Yuras Bushlyakov wrote about the word "search" and synonyms in 2004.

His perception of these words in the modern language was partly confirmed by time.

However, something should be added.

Search

Perhaps this is unexpected for modern Belarusian speakers, but the word

search

was a stable legal term in the Old Belarusian language:

ѡбыискъ вчинити

(read as

обыйск учинити

, Statute of the Central Government of 1566).

Monosyllabic:

seek

(including in the sense of "getting one's own" —

seek revenge

),

seek

.

According to etymologists, already in modern times the word

search

reappeared in the Belarusian language as a borrowing from Russian.

It was used by the classics of the interwar period (Kolas, Zaretskyi, Mriy - as a rule, in the gendarme-police sense), it was in the terminological dictionaries of the Institute of Belarusian Culture in the 1920s.

But the authoritative dictionary of S. Nekrashevich and M. Baikov does not include it among the equivalents of the Russian "search".

S. Nekrashevich, M. Baikov.

Russian-Belarusian dictionary.

Minsk: BDV, 1928

The reason is that over the centuries, the verb "to search" in the Belarusian language has been replaced by another - "to search".

The word "search" or "search" in some languages ​​has only one specific meaning - "to look for a louse in the head" (although, in Polotsk languages, on the contrary, it is precisely "to search" for a louse, as Piotr Sadovsky testifies).

As a result, the word

search

was left without word-forming support.

Search

A relatively new word in the Belarusian language, it is not in dictionaries.

But it is used in the Internet space five times more often than

search

.

We will find it in the authors of the diaspora and in Karatkevich, it was recommended by the expert on language culture Ales Kaurus.

True,

obshuk

looks like a tracing from

obysk

, where the root is replaced by the one familiar to modern languages.

At the same time, the verb

to search

is old, widely used, recorded in dictionaries.

Therefore, the word

search

is not perceived as foreign.

About the nuances of its meaning in today's living language - the observation of Sergey Dubauts, who reread many documentary evidences about the events of 2020:

It is interesting how organically the Belarusian language developed the concepts of "search" and "search".

The first is personal, and the second is in an apartment, office or cell.

And in Russian only "search".

Consequences of the search in the editorial office of the newspaper "Nasha Niva"

And indeed: we would rather say "they searched him" about a person, but the room is being searched.

Search

To shake, to shake

are old folk verbs.

Their first meaning is constructional:

to shake the house

meant to rearrange, rebuild.

But long ago, and now mostly, they mean "to search, shaking and overturning everything":

They searched him, searched

all

his pockets, very carefully reviewed all the pieces of paper he had, took all the money

(Yakub Kolas)

After shaking the house, the attic, all the attics in it, they did not think to move the board

[behind which was the safe] in the hall (V. Adamchyk)

The corresponding noun in speech has the form

peretrus, peretruska, trus, truska, trýchy

(so in Tishka Gartny).

But the main option was

the search

.

It is recorded in the Polish-Belarusian dictionary by Ya. Volkova and V. Avilava (2005, official spelling), the English-Belarusian dictionary by V. Pashkevich (2006, classic spelling).

I think that the folk word

search

very vividly conveys the essence and physical characteristics of the ritual.

The frequency of use of the word

search

(as well as the word

grab

) has grown significantly in recent years.

What the folk characters of Sauk and Hryshka remind us of together with Levon Volsky:

We are always threatened


with arrest or search


in that strange country


called Belarus.

According to Google, the word

search

occurs 103,000 times in the Internet space — an order of magnitude more often than

search

.

Some readers of social networks even suggested

the search

as the "Belarusian word of the year" for 2021 and 2022.

But he was not chosen, and that's good.

After all, this word will definitely return to its niche - as an ordinary legal procedural term.

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"Belarusian with Vintsuk Vyachorka" is an author's column where evaluations and opinions do not necessarily reflect the position of the editors.

  • Vintsuk Vyachorka

    Born in Brest in 1961. As a linguist, he studied the language of publications of Western Belarus during the interwar period, initiated the modern arrangement of Belarusian classical spelling, contributed Belarusian programs and reading books for preschool institutions.

    An active participant in the national movement, starting with "Maistrovni" and "Talaki" in the 1980s.

    Author and contributor of popular science texts and books, including about national symbols.

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