Re: Slavic "drag-"

From: Jim Rader
Message: 28654
Date: 2003-12-19

Richard--

I see from the link that you're looking at Dal's dictionary, compiled
more than 130 years ago. I wouldn't call myself an expert, but I would
guess Dal' means "Church Slavonic," not Russian. Have to look at
some other entries and the front matter to be sure. In the 19th century
the division between Russian and Russian Church Slavonic was
somewhat more porous than now. Poets would occasionally resort to
a pure Church Slavonicism for metrical purposes, usually a cognate of
a (more) vernacular word.

Jim

> <Dragoj> looks like Russified Church Slav(on)ic, <dragij> >
> unadulterated Church Slavic. You must be using a very old dictionary!
>
> Sorry, it's my typographical error for the headword <dorogoy> at
> http://dic.academic.ru/misc/enc2p.nsf/ByID/NT00038546 ! But my
> question to the experts is, 'Does the qualification "tserk." mean
> <dragij> is Church Slavonic or that it is a loan into Russian from
> Church Slavonic?'.
>
> Richard.