ВОПРОСЫ ОНОМАСТИКИ | PROBLEMS OF ONOMASTICS

Iulia V. Borovik
Ural Federal University
Ekaterinburg, Russia

Personal Names of Newborns in the Old Believer Communities of Ekaterinburg in the Early 20^th Century

Voprosy onomastiki, 2019, Volume 16, Issue 3, pp. 30–47 (in Russian)
DOI: 10.15826/vopr_onom.2019.16.3.029

Received 19 February 2019

Abstract: This paper explores the child-naming practices among the Old Believers of Ekaterinburg at the beginning of the 20th century, at that time, a large administrative and trade center of the mining Urals. It aims to outline the main features of their nomenclature and study the composition of names including peculiarities of their writing. The study builds on the database of births, compiled from the metric books of the three Old Believer communities of Ekaterinburg in 1907–1926. Two of these, Uspenskaya and Nikolskaya, belonged to the chasovennye [chapellers] Old Believer hierarchy which did not have a priesthood, whereas the third one, Troitskaya, represented the Belokrinitsky denomination. The records helped to detect each name’s variability, distinguish the canonical and colloquial forms, determine the number of names used, and their frequency. The extraction of phonetic variants brought the author to the final ratio of 178 names per 929 people. The article gives statistical results for the name usage among Old Believers, the set of most common names is compared with the corresponding data sets from other regions. The conclusion holds that in the early 20th century, almost half of the newborns of both sexes received common secular names, particularly it refers to the boys, as they were supposed to be more socially active. Hence, apart from observing religious traditions of their confession, the parents also relied on general preferences of the urban population. The annex contains a list of all the names recorded in the newborns’ section in the Old Believer churches of Ekaterinburg in 1907–1926.

Keywords: nomenclature, anthroponyms, Old Believers, chapellers hierarchy, Belokrinitsky hierarchy, metric books, database, linguistic statistics, mining Ural, Ekaterinburg.

Acknowledgements
The article was prepared within the framework of the state order of the Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation, project 33.2182.2017/4.6 “Formation of Russian Cultural and Religious Identity: the Monuments of Written Tradition as Symbolic Codes of Cultural Memory”.

References

Avdeev, A. et al. (2008). Narechenie imeni v Rossii [Russian Naming]. In M. B. Denisenko, & I. A. Troitskaya (Eds.), Istoricheskaia demografiia [Historical Demography] (pp. 210–238). Moscow: MAKS Press.

Beloborodov, S. A., & Borovik, Iu. V. (2017). Starovery gornozavodskogo Urala: stranitsy istorii soglasiia beglopopovtsev / chasovennykh XVIII — nachala XX v. [Old Believers of the Mining Urals: Fugitives / Chapellers Confessions in the 17th — Early 20th Centuries]. Ekaterinburg: Ural University Press.

Bondaletov, V. D. (1976). Russkii imennik, ego sostav, statisticheskaia struktura i osobennosti izmeneniia (muzhskie i zhenskie imena) [Russian Nomenclature, its Composition, Statistical Structure and Changes (Male and Female Personal Names)]. In L. P. Kalakutskaya (Ed.), Onomastika i norma [Onomastics and the Norm] (pp. 12–46). Moscow: Nauka.

Danilova, I. V. (2004). Sistema lichnykh imen Smolenskogo regiona v XX veke: dinamicheskii aspect [The Evolution of Personal Name System of the Smolensk Region in the 20th Century] (Doctoral dissertation summary). Smolensk State Pedagogical University, Smolensk.

Golynets, G. V. (Ed.). (1997). Nev’ianskaia ikona [Nevyansk Icon]. Ekaterinburg: Ural University Press.

Goncharov, Yu. A. et al. (Eds.). (1998). Ural’skaia ikona [Ural Icon]. Ekaterinburg: Ural University Press.

Kopylova, E. V. (2016). Imia i vremia: dva veka istorii imen astrakhantsev (1800–2000 gg.) [Name and Time: Two Centuries of History of Astrakhan Citizens’ Names (1800–2000)]. Moscow; Astrakhan: KnoRus; Astrakhan University.

Kuznetsova, Ya. L. (2006a). Zhenskii antroponimikon staroobriadtsev Isetskoi volosti kontsa XIX veka [Female Names of Old Believers of the Iset Parish at the End of the 19th Century]. Vestnik Tiumenskogo gosudarstvennogo universiteta. Sotsial’no-ekonomicheskie i pravovye issledovaniia, 7, 138–141.

Kuznetsova, Ya. L. (2006b). Isetskie staroobriadcheskie imena v sovremennom iazykovom soznanii: struktura, semantika, pragmatika (na materiale Pervoi vserossiiskoi perepisi 1897 goda) [Isetian Old Believer Names in Modern Language Practices: Structure, Semantics, Pragmatics (Based on the Data of the First All-Russian Census of 1897)] (Doctoral dissertation summary). Tyumen State University, Tyumen.

Muratova, E. Yu. (1994). Imennik staroobriadcheskoi obshchiny na territorii Miorskogo raiona Vitebskoi oblasti [The Nomenclature of the Old Believer Community on the Territory of the Miorsky District of the Vitebsk Region] (Doctoral dissertation summary). Belarus State University, Minsk.

Nazarov, A. I. (2009). Imennik staroobriadtsev-popovtsev zemli Ural’skogo kazach’ego voiska [The Nomenclature of Priested Old Believers (Popovtsy) of the Ural Cossack Army]. Voprosy onomastiki, 7, 81–99.

Nikonov, V. A. (1974). Imia i obshchestvo [Name and Society]. Moscow: Nauka.

Shaikevich, A. Ya. (1970). Russkie lichnye imena XX v. (po materialam zagsa Frunzenskogo raiona g. Moskvy) [Russian Personal Names of the 20th Century (Based on Materials from the Registry Office of the Frunzensky District of Moscow)]. In V. A. Nikonov (Ed.), Lichnye imena v proshlom, nastoiashchem, budushchem [Personal Names: Past, Present and Future] (pp. 84–91). Moscow: Nauka.

Shchetinin, L. M. (1972). Russkie imena (ocherki po donskoi antroponimike) [Russian Names (Essays on the Anthroponymy of the Don River Area)]. Rostov on Don: Rostov University Press.