gorodishka

[Alina Israeli]

The difference between gorodishka and gorodishko is the spelling of  
the final unstressed [a]. Clearly Lermontov and Pushkin lived before  
there was a standardized spelling, Academy dictionary etc. Old  
Pushking editions had various spelling of the same word on occasion.  
This may be contemporary convention: fem. nouns we spell -ishka, masc.  
nouns we spell -ishko. But there is not a single masc. noun listed in  
Zaliznjak in -ishka.

Now, domina was mentioned earlier. Such nouns are not terribly common  
either in Zaliznjak: голосина, животина, дождина кирпичина, мостина,  
and that's about all (unless I missed something). Moreover, Zaliznjak  
marks both genders next to these nouns which are all masculine without  
the suffix. Храмина, хренина are marked fem. This is augmentative - 
ina; singular -ina for abstract nouns (бисерина, изюмина) is always  
fem. for the abstract masc. nouns.

AI


Jun 16, 2011, в 9:22 PM, Kevin Windle написал(а):

> There may be very few inanimates, but gorodishka is another (in  
> addition to domina, cited by Denis). Authoritative editions of  
> Lermontov's Geroi nashego vremeni have: Taman' samyi skvernyi  
> gorodishka ...
>
>
>
> Google tells me, however, that some editions prefer -ishko: samyi  
> skvernyi gorodishko.
>
>

Alina Israeli
Associate Professor of Russian
LFS, American University
4400 Massachusetts Ave.
Washington DC 20016
(202) 885-2387 	fax (202) 885-1076
aisrael at american.edu

-------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Use your web browser to search the archives, control your subscription
  options, and more.  Visit and bookmark the SEELANGS Web Interface at:
                    http://seelangs.home.comcast.net/
-------------------------------------------------------------------------