The word guest in the history of the Russian literary language has always been ambiguous. According to historical dictionaries, a guest was a visitor, a merchant who traded in different cities and foreign countries, a member of the highest privileged corporation of merchants in the Moscow state. In the modern Russian literary language, the meaning of "merchant" is considered obsolete, and the word guest means someone who visits, visits someone, as well as an outsider who is invited or allowed to attend any meeting, meeting (MAC. T.1. P.339).

In folk songs and epics, the guest is a fairly common character. Who is called a guest in Russian folklore?

Both in the northern songs from the vaults of A. I. Sobolevsky and P. V. Kireevsky, and in the epics recorded by A. F. Hilferding, a guest is "a visitor, a person who came at the call or uninvited, to visit another, for the sake of a feast, leisure, conversation "(See: V. I. Dahl. Explanatory dictionary of the living Great Russian language).

Song guests are most often close relatives-father (tyatenka), mother, brother, "shurya-brothers":

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I will name my dear guests:

Dear guest Father,

Dear guest Mother

(Songs collected by P. V. Kireevsky. New series. Issue II. Part 1. Moscow, 1917. Further - Kireevsky).

Visitors also go mainly to their native home, if the lyrical heroine is a married woman and lives in her husband's family.:

Moryanin was invited to visit:

Moryanin, moryanin, let's go visit!

You go to your mother-in-law, and I'll go to my mother,

You go to the shuryam, and I go to my own brothers! (Kireevsky)

In an epic text, the guest is usually a stranger. Only in some cases this word refers to relatives:

A distant visitor is coming to see me-ka-wa,

Distant guest eating favorite father-in-law.

Still the same King Politovsky.

(Onega epics, recorded by A. F. Hilferding in the summer of 1871. Further Hilferding).

A guest can be compared, but not identified with a brother: You have a guest on a visit, but bydto is a native brother (Hilferding)

And the word brothers in the conjugation druzhya - brothers-guests reveals not a direct, but a figurative meaning.:

- And you druzhya brothers are loving guests.

- And you go and check it out,

- And where is the old Cossack Ilya Muromets located there? (Hilferding)

An epic guest is usually a guest at a feast:

In the capital city of Kiev

At the affectionate prince at Vladimir's

Brans were invited guests coming

To the feast of honor (Hilferding)

Guests are invited, received, collected for them, a feast is started; the guest is taken by the arms, seated at the table, amused and treated:

Are all our guests still eating and drinking,

Still everyone who comes here eats bread and salt,

And the white swan is being destroyed while sitting down. (Hilferding)

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Another guest often mentioned in song lyrics is a sweet friend, a favorite, who usually comes to an unmarried girl:

I will call a guest, a dear guest,

A dear guest - a dear friend.

(Great Russian folk Songs / Ed. by prof. A. I. Sobolevsky. Vol. II. SPb., 1895. Vol. III. SPb., 1897. Further - Sobolevsky).

Navaryu moloda zelena vina.

I'll call my friend Milago to visit. (Kireevsky)

Sometimes the beloved girl herself goes to visit, which becomes a joyful event for her friend:

Never mind the dawn-day-day in the window has risen, -

Masha herself came to visit me. (Sobolevsky)

The one who goes to visit is not a casual acquaintance, but is connected with the heroine by a love feeling:

Became nice to leave love,

Go for a walk with another one. (Kireevsky)

Parting with a girl, cute ceases to be her guest:

You don't burn the candle but I'll wax the jarago,

Don't wait, don't wait for Milago's guest!..

I'm not a guest come, but not to stay with you,

I have come to you, joy, to be forgiven.

For your love, let us worship. (Sobolevsky)

In numerous versions of this song plot, the concepts of guest and friend are interchangeable.

Well done goes to visit with goodies. A gift is "an offering, a gift, an offering, especially from a close person with whom you lead bread and salt" (Dal. Vol. I. P. 387). In the northern songs marked goodies and goodies'.

Well done to the girl went,

He didn't just go, he wore presents,

Goodies are sweet, gingerbread on honey. (Kireevsky)

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In the epics, a sweet friend as a guest is found only in one story about Churila (Dobrynya):

In the glorious city of Kiev

Old Permyat Vasilyevich lived there

He had a wife, Katerina Mikulichna.

A guest came to visit her.

Dobrynya Mikitinich. (Hilferding)

Churila, a dandy, handsome man, comes to the house of an old merchant and, while he is in church, plays with his wife. And if for the heroine Churila is a favorite guest, then a maidservant (chernavka, scullion, yard maid) such a" heartfelt friend " is perceived as an unloved, unloved, uninvited, unexpected guest in the house of a married woman:

Do you have a non-nice guest at home

Works with Katerina Mikulichna. (Hilferding)

In some song contexts, the word guest is used in a figurative sense, noted by V. I. Dahl: "Guests are called, for the sake of a joke or politeness, unkind people, uninvited visitors, thieves, especially robbers along the Volga" (Dal. Vol. I. P. 386). One of the Novgorod songs tells about the sisters who called their gang of thieves to "Uncle Mikhail" and cut off his head:

Be prepared, you thieves!

Get on the good horses,

Let's go visit my uncle...,

and "aunt Nenila" and "sister Stepanida" were threatened:

You live, grandma, podol,

Mine more gold and silver!

We're going to visit you,

We will, we will, we will not forget! (Kireevsky)

Variants of another common ballad-type song about recognizing a long-lost husband as a" widow "refer to " uninvited guests" who are apparently robbers (although, it is true, sometimes a big guest can be called an "officer", and his army - "soldiers", "Cossacks").:

The guests didn't look at it:

The collar was broken off,

The guests forced their way in.,

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All gathered in the hut,

Isposeli all on the shops,

And a big guest under the window. (Kireevsky)

As for the social status of a folk character called a guest, in the epic it is, as a rule, "a foreign or nonresident merchant who lives and trades not where he is assigned" (Dal. T. I. P. 386).

It should be noted that in most cases, the meaning of a noun is determined from a minimal context. So, the definitions dear, dear, beloved, amiable, bazheny (cute, desirable, dear, affectionate address) are used to implement the values of "visitor" and "dear friend", and the adjectives rich and commercial-the values of "merchant".

Take a wedding dress from the girls,

With old men to take tonsuring.

Posukonnoye is charged to the guests. (Hilferding)

The same meaning is revealed in cases when the word guest is paired with the noun merchant and/or a proper name.:

And go that Ivanushko is getting married,

And to the guest to the merchant still Mitrishchu,

And for that for the glorious blue sea.

Yes, I'm Plenko and the guest is Sarozhanin. (Hilferding)

In many fragments, this series is supplemented by the definition:

And the guests are merchants here, And they bragged about their goods here. (Hilferding)

The word guest in this sense often acts as an application:

But Sadko the merchant, a rich guest, was holding the train here. (Hilferding)

The" social " meaning of the word guest is also shown in those cases when a number of princes are built up... boyar... (merchant)... guest:

Yes the prince went up to Pochay on the river,

Yes, with the princes-you went with the boyars,

With merchants with guests with merchants (Hilferding)

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In the corpus of northern songs under consideration, the word "merchant" is found only in one text, where the meaning of the word is also supported by the definition of trade and vertical connections.:

Even the boyar princes marveled at the well-done man, And even the trading guests envied him. (Sobolevsky)

Sometimes the context does not give grounds to speak with confidence about a particular meaning of the word guest. For example, in the epic situation "at a feast", the values "visitor" and "merchant"may not be differentiated.

A multi-night feast was held

For all the princes, but for the boyars,

For all invited guests-the chosen ones. (Hilferding)

Invited - "invited to visit" (SLRYA XI-XVII centuries. Vol. 5. p. 344), chosen - "belonging to a chosen circle, especially valued, distinguished" (SLRYA XI-XVII centuries. Vol.6. p. 102).

He started it up here but a dishonest feast,

On princes feast yes he on boyars feast

And on all the guests and invited branyih. (Hilferding)

Brany - " selected "(SLRYA XI-XVII centuries Vol. I.P. 317). P. Rybnikov, based on the meaning of brany" patterned, embroidered", characterizes the combination brany guest as"probably not simple, but dressed up".

It is especially difficult to determine the meaning of a word if the context does not contain explanations:

Guests were coming,

They knocked on the boards. (Kireevsky)

And all these guests were screwed.

And all these guests were sad. (Gilferdint)

In the analyzed texts, we have noted a number of derivatives of the word guest. In the epic, this is gostyushko (gostyushki). This form is recorded in different epic stories of different performers in different territories, and it can be adjacent to the main one:

- Ah, you are visiting guests,

Visiting guests passing by!

Why are you here, why did you stop by? (Hilferding)

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However, in one case, the word gostyushka reveals the meaning of "husband":

At her Vasilista Mikulichna

My favorite guest girls were taken away.

She eats, yes drinks, eats,

Over itself adversities does not know,

That Stavra was no longer young for her. (Hilferding)

However, referring to the general text allows us to understand why the storyteller Surikova used the word guest in an atypical meaning for the epic: at the beginning of the epic, Staver is called the guest of Chernigov:

At the same table at the oak table

A young guest of Chernihiv region is sitting,

Young Staver son Godinovich. (Hilferding)

And in the song lyrics we have marked the nouns gostyk and gosteyka. The word gosteyka in the dictionary of V. I. Dahl is interpreted as "a hang-on who wants to feast, to other people's dinners", "a guest living in the house, a guest" and "a friend or a loved one who has come on leave". One of the marked examples confirms the implementation of the last value:

I'm at Mamonka's, at Tyatenka's

My dear guest. (Sobolevsky)

In another song plot probably the first or second meaning:

That the priest is having a feast on a visit,

Did my mother have any guests,

And my friends and sisters! (Kireevsky)

The appearance of a single form of gostk is probably due to the requirements of the song rhythm:

I'll call a guest,

Dear guest,

Father rodnago.

That not long gostik is staying -

He spends one night. (Sobolevsky)

I'll call a guest,

Dear guest -

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My dear mother. What is not given a guest is staying... (Ibid.)

In the "Onega epics" recorded another noun with the root gost -: gostebishche (gostebishche, gostebishche). In 19 out of 20 uses of this word, the meaning of "feast, participation in a feast, stay at a party" is revealed (SRNG. Issue 7. p. 90). "And she calls herself-ka-va in gostebishcho" (Hilferding) and only once the meaning of "treat" (Ibid.).

Tut solnyshko Vladimir stolno-Kievsky

He also put the tables oak

And ugaschival great gostebishchem. (Hilferding)

The adjective gostiny in songs and epics has different combinations. Only the seating row attribute pair is shared:

Ay, you'll get shops in a row and in a drawing room with expensive goods. (Hilferding)

The word gostiny in this combination obviously means "shopping".

In the epic about the Nightingale Budimirovich, the combination gostiny dvor is noted, which rather means "inn or visiting yard for merchants" (in Dahl with the mark star. ):

And sostroyte-tko me-ka three towers,

Three towers of the Golden Domes,

And fourth, build me a living room courtyard. (Hilferding)

The expression "my son" found in the song bizarrely combines the meanings of "merchant" (SRNG. Issue 7. p. 94) and "dear, warm-hearted friend", since it is clearly inappropriate to indicate social status in the following context:

She came out and met me,

Guest son,

For white hands took,

I kissed her, hugged her. (Sobolevsky)

Gostiny in the epic "Ivan Godinovich", combined with the proper name Mitri, probably means "belonging to the merchant class", and possibly "owner of gostiny dvor":

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And Yong came to the city of Chernihiv,

And whether to that or to Mitre the living room. (Hilferding)

The expression living room week used in the song is interesting. According to Northern Russian customs, girls were allowed to stay for a week or two with relatives; these weeks were spent especially cheerfully and freely by young people. In some places, holiday weeks were timed to coincide with Christmas, New Year or Easter.

Husband removed golovushka!

You let me down for a visit,

On gostinu, on nedelyushku

On the native side,

To the parent to the father,

To the desired mother. (Sobolevsky)

Verbs with the root gost-both in songs and in epics are low-frequency, but in the epic they are more diverse - to stay, stay, treat, treat.

They feasted and treated us.

Exactly sem-de-den. (Hilferding)

While in the lyrical song one verb form is marked to stay: "I vechor was a guest" (Sobolevsky).

A characteristic feature of folklore is tautological combinations of words of different parts of speech with the specified root: "I will call a guest" (Sobolev); "You have a guest on a visit", "Yes, you have a guest in the tower" (Hilferding).

It is interesting that in the northern songs the word guest has never been used as an address, but in the epic text, on the contrary, it is quite a regular phenomenon:

Go you guests to their homes,

Now I don't have time to visit you guys.

Ah the same guests bazhenye kind,

Ah ruseiskie silnii mighty bogatyrs! (Hilferding)

Thus, our observations allow us to speak about the semantic diversity of the word guest in Russian folklore, about the priorities in the lyrical and epic genres, and about the richness of the word-forming nest with the top guest in oral folk art.

Kursk

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