The Gentle Art of Borrowing

Whenever students of Russian feel overwhelmed and discouraged — which is, let’s face it, any time you use a verb or have to put a number into the instrumental case — it’s useful to remember what makes learning Russian easier than some other languages.

For one, modern Russian evolved from (largely) one language, which means that there are roots that get modified by prefixes and suffixes to form a plethora of related words. So, once you know that the root пах has to do with smell, you can figure out that па́хнуть means to smell, за́пах is a noun for a smell and паху́чий is the adjective. This is much easier than English, where a variety of source languages gives you the sentence: A fragrant scent smells good.

But, on the other hand, over the millennia Russian has borrowed big batches of foreign words. Today, the main source of borrowed words is English, but in past centuries Russians dipped into European languages, particularly Dutch, French, and German. So if you know French, when your neighbor histrionically swoons over the soupy, filthy, spring mess in the yard with “Како́й кошма́р!,” you know it’s cauchemar (a nightmare). And when that neighbor wants to make someone pay for the mess and shouts about большо́й штраф, if you know a bit of German, you understand that she wants the lazy janitors to pay a big fine — Strafe — for their neglect.

In general, Russian borrows words that describe things, processes, qualities or concepts that were either unknown or unexpressed in the language before. From French, for example, Russian imported new foods and cooking methods — гастроно́мия (gastronomie) and their names, like антреко́т (entrecote) or бискви́т (biscuit). Sometimes there appears to be duplication, like банке́т (banquet), which existed as пир (feast, banquet), or бульо́н (bouillon), which existed as отва́р. In these cases, usually the imported word described a new, European version of a native Russian thing or concept. Отва́р is plain old broth, but бульо́н was a fancy clear bouillon served as a separate course.

There are lots of borrowed French words in the arts, such as бале́т (ballet); бино́кль (binocle, binoculars);  абонеме́нт (abonnement, subscription); актёр, актри́са (acteur, actrice); the creator of art  — а́втор (auteur); the person who appreciates it — мелома́н (mélomane, a music lover); and the place where art is housed — музе́й (musée).  Oh, French also provides the word you shout when you want more: Бис! (bis, once again).

Clothing and cloth also have a French accent, with words like бере́т|берёт (beret); муа́р (moiré) and the indispensible неглиже́ (négligé). You’ll find French in architecture, from архитекту́ра (architecture) to эта́ж (étage); in the military, from the very concept of а́рмия (armée), where the army is — фронт (front); and what it fights with: артилле́рия (artillerie, artillery).

In the late nineteenth century, Russians must have gotten their first technological wonders from their French friends, since авиа́ция (aviation) and электрифика́ция (electrification) came from there.

And who can imagine Russian, or life, without шик and шика́рный (the noun and adjective chic); боге́ма (bohème, bohemian); шеде́вр (chef d’œuvre, a masterpiece, literally “work of a master”); шарм (charme); шанта́ж (chantage, blackmail); or those great words комильфо́ (comme il faut, proper) and шаромы́жник (cher ami).

Among the thousands of words imported into Russian from German is шлагба́ум (Schlagbaum), famous among English-speaking expats in Russia as the thing no one knows the name for. And even learning that it can be called a boom arm, boom barrier, gate arm, or automatic barrier gate, expats just call it a schlagbaum.

Because borrowing can go both ways.