народъ

Forms

народъ (narodŭ) m, o-stem^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Proto-Slavic *narodъ (“people”), a word of every Slavic language except Polabian.^[2][3][1] The same word is Russian народ (naród), Bulgarian народ (naród), Serbo-Croatian národ, Slovene národ, Czech národ and Polish naród, meaning nation and people, and in many of them also older senses such as birth or origin, offspring, generation, a crowd, and in a Russian dialect a herd.^[2][3]

ESJS takes it as a noun made from the verb Proto-Slavic *naroditi, of the prefix *na- and *roditi (“to give birth”), the source of родити.^[2] The prefix may have meant either the place one is born into, as in Old Czech “to be born onto the world”, or quantity, so that the noun first meant what is brought forth in numbers.^[2] Derksen analyses it instead as a prefixed noun of *na and *rodъ (“birth, kin”), the source of родъ, with the stress moved to the middle syllable by Dybo's law, and Wiktionary allows both analyses, which come to the same root.^[3][1] From “everything born” ESJS traces the senses kind or sex, generation, and tribe or nation, and compares Latin nātiō (“birth; race; tribe, nation”).^[2][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

In the Gospel codices народъ renders Ancient Greek ὄχλος (ókhlos, “crowd”): насꙑтити толико народа “to feed so great a crowd” (Mt 15, 33 Zogr Mar As), дивишѧ сѧ народи “the crowds marvelled” (Mt 9, 33 Zogr Mar As Sav).^[4][5]

Semantic evolution

In the canonical texts the word means a crowd or gathering of people, for ὄχλος, Ancient Greek πλῆθος (plêthos), Ancient Greek δῆμος (dêmos) and Ancient Greek λαός (laós), and once in the Codex Suprasliensis the world, for κόσμος.^[4][5] The phrases въ народѣ and прѣдъ народомь render δημοσίᾳ “in public”, and вьси народи renders παμπληθεί “all together”.^[5] Only in the Freising fragments does it mean generation or humankind.^[4] The sense tribe or nation, for Latin natio and gens, belongs to texts translated from Latin and to the Old Czech recension, as in оучеща и крстеща народи чешⸯкие (CMLab), and the Proglas addresses “all the Slavic people”, словѣньскъ народъ вьсь.^[4]

Church Slavonic passed the word to Romanian norod (“people, crowd”).^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. A crowd, multitude, throng; for ὄχλος, πλῆθος.^[4][5][1]
2. The people, the populace; for δῆμος, λαός.^[4][5]
3. A generation, humankind.^[4]
4. A tribe, a nation.^[4]

Related words

• родъ
• родити
• Russian народ (naród)

Usage notes

In Church Slavonic народъ is above all a crowd, for ὄχλος, as in видѣвъ же народы, милосердова ѡ нихъ (Mt 9, 36), not the nation or people of Russian народ.^[6]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Havlová, Eva; Erhart, Adolf; Janyšková, Ilona (eds.) (1989–2022), Etymologický slovník jazyka staroslověnského, 21 fascicles, Praha: Academia / Brno: Tribun EU, p. 530
3. ^ a b c Derksen, Rick (2008), Etymological Dictionary of the Slavic Inherited Lexicon, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 4, Leiden / Boston: Brill
4. ^ a b c d e f g h Kurz, Josef; Hauptová, Zoe (eds.) (1958–1997), Slovník jazyka staroslověnského / Lexicon linguae palaeoslovenicae, 4 vols. + supplements, Praha: Academia; digital ed. gorazd.org
5. ^ a b c d e Slovník nejstarších staroslověnských památek (digital ed., Gorazd, Slovanský ústav AV ČR, gorazd.org); cf. Cejtlin, R. M.; Večerka, R.; Blagova, É. (eds.) (1994), Staroslavjanskij slovar' (po rukopisjam X–XI vekov), Moskva: Russkij jazyk
6. ^ Sedakova, O. A. (2005), Slovar' trudnyx slov iz bogosluženija: cerkovnoslavjano-russkie paronimy, Moskva: Grēko-latinskij kabinet Ju. A. Šičalina