Гипокористические имена на -ец- в древнерусском языке

Slovĕne. 2026. Т. 1. С. 31–67.

Budennaya E.

The article examines Old Russian anthroponyms with the suffix -ec-, orig-
inally conveying the meaning ‘less than X’. A diachronic corpus study of
11th–17th-century texts reveals that while this suffix lacked inherent pejorative
connotations in Old Russian sources, contextual (adherent) pejoration is clearly
observable. For pre-15th-century chronicles, two primary usage patterns are
identified—1) characters with explicit negative evaluation, and 2) individuals of
lower social or communicative status. The metaphoric shift from diminutive to
pejorative meaning aligns with cross-linguistic typological patterns, though in
Old Russian, -ec- was not an exclusive marker of such meanings: lexical intensi-
fiers could reinforce negative evaluation (e.g., lživyj vladyka Feodorec ‘the deceit-
ful Bishop Feodorec’). Chronicle texts and birchbark letters further demonstrate
a correlation between –ec- forms and patientive roles of referents. Quantitative
analysis of epigraphic materials shows statistically significant prevalence of
lower-status semantics over direct pejoration. Comparative analysis of the later
(16th–17th century) official documents reveals an evolutionary trajectory: while
15th-century texts freely applied -ec- to participants of lower status (servants,
debtors, children), by the 16th century it became institutionalized in legal doc-
uments—appearing in self-deprecating petitions (čelobitnye) and witness for-
mulas in legal deeds (sales, exchanges, wills), along with other hypocoristic
derivatives. By the 17th century, -ec- was gradually supplanted by other hypo-
coristic suffixes (-ko/-ka, -ško/-ška). Thus, the usage of -ec- in 11th–17th-century
anthroponyms was governed by a complex interplay of semantic, pragmatic,
syntactic, and sociolinguistic factors that evolved alongside language norms.

Keywords: социальный статус, прагматика, social status, древнерусский язык, semantic shift, diminutives, семантический переход, Old Russian, антропоним, гипокористика, anthroponymics