Old Russian language

   In the XIV-XV centuries on the basis of the East Slavic languages ​​(also called Old Russian) formed Russian, Ukrainian and Belarusian languages ​​(dialect groups), and a number of ancient dialect features that distinguish subsequently three East Slavic language, appeared before this time. In the XVI-XVII centuries and have developed «Borean-Greatrussian» and «Southen-Greatrussian» adverb and intermediate «Average-Greatrussian Talks».

   Church Slavonic language from the very beginning was (and still is) the language of Orthodox worship, long time, he has held a dominant position in the field of writing in general.

   In the XIV-XVIII centuries, writing, and for a long time and the official language of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania was from western written language, which, in spite of the fact that had at its core the Belarusian and Ukrainian substrate is subjected to strong influence of the Polish and Old Church languages.

At the same time that two new options "simple Language Society": Belarusian and Ukrainian (more Slavicised). However, the "simple Ruska mova" was not a spoken language, and artificial book, which also had to master, as well as Church Slavonic.

   The oldest literary monuments in the history of Russian language - is the Novgorod Code (1st quarter of XI century), Ostromirov`s Gospel (1056/1057 г.) in Slavonic and birch bark (from the XI century) on Old-Novgorod`s dialect.

   

   Given the evidence of monuments and checking their data a comparative study of Russian dialects, we can restore these the most important stages in the development of the grammatical structure of Russian language XIV-XVII centuries:

   - Loss of the dual category (a reminder of the dual number in the form of masculine nouns, use is with numbers два, три, четыре, two, пол- and полтора special form, in most cases coincides with the form of the genitive singular, but sometimes different from She accented with: два зверя, два шага, два шара, два часа; relics of the dual are also modern forms: колени, очи, плечи, уши and a few others);

   - Loss of short forms of the adjective in the oblique cases (in modern language forms are stored in the frozen expressions like: на босу ногу, средь бела дня, к едрéне фéне and others;

   - Extensive development and consolidation in the written monuments of the later period (from the XVI-XVII centuries) forms of instrumental case of nouns and adjectives that belong to a predicate (type “он был учителем” (“he was a teacher”));

   - Elimination of vowel alternations in stems in velar sounds.

   - Interference with the basics of declension into hard and soft consonants.

   - Simplification of times gone by;

   - Create a category gerunds;

   - In the area of ​​case forms for nouns XIII-XVII centuries seen to increase and develop designs with prepositions;

   - Development of the structure of speech is also the development of complex sentences.

   

The position of the Russian language in the world. Official status

   Modern Russian language was formed around the turn of XVIII-XIX centuries. (The standard version, in the Russian tradition known as the literary language). Of subsequent changes should be made reform of the Russian spelling, 1918, as well as less significant changes in 1956.

   In the XX century Russian language became one of the so-called world (global) languages. Distribution of Russian language geographically and territorially was largely the result of the Russian Empire and then the Soviet Union and now the Russian Federation.

   Russian is the official language in the following countries: Russia, Belarus (along with Belarus), partially recognized South Ossetia (along with Ossetian) and the unrecognized Transnistrian Moldovan Republic (along with the Moldovan and Ukrainian).

   Russian language is the official language of state institutions (in all other cases or other languages ​​as official act) in the following countries: Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, partially recognized Abkhazia. In a number of administrative units of Moldova, Romania and Ukraine, Russian is recognized as one of the official languages. In Tajikistan, the Russian language is constitutionally the "language of interethnic communication". In some counties, the State of New York for the Russian language should be translated documents related to the election.

   Russian language was the national or official status in a number of historical states. He is also an official and working language in a number of international organizations.

   The total number of Russian speakers in the world on the 1999 assessment - about 167 million, about 110 million people speak Russian as a second language.

   At present, the Russian language is unofficially the international language for manned missions to near-Earth orbit. Spoken Russian language are required reading in all the astronauts working on the International Space Station.