the same as the fall of the Bulgarian pre-reform spelling (the arrival of Soviet forces and influence in Europe after 1945).
Russian pre-reform orthography (often pre-revolutionary orthography) is the orthography of the Russian language that was in force before its reform in 1918 and was later preserved in emigrant publications. The beginning of Russian pre-reform orthography can be considered the introduction civil font under Peter I.
There was no single generally accepted standard of pre-reform spelling (similar to the Soviet code of 1956). Spelling for the last approximately 50 years before the 1917 revolution (1870s-1910s) was standardized in to a greater extent than the spelling of the first third of the 19th century and especially the 18th century. The most authoritative (although not fully observed in the press published at that time) manuals and sets of rules on Russian pre-reform orthography are associated with the name of academician Yakov Karlovich Grot. They relate specifically to the last stable 50th anniversary of the existence of pre-reform spelling.
The 1917 reform, announced by the Minister of Education of the Provisional Government, abolished "yat" (replacing it with "e"), "fita" (replacing it with "f"), "izhitsa" and "decimal i" (i), replacing both with "i" "("octal and"). (The replacement of the letter “ё” with “e”, adopted in print under the old spelling, remained, i.e. the letter “e” was not introduced.) The silent hard sign (“er”) after final consonants was also abolished. Forms of nouns and pronouns in “-ago”, “-yago”, “-yya” and some others were abolished. The reform was met with hostility by many cultural figures and, in particular, most emigrant writers (for example, Aldanov, Bunin, Nabokov) and a number of foreign publishing houses continued to publish Russian-language books in the old orthography, some until the 1950s.
The Bolsheviks, having seized power, supported the reform and actively promoted the new spelling as “more accessible to the people” and “breaking with the legacy of tsarism,” and the old spelling began to be called “tsarist.” This politicized the reform and, of course, did not contribute to the adoption new spelling Russian diaspora abroad. However, the second, more numerous wave of Russian emigration (1945) for the most part did not know the old spelling.
After 1917, language and spelling, of course, continued to change, naturally and gradually. For example, instead of “exploiter” they began to write “exploiter”, they stopped writing hyphens in combinations like “that is”, “as if”, “the same”, etc.
Differences between pre-revolutionary spelling and modern
Alphabet
Before the revolution, the Russian alphabet had 35, not 33 letters, as it is now. It included the following letters:
The names of the letters of the Russian pre-reform alphabet: Az, Buki, Vedi, Verb, Dobro, Yes, Live, Earth, Izhe, I (and decimal), Kako, People, Myslete, Our, He, Peace, Rtsy, Word, Firmly, Uk, Fert, Her, Tsy, Worm, Sha, Shcha, Er, Ery, Er, Yat, E, Yu, Ya, Fita, Izhitsa (source: “The Law of God”).
As you can see, the alphabet included 4 abolished letters , , , , but there were no letters е and й. It is interesting that the letter was not officially abolished; there is no mention of it in the decree on spelling reform.
The “writings” ё and й were only formally not included in the alphabet, but were used in exactly the same way as now. “Writing” was called “and s short”.
Pronunciation of abolished letters
Thus, for the sound [f] there were two letters - f and, for the sound combination [ye] there were also two letters - e and, and for the sound [i] - three letters - i, i and.
Rules for using abolished letters
Letter
Used before vowels (including before “e” (“e”), “”, “yu”, “ya”) and before “y”, as well as in the word “mir” with the meaning “universe”, to distinguish from the word “peace” - peace, silence. According to folk etymology, they also wrote “Vladimir”, but Academician Grot prescribed to write “Vladimir”. The only exceptions were Difficult words, the first part of which ended in “and”: “five-arshin”, “seven-story”, “octagon”, “most terrible”, “from nowhere”, etc.
Letter
It was written at the end of words after consonants and was not read, as opposed to b at the end of words, which softens consonant sounds. Also in some cases after prefixes before unioted vowels and And, for example, in the word otexamenovat. Occurs in the word supersensible. In the word suzhit, Grot ordered not to use it. When writing words with a hyphen - in the usual common words ъ was retained: iz-za, rear-admiral. And when writing borrowed names, ъ could be omitted before the hyphen. (Omitting ъ before the hyphen is Grot’s wish).
Letter
Used in words that came into Russian (or earlier into Church Slavonic) directly from Greek language instead of greek letterθ (theta). Common words there was little with this letter.
Letter
Used in the word mro to distinguish it from the words mir and mir, and also, according to tradition, in several other words of Greek origin instead of the letter upsilon (like mro, these are mainly words related to the church).
The following materials were used when writing this article:
1. http://slovnik.narod.ru/old/pravila/01.html - "Introduction to pre-reform spelling"
2. http://ru.wikipedia.org/ - "Russian pre-reform spelling"
S. Vinitsky. INTRODUCTION TO PRE-REFORM SPELLING
A brief summary of spelling rules changed by the 1917 reform, and a “guide” to help translate text from the new spelling to the old one.
Introduction
Russian classic literature The 19th century actually standardized spelling and abolished the archaic letters “psi”, “zelo”, “yus”, “ot”, etc. The alphabet used 35 letters: Az, Buki, Vedi, Verb, Dobro, Yes, Live, Earth, Izhe , I, Kako, People, Think, Our, He, Peace, Rtsy, Word, Firmly, Uk, Fert, Her, Tsy, Worm, Sha, Shcha, Er, Ery, Er, Yat, E, Yu, I, Fita , Izhitsa (source: “The Law of God”). The sound “e” was replaced by the letter “e”, as it is now.
The 1917 reform, announced by the Minister of Education of the Provisional Government, abolished "yat" (replacing it with "e"), "fita" (replacing it with "f"), "izhitsa" and "decimal i" (i), replacing both with "i" "("octal and"). (The replacement of the letter “ё” with “e”, adopted in print under the old spelling, remained, i.e. the letter “e” was not introduced.) The silent hard sign (“er”) after final consonants was also abolished. Forms of nouns and pronouns in “-ago”, “-yago”, “-yya” and some others were abolished.
The reform was met with hostility by many cultural figures and, in particular, most emigrant writers (for example, Aldanov, Bunin, Nabokov) and foreign publishing houses continued to publish Russian-language books in the old orthography, some until the 1950s. I heard that M. Tsvetaeva categorically objected to the publication of her poems in the new orthography. However, the supporter of the reform, apparently, was the outstanding Russian linguist I.A. Baudouin-de-Courtenay, editor of the latest (third) edition of Dahl's dictionary (Wolf Company, 1903, republished in Paris, 1954). In the preface and articles about a firm sign and “fite” Baudouin-de-Courtenay spoke about the uselessness of these letters.
The Bolsheviks, having seized power, supported the reform and actively promoted the new spelling as “more accessible to the people” and “breaking with the legacy of tsarism,” and the old spelling began to be called “tsarist.” This politicized the reform and, of course, did not contribute to the adoption of the new spelling by the Russian diaspora abroad. However, the second, more numerous wave of Russian emigration (1945) for the most part did not know the old spelling. In 1952, the Chekhov Publishing House published Nabokov’s novel “The Gift” in a new orthography.
After 1917, language and spelling, of course, continued to change, naturally and gradually. For example, instead of “exploiter” they began to write “exploiter”, they stopped writing hyphens in combinations like “that is”, “as if”, “the same”, etc. This article does not discuss this further evolution Russian spelling.
Arguments for and against reform
The reform is supported by simplification of spelling (one sound is conveyed by only one letter, non-functional ones have been removed hard signs and decimal “and”) and the abolition of the relatively rarely used letters “Izhitsa” and “fita”, which had only historical meaning. After the reform, “er” also became a rare letter and was excluded, for example, from typewriter keyboards; it began to be replaced with quotation marks. Previously, the Roman numeral V was replaced by Izhitsa (this was done even in the publication “ Short course History of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) 1938), and the number I with the letter I, now they began to print “U”, “1”, “P” and “W” instead of Roman numerals.
The abolition of “yate” mixed up many previously distinct words in writing that contained “e” or “e”, and made the origin of many words less obvious. For example, pairs of words “thing” and “prophetic”, “behavior” and “tell”, “sweep” and “note”, “return” and “loyalty” are not the same root, which is easy to see in the old spelling by the presence of the letter “yat” " (in the second word of each pair), but not obvious in modern spelling. Ambiguities in the pairs of words “all” “everything”, “self” - “most”, “donkey” “donkey”, “than” “what”, etc. were resolved in writing in the old orthography, making it easier to read . The abolition of the forms of the pronouns “one”, “one” (g. and cf. gender) and some other forms also impoverished the language.
Summary of differences between the old spelling and the new
In order to write correctly Russian word in the old spelling, you need to find out the origin and determine the root of this word. Depending on this, it may be necessary to replace some letters in the root, and sometimes also in prefixes and endings. Apparently, the most difficult thing is to spell the letter “yat” (hence the expression “to know on yat”).
Below I tried to formulate the basic rules that I obtained empirically, which can be used to guide the transition to the old spelling from the new one. A complete list of spelling rules, in particular, roots with the letter “yat,” can be found in Smirnovsky’s textbook.
General differences:
1. Hard signs are written after all final consonants, except “y” and “b”. For example: “cloak”, “doctor”, but: “thing”, “stove”.
2. The letter “and decimal” (“i”) is written instead of “and” in all cases when “and” is followed by a vowel: “Russia”, “aviator”, with the exception compound words such as “five-altyn”, “seven-story” the letter “and” is preserved there. In all other cases it is written “and”, with the exception of the word “world” (see below).
Replacing letters in word roots:
2a. The letter "i" in the root occurs only in the word "world". This word is written “peace” in the meaning of “peace”, but “mir” in the meaning of “universe”. The distinction remains in all derivative words, for example: “peaceful”, but “worldly”.
The letter “Izhitsa” is written instead of “and” in the roots of some church words, for example: myrrh, myrrh-bearing, synod, hypostasis, subdeacon, iparchy, singklit; sometimes they also wrote “symbol” using izhitsa. (By the beginning of the 20th century, this letter was never used outside the church press, even in these words.)
3. The letter “phyta” is written in words of Greek origin in which the letter “theta” was written (can be checked by the Latin transcription “th”): arithmetica, mythos, rhythme, Theodore , “Theophanus” pay attention to the second “f”, which is not replaced by “fita”. In all other cases it is written “f”.
4. The letter “yat” is written instead of “e” in some words of original Russian origin (with a few exceptions), namely in a very limited set of roots. The set of these roots needs to be remembered. As a rule, all cognate and derived words in such cases are also written with “yat”. (Exception: “rech” is written with “yat”, but derived verbs are written with “e”, for example “renounce”.) The letter “yat” is not found in the suffixes of nouns and adjectives, except for some verbal nouns with “-evanie” and “ -enie” (see below). To check spelling, they fundamentally use the following rule: “yat” does not occur in the place of “e” in those words that, when changed, translate this “e” into “e” or into “b” or omit it altogether. For example: “medovar” (honey), “calf” (heifer), “pei” (drink), “lion” (lva). “Yat” is also not written after sibilants (with the exception of the form of the pronoun “than”) and after “g”, “k”. Here is a (complete) list of roots containing “yat” (for contrast, similar, but not cognate words that do not contain “yat” are also given):
beg-, bezh- (run, refugee, shelter, ) but: beige (borrowing) bed- (trouble, b
edny, victory, convince, lunch, but: sneak) white- (white, squirrel, whiten, ) but: belladonna (borrowing) bes, go berserk, but: dunce (not the same root) bet- (vow, promise)
pale
ved- (“to know” in the sense of “know”, but not in the sense of “to lead”) and derivatives vezh-, vest-, etc. (ved, conscience, witch, bride, polite, ignoramus, fresh, thing, bear , ) but: “I lead (by the hand)”, “vestal” ( Latin borrowing), “righteous” (“great-” is not a prefix here).
eyelid
century (eternal, person, mutilate, )
crown, crown, vein,
ver- (vera, true, probably, ) but: twirl, return
weight- (canopy, hang, )
vet- (branch, branch, ) but: dilapidated, rags.
blow, blow, wind,
anger-
bay
nest
sin- (sinner, )
maiden
put on, child, put on, dress, blanket,
grandfather
del- (deed, divide, week, limit, highlight, action, deed, witness, )
del
det- (children, children's)
children
food
eat (eat), ела, but: “am”, “is” (forms of “to be”)
to go, to go, to leave,
iron (iron, ) but: gland (organ)
oppression, but: oppression
idea (entertainer, )
star (also plural: stars)
beast
yawn- (yawn)
zenitsa, but: zenith
snake
ripen
Indian
cripple, cripple,
cage, cage,
knee
strength - (strength, )
cherish
lion- (left, ) but: lion (beast)
climb, ladder
laziness
lep- (to sculpt, absurdly, blind, )
les (but: fishing line)
let- (summer, decade, ) but: fly
lekha
lech- (doctor, treat) but: lie down
copper
chalk- (powder, or drawing chalk, but: small, chalk (yard), mill)
mѣn- (exchange, mѣna, )
measure- (measure, intention, example, )
mѣs-, mѣsh- (knead, mix, bag, mix, )
mѣst-, mѣshch- (instead, deputy, mѣshchanin, displacement, but: sweep away)
month
mѣt- (in the meaning of “notice”, but not in the meaning of “throw”): mѣtko, mark, but: headlong
fur, bag
procrastinate
fly away
opinion
bliss, gentle, bask,
subsoil
nem- (mute, German, )
mute
(dinner, vow from other roots)
nut- (hazel, )
Pecheneg
piebald
foam
stump
nurture
sing (singer, song, rooster, )
pesh-, pekh- (foot, infantry, )
captivity
mold
baldness
log
fresh
damn
red-, cut-, cut- (rare, cut, )
radish
turnip (but: burdock)
eyelash
ret- (invent, acquire, meet, ) but: prohibition
rѣch-, rѣk- (river, speech, adverb, but not in verbs: utter, doom, )
resh- (hole, solve, sieve, lattice, )
fresh- (refresh, )
light-, candle-
ferocious
north
sow, seed, sow, scattered, (but: family, sow)
gray-haired
hay, hay
canopy (to fall)
sulfur, gray
sit (sel, saddle, neighbor, )
set- (network, visit, )
lament
sich-, sek- (sich, cut, )
trace- (investigation, track down, inheritance, )
blind
dare
laughter- (to laugh, to make fun of, )
snow-
advice-
hastily- (success, hastily, armor)
wall (dungeon, shy, )
arrow-
fear
cart
te- (undertaking)
body (but: “to lay”, “bed”)
shadow (shade, )
cramped (to cramp, )
dough
joy
bread-, but: slurp
stable
horseradish
хѣръ (old name for the letter X)
color-, color- (bloom, bloom, )
forend, forend, forend
tsed- (tsed, tsezhenny)
whole- (whole, kiss, )
price- (price, rating, )
chain- (chain, cling, numb, )
“Yat” is written in names:
Alexey
Vienna
Gleb
Dnieper
Dniester
Elisha
Eremey
Matvey
Neman
Rogneda
Sergey
Fadey
April
“Yat” is also written in the words: no, where, now, two, two hundred, twelve, all, one, one, both, here, zelo and in some other words, for example in the church word “golemy” (great). As an exception, yat is written instead of the sound “е” in the words: stars, nests, saddles, mockery, smetka, bear, veshka, vdezhka, blossomed, found, yawned, put on, put on, imprinted, pressed.
The words “reyat” and “kopek” can be written either through “e” or “yat”. The word "dick" was written with "yat" as a name Old Church Slavonic letter, however, derived words were usually written "e".
Replacing consoles
5. The prefix “not-” in indefinite pronouns is written “ne”: “someone”, “something”, “some”, “never” (meaning “once upon a time”), “several”, but not in negative pronouns: “no one (to replace)”, “nowhere (to live)”, “no time” (to do something). There were also outdated pronouns “nѣgde” (meaning “somewhere”), etc. “Yat” is not used in other prefixes.
6. In the prefixes “without-”, “raz-”, “voz-”, “iz-” “z” is always written before “s”, and in the prefix “without” “z” is also written before k, p, h, sh, sh: “uprising”, “restless”.
Replacing endings
7. Verb endings “-et” are always written through “yat” (“boil”, “see”, “heat”, etc.), with the exception of verbs ending in “-die”, “-peret”, “-rub” " To check: if the past tense form does not contain a suffix (“died”, “ter”), then we write “e” (“to rub”), and if it ends in “-ate”, then we write “yat” (“see saw”). Also, in these cases, the forms “-ela”, “-elo”, “-eet”, “-eveshi”, “-eat”, etc. are written through “yat”. In the suffixes of verbal nouns to “-evenie” and “ -enie" contain "yat" only if there is a corresponding verb, for example: "to see" "vision", "smolder" "decay", "heat" "heating", but: "learning", "plant", etc. There are no verbs “*take into account”, “*grow”. However, pay attention to the difference in spelling of the words “vѣdenie” (knowledge) and “venie” (driving).
8. At the endings of pronouns, nouns and adjectives of the dative and prepositional cases (and only them), “yat” is always written instead of the sound “-e”. For example: “to me” (to whom), “on horseback”, “on the water”, “about the sea”, but: “I went out into the field” (vin. p.), “open field” (nom. p.). It is also written yat in adverbs and prepositions formed from nouns with dative or prepositional cases: “outside”, “new”, “soon”, “grief” (meaning “up”), “until”, “in secret”, “in vain” ", "from the outside", "tipsy", etc.
9. It is written “yat” in comparative degrees: “faster”, “strongest”, but not in endings with one “e”: “more”, “earlier”.
10. The endings “-ogo” are replaced by “-ago” and “-ego” by “-yago”, unless the stress falls on one of these syllables. For example: “at the very blue sea,” but “at yourself.” However, these endings are not replaced in the forms of pronouns: “this”, “someone”, etc.
11. The endings “-i” and “-i” are replaced with “-i” and “yya” in the feminine and neuter gender: “large formidable waves”, but “large formidable hurricanes”. Also in the feminine and neuter plural. h. “they” are replaced with “one”, “alone” with “one”. The forms “her” and “her” are replaced by “her” and “her” in gender. etc., but not in wine. p.: “I looked for her, but she was not there.”
Punctuation
The punctuation basically coincided with the modern one, with the exception of combinations with “would”, “whether” and “whether”, in which a hyphen was written: “as if”, “do you know”, “what”: “she looked as yesterday". They also wrote a hyphen in the combination “that is.”
Alphabet
To make it easier to learn a list of roots with ѣ, special poems were invented (see sidebar).
Letter
It was used in words that came into Russian (or earlier into Church Slavonic) directly from the Greek language instead of the Greek letter θ (theta). There were few commonly used words with this letter.
Letter
Used in the word m ѵ́ ro for its difference from the words mir and mir, and also, according to tradition, in several other words of Greek origin instead of the letter upsilon (like m ѵ ro, these are mainly words related to the church).
- By the beginning of the 20th century it was: ѵ pacoi, ѵ subdeacon ѵ fast, floor ѵ oil, with ѵ mvol(only in the sense of a creed), with ѵ nod (although in dictionaries - synod). Derived words from s ѵ mvol and s ѵ but by the beginning of the 20th century they could not hold it: symbolic, synodal, synodical, synodic. In texts in the Church Slavonic language of the civil press (for example, in prayer books), the range of words written through Izhitsa was wider - ѵ ssop, M ѵ ry L ѵ Chinese(instead of hyssop, M ѵ ry Lycian).
Spelling of individual morphemes (prefixes, case endings)
- Prefixes ending in -з (iz-, voz-, raz-, roz-, niz-) before the subsequent s were retained з: story, reason, reconnect. Prefixes without-, through-, through- always had -z at the end: useless, bloodless, tactless, sleepless; too much, beyond the stripe.
- In the event that an adjective, pronoun, participle or numeral in initial form ended with th, -ій(every, blue, former, bitter, most), then in the genitive and accusative cases of the masculine and neuter gender it had the ending -ago, -yago: each, blue, former, bitter, samago. For example: "apples the very best varieties."
- IN otherwise the ending was written - Wow: earthen, this, himself - earthen, this, himself. For example: “I recently saw himself king."
- Ending instrumental case The III declension had two spelling options (in some cases, possibly reflecting pronunciation) - the main one - іу and its variant -yu.
- In the feminine and neuter gender, instead of the endings -й, -ь, the endings -ыя, -ія were used: Russian pѣ take off, new chairs. The endings -е, -іе were used with masculine words: new tables, nice houses. When listing words of the feminine and neuter gender, the endings -yya, -iya were used: new pѣ sleep, chairs and dreams. To denote aggregates in which masculine nouns participated, the ending -е, -ie was used: new magazines, books and publications.
- In the feminine gender, instead of “they” they wrote (and in some cases pronounced) “one”. (In other genders - “they”).
- In the feminine gender, the words “one”, “one x”, “one m”, “one mi” were also used. (In other genders - “one”, “one”, “one”, “one”).
- The pronoun “her (her)” in the genitive case was written (and in poetry it could be pronounced) as “her (neya)”, but “her (her)” in the accusative case: He took her the book and gave it away her to her, Her Imperial Majesty, her sad villages .
Foreign words are transferred according to the rules of the grammar of the language from which they are borrowed, unless this contradictsѣ read prosodic dѣ our laziness: Shlag-b aw m, not barrier-um; L wow-ra, not Lu-ara (for au and oi in the words Schlagbaum, Loire are diphthongs); cat-ehizis (κατ-ήχησις), mis- anthrop(μισ-άνθρωπος): not the monarch, Evan-gelie, katihi-zis, mis-zan-trop.
In the prosodic division of words, it is implied that the consonant standing between two vowels goes to the next syllable, for example, “mo-narkh”.
Subtleties of spelling
Spelling and pronunciation
The combination of letters ьи was pronounced as [ы]. (At the beginning of the 20th century it ceased to be used, but is found in books published earlier). The combination of letters іе was sometimes pronounced as = e: Jehovah, Jerusalem (and [ijerusalem]), Yemen, Jena. The combination of letters іо was sometimes pronounced as = ё, yo: This, major, region. The combination of letters іу was sometimes pronounced as yu: Judi, Iulian(But Iuda- Judas). The indicated combinations of vowels with a letter i occur mostly at the beginning of words. The difference in pronunciation before the revolution and now is noticeable only in two cases - Jehovah And Jerusalem(however, the last word could be pronounced the same way as now). Note: in modern Russian in the word yen the first two vowels are also pronounced [је].
Word abbreviations
When abbreviating words, dots must be added: S. s.- state councilor, d.s. With.- actual state councilor, t.s.- secret adviser, d.t.s.- actual secret adviser M.V.D.- Ministry of Internal Affairs, Scientist Com.- Scientific Committee, Min. Nar. Etc.- Ministry of Public Education, Aks. General- joint stock company.
Superscripts
It was customary to place emphasis on the word “what”, distinguishing between types of words. The accent indicates the pronoun “what” in the nominative or accusative case to distinguish it from the similar conjunction “what”: - You know, What good for you. You know, What teaching is good for you.
Punctuation
Dots were added at the end of the headings. Official ones were written with a capital letter. Russian titles Imperial House, as well as addresses (titles): “Sovereign Emperor”, “Medal in memory of the coronation of Their Imperial Majesties”, “Highly approved”, “Your Imperial Majesty”, “Your nobility” (in official documents often all letters of words denoting the Emperor, including pronouns, were typed in capitals). Church titles (bishops) in non-church documents and literature were usually written with a lowercase letter.
- Form verb "to be" in the 3rd person singular it was written through the letter “” - in contrast to the verb “eat” (“to eat”). The spelling of the pair “all” - “all” had a similar semantic distinctive meaning: the last word meant “everything”.
Changes in spelling during the 18th-20th centuries
XVIII-early XIX century
In the middle and second half of the 19th century one can still find such spellings as previous, weaned. Academician Grot calls for replacing them with denominative, previous. And at the beginning of the 20th century you will no longer find forms in textbooks “ previous».
However, not all of Grotto's wishes were implemented in practice. Thus, Grotto prescribed to write hygiene And go. But in practice we met hygiene And hygiene, go And go. (Word go as a variant of the word go also found in Ushakov’s dictionary).
There were variants of spelling words with the sound [j]: major And major, New York And New York, seriously And seriously and many others.
There were a large number of words with variant spellings in pre-reform spelling. These are differences in the spelling of some individual words from the middle of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century. And also the difference between the spelling of some words of the early 20th century and modern ones.
By the beginning of the 20th century, the following words remained, different from modern spellings: go And go, gallery And gallery, corridor, number, official. Nowadays - go, gallery, corridor, number, official.
Obsolescence
Although the decree on the transition to the reformed spelling was issued in December 1917 (effective from January 1, 1918), printing and office work in Soviet Russia were able to switch to the new spelling, mainly only in October 1918 (see .: Reform of Russian spelling in 1918).
Old spelling in modern Russia
The building of the Nizhny Novgorod Regional Court, built in 1896. In 2010, the pre-revolutionary sign “District Court” was restored on the facade of the building.
During perestroika and in the early 1990s, numerous reprints of pre-revolutionary (sometimes emigrant) literature published according to the old spelling were published in the USSR and Russia. Entire sites appeared on the Internet (in addition to individual texts and collections of publications), entirely typed in the old spelling.
Elements of pre-reform spelling are used (often with errors) in advertising and on signs.
The ability to create texts and work with them according to the rules of the old spelling
Pre-reform Cyrillic characters are supported in the second version of Ilya Birman's Typographic Layout
There are also sites that allow you to type text in the old spelling, print it and save it.
Computer fonts
The following fonts support the old spelling:
Available- GNU Unifont
- Old Standard
- PT Serif
- Palatino Linotype
see also
Notes
- Russian grammar, composed by the Imperial Russian Academy. Third edition. In St. Petersburg, Printed in the printing house of the Imperial Russian Academy, 1819, p. 2, paragraph 5 " Letters in Russian languageѣ , slѣ According to general usage, there are thirty-five, whose outline and name are the wordsѣ blowing...»
- Practical Russian grammar, published by Nikolai Grech. Second edition, corrected. St. Petersburg, in the publisher's printing house. 1834. P. 3, paragraph 8. “ Russian alphabet named afterѣ there are thirty-five wordsѣ blowing letters...»
- Russian spelling / Manual compiled on behalf of the Second Department of the Imperial Academy of Sciences by Academician J. K. Grot. - Eleventh edition. - St. Petersburg: Printing house of the Imperial Academy of Sciences (Vas. Island, 9 lines, No. 12), 1894. - P. 2, item 2. « The Russian alphabet consists of 35 letters...»
- Russian spelling / Manual compiled on behalf of the Second Branch of the Imperial Academy of Sciences by Academician J. K. Grot. - 11th ed. - St. Petersburg. : Printing house of the Imperial Academy of Sciences, 1894. - P. 2.“The Russian alphabet consists of 35 letters... The letters i, e also receive a special purpose with the help of superscripts (й, ё), with which they represent other sounds and therefore in this form should also occupy a place in the alphabet”
- Y. K. Grot. Russian spelling. Management. 11th ed., St. Petersburg, 1894, p. 80 (p. 89 in the viewer)
- // Encyclopedic Dictionary of Brockhaus and Efron: In 86 volumes (82 volumes and 4 additional ones). - St. Petersburg. , 1890-1907.
- kcmamu: Speaking of yata
- Lives of the saints, in Russian, set out according to the guide of the Chetya-Minea of St. Demetrius of Rostov with additions, explanatory notes and images of saints. Book four. - M., Synodal Printing House, 1906. - P. 866.
- Russian and Church Slavonic etymology. For secondary educational institutions / Comp. L. Polivanov. - M.: type. M. N. Lavrova and Co., 1879.
- Smirnovsky P. Decree. Op. - P. 76.
- Encyclopedic Dictionary. Volume XL. SPb.: Typography Akts. General Brockhaus-Efron. Article "I"
- Generally useful calendar for 1915
- Russian spelling. Decree. Op. - P. 120.
- Dictionary of Church Slavonic and Russian languages, compiled by the Second Branch of the Imperial Academy of Sciences. Volume IV. Saint Petersburg. 1847
- New parallel dictionaries of Russian, French, German and English languages in four parts according to the dictionaries of the Russian Academy, the French Academy, Adelung, Heinsius, Johnson, Spears, and other Lexicons, compiled by Philip Reif, Knight of the Russian Order of St. Anne and the Baden Order of the Zähringen Lion. Author of the Grammar of the French-Russian, German-Russian, English-Russian and Etymological Lexicon of the Russian Language. Part one. - Russian dictionary. ...Third edition... Karlsruhe. Leipzig. Saint Petersburg. Paris. 1860. pp. LXXXV-LXXXVI
- Explanatory dictionary of the living Great Russian language by Vladimir Dahl. Second edition, corrected and significantly enlarged according to the author's manuscript. Volume four. R-V. SPb.-M.: 1882. P. 498. Article “under”