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Petr Igorevich Prudovsky
V. V. Vinorgadov Russian Language Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, Russia
RUSSIAN ANTHROPONYMY IN BRANDENBURG-PRUSSIAN DIPLOMATIC DOCUMENTS OF THE 1650s:
SOURCE-CRITICAL AND SOCIAL ASPECTS
For citation
Prudovsky, P. I. (2026). Russian Anthroponymy in Brandenburg-Prussian Diplomatic Documents of the 1650s: Source-Critical and Social Aspects. Voprosy onomastiki, 23(2), 162–185. https://doi.org/10.15826/vopr_onom.2026.23.2.025
Received on 1 August 2025
Accepted on 13 April 2026
Abstract: The paper presents a comprehensive and systematized corpus of Russian personal names found in diplomatic documents of Brandenburg-Prussia relating to the first decade of its contacts with Russia (1649–1660). These sources reflect the following components of personal naming: an appellative noun denoting a person’s social status (rank, position, or title), first name, patronymic (which may have either an analytic or a synthetic form), and family name. Different combinations of these elements produce a wide variety of naming patterns. The sources are divided into three groups according to their connection to the Russian-language environment. The first group comprises written translations of Russian documents and reflects the formal Russian naming system. The second group documents the reception of Russian names through oral communication during personal interactions. It includes diplomatic diaries and reports, as well as negotiation protocols and lists of embassy members, among other sources. The analysis tests the hypothesis that the documents in this group reflect three naming systems: formal Russian, informal Russian, and certain aspects of Western European naming formula. The third group consists of internal administrative documents, including instructions, correspondence between Prussian officials, drafts, and notes. This group demonstrates the further incorporation of Russian names into the German bureaucratic environment. Particular attention is paid to the use of patronymics independently of first names as a means of personal naming; such cases are recorded in the second and third groups of sources. These cases can be divided into two types. In some instances, the patronymic represents a reduction of the formal “first name–patronymic” pattern, with the first name omitted and the patronymic functioning as a substitute for the surname. In other instances, the evidence points to the actual use of patronymics as an independent naming pattern. The sources examined in the study demonstrate a broader range of naming patterns than is attested in official Russian documents of the period.
Keywords: anthroponymics; linguistic source studies; sociolinguistics; Moscovite Rus’; foreign sources for the history of the Russian language; patronymics; 17th century
Acknowledgements
An earlier version of this paper was presented at the 17th conference Ancient Rus and the Germanic World in Historical and Philological Perspective on 6 November 2024. The author thanks the conference participants for their questions and comments. The archival materials used in this study were collected with the support of a grant from the Paulsen Foundation in 2019.
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