The name of the" mistress " of the Sayan taiga, Agafya Karpovna Lykova, has become popular in recent years. The interest of journalists, scientists, writers and just curious people does not weaken to this day. In turn, Agafya seeks to communicate with people "from the world". Meetings in the taiga on the Khat River (a tributary of the Abakan River) with relatives and acquaintances are usually short-lived. After such meetings, letters written by Agafya Lykova usually fly to different parts of the country. They are addressed to everyone Agafya needs. Many letters from the taiga are received by the writer L. S. Cherepanov. We are publishing one of them.

Observations of the letters have shown that they may be of scientific interest. So, all letters are written in semi-articulate handwriting (a letter in "printed" letters without a slope) and are a kind of everyday, personal gramotka-letters. Unlike the charter - the most ancient type of writing (XI-XIII centuries) - a semi-statute, as a rule, strives not for beauty, solemnity, but for the convenience of writing and speeding up the writing process. From the middle of the XIV century, the semi-ustav began to be used as a new type of Old Russian writing. It was this type of writing that was preserved in Russia until the XVIII century. In the XVIII-XIX centuries, a new bright phenomenon appeared in the east of our country (the Urals, Siberia) - peasant Old Believer writing.

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Our observations show that all Lykova's letters are written in a good narrative style. The language of the letters is simple, close to everyday colloquial, devoid of rhetorical embellishments and heavy imitations of the Old Russian book style. All letters contain characteristic features of the epistolary genre. In their "classic" form, they are divided into three parts: the beginning, the" business " part (disclosure of the topic, content) and the conclusion (ending).

In the beginning, the author usually turns to God, then the author's name is indicated and to whom this letter is addressed.

In the" business " part of the letter, Agafya Lykova writes about herself; raises certain issues that arise in the Siberian taiga; makes a particular request to the addressee; provides the necessary information, etc.

The end usually confirms the authorship and indicates the date of writing the letter.

As already mentioned, letters are written in a semi-joint, or rather a straight half-joint. By the nature of writing words, they can be attributed to the peasant Old Believer type of writing that developed in Siberia in the XVIII-XIX centuries - during the mass migration of Old Believers. A characteristic feature of this type of writing is the graphic division of the text into words using spaces, as, for example, in modern writing, although in the charter and semi-charter, as is known, the text was not divided into words by spaces. In A. Lykova's letters, prepositions, conjunctions, and particles followed by significant words form a graphically unified whole.

It should be noted that similar patterns of writing were also found in cursive manuscripts of the XVII century, where there was already a division of the text into words using spaces. But it wasn't until the 18th century that the division of text into words using spaces became widespread and mandatory. Until then, the combined spelling of words was not considered illiterate. In our opinion, the following historical fact is also interesting: Peter I wrote without dividing the text into words using spaces at the beginning of the XVIII century.

The description of the letter type by A. Lykova will be incomplete if nothing is said about its graphic and spelling features. Observations show that various methods of word reduction are quite common in emails. In general, abbreviated spellings were characteristic of the entire system of Old Russian writing. As a rule, words denoting the main and most frequently encountered religious concepts were reduced. In the letters of A. Lykova, they are abbreviated.

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The method of shortening is that when writing a word, letters indicating vowels and consonants, as well as some median combinations of letters, are omitted. Over the abbreviated word A. Lykova puts a special sign in the form of a dash with curved ends or a bow-titlo. Under the title, she writes words denoting religious concepts: god, saints, father, pray, lady, Mother of God, bless.

In addition to the mentioned method of shortening words, in A. Lykova's letters, you can also notice such a technique as putting letters above the line, usually at the end of the line, when there is not enough space. It is noted that writing letters above the line is allowed by the author of letters in a strictly defined position - only at the end of the line. Don't put a title sign above the extension letter. These techniques used by A. Lykova bring her type of writing closer to semi-articular writing, where the removal of letters was rare and practically did not expand the positions in which the letters were pronounced (for example, in the middle of a word).

A few words should be said about superscripts. In A. Lykova's letters, arches are used over the letters denoting vowel sounds. They are usually placed over the initial vowel of a word (the absolute beginning of the word), as well as over the second of two adjacent vowels. Superscript characters also include the title that was mentioned earlier.

In addition to the listed features of the letter of A. Lykova, we can also note those that are associated with the methods of graphic designation of letters. So, for the graphic designation of the vowel sound [o], Agafya uses two letters: o and w (omega). Omega spellings are usually found in the preposition from at the beginning of a word and after vowels.

It should also be noted that there is such a phenomenon as graphic dissimilation, i.e. the author's desire not to write two identical letters side by side when the same phonemes meet. Cf. the following spellings: co\mbts1ayu, agafsh. It should be noted that until the end of the XIV century in Old Russian orthography there was a rule for using the o-w doublets: it was impossible to write after the consonants w, in other cases it was possible (but it was also possible to write o). Since the end of the XIV century, the norm for writing o - w doublets has changed: now it was impossible to write o after vowels and at the beginning of words, but after consonants it was possible (but it was also possible to write w). Similar rules applied to the vowels and and 7. For example, in the letters of A. Lykova, the doublets mi/ are found at the beginning of words, after vowels and consonants.

It is known that the Old Russian texts used the doublets ou-u-K.. The letters of A. Lykova are the most revealing in this series

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the use of S, and y is rarely written: only at the beginning of a word or as a preposition. This usage in A. Lykova's letters is almost unique.

To convey [ja] and [a] after soft consonants in letters, the letter a is used, which corresponds to the modern letter i. It should be noted that in ancient Russian writing, there were "synonymous" relations between the letters a and ga. Let us add that the" synonymous " letter ga, which was used to transmit the sound [ja], is absent in A. Lykova's letters.

In addition to the letters a and ga, the Old Russian script also used the" synonymous " letters e and k (yotirovanny b). So, with the help of k, the sound [je] was usually transmitted, and e - [e], although the meaning of b was much broader, i.e. with the help of e, the sounds [je] and [e] could be transmitted with the softness of the preceding consonant phoneme. Our observations have shown that in A. Lykova's letters k is not used, but in both meanings [je] and [e] e is written.

It is known that until 1918, the letter B was used in Russian writing, pronounced as the sound [e]. The letter B appeared in the common Slavic era. Over time, B coincides with the sounds [e] and [i], which is reflected in the monuments of ancient Russian writing. In A. Lykova's letters, the letter-v is rarely used, but cases of mixing letters prevail ?B and E.

In modern Russian writing, the letters b and b are used as delimiters. However, in the Old Russian language, these letters appeared in the meaning of reduced vowel sounds - very short sounds pronounced in a weakened voice. However, [b] and [b] were pronounced differently: in one position they sounded more clearly and came closer, respectively, to the sounds [o] and [e], in the other - the clarity of pronunciation decreased, weakened. Changes in the pronunciation of the reduced vowels [b] and [b] led to the fact that since the end of the XI century, weak reduced sounds have lost their existence. Their disappearance is evidenced by numerous omissions of weak [b] and [b] on the letter. This linguistic trait can also be traced in the letters of A. Lykova. In addition, they contain words that use the letters b and b, apparently, only as signs, and not as reduced vowels. Although, in our opinion, the meaning of such spellings b and b can be understood only in the course of discussing the issue related to the morphological and phonemic interpretation of the use of reduced vowels by A. Lykova.

The spelling vyzbe (in the hut), vyzbu(in the hut) also attracts attention. Similar spellings are found in Old Russian manuscripts as early as the 14th century. As historians of the Russian language note, this is the spelling with s

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it already conveyed the loss of the weak reduced [b] in the preposition, and the transition [i] after the hard consonant to [s]. However, in one letter we also found the spelling kizbe, kikonam. This may indicate that in some cases in the speech of A. Lykova, [i] after a hard consonant does not go to [s].

We have already said that [b] and [b] were pronounced differently in the Old Russian language. In the strong position, the reduced ones coincided with the vowels of the full formation: [b] with [o], and [b] with [e]. This eventually led to a connection between the transition of the original Old Russian reduced vowels [b] and [b] to [o] and [e] and the development of full-voiced combinations-oro -, - er -, - olo -, - barely-. In the letters of A. Lykova, there are spellings of words only with full-voiced combinations. Here are typical examples: head, cold, agorod, napohorony, go-rod, vseret (in the meaning of "in the middle"), up (in the meaning of "in the middle"). These are the features of the designation of reduced vowels in the letters of A. Lykova.

It is known that many Cyrillic letters were ligatures, i.e. they were a combination of two letters: ga, (a, k, kk, r, t"!. In the letters of A. Lykova, a ligature is very often used (a combination of the letters sh, which corresponds to the letter sh in modern Russian graphics).

Consider the observance of the syllabic principle of graphics after the letters w, w, h, i/ i and, in the letters of A. Lykova. So, after or w, the following vowels are used: a, o, e,/, and . Once there was also the spelling of the letter s after w - in the word mice. After h and such vowel letters as a, u, e, i, and O. are used. Occasionally, the letters a and I are written after h - in the words sad, at night, safely. Normally, after c are written a, b, s, S. For example: mesetsa, kkoni, bogoroditsey, saperatsy, nauli, petnatsatago.

When you get acquainted with ancient manuscripts, you usually pay attention to the Old Slavonic combinations zt*i, / ct"!,; gy, which by the XI century on the letter began to be transmitted as gi, ki, hi. Observations show that A. Lykova prefers writing with gi, ki, and chi.

A characteristic spelling feature of ancient Russian monuments is the use of various Old Slavonic forms. Among them, for example, the forms of adjectives in the genitive singular case, written with the endings-ago, - iago (for example:

new, blue). Old Slavonic forms of adjectives are often found in the letters of A. Lykova. Here are typical examples: vslkago, dshevnago.

The punctuation system of Old Russian manuscripts has been studied so far

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not enough. Methods for analyzing individual features of punctuation placement have not been developed. Therefore, in relation to A. Lykova's letters, there is no need to talk about the punctuation system. As a rule, the author of emails dispenses with periods and commas. The absence of punctuation marks makes it difficult to understand the text. In the seventeenth-century manuscript tradition, the absence of lowercase characters was usually compensated for by the use of paragraphs, which were often the only means of semantic division of the text. There are no paragraphs in A. Lykova's letters. These spelling features, in our opinion, need additional consideration and further clarification.

One conclusion, however, is worth dwelling on. We believe that the division of letter texts into words using spaces replaces punctuation marks - dots and commas, i.e. the basis of punctuation is the actual communicative division of the sentence into words that can be combined into syntagmas (minimal semantic-syntactic and rhythmic-intonation units of speech), at the end of which the punctuation mark is set, although not always occurs, but is always possible. In addition, the actual communicative division of the sentence was also the basis of Old Russian punctuation. This tradition of Old Russian punctuation is still preserved in A. Lykova's letters. Note that the comma as a punctuation mark appeared in Russian manuscripts of the 15th century and was originally used in the same sense as the period.

The commas found in A. Lykova's letters resemble only elements of punctuation, which over time can turn into a complete system of rules for using this punctuation mark on a letter (similar to what we have in modern Russian punctuation). Here is an example of setting a comma in one of A. Lykova's letters:

"while the helicopter was loaded, but they talked somnoi, that adna, said kakby zhenshin at least but take off saying that Galina Ivanovna zhalat but they told me to write to her, and write to her and then write to you-sava noapet will come to nakair and send letters while flying if 6dt takes out."

Thus, the observations made on the graphic and spelling features of A. Lykova's letters give grounds for the following conclusions. The letters of A. Lykova convincingly testify to the existence of a developed written language that once developed on the basis of the Russian Old Believers proper, showing how versatile and wide the possibilities of the peasant Old Believers ' type of writing are in our time. In addition, the letters allow us to better understand the norms of speech etiquette associated with

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influence of Old Russian speech culture (memorized etiquette beginnings and endings). Written by a skilled scribe, such as A. Lykova, texts of business content can be handwritten monuments of folk colloquial (dialect) speech. The alphabetic-alphabetic composition of A. Lykova's letters, which goes back to the Cyrillic writing system that existed until the beginning of the XVIII century, determines all the graphic and spelling features of living written speech.

Kazan

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