Introduction chapter one. Borrowed words and their peculiarities

araba 1, arba, n. [Also aroba, = Bulg. araba, Russ. arba, < Hind. Pers. arāba, Turk. Ar. ‘arabah, a cart, wheeled vehicle.] A heavy, springless wagon, usually covered with a screen as shelter from the rays of the sun, drawn by oxen or cows, and used throughout north-western and central Asia, India, Turkey, and Russia, wherever Tatars have settled.
(5) words derived from a historical source different from Russian;
yurt, n. [Siberian.] One of the houses or huts, whether permanent or movable, of the natives of northern and central Asia. Also yourta, yourte, jurt.
Many headwords are derived, either directly or indirectly, from Russian, but this is not always the case. Some words, such as aoul, araba, barchan, caftan, dzeren, kefir, knez, sarlak, shaman, shor, tarpan, verst, or voivode, are almost notorious for having non-Russian etymologies, because usually only one out of five dictionaries indicates their Russian origin. Other borrowings, such as balagan, barukhzy, baidar, carlock, chum, corsac, dolina, gley, iconostas, Kalmuck, Katyusha, kendir, koumiss, olen, pogrom, rendzina, starost or zubr, show an equal degree of variability, i.e., the Russian and non- Russian etymologies are found in roughly the same number of dictionaries.
Languages of Turkic peoples left numerous traces in different languages, including the English language. Turkic borrowings, which belong to the social and political vocabulary, are generally used in special literature and in the historical and ethnographical works, which relate to the life of Turkic and Muslim peoples. The ethnographical words are generally used in the scientific literature, and in the historical and ethnographical texts. The adoption of Indian words, among which there were some Turkic borrowings, became one of the ways for the words of the Turkic origin to penetrate English. Additionally, several words of Turkic origin penetrated English through East European languages like Russian and Polish. German, Latin, Spanish, Italian, French, Hungarian and Serbo-Croatian were also intermediary languages for the Turkic words to penetrate English, as well as containing numerous Turkic loanwords themselves (e.g. Serbo-Croatian contains around 5,000 Turkic loanwords, primarily from Turkish
In the nineteenth century, Turkic loanwords, generally of Turkish origin, began to penetrate not only through the writings of the travelers, diplomats and merchants, and through the ethnographical and historical works, but also through the press. In 1847, there were two English-language newspapers in Istanbul – The Levant Herald and The Levant Times, seven newspapers in French, one in German and 37 in Turkish. Turkish contributed the largest share of the Turkic loans, which penetrated into the English directly. This can be explained by the fact that Turkey had the most intensive and wide connections with England. Nevertheless, there are many Turkic loans in English, which were borrowed by its contacts with other peoples – Azerbaijanis, Tatars, Uzbeks, Kazakhs and Kirghiz.
Most of the Turkic loans in English carry exotic or ethnographical connotations. They do not have equivalents in English, do not have synonymic relations with primordial words, and generally are used to describe the fauna, flora, life customs, political and social life, and an administrative-territorial structure of Turkic regions. But there are many Turkic loans, which are still part of the frequently used vocabulary. Some Turkic loans have acquired new meanings, unrelated to their etymology.¹
To conclude, the words of the Turkic origin began penetrating English as early as the Middle Ages, the Turkic loanwords found their way into English through other languages, most frequently through French. Since the 16c, beginning from the time of the establishment of the direct contacts between England and Turkey, and Russia, in English appeared new direct borrowings from Turkic languages. German, Polish, Russian, Serbo-Croatian, French, Arabic, Armenian, Afrikaans, Hungarian, Yiddish, Indian, Spanish, Italian, Latin, Malayan, to a different extent, took part in the process of the transfer of the Turkic words into English. The main language from which the borrowings were made, was Turkish.
To give the view of the borrowings in modern English we decided to analyze the text from contemporary writer Sophie Kinsella her novel “Shopaholic”.
“Whoever designed our trendy kitchen bar stools obviously never had their parents come over for a cup of coffee. It takes Mum and Dad about five minutes to climb up onto them, while I watch, completely petrified they're going to topple over. "Spindly legs, aren't they?" puffs Dad as he tries for the fifth time. Meanwhile Mum's inching slowly onto the seat, gripping the granite breakfast bar for dear life. At last, somehow, they're both perched up safely on the steel seats, looking all self-conscious as though they're on a TV talk show.
"Are you all right?" I say anxiously. "Because I could go and get some different chairs..."
"Nonsense!" says Dad at once. "This is very comfy!" He's lying. I can see him clenching his hands round the edges of the slippery seat and glancing down at the slate floor below as though he's balanced on a forty-fourth-floor ledge.
"The seats are a little hard, aren't they, love?" ventures Mum. "You should get some nice tie-on cushions from Peter Jones"
"Er... maybe"
I hand Mum and Dad their cups, pull out a bar stool for myself, and nonchalantly swing myself up onto it.
Ow. That hurt
God, they are a bit tricky to get onto. Stupid shiny seats.
"So ... are you both well?" I say, reaching for my coffee.
There's a short silence
"Becky, we came here for a reason," says Dad. "I have something to tell you"
He looks so grave, I feel worried. Maybe it's not the house after all.
Maybe it's something worse.
"It's to do with me," he continues.
"You're ill," I say before I can stop myself. "Oh God. Oh God. I knew there was something wrong — "I'm not ill. It's not that. It's... something else" He massages his temples, then looks up. "Becky, years ago — "Break it to her gently, Graham!" Mum interrupts.
"I am breaking it to her gently!" retorts Dad, swiveling round. "That's exactly what I'm doing!"
"You're not!" says Mum. "You're rushing in!"
Now I'm totally bewildered.
"Break what to me gently?" I say, looking from face to face. "What's going on?"
"Becky, before I met your mother..." Dad avoids my gaze. "There was another... lady in my life"
"Right," I say, my throat thick.
Mum and Dad are getting divorced and that's why they're selling the house. I'm going to be the product of a broken home.
"We lost touch," Dad continues. "But recently... events have occurred"
"You're confusing her, Graham!" exclaims Mum.
"I'm not confusing her! Becky, are you confused?"
"Well... a bit," I admit.
Mum leans over and takes my hand.
"Becky, love, the long and the short of it is... you have a sister"
A sister?
I stare at her blankly. What's she talking about?
"A half sister, we should say," Dad adds, nodding earnestly. "Two years older than you"
My brain is short-circuiting. This doesn't make any sense. How could I have a sister and not know about it?
"Dad has a daughter, darling," Mum says gently. "A daughter he knew nothing about until very recently. She got in touch with us while you were on honeymoon. We've seen each other a few times, haven't we, Graham?" She glances at Dad, who nods. "She's... very nice!"
The kitchen is completely silent. I swallow a few times. I can't quite take this in. Dad had another child?
Dad had another — "So ..." I falter. "Who was this other lady in your life?"
I can't believe I'm asking my own father about his love life. Even if it is his love life of thirty years ago.
Dad doesn't flinch at the question.
"Her name was Marguerite," he says with a steadfast gaze. "I was traveling a lot for business then and she was a stewardess on the 7:40 London to Carlisle train"
A stewardess on a train. I have a sudden image of a young Dad sitting in a pale 1970s suit with flappy lapels, smiling up at a uniformed girl as she pours him coffee. She brushes against him as she moves the trolley on...”¹
Having analyzed this text we came to the following results: borrowed words in this text is 30 %, it means that 70% of words are of Old and Middle English origin. Among the borrowed words - 40% borrowed from Latin, 28% from French, from Germanic languages 22% and from others(Turkish, Italian, Spanish etc) 10%. Here are some examples
Design- Latin designare ‘to designate’,
kitchen -, based on Latin coquere ‘to cook’ coffee-late 16th cent.: from Turkish kahveh, from Arabic qahwa, probably via Dutch koffie
petrify - from French pétrifier, from medieval Latin petrificare,
flinch - French
continue – Latin
granite Italian
chair - French
different - Latin
So, we can see that borrowed words have entirely entered the language and are widely used in contemporary language, and also we can see that some words derive from two or more languages at the same time for example petrify - from French pétrifier, from medieval Latin petrificare.¹ This because of the Origin of Germanic languages, they have the same roots and the same history also, and we should say that the process of borrowings is closely connected with the historical and political events.