Russian surnames with the character ё in written Czech Cover Image

Ztraceno v přepisu: ruská příjmení s písmenem ë v česky psaných textech
Russian surnames with the character ё in written Czech

Author(s): Martin Beneš, Lucie Benešová
Subject(s): Language studies, Language and Literature Studies, Western Slavic Languages, Eastern Slavic Languages
Published by: AV ČR - Akademie věd České republiky - Ústav pro jazyk český
Keywords: Cyrillic script; homography; norm; Russian orthography; Russian surnames with the character ё; transcription; usage; written Czech

Summary/Abstract: The paper deals with the Russian Cyrillic character ⟨ё⟩, which stands for the sound [ʲo]/[jo], and its transcription into Czech. This character is used only facultatively and is usually replaced by the Cyrillic character ⟨е⟩. This causes potentially troublesome homography since the character ⟨е⟩ could stand either for [ʲo]/[jo] (⟨е⟩ replacing ⟨ё⟩) or for [ʲe]/[je] (the “usual” ⟨е⟩). The paper investigates how chosen Russian surnames containing this facultative character (Потёмкин, Рублёв etc.) are transcribed into the Czech Latin alphabet and discusses the reasons for transcribing it into Czech (“appropriately”) as ⟨o⟩, ⟨jo⟩ or (“inappropriately”) as ⟨e⟩, ⟨je⟩, ⟨ě⟩.

  • Issue Year: 106/2023
  • Issue No: 2
  • Page Range: 110-123
  • Page Count: 14
  • Language: Czech