Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume XIV.djvu/520

 496 RUSSIA (LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE) matical features : Masculine noun declined : nom. sing, tear, (a, the) czar or king; gen. tzarya ; dat. tzaryu ; ace. tzarya ; voc. tzar; instrumental, tzarem ; indicative, tzarye ; pi. : tzari, tzarei, tzaryam, tzarei, tzari, tzarya- mi, tzaryakh. The indicative is always used with a preposition, of, on, or the like : o tzarye, of the czar ; na tzaryakh, on the czars. Fem- inine noun, sing. : ruka, hand, ruki, rukye, ruku, ruka, rukoyu, rukye; pi. ruki, ruk, rukam, ruki, ruki, rukami, rukakh. Neuter noun, sing. : zerkalo, looking glass, zerkala, eerkalu, zerkalo, zerkalo, zerkalom, zerkalye ; pi. : zerkala, zerkal, zerkalam, eerkala, zerkala, zerkalami, zerkalakh. Adjective masc. sing. : mudry, wise, mudravo, mudromu, mudravo, mudry, mudrym, mudrom ; pi. : mudryye, mudrykh, mudrym (mudrykh), mudryye, mu- drymi, mudrykh. The personal pronouns are the following: ya, I; ty, thou ; on, he; ona, she ; ono, it ; my, we ; vy, ye ; oni, onye, they. The first 10 numerals (rnasc.) are: odin, dva, tri, tchetyre, piat, thest, sem, osem or vosem, deviat, desiat. The perfect of the verb bit, to be, is sing. : ya byl, I have been, ty byl, on byl, ona byla, ono bylo ; pi. : my byli, vy byli, oni and onye byli. How far the language is susceptible of assimilating foreign words, es- pecially German and French, can be seen from a few examples : general, heneral; civilization, tzivilizatziii ; department, departament ; min- istry, ministerstvo ; poetry, jwczia ; prose, pro- za; theatre, drama, tragedy, comedy, teater, drama, trahedia, comedia, and so on. Among the best grammars of the Russian language for the use of foreigners are those in German by Heym, Vater, Schmidt, Tappe, Oldekop, Boltz (2d ed., 1854), Joel (1860), and Booch-Arkossy (1864), and in French by Langen (1825) and Reiff (2d ed., 1859). Among the best diction- aries are those of Heym, Russisch-deutsches und deutsch-russisches Worterbuch (Riga, 1795-'8 ; Russian, German, and French ed., Leipsic, 1844) ; Tatishtcheff, Nouveau dictionnairefran- fai-rute (2 vols., Moscow, 1832); Oldekop, Rutiisch-deutschea und deutsch-russischea Wor- terbuch (last ed., St. Petersburg, 1843); and Makaroff's French-Russian and Russian-French dictionaries (St. Petersburg, 1868). There is an English-Russian grammar and dictionary by Oonstantinoff (3 vols. 8vo, London). The first germs of literary life in Russia appear in the time of the introduction of Christianity by Vladimir the Great (about 990). The Slavic translation of the Bible and the introduction of Old Slavic liturgical books by Cyril and Metho- dius led to the general adoption of the Old Slavic as the written language, while the com- mon Russian language began to form itself from the various dialects of the mixed population. No monuments whatever are left to show the condition and growth of the Russian language at this early stage; even the popular songs which elucidate the beginning of many other literatures have reached us only intermixed with later alterations. In the Old Slavic lan- guage we have the treaties of the princes Oleg and Igor with the Greeks of the years 911 and 944, and an address of Sviatoslav ; but whether their origin really belongs to this ancient time, or whether they are more recent translations from the Greek, is uncertain. An important Old Slavic work, Russkaya Pranda (" Russian Justice "), which was composed during the reign of Yaroslav (about 1020), was discov- ered in 1738 by Tatishtcheff, and published by Schlozer (St. Petersburg, 1767). Nestor, the father of Russian history, belongs to the same period (died about 1114). The rule of the Mongols over Russia interfered but little with the growth of Russian literature, for the conquerors spared the convents, in which science found a safe refuge. Among the few works of this early period which have been preserved are the "Annals" of Simon, bishop of Suzdal (died 1226), a work of the metro- politan Cyprian (died 1406), a part of the "Sophia Chronicles" from 862 to 1534 (pub- lished by Stroyeff, Moscow, 1820-'22), and a considerable number of fables and tales, most- ly centring round Vladimir and his knights, and bearing great resemblance to the tales of the round table. Among the most celebrated old Russian poems is the Pesnia o polku igore- vom (on the expedition of Igor against Polotzk), written about 1200. It was discovered in 1796 by Count Mussin-Pushkin at Kiev, and has since been often published (with a German translation by Hanka, Prague, 1821). The long duration of the Mongol rule caused a number of Mongol words to be received into the Rus- sian language, which are still in use. After the expulsion of the Tartars, Ivan III., Ivan IV., and especially Michael Romanoff, gave a new impulse to the progress of Russian litera- ture, by establishing new schools, encouraging scholars, and calling distinguished foreigners into the empire. Among the authors of this pe- riod are the metropolitan Macarius (died about 1564), who wrote biographies of saints, Rus- sian divines, &c., and Matvieyeff, the author of several historical works. Nikon, patriarch of Russia (died 1681), had the Bible translated into the Slavic language, and caused a revision of the Slavic liturgical books after the Greek originals, for which purpose more than 500 Greek manuscripts were collected by his order. But the great drawback to the rise of a truly national and popular literature, the use for literary purposes of another language than that of the people, was not removed until the reign of Peter the Great, under whom the intellec- tual condition of Russia underwent a revolu- tion no less thorough than the material. lie abolished the use of the Old Slavic as the offi- cial language of the government, and took en- ergetic steps for superseding it as the language of literature. He fixed the alphabet of the common Russian language, superintended at Amsterdam the casting of the first types, and gave to a printer of Amsterdam, who in 1699 published the first book in the Russian Ian-