Origins

Russian is an Indo-European language of the Slavic family. It belongs to the Eastern Slavic branch, along with Belarusian and Ukrainian. Russian is considered to have derived from the Old Church Slavic, evolving separately from Ukrainian and Belarusian ever since the separation of Kievan Rus in the 12th Century. It suffered the strong influence of Western languages, especially German and French after the rule of Peter the Great. In the times of the Soviet Union, Russian was the official language for all the USSR’s republics – it had a great impact on their languages and was rarely affected by local linguistic features.

Official Language

Russian is the official language of Russia. It’s also official, entirely or partly, for most of the former USSR republics. It’s official at a different level in Abkhazia, Belarus, Krymea, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, South Ossetia and Transnistria. Russian is also one of the six official languages of the UN.

Varieties

Russian dialects are most often divided into two groups, southern and northern, with the region of Moscow as the borderline. Some linguists also recognise a central group of dialects. Generally, Russian has developed a great number of varieties thanks to its large popularity and geographical distribution in all former USSR republics, and groups of the Russian diaspora all over the world.

Brief History

It’s considered that around the year 1000 AD, Kievan Rus was already formed and flourishing, uniting the territories of today’s Russia, Ukraine and Belarus. Kievan Rus united the Eastern Slavs, considered to have spoken similar dialects.
With the dissolution of Kievan Rus around the 12th Century, the history of the three countries was launched.

Russians spoke Church Slavic, which was an evolved version of Old Church Slavic. The basis for the official language was the Moscow dialect. This status lasted until the era of Peter the Great. During his rule, the king undertook significant reforms, some of which were aimed at the language and alphabet. Peter the Great was charmed and bewitched by the Western World. He adopted technical and scientific knowledge by bringing in foreign experts, and all of this was reflected in the linguistic development. His reforms completed the attempts for westernisation. For the following centuries, all cultured Russians were expected to speak French and German fluently. In fact, they spoke French on a daily basis. This curious fact is still visible in literature such as 'War and Peace', in which entire paragraphs and pages are written in French, with no translation given.

The Russian language gained its greatest impact and prestige during the time of the Soviet Union. With the scientific progress and huge achievements of the Russians in the area of space and military technologies, the language spread as almost official in the field. It was also imposed as official upon all of the republics in the Union.

Did you know?

Russian uses the Cyrillic alphabet, though not the original version but a modified one – Cyrillic was originally meant to be the writing system of Bulgarian.

The modern era of the Russian language is considered to have started with the works of the great poet Aleksandr Pushkin. He rejected the so-called high style and adopted the popular and vernacular speech in literature.