When was russian language invented

Since then, Cyrillic has spread across the Slavic world; and after the baptism of Rus it came into use by the Eastern Slavic population. It was only in the 18th century the language was modified and simplified. In it acquired modern Russian graphics. The latest reform of the language dates back to the early s. The Eastern Slavonic language group changed over time, eventually becoming Russian, Belorussian, and Ukranian.

The grammar in the Slavonic languages remained similar, permitting the three groups to share a common written language. This shared language, used only in writing, was called Old Church Slavonic. Old Slavonic's alphabet, also known as the Cyrillic alphabet, was created in the 9 th century by Constantine, who based it on the Greek alphabet with an additional twelve letters for uniquely Slavic sounds.

The first Cyrillic letters were neatly written in large letters called ustay. Over time, script letters evolved. By the 18 th century, the alphabet was restructured to remove archaic references to Greek sounds. Both of the writing systems, however, have served as valuable sources for clues about the history of the Russian language.

The Phonological and Phonetic Systems Although a great number of changes have occurred in the phonological and phonetic systems of the Russian language since its early origins in Indo-European, I must restrict my discussion to a few of the more principle sound shifts. The most interesting and important sound changes occur between Common Slavonic and Old Russian. The Common Slavonic language had two voiceless vowels known as "jers" Russian glukhije.

As Kiparsky notes, we can tell by analyzing texts dating from the second half of the tenth century that these letters were already changing, being "frequently interchanged.

Eventually, in certain environments, the jers grew so weak that they were not pronounced at all in word final position or interconsonantally in certain syllables. In other places, the change was more gradual. As Kiparsky states, the "loss of medial weak and did not begin before but was completed by some time in the 13 th cent[ury]. Although the weak jers are no longer pronounced in modern Russian, the "soft sign" is still written in many words, indicating the "softness" or palatalized nature of the preceding consonant.

The or "hard sign" was done away with in most words as a result of the orthographic reforms Sokolsky , but remains in a few isolated words. Matthews states that this change spread gradually, beginning as a dialectal variation found in central Russia apparently looked down upon as "provincial" and moving slowly through the populace until it became a part of the standard dialect.

As Matthews points out, "the Common Slavonic velars were hard [i. This change moved gradually through the language from the 11 th to the 14 th centuries, when "it is usually assumed that. In Modern Russian, velar consonants are exclusively followed by front vowels, indicating the completion of the process of palatalization.

Of course this is far from an exhaustive discussion of all of the phonological and phonetic changes in the history of Russian. I hope, however, that it will serve as a sampling of some of the sound changes that have occurred between Common Slavonic and Old Russian, as well as a basis for further exploration of this topic.

Historical Reflexes in the Modern Lexicon The history of the words that make up the modern Russian language is extremely complex. The intricate web of lexical items reflects the complicated history of the Eastern Slavs themselves, with roots in the past as well as the present.

Sokolsky divides the Russian lexicon into four groupings, which I would like to discuss briefly: "Common-Slavonic words, Eastern-Slavonic, pure Russian words, and words borrowed from other languages" Sokolsky cites the Russian linguist Trubachev, who apparently claims that a particular Russian dictionary contains words of Common-Slavonic origin.

These words reflect themes of nature, body, social relationships, and work, and seem to have cognates across Slavic languages Another group of words that Sokolsky indicates as making up part of the modern Russian lexicon is of Eastern Slavic Old Russian origin.

These words are common to the Russian, Byelorussian, and Ukrainian languages of the present day, but are absent from the Western and Southern groups of Slavic languages.

These words include family relationships, animals, colors, and time reference words such as "today," "after," and "now" The bulk of the words in modern Russian, however, are considered to be "pure" Russian Sokolsky Many of these include words coined during the Soviet era, particularly contractions and compounds which flourished in an age of bureaucratic language Many words in Russian have been borrowed from various other languages at different stages in history.

The words for "brick," "guard," and "money," among others, survive in the Russian language today Sokolsky Because a great number of books on subjects new to Russia were being introduced, translators often chose to simply copy the foreign words instead of finding suitable counterparts in Russian.

This led to "a battle.