Remarks on Phonetics and Spelling of M. Lomonosov’s German Texts

Abstract

M. Lomonosov’s texts in German provide numerous examples of word spelling inconsistency, e. g. Freiheit/Freyheit, Dero/dero, etc. The influencing factors for this are Lomonosov’s individual style and the scientific and educational discourse of 18th century Russia. The research focuses on the alternation of g/h and g/сh. The alternation at the beginning of a morpheme (Staffengagen/Staffenhagen) can be explained by the similarity in the pronunciation of the German letters g and h in Russian educational tradition. As possible reasons for the alternation in the intervocal position after i (abziegen/abzihen) and ei (verzeigen/ Verzeigung/verzeihen), one can point at voicing of a voiceless consonant /h/ in the position between two vowels and Russian spiranta /ɤ/ functioning as a variant of the phoneme /g/. In the final position of a word, the alternation of g / ch is observed in adjectives with the suffix -lich, causing a deviation from the standard spelling in the words neulig and unmöglig. In this case, the explanation could lie in the fact that in the German language, two productive derivational suffixes -ig and -lich exist, similar in form and in semantics. Also in the German texts of Lomonosov one can find variants Petersburg/Petersburch with alternating g/сh at the end of a word. The tradition of substituting -urch for -urg in place names survives in Russian grammar textbooks for foreigners up to mid–19th century as Russian г is pronounced as /x/ at the end of some words. Refs 22.