The works and activities of R. I. Avanesov, a prominent Russian dialectologist, historian of the Russian language, organizer of many useful scientific endeavors, teacher of more than one generation of Russian scientists, have been repeatedly evaluated by contemporaries throughout the XX century. And the scientist himself, who also has a very refined writing style, told a lot about himself in the memoirs of his mentors. "My interest in the history of the Russian language," he wrote in the 1970s, " in Russian dialectology, in descriptive and historical phonetics of the Russian language, in orthoepy, phonology, and spelling theory was developed by my wonderful teachers. And if in these areas of the science of the Russian language I managed to create something and train my own students working in the same field, then I owe this mainly to two remarkable Russian people and major Russian scientists-Dmitry Nikolaevich Ushakov and Afanasy Matveyevich Selishchev" (cit. ed.: Stepanov Yu. S. On the 75th anniversary of the birth of Corresponding member of the USSR Academy of Sciences Ruben Ivanovich Avanesov // Izvestiya AN SSSR. Literature and Language Series, vol. 36, No. 1, 1977, p. 91).

R. I. Avanesov lived a long and difficult life, having passed through many cataclysms of the history of the fatherland, but remained true to his own

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your vocation. Our contemporaries, and perhaps our descendants, have yet to put together the legacy of the scientist, make a commentary worthy of his work, find archives and those grains of his linguistic talent that are scattered in numerous public and private collections. It is about them (i.e., using these new data) that we will discuss in our short biographical sketch.

Ruben Ivanovich Avanesov was born in Shusha (Nagorny Karabakh) in Azerbaijan on February 1 (14), 1902. For some time he studied at the famous Lazarev Institute of Foreign Languages, and after its closure he graduated in 1919. Soviet Labor School. He received further education at the Faculty of History and Philology of Moscow University, from which he was initially forced to leave, unable to combine his studies with work. He entered the Department of Literature and Language of the Faculty of Social Sciences for the second time in 1922 and graduated in 1925 with a degree in Slavic-Russian Linguistics. At the same time, the first independent scientific experiments of R. I. Avanesov and expedition trips to collect dialectological data belong to the same period. He told about one of them in a letter to a close friend E. E. Tager, later a well-known literary critic, author of articles and monographs on artists and sculptors:

"I came to Pereslavl last night. For five days I left to travel with M. I-chem (the initials indicated could not be deciphered) around the county. We walked together for about 100 versts. I was engaged in dialectology, he was engaged in archeology-he did excavations and went to churches-they were looking for old icons - they made interesting acquisitions for the museum. Our journey on foot was not without adventure; we went through the woods - in one place we got lost, almost had to spend the night in the forest - and there are a lot of wolves and snakes. It wasn't without booze, either - in one village, M. I. and I drank moonshine together with a local priest. M. I. didn't drink much, but I competed with the priest, the dean, and Fr.Vasily (who is the most famous drunkard in the district). I competed very well and thought I was winning. But then, all of a sudden (I didn't remember anything and didn't find out until the next morning), the affair ended in a most shameful defeat. (...) there were other adventures" (RGALI. F. 2887. Op. 1. Ed. hr. N 317. Ll. 1-1 vol.). The scientific side of the trip was described by him in one of the first articles "On the dialect of the Pereslavl-Zalessky uyezd of the Vladimir province" (1927).

The main interests of the young scientist lay in the plane of historical and applied linguistics, the more interesting it seems to turn to another element-research on Russian literature. In 1922, he published a large article entitled "Dostoevsky in his work on the Double", which revealed the multifaceted talent of R. I. Avanesov

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on a different plane - as a fine stylist and connoisseur of Russian classics. Now hardly anyone will remember this, but in his youth he was connected with such a luminary of literary studies as Professor P. N. Sakulin. An interesting document of those years has been preserved, which also gives personal evidence of the scientist about the fate of his family. In a letter to P. N. Sakulin in 1924, he writes:: "Dear Pavel Nikitich, I would very much like you to excuse me for not being able to attend the meeting today: my brother and sister are going abroad, far away (to Paris) and for a long time, and I, who bear the whole organizational burden of their move, cannot but accompany them" (RGALI. F. 444. Op. 1. Ed. hr. N 60. l. 1).

Much later, we found another fact that speaks about R. I. Avanesov's long-standing research and human interests in belles lettres. In a letter to the famous Soviet writer L. P. Grossman (1958), he dropped: "I know and love you from the first days of my student years, when I became under the guidance of the late Nikolai Leontyevich (apparently, Brodsky. - O. N.) study Dostoevsky. My colleagues and I have attended all your reports and speeches and considered you one of the most brilliant and talented literary critics. However, I got to know you personally much later" (RGALI. F. 1386. Op. 2. Ed. hr. N 163. L. 1). Finally, here is another document. In a 1923 letter to his student friend E. B. Tager, later a well-known literary critic, he wrote: "I do absolutely nothing. However, I went to the history department every day, but, to tell the truth, I didn't go to study, but for completely different purposes: I just went to sit and talk with a very nice librarian (a student of the archeology department). Now (from the 1st ) she no longer works in the library (but in another department), so I seem to bring my "academic studies".

I have just read Al. Tolstoy's "Walking in Torment". Have you read it? I really liked it. I am too lazy to write about this novel, because only yesterday I wrote about it in detail to Lila (Lydia Moiseevna Polak-the wife of R. I. Avanesov. - O. N.). If you haven't read it, I strongly advise you to read it" (RGALI. F. 2887. Op. 1. Ed. hr. N 45. Ll. 1 vol. - 2).

For many years, R. I. Avanesov has been working in secondary schools, at workfacts and at the workers 'university, creating school textbooks:" Working Book on the Russian Language "(together with P. Krivorotenkov and L. B. Perlmutter, 1928), " Collection of spelling exercises for primary educational schools of adults "(1929), " Syntax, Punctuation, stylistics. Educational book on the Russian language "(together with L. B. Perlmutter and V. N. Sidorov, 1930), " Grammar of the Russian language for the 6th grade of secondary school "(together with L. B. Perlmutter and V. N. Sidorov, 1932), " Russian language. Grammar and spelling. Textbook for schools of the illiterate" (1933) and others.

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In 1931-1933, R. I. Avanesov was an employee of the Research Institute of Linguistics under the People's Commissariat of Education of the RSFSR, and from 1932 to 1947, he was head of the Russian Language Department of the V. P. Potemkin Moscow City Pedagogical Institute. It was in those years that V. N. Sidorov, P. S. Kuznetsov, and A. A. Reformatsky worked together with him - the core of the future Moscow phonological School. In 1935, R. I. Avanesov was confirmed in the academic rank of professor and in the academic degree of Candidate of Philological sciences without defending his dissertation. By that time, he already had considerable experience in research and expedition work in the field of the history of the Russian language and dialectology, his works were published: "Spelling reform in connection with the problem of the written language" (co-authored with V. N. Sidorov, 1930), "Dialects of the Upper Povetluzhye. Phonetics and dialectological groups" (co-authored with V. N. Sidorov, 1931), numerous textbooks, methodological developments.

A special page in the life and work of R. I. Avanesov is cooperation with D. N. Ushakov. The beginning of this was laid from the time of studying at Moscow State University. Dmitry Nikolaevich attracted the young graduate to work in the Moscow Dialectological Commission, of which he had been a member since 1925. Then there was joint work in the system of the USSR Academy of Sciences: D. N. Ushakov invited R. I. Avanesov to the Slavic Languages Sector of the Institute of Language in Writing, which was organized in 1939, where he was one of the most active participants, organizer of many trips to collect dialect data, etc. around D. N. Ushakov, they contributed to the development of creative intuition and the improvement of scientific methods of R. I. Avanesov.

We were able to get acquainted with the minutes of the pre-war Sector meetings. Here are some of our observations. At the first meeting on September 3, 1939, R. I. Avanesov proposed "to outline the following works on dialectology:: 1) organization of expeditions, 2) compilation of maps and monographs, 3) compilation of bibliography" (Archive of the Russian Academy of Sciences. F. 502. Op. 3. Ed. hr. N 150. L. 2). He actively worked together with other members of the Sector on the compilation of a dialectological map of the Ryazan region and the description of individual dialects, on "Regional Dictionary of the Russian language".

The preserved plans of the Ushakov boys for studying the history of the Russian language still impress with their novelty, breadth of data, and experimental approaches. So, in the plan of the Slavic Languages Sector for 1940, the following topics were listed: a selection of materials (50,000 cards), drawing up a preliminary plan and instructions for the " Regional Dictionary of the Russian Language "(heads-R. I. Avanesov and S. I. Ozhegov), a monographic description of individual Russian dialects-the study of dialects on the Pre River in the Spassky district of the Rya-

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Russian dialects (R. I. Avanesov), dialects of Melekhovsky (V. N. Sidorov) and Mozharsky (P. S. Kuznetsov) districts of the Ryazan region, the problem of classification of South Great Russian dialects in connection with the study of dialects of the Volkhovsky district of the Orel region (A.M. Sukhotin), etc. In his speech on January 10, 1940, at a meeting of the Sector headed by D. N. Ushakov, R. I. Avanesov emphasized the importance of studying the dialects of the Ryazan region: "More (...) Budde once said that the Ryazan region is very interesting. The institute is thinking of organizing scouting trips. The study is expected to start in the summer of this year and cover the territory not within the modern Ryazan Region, but within the Ryazan Principality within a few years. The material will provide an opportunity to reconsider the point of view on the formation of transitional dialects. The map will be a supplement" (Archive of the Russian Academy of Sciences. f. 502. Op. 3. Ed. hr. N 150. L. 15). In the plan of the Sector for 1941 in the field of works on dialectology, R. I. Avanesov was listed as "The problem of the genesis of Central Russian dialects" (6 author's sheets by December 1, 1941) (Ibid., p. 70). And the last meeting was held on the eve of the war - June 21, 1941.

The pre-war period was very fruitful for R. I. Avanesov. In addition to the known data, RGALI and the Archive of the Russian Academy of Sciences have preserved other materials related to the scientist's activities in those years. These are A. M. Sukhotin's" Review of the Rules for Punctuation Marks " (1935), D. N. Ushakov's "Questions of Russian Literary Pronunciation" (article 1937), R. I. Avanesov's letters to D. N. Ushakov, topics for special courses, and much more. One of the first experiments in the field of orthoepy, which later developed into the classic book "Russian Literary Pronunciation", which lasted until the mid-1980s.6 editions. The thoughts expressed by R. I. Avanesov back in 1937 are still very new and relevant: "The exclusive attention of our school to spelling is clear: illiteracy should be eliminated as soon as possible. But the time has long come to raise the culture of oral speech and, in particular, to develop correct pronunciation.

Correct pronunciation, as well as correct writing, are essential aspects of a literary language. Their tasks are to bypass all the individual features of speech, as well as the features of local dialects, to be a means of broadest communication. Therefore, learning to pronounce correctly is just as necessary as learning to spell. Conscious cultivation of correct pronunciation (at school, on the radio, on the stage, in movies) is of great practical importance in introducing the illiterate masses of working people to the literary language ( ... ) " (Archive of the Russian Academy of Sciences. F. 502. Op. 5. Ed. chr. N 1. Ll. 3-4).

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The hard years of the war scattered the "Ushakov boys" in cities and towns of Russia. D. N. Ushakov, together with the Institute of Language and Writing, ended up in Tashkent, A.M. Sukhotin - in Ulyanovsk, R. I. Avanesov - in Kozmodemyansk (on the Volga), where he spent a year. This period is vividly evidenced by the scientist's own account in his letter to V. V. Vinogradov dated February 18, 1943:" (...) I worked at the Mari Pedagogical Institute. There was a lot of work, and it wasn't interesting. Living conditions there are uneven, but in general, there was little attractive. The most difficult part was the low-cultural environment, the quarrelsome team (true, the institute squabbles did not concern us, but this is unpleasant). Therefore, when the University moved to Sverdlovsk and it was possible to return to it (i.e., to the former IFLI) "I did it willingly. Here, too, it is not easy for us in everyday life. It has its own peculiar difficulties, which are long and uninteresting for you to write about. But otherwise I am happy: the work is interesting, my own team, my own faculty, where I worked for many years, our cultural environment in Moscow, many friends.

During this time, I worked as much as I could (although almost without books, mostly based on my own materials) - I dealt with several issues of Slavic phonetics of the prehistoric era, several issues of historical phonetics of the Russian language (partly in connection with my dialectological observations), the question of the origin and composition of Middle Great Russian dialects, on the classification of r [Us] dialects in connection with the more general question of the classification of dialects in general. Now I am busy (in my free hours - and there are few of them, t[ak] k [ak] very much time is spent on all sorts of household chores) with this last question. If you only knew how shaky the classification of r [Us] dialects is and how illogical their allocation is! According to what principle, for example, are the sr[edne] v[eliko] r[Us] dialects distinguished? Or-y[zhno] v[eliko] r [usskiye] dialects? There are no clear principles. If we also establish the signs that the presence of kot [ory]x allows us to attribute this dialect to a particular r [Us] group, then something will "move" from its place - the scope of the concepts of "wed[edne] v[el-ko] r[Us] dialects" and "yu[zhno]-in[eliko] r [Us] dialects".

Among the questions of phonetics of the r [Us] language, I will note the question of the "transition" of e to o, which I did last year. Based on some of my observations on modern dialects, as well as other materials, I am trying to give a new explanation of this phenomenon. Shakhmatov's explanation (which mostly goes back to Fortunatov) it doesn't seem satisfactory to me right now. I would love to tell you my thoughts and suggestions and give you some advice. Unfortunately, in an email, this is not possible. He also studied the history of I and y (the history of their functional convergence), the percussive vocalism of the r [Us] language, and noted some details in the types

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yu [zhno] v [eliko] r[usskogo] yakan'ya, and also put in order and processed his dialectological materials of the two pre-war years" (Archive of the Russian Academy of Sciences. F. 1602. Op. 1. Ed. chr. N 128. Ll. 1-1 vol. and further).

Past grievances and disagreements were forgotten in the depths of inhuman trials and suffering. Everyone who had the opportunity to help a colleague in the "philological workshop" and felt such a desire responded to the news of others. So R. I. Avanesov in his letters to N. M. Malysheva (V. V. Vinogradov's wife) inquires about the fate of Viktor Vladimirovich, with whom, we note, until the end of his life there were very difficult relations. But here, in these words of his-how much sincerity, understanding of human problems! Here are the lines from a letter dated May 13, 1943: "I really want to know about your prospects. I asked Vict [ora] Vl [adimirovich] cha and I ask you to write to me in Moscow. Is there anything I can do to help you with your Moscow affairs? You know. Nadezhda Matveevna, these are not empty words. I would be very happy if I could bring your return to Moscow even a little closer or improve your life outside of Moscow for now. Write to me, do not hesitate, about everything. I'm afraid that Vict[or] Vladimir Vladimirovich, based on our fundamental disagreements in some areas, may not want to contact me. In my opinion, principles are principles, and personal relationships are personal relationships. And I don't think any fundamental differences can interfere with good, friendly relations. I don't even have any disagreements with you. In addition to great sympathy, great attraction to you (no matter how different we are externally in character - but your eccentricity and kinks of the soul are very close to me), love, respect and even almost worship - I have no other feelings for you" (Archive of the Russian Academy of Sciences. F. 1602. Op. 1. Ed. chr. N 528. L. 1).

After the war, R. I. Avanesov was actively involved in the development of phonological theory. In 1948, he successfully defended his doctoral dissertation. At the same time, program articles of the scientist are published: "Questions of language formation in its dialects "(1947), "On the system of phonetic transcription when collecting materials for the dialectological atlas of the Russian language" (1947), "Essays on dialectology of the Ryazan Meshchera. 1. Description of one dialect along the Pra River "and others, as well as" Programs for collecting information for compiling a dialectological atlas of the Russian language".

In the works of R. I. Avanesov in the 1940s, the concept of linguistic geography as a science was put forward and substantiated, and a number of controversial issues in the field of historical linguistics were theoretically substantiated. He " for the first time in our linguistics systematized and published a phonological description of the dialect language and published it in the form of a book "Essays on Russian Dialectology "(part 1. Moscow, 1949). R. I. Avanesov became, thus, one of the founders of the Moscow School of Linguistics.-

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Kovo Phonological school" (Stepanov Yu. S. Edict. op. p. 92). In this book, the scientist acts not only as the initiator of a new method of descriptive dialectology, but also as a consistent proponent of a systematic approach to the analysis of linguistic phenomena. In the preface to his work, he writes:: "In foreign linguistic science, there is a fairly widespread opinion about the incompatibility of studying a language as a system, on the one hand, and as an object of dialectology, in particular linguistic geography, on the other. Such an opinion is wrong. The modern Russian language in its national, literary form and local dialects and dialects forms a complex system that includes general and particular features, features of unity and differences of different degrees of dialect division" (Avanesov R. I. Essays on Russian Dialectology, Part 1. Moscow, 1949. p. 3).

In 1958, R. I. Avanesov was elected a corresponding member of the USSR Academy of Sciences. On his shoulders lay a truly titanic work on creating a dialectological atlas of Slavic languages. This idea was put forward by the scientist at the IV International Congress of Slavists in Moscow. "In his report at the Congress," writes V. V. Ivanov, " he formulated the theoretical foundations and principles of the atlas and outlined its boundaries. Ruben Ivanovich headed the work of the Commission of the Common Slavic Atlas ( ... ) " (Ivanov V. V. Ruben Ivanovich Avanesov (To the 75th anniversary of his birth) / / Russian language at School No. 1. 1977. p. 115). At the same time, the development of theoretical problems of dialectology and the history of Russian and Slavic languages continues on a wide geographical and chronological space (see, for example, his works: "Comparative historical method as a system of research methods for studying related languages "(1956), "Linguistic geography and language structure. On the principles of the Common Slavic Linguistic Atlas "(1958), "Descriptive Dialectology and Language History" (1963), "On two Aspects of the subject of dialectology" (1965), etc.

R. I. Avanesov initiated the publication of the Dictionary of the Old Russian Language of the XI-XIV centuries. In the 1960s, he prepared an introduction, instructions, a list of sources, and published test articles. He headed the team for the compilation and publication of this dictionary.

In 1968, R. I. Avanesov was awarded by the Presidium of the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences with the I. Dobrovsky Silver Medal "For Services to the development of Social Sciences". For many years, he was a member of the OLYA Bureau of the USSR Academy of Sciences, performing a large coordination work in the Commission on Dialectology. R. I. Avanesov was Chairman of the Commission of the General Slavic Linguistic Atlas, Chairman of the Scientific Council on Dialectology and History of the Russian Language, headed the Commission on Phonetics and Phonology of the OLYA Academy of Sciences of the USSR. Since 1967, he has served as Vice-President of the International Society of Phonetic Sciences. And in 1976, he was elected Vice-President.-

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President of the International Organization "Linguistic Atlas of Europe".

Students of R. I. Avanesov S. V. Bromley and L. N. Bulatova recall: "There are few scientists who would do as much for the training of scientific personnel as R. I. Avanesov did. He took part in this work both as a lecturer, as an author of textbooks for secondary and higher schools, and as a compiler of university programs in a number of linguistic disciplines. (...) More than 120 linguists working in scientific and higher educational institutions of our country and abroad have passed the school of R. I. Avanesov; 20 of them are already doctors of sciences" (Bromley S. V., Bulatova L. N. 70th anniversary of Ruben Ivanovich Avanesov // Proceedings of the USSR Academy of Sciences. Literature and Language Series, vol. 31, issue 3, 1972, p. 288).

The 100th anniversary of R. I. Avanesov's birth is marked by the preparation of the Avanesov Collection and the continuation of the famous series " Materials and Research on Russian Dialectology at the Vinogradov Institute of the Russian Language of the Russian Academy of Sciences, where the works of R. I. Avanesov's colleagues and students, as well as rare archival materials, will be presented.

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