Despite the fact that most companies opened today are created for...
Period, period, comma...
(From the history of punctuation)
Punctuation marks, which make it possible to say in writing much more than can be written down in letters, helping to express the different meanings of words and the feelings of the one who writes, seem so systematic and familiar that it seems that they have always existed and appeared along with alphabets. But of course this is not true.
The word itself punctuation comes from the Latin punctus - ‘point’. But this word originally had a completely different meaning than we give it now. Until the mid-17th century, punctuation was the use of dots near consonants to indicate vowel sounds in Hebrew text, while writing signs in Latin text was called dotting. And only in the middle of the 17th century. the word punctuation began to be used in its usual meaning.
Development of the punctuation system in Europe
The first evidence of the use of punctuation marks dates back to the 5th century. BC. Thus, the playwright Euripides marked the change in the speaking person with a pointed sign, possibly derived from lambda (<); философ Платон иногда заканчивал разделы своих книг знаком, аналогичным современному двоеточию.
The appearance of the first significant punctuation mark is associated with the name of the philosopher Aristophanes, who lived in the 4th century. BC. It was a paragraphos - a short horizontal line at the bottom at the beginning of the line. It was used to indicate a change in semantic meaning and, therefore, a new, fairly voluminous section of text, which even today we often call a paragraph, although we denote it with a different sign (§).
The use of punctuation marks to divide text into smaller meaningful segments began around the 2nd century BC. The grammarian and lexicographer Aristophanes of Byzantium, as the head of the Library of Alexandria, invented a system of three points: the point below - comma - was placed at the end of the shortest segment; the dot at the top - periodos - divided the text into large segments, and the dot in the center - colon - into medium ones.
There is an assumption that it was Aristophanes who invented many other punctuation marks, for example, the hyphen for writing compound words, the slash, which he placed next to words with an unclear meaning. Of course, these signs were not widely used and were used sporadically and rather haphazardly.
The first attempt to eliminate these inconveniences was made by the Anglo-Saxon scholar Alcuin (735-804), who led the court school in Aachen (now a city in Germany). In reforming Aristophanes' system, Alcuin made several additions. It was he who introduced punktum (.) and puktumversus (;) to indicate pauses and changes in intonation. But, despite these improvements, consistency in the use of signs was never achieved, and only in the 15th century. Venetian printer Aldus Manutius began to introduce signs of pauses, inhalation, and changes in intonation into the books he printed, and the most frequently used were periods, semicolons, and colons.
The first person in England to declare the role of punctuation marks in syntactic terms, that is, their use to determine the structure of a statement, was the English playwright Ben Jonson. He did this in his work “English Grammar” (late 16th century).
By the beginning of the 17th century. Most modern signs have already been put into use. The first edition of W. Shakespeare (1623) already uses a period, comma, semicolon, colon, question mark and exclamation mark. At the end of the century, quotation marks appeared in English punctuation.
History of Russian punctuation
At the beginning of its development, the Russian punctuation system was guided by the Greek, so the main punctuation mark was the dot. Initially, dots were placed arbitrarily, because texts were written for quite a long time without dividing into words and sentences. It could be one point (at the bottom, top or middle of the line) or a combination of them in different versions. Naturally, there were no rules. The meaning of the statement served as a guide, and dots were placed to highlight semantic parts. In addition to dots, in ancient Russian texts there were lines at the bottom of the line (_), serpents (~), as well as various combinations of lines and dots.
The first attempt to streamline the placement of punctuation marks on a semantic basis was made by M. Greek (XVI century). It was he who, in his work “On the literacy of Monk Maximus the Greek of the Holy Mountain declared for subtlety,” showed a desire to indicate the role of such signs as a period, and subdiastole - comma, and subdiastole with a dot - semicolon. The dot was supposed to indicate the end of the statement, the subdiastole was supposed to give the speaker a break when reading, and the sign subdiastole was recommended to indicate a question.
In the same era, articles by anonymous authors appeared in handwritten collections, which either only listed punctuation marks or gave a few tips on their use. Here is a description of such signs as a comma, a sub-column - comma (how they differed is difficult to establish; in addition, in some works a semi-colon was called a sub-column), kendema (the “sign” at the end of a statement), statiya (~,), etc.
End of the 16th - beginning of the 17th centuries. marked by the publication of printed grammars by Lavrenty Zizaniy (“Grammar of Slovensk...” 1596) and Melety Smotritsky “Grammar of Slovenian correct syntagma” (first edition in 1616, printed in Moscow in 1648), which played a certain role in the development of Russian punctuation system.
Lavrentiy Zizaniy speaks of six punctuation marks - these are the comma (,), the term (е), the two-term (:), the subframe (;), the connective (-), and the period. In determining the functions of punctuation marks by L. Zizaniy, the semantic principle is based on the completeness or incompleteness of the statement. The point is at the end of a complete whole. It is recommended to use comma, term and double as separators in the middle of a sentence. The under-tables are a sign of expressing interrogative intonation. Connective - a sign of word transfer (by the way, without saying anything about the syllabic division of words, L. Zizaniy in the examples given demonstrates taking into account their morphemic structure).
I.I. Sreznevsky rightly noted that “in the grammar of L. Zizania there is often a confusion of terms, commas and doubles, and in some cases the functions of terms and periods are not differentiated.” And yet, the desire to determine the place of each character in the text is a great merit of L. Zizaniya in the development of the punctuation system.
Meletiy Smotritsky has already identified ten “lowercase punctuations” - this is a bar (/), a comma (,), a colon (:), a dot (.), disjointed, unitary (-), interrogative (;), surprising (!), placeholder, call(). As you can see, the naming of punctuation marks is already somewhat different than that of L. Zizania.
M. Smotritsky’s use of “lowercase punctuation” is based on the intonation principle, taking into account the meaning of the statement. So, a trait is a short rest when reading; a comma allows the speaker to pause longer; a colon is used when not the whole thought is expressed, but only part of it, but the parts of the sentence are more independent than when separated by a comma; A period is placed at the end of a complete statement, a question mark is placed at the end of an interrogative statement; disjointed and united are signs of transference.
M. Smotritsky, for the first time in the history of Russian punctuation, identified three new signs: surprising, turn-down and place-holder, clearly defining their functions. Surprising - at the end of a sentence pronounced with a special (exclamatory) intonation; accommodative - includes a less independent part of the sentence; deferred - one that can be completely removed from the sentence.
Despite some imperfections in the description of the rules for using punctuation marks, M. Smotritsky’s grammar has long been the main textbook for students of grammar, spelling and punctuation of the Russian language of that era. Its significance has been repeatedly emphasized by such famous linguists as V.A. Bogoroditsky, V.V. Vinogradov and others.
The next serious stage in the development of Russian punctuation is associated with the name of V.K. Trediakovsky. In 1748, in St. Petersburg, his rather voluminous (460 sheets) work, known to this day, “A conversation between a foreigner and a Russian about ancient and new orthography and about everything that belongs to this matter,” was published. It is V.K. Trediakovsky who is credited with formulating the rules for using signs from the point of view of syntactic features; he established individual cases of the use of signs, taking into account the structure of a simple or complex sentence, with examples of argumentation for each position. In addition, V.K. Trediakovsky introduced a question mark into his text (although we find a description of its function in M.V. Lomonosov’s “Russian Grammar”) and introduced the use of the semicolon in the modern sense - no longer at the end of interrogative sentences, but to separate parts of a complex sentence and (sometimes) when addressing.
In the middle of the 18th century. “Russian Grammar” by M.V. Lomonosov is published. Chapter V of this work of the great scientist entitled “On Spelling” presents a brief theory of punctuation.
M.V. Lomonosov does not introduce new signs, but defines the basic principle of their use: taking into account not only the meaning of the sentence, but also the arrangement of parts, and the meaning of conjunctions, which serve “to pair and relate concepts.” Thus, in punctuation M.V. Lomonosov affirms two closely interrelated principles: semantic and syntactic. But M.V. Lomonosov failed to present complete and detailed rules for the use of punctuation marks. Thus, he defines the function of the comma only to separate homogeneous (“identical”) members of a sentence, but does not formulate other rules for using this sign.
Quotation marks appeared in the 17th century in the form of a quotation mark - “hook sign”, modern pronunciation and spelling with A appeared as a result of the development of akanya and its consolidation in writing.
The history of such a punctuation mark as a dash is interesting. Introduced into use by N.M. Karamzin, described in “Russian Grammar” by A.A. Barsov, where the silent sign was named, then the line, and later the sign of mental separation (A.Kh. Vostokov). All these are former names of the modern dash.
Further development of the punctuation system is aimed at a more detailed development of its foundations in different directions: logical (semantic), grammatical (syntactic) and intonation. “Despite the differences in views among representatives of different directions, what they have in common is the recognition of the communicative function of punctuation as an important means of formatting written speech.”
Thus, punctuation marks arose from the need to divide written text into independent segments (with a greater or lesser degree of independence) in accordance with the semantic structure of the statement. The first punctuation marks indicated pauses of varying lengths; With the development of writing and the spread of printing, the system of punctuation marks became more complex and deepened until it reached a state that is preserved in its basic features in modern European languages.
In Russian, the etymologically proper Slavic terms are such names as dot- the term is formed using suf. -к- (modern -к-) from exactly<…>, going back to t'ch, which is derived through the theme -ь- from the base t'k-, appearing in t'kati, t'knuti<…>; k front changed to h; comma- origin “from the verb comma - “to prevent, to delay.” Wed. cufflink, puto, obstacle” (please note that the word comma has the same root as the words punctuation mark, stutter, etc.); brackets, quotes(proper Russian) - “kovychka” - formation with the suffix -ьк- (modern -к-) from kovyk; k changed in the past - the word kovyka is still preserved in dialects - ‘interference, hitch’; trait- formed from the same stem as the verbs čersti, čertu - ‘to draw’. Of non-Slavic origin, the modern names of such punctuation marks as dash, hyphen, apostrophe, asterisk. Term dash borrowed in the 19th century from French. First recorded in Dahl's Dictionary. From French tiret - a dash, is derived from tirer - to pull. Word hyphen came into Russian punctuation from the German Divis from the Latin divisio - division, dismemberment. Apostrophe- from the Greek apostrophos - facing to the side or back. Asterisk(*) - from Greek aster - star; We prefer to call this sign the actual Russian word asterisk.
In the development of Russian punctuation, two features attract attention:
Despite the fact that punctuation marks are widely used throughout the world, in quantitative terms the system of punctuation marks has not reached its completeness. The regulatory documents defining the rules for placing punctuation marks in the Russian language contain 10 canonical characters: period, comma, semicolon, colon, dash, question mark, exclamation mark, ellipsis, parentheses, quotation marks, although in fact there are much more of them. As the practice of written speech shows, the hyphen is currently widely used; rarely, but still used are paragraph, slash, and asterisk. In recent years, opinions have been expressed about the adequacy of the names of such signs as two commas - as a single paired sign (in the excretory function), two dashes or a double dash - as a paired excretory sign. These signs serve for internal division of sentence 10
Punctuation marks have been around for a long time. But their number and rules of use gradually changed. There was a time when those writing in Russian made do with just one sign - a dot located in the middle of a line between groups of undivided words. Punctuation is an important means of formatting written speech: punctuation marks indicate its semantic division. At the same time, to a large extent, Russian punctuation is built on a syntactic basis, as the wording of most punctuation rules shows. All this gives the Russian punctuation system greater flexibility: along with mandatory rules, it contains instructions that do not have a strict normative nature and allow punctuation options associated not only with the semantic side of the written text, but also with its stylistic features. J. K. Grot believed that through basic punctuation marks “an indication of the major and minor connections between sentences, and partly between members of sentences” is given, which serves “to facilitate the reader’s understanding of written speech.”
Having analyzed Shapiro’s publication “Punctuation”, we can come to the conclusion that punctuation marks are signs that form a special part of the general graphic system of a given language and serve those aspects of written speech that cannot be expressed by letters and other written symbols (numbers, equal sign, similarity).
This definition of the role of punctuation marks is a modern generalized view. But how did Russian science come to it?
Ancient scribes did not use punctuation marks, and for a long time all words were written together. Punctuation originates in the 4th-5th centuries. when they start using space; the texts are designed so that each major period begins with a red line and a capital letter. Most Latin monuments are punctuated later.
To indicate the end of a sentence or phrase, a combination of dots and dashes was used: “syllable”, “article”, “verse”.
In the most ancient monuments of writing, other signs were common:
A period in the middle of a line (corresponds to a comma)
Quarter dot (imaginary cross, corresponds to a point)
Crosses of various types (placed to divide the sacred text into verses).
It is interesting that part of the text of the Ostromir Gospel (1056 - 1057) also uses a cross and a wavy vertical line - a “serpent”, the function of which is not entirely clearly defined. “Cross” and “serpent” are written in red, the dot is written in black, like the text itself. According to the design, these signs resemble “kryzh” and “serpent” in ancient sheet music, and on the first sheets two more signs are added to the cross, also clearly originating from notes: on top - a sign called in ancient notation “horn”, below - “bench” .
In Old Russian writing, the text was not divided into words and sentences. Punctuation marks (period, cross, wavy line) divided the text mainly into meaningful segments or indicated a stop in the scribe’s work.
The introduction of printing was of great importance for the development of punctuation. The placement of characters in printed works was primarily the work of typographical craftsmen, who often did not take into account what the author's handwritten text represented in terms of punctuation.
The system of punctuation marks, which had formed in its basic outlines by the 18th century, required the development of certain rules for their use. Back in the 16th – 17th centuries, the first attempts to theoretically understand the placement of punctuation marks that existed at that time were observed. However, the general and specific principles of punctuation marks in their main features developed during the 18th century, when the formation of the foundations of the modern Russian literary language ended.
The principles on which the entire system of punctuation rules is based were comprehended gradually.
Most ancient writings knew only “paragraph” or “period” among all punctuation marks. They were expressed graphically in different ways, although, apparently, the dot was the most common form. In ancient Russian writing, the most common sign was the dot, which is used more or less in the sense of our comma and basically divides, apparently, the text into syntagms. Those or other signs of a more complex form, which would more or less correspond in meaning to our point, are less common and are something in between our “paragraph” and “point”.
As far as can be judged from the testimony of monuments, including printed ones, as well as from grammatical and spelling manuals of the 18th century (mainly for the study of foreign languages), the main reason for placing punctuation marks was the presence of pauses in speech of greater or lesser duration. To place a question mark, the basis was the interrogative meaning of the sentence, to place a colon - the transition from the explained part of the sentence to the explanatory one. But these two punctuation marks were not used in all cases. So, there were significantly fewer punctuation marks in the middle of the 18th century than in our time. By the end of the 18th century, new punctuation marks appeared: dashes, quotation marks, ellipses. They were usually introduced into the practice of writing by writers and, accordingly, were reflected in textbooks and teaching aids on grammar and spelling. It is known that Karamzin was the first to use the dash (or “dash”) sign. It is still not possible to indicate exactly who initiated the use of ellipses and quotation marks in Russian writing.
The beginning of the scientific development of Russian punctuation was laid by the brilliant representative of grammatical science of the 18th century M.V. Lomonosov in his work “Russian Grammar”, written in 1755. M.V. Lomonosov gives an exact list of punctuation marks used at that time in Russian printed literature, sets out the rules for their use in a system, formulating these rules on a semantic and grammatical basis.
The greatest merit in streamlining Russian punctuation in the 19th century belongs to academician J. K. Groth, whose book “Russian Spelling” - the result of many years of research into the history and principles of Russian writing - became the first academic set of rules of spelling and punctuation in Russia and went through 20 editions until 1917 . Grot sets out in detail the history and principles of Russian writing, difficult cases of spelling, and provides a scientifically systematized and theoretically meaningful set of rules for spelling and punctuation. The rules for the use of punctuation marks formulated by him are valuable in that they summarize the searches in the field of punctuation of previous authors. Grotto's ordered punctuation, as well as spelling, rules entered into the practice of schools and publishing houses and, at their core, with minor changes, are still in effect today.
Some linguists are of the opinion that Russian punctuation is based on a semantic basis, others on a grammatical basis, and still others on an intonation basis. However, despite the theoretical disagreements among scientists, the fundamental principles of Russian punctuation remain unchanged, which contributes to its stability, although individual punctuation rules are periodically clarified and specified in connection with the development of Russian grammatical theory and the Russian literary language in general.
1. 2. Principles of modern punctuation.
Classification of punctuation marks and their characteristics.
Modern Russian punctuation is built on semantic and structural-grammatical foundations, which are interconnected and determine each other. Punctuation reflects the semantic division of written speech, indicates semantic connections and relationships between individual words and groups of words, and various semantic shades of parts of a written text.
Punctuation marks are divided into:
▪ highlighting signs, which serve to indicate the boundaries of a syntactic structure that is introduced into a sentence to complement, explain its members or the entire sentence, explain its members or the entire sentence as a whole, intonation-semantic highlighting k. - l. part of a sentence, as well as to indicate the boundary of a construction containing the name of a person or object to which speech is addressed, or expressing the writer’s subjective attitude to his statement, or formalizing someone else’s statement: two commas - as a single paired sign, two dashes - as a single paired character , quotes, brackets;
▪ separating signs that serve to distinguish independent sentences, their parts (main and subordinate clauses, subject groups and predicate groups), homogeneous syntactic elements (homogeneous sentence members, subordinate subordinate clauses), as well as to indicate the type of sentence according to the purpose of the statement, on the emotional nature of the sentence, for a break in speech: period, question mark, exclamation mark, comma, semicolon, colon, dash, ellipsis.
Let's consider the modern idea of punctuation marks:
1) A period (.) is a punctuation mark placed at the end of a sentence. The period is one of the most ancient punctuation marks. It was used to separate words or larger sections of text from each other. A cross or a vertical, wavy line was used for the same function. The dot was initially placed at different levels: either at the base of the letter or at the level of its middle. Sometimes the scribe, interrupting his work, could even put a period in the middle of a word. In modern Russian written speech, a period is placed at the end of a narrative or incentive sentence: “It was evening. The sky was darkening. The waters flowed quietly" (Pushkin "Eugene Onegin"). A period is used when writing words in abbreviations (for example: etc., etc.); and there is no period in abbreviations.
2) Question mark is a punctuation mark used to express a question. Initially, a semicolon was used in the meaning of a question mark (this is reflected in the grammars of L. Zizaniya, (1596), and M. Smotrytsky, (1619), although the question mark was already found in books of the first half of the 16th century. Finally, a question mark was fixed to express the question by "Russian Grammar" by M. V. Lomonosov. In modern Russian written speech, an exclamation mark is placed:
▪ at the end of an interrogative sentence, including after incomplete interrogative sentences following one after another: “Who are you? Alive? Dead? (A. Blok, “Poems about a Beautiful Lady”);
▪ in interrogative sentences with homogeneous members after each homogeneous member in order to dissect the question: “What do I care about whom? before them? to the whole universe? (Griboyedov “Woe from Wit”);
3) Exclamation mark (!) – a punctuation mark used to express an exclamation. This sign called “amazing” is mentioned in the grammar of M. Smotritsky (1619). In modern Russian written speech, an exclamation mark is placed:
▪ at the end of an exclamatory sentence: “Long live the revolution, joyful and speedy!” (Mayakovsky, poem “V.I. Lenin”);
▪ in exclamatory sentences with homogeneous members after each homogeneous member to indicate emotional intermittency of speech: “I rejected everything: laws! conscience! faith!” (Griboyedov “Woe from Wit”);
▪ after words pronounced with an exclamatory intonation - sentences, addresses, interjections, standing at the beginning (in poetic speech - and in the middle) of a sentence or used independently: “Old man! I heard many times that you saved me from death” (Lermontov “Mtsyri”);
▪ in parentheses inside or after a quotation to express the author’s attitude (irony, indignation, etc.) to the quoted text.
4) Comma (,) is a punctuation mark used to separate or highlight words, groups of words and simple sentences within a complex sentence. The appearance of the comma in the monuments of Russian writing dates back to the 15th century. In modern Russian written speech, the comma is the most common punctuation mark, acting in a separating function (one comma) or in an exclusive function (paired punctuation mark - two commas). The comma is used:
▪ between homogeneous members of a sentence (connected without conjunctions, repeated or paired conjunctions, non-repeating conjunctions with an adversative or concessive meaning) and between repeated words: “I will put the mind, not the genus, as a governor.” (Pushkin “Boris Godunov”); “Winter was waiting, nature was waiting” (Pushkin “Eugene Onegin”);
▪ between simple sentences that are part of a complex non-union or compound sentence: “The sun set behind the mountains, but it was still light” (Lermontov, poem “Demon”);
▪ between the main and subordinate clauses (or to highlight the subordinate clause on both sides), between subordinate clauses: “Go along the free road, where your free mind takes you” (Pushkin, poem “To the Poet”);
▪ to separate or highlight isolated members of a sentence, with words or groups of words that limit or clarify other words in the sentence: “In the distance, closer to the grove, axes sounded dully” (Turgenev “Notes of a Hunter”);
▪ in comparative phrases: “like a storm, death carries away the groom” (Pushkin “Boris Godunov”);
▪ to separate or highlight words that are grammatically unrelated to the members of the sentence (introductory words, addresses, interjections, affirmative, negative and question words): “With his eyes, it seems he would like to eat everyone.”
(Krylov, fable “The Wolf in the Kennel”).
5) Semicolon (;) is a punctuation mark used in a complex and, less often, in a simple sentence to separate its relatively independent parts. First introduced by the Italian printer Aldus Manutius in 1449, who used it to separate opposite words and independent parts of compound sentences. Shakespeare already used (;) in his sonnets. In Church Slavonic, the semicolon played the role of a question mark.
▪ “And Esau said: Behold, I am going to die, and this is my preeminence.”
▪ “Esau said: Behold, I am dying, what is this birthright to me?”
In modern Russian writing, a semicolon is used:
▪ in complex non-conjunct and compound sentences, if their parts are significantly common and contain commas, for example: “The pale gray sky became lighter, colder, bluer; the stars blinked with faint light and then disappeared; the earth is damp, the leaves are sweating” (Turgenev “Bezhin Meadow”); “Almost every evening later they went somewhere out of town, to Oreanda or to a waterfall; and the walk was a success, the impressions were invariably beautiful and majestic every time” (Chekhov’s “Lady with a Dog”);
▪ in a simple sentence between homogeneous members of the sentence, if they are significantly common and contain commas, for example: “In the darkness, the same unclear objects were vaguely imagined: at some distance a black wall, the same moving spots; next to me is the croup of a horse, which, wagging its tail, spread its legs wide: its back is in a white Circassian coat.”
(L.N. Tolstoy, collected works, story “Raid”).
6) Colon (:) – a punctuation mark in the form of two dots located one below the other, used in a simple sentence and in a non-union complex sentence. Combinations of several points are noted in the monuments of Russian writing from the most ancient period. These signs were originally used to separate words or larger sections of text from each other. In modern Russian writing, a semicolon is used:
▪ before the listing, if it is preceded by a generalizing word or words, for example, somehow, namely, for example: “Large fish fight sharply, such as: pike, catfish, asp, pike perch” (Aksakov, “Notes of a rifle hunter of the Orenburg province ", stories and memories of a hunter about different hunts. "Hunting with a sharp edge");
▪ in a complex non-union sentence, if the second part reveals the content of the first part, complements the first or indicates the reason for what is said in the first part, for example: “Here a rather interesting picture opened up: a wide hut, the roof of which rested on two sooty pillars, was full of people” (Lermontov “Hero of Our Time”);
7) Dash – (French tiret, from tirer – to pull) – a punctuation mark in the form of a horizontal bar (-), used in simple and complex sentences. Introduced into use by the Russian writer and historian N.M. Karamzin. In modern Russian written speech, a dash is placed:
▪ between subject and predicate: “Lgov is a large steppe village” (Turgenev “Notes of a Hunter”);
▪ before the generalizing word that comes after homogeneous members: “Hope and the swimmer - the whole sea swallowed up” (Krylov, works in 2 volumes. “An old man and three young people”);
▪ before a separate application, usually at the end of a sentence: “I had a cast-iron kettle with me - my only joy in traveling around the Caucasus.”
(Lermontov “Hero of Our Time”);
▪ between members of a sentence to express surprise or opposition: “I wanted to travel around the whole world - and did not travel a hundredth part” (Griboyedov “Woe from Wit”);
▪ in a complex non-union sentence to indicate a rapid change of events, to express a sharp contrast, to express temporary, conditionally investigative and other relationships: “Ignat pulled the trigger - the gun misfired” (Chekhov’s “White-fronted”);
▪ between remarks in a dialogue given without a paragraph, or at the beginning of remarks given with a paragraph;
▪ to indicate the breakdown of a simple sentence into verbal groups, which often happens when a member of a sentence is omitted:
“I ask you: do workers need to be paid?” (Chekhov “Ivanov”);
“Everything is obedient to me, but I obey nothing” (Pushkin “Eugene Onegin”);
8) A double dash (a paired punctuation mark serving an emphatic function) is used to highlight:
▪ introductory and inserted sentences and constructions: “There is nothing to do here - friends kissed” (Krylov, fable “Two Doves”);
▪ a common application, standing after the word being defined to emphasize the independent meaning of this application: “In front of the doors of the club - a wide log house - workers with banners were waiting for the guests” (Fedin, novel “An Extraordinary Summer”);
9) Ellipsis - () - a punctuation mark in the form of those adjacent dots, used to indicate the incompleteness or interruption of a statement, as well as omissions in the text. It was first indicated in the grammar of A. Kh. Vostokov (1831) under the name “preventive sign”. Ellipsis is used:
▪ to indicate incompleteness or a break in a statement caused by the speaker’s excitement or an unexpected transition to another thought, as well as to indicate a pause emphasizing the text that follows: “Not receiving an answer, Dunya raised her head and fell on the carpet screaming.”
(Pushkin, prose, “The Station Agent”);
▪ when quoting (before the beginning of the quotation, in the middle or after it) to indicate that frequently quoted text has been omitted. To distinguish an omission in a quotation from an author's ellipsis, some special editions use a special technique: in the case of an omission, not three, but two dots are placed side by side.
2. 1. General comparison of modern Russian and European punctuation
The punctuation mark systems of most modern writing systems are the same.
The differences concern only details. Punctuation marks in English, for example, are used less frequently and differently than in Russian. Punctuation in English is a very problematic part of grammar. Unlike the Russian language, punctuation in English is not given due attention. Many native speakers take such liberties with punctuation marks in writing that they seem unacceptable.
English punctuation is basically similar to Russian, but its use is characterized by great freedom and is not subject to strict, mandatory rules.
The punctuation systems of Russian and English languages, in addition to general similarities, have a number of features. The functions of the same punctuation marks, as well as the ways of representing similar linguistic phenomena in written speech, often do not coincide. In Russian, punctuation depends mainly on the syntactic structure of the sentence, and in English, syntactic boundaries within a sentence are not necessarily formalized punctuationally.
In Russian, a subordinate clause is always separated by a comma from the main clause. In English this happens much less frequently, namely:
▪ The additional clause is not separated by a comma:
We know that at present all roads lead to Communism.
We know that nowadays all roads lead to communism.
▪ A subordinate attributive clause is not separated by a comma if it is not descriptive, but restrictive, that is, when it distinguishes the word being defined from a number of others:
The historic changes that have occurred in Asia are of cardinal significance.
The historical changes that have occurred in Asia are of paramount importance.
If the subordinate attributive clause provides only additional information about the word or sentence being defined and is equivalent to an independent clause, then it is separated by a comma:
Tsiolkovsky studied many branches of knowledge, which enabled him to become a prominent scientist.
Tsiolkovsky studied many branches of knowledge, which helped him become an outstanding scientist.
A subordinate conditional and adverbial clause is separated by a comma only if it precedes an equal clause (or if it is too long):
If you added less acid, the reaction would not be so violent.
If you added less acid, the reaction would not be so violent.
In Russian, quotation marks are placed at the bottom and at the top, in English - only at the top of the line:
Don't you like this “You don't like the man?” do you?”
Yes, I don't like it. "No, I don't"
Don't you like this “You don't like the man?” Do you?”
No, I like it. “Yes, I do”
In English, a dash is not used to convey remarks in dialogue between interlocutors or between the words of the author and direct speech, as in Russian; in this case, quotation marks are sufficient.
Single dashes perform several functions in English that do not coincide with the functions of a dash in Russian (here it is used to distinguish the subject from the predicate in a zero connective), for example: “Our neighbor is an engineer.” There is no such function in the English language, since in English there is no connective in a declarative sentence, then there may not be a dash, for example: “Not a coward!” But in the English language, a dash is placed where in the Russian language it is not typical for it to appear, namely, to indicate an interrupted or for some reason unfinished sentence (in Russian, in such cases, an ellipsis is placed). Let's analyze the examples: “Marrying Sibil Vane? " cried Lord Henry, standing up and looking at Dorian. “But, my dear Dorian – Yesterday when I heard that Sibil Vane had killed herself -. “The dash in this case denotes an unfinished statement, the reason for which is the strong excitement of the speaker, weighing his words. Another difference in the use of dashes in English from Russian. In English, it is not customary to place a dash at the beginning of a dialogue to indicate a change in speakers. Thus, we can safely say that the functions and rules for using a dash differ in Russian and English.
Both in English and in Russian, to frame words, phrases of an introductory nature, wedged into the text, to isolate a common application, paired commas or paired parentheses are used to close:
He, Martin Eden, was a better man than that fellow.
The old gentleman, her father, was always dabbing on speculation.
Sometimes commas are used to highlight additions on both sides, which in conversation have an intonation effect.
In the same way in Russian and English, a comma is placed in complex sentences in the presence of conjunctions “and”, “but”, “so”.
(“and”, “but”, “so”).
Use of a comma in a complex sentence. In Russian, a comma is always placed, but in English it is placed only when the subordinate clause ends, which is part of a complex sentence starting with the words “that”, “because”, “as”, “if”, “when”, “after”, “since”-(“this”, “because”, “how”, “if”, “when”, “after”, “since”), etc. But if the main clause comes first, then a comma is not placed before the listed allied words:
When Paul called to see Pearl, she found her still sick.
The day came to an end when they appeared in the distance.
Let's look at the differences in the use of commas in English and Russian sentences. In a sentence with a small text of direct speech, a comma is placed in the English sentence, but in Russian there will be a colon:
She sank down by his side and cried, “Oh, Phil! It’s all so horrid!” But if the text of direct speech is long, then a colon is also placed, for example:
Lincoln said: “Many years ago our fathers had left on this continent a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal”
In conclusion, it is worth adding that introductory words in English, as in Russian, are necessarily separated by commas:
Namely, it was her natural shyness. (Namely)
Of course, he apologized. (Certainly)
As for the next sign, the colon, in both languages it clarifies, explains, expands or narrows further information.
Sometimes a colon stylistically colors a sentence and indicates its high style and seriousness of information. Of course, there is a slight difference between the use of a comma and a colon, and in English the colon is used more widely, in a slightly different direction, i.e., it can be an independent statement, for example:
Oh, don’t shout Paul: it really isn’t nice.
Mother-in-Law, Sergius: mother-in-law.
The next sign - the semicolon - is also approximately the same in Russian and English, but sometimes the Russian semicolon corresponds to a colon in English. The most important function of a semicolon is to come at the end of a sentence that expresses an incomplete thought, followed by another simple or complex sentence that completes the sentence, followed by a period. A semicolon can be placed several times in a sentence, using the example of one long complex non-union sentence, which includes several simple sentences that are not closely related to each other, so as not to confuse the reader with a long sentence with various complications.
Moreover, you can notice that mistakes are made much less frequently with this punctuation mark.
It should also be noted that the function of a period as a punctuation mark at the end of a sentence does not differ at all in different languages, which cannot be said about the dash.
Having analyzed the use of punctuation marks in Russian and English, we can come to the conclusion that it is some difference in their use that can cause errors.
Punctuation marks are now largely uniform and serve almost the same function in many European and non-European languages. So, for example, in Russian and most European languages, interrogative and exclamation sentences are fixed, as a rule, with one question mark or exclamation mark at the end of the sentence, and in Spanish - with two question marks and exclamation marks - at the beginning and at the end of the sentence. In this case, an inverted question mark and an exclamation mark are placed first:
-“¿Quién fue el autor de la Ilíada?”
-“¡Que me me acuerde de tí!”
- “¿Qué hace ahí?”
The Spanish language uses all the same symbols as the Russian language, but it also has its own, special ones. What are they called and what role do they play? coma - comma, punto final - period, punto y coma - semicolon, dos puntos - colon, puntos suspensivos () - ellipsis, principio de interrogación (¿) - initial question mark, fin de interrogación (?) - final question mark , principio de admiración (¡) - initial exclamation mark, fin de admiración (!) - final exclamation mark, paréntesis () - parentheses, diéresis o crema (¨) - trema, colon above the letter, comillas (""; "") - quotation marks, guión (-) - hyphen, raya (-) - dash, dos rayas (=) - double dash.
Commas, periods and parentheses indicate pauses of varying lengths, which when reading make it possible to understand the meaning of sentences. These signs are used in Spanish almost the same as in Russian, with the only difference being that complex sentences with many participial and participial phrases are not as frequent in Spanish as in Russian, and they do not stand out in writing.
A period is the end of a sentence or an abbreviation. Comma - enumeration, appeal, clarification, introductory words and connective words (esto es, es decir, o sea, en fin, por último, por consiguiente, sin embargo, no obstante, además, en tal caso, por lo tanto, en cambio, en primer lugar, generalmente, posiblemente, efectivamente, finalmente, en definitiva, por regla general, quizás). In addition, the comma is used in dates, bibliographic data and addresses (Madrid, 25 de enero de 2007. BELLO, Andrés: Gramática de la lengua castellana destinada al uso de los americanos.)
The semicolon is used to indicate a pause longer than that of a comma but shorter than that of a colon, and is most often used before a subordinate adversative clause.
A colon is used before a listing after a generic word.
Quotation marks indicate quotations, or give figurative meaning to certain words. The hyphen is used to hyphenate words and to connect parts of compound words.
The dash is used in direct speech, and in all other cases in the same way as in Russian (for lists, for clarifications, pauses, etc.). As for the double dash, it is a rarely used obsolete symbol used in copies of documents to indicate paragraphs that are given separately in the original.
Conclusion
Russian punctuation can be considered both in a narrow and in a broad sense. In a narrow sense, it includes basic punctuation marks. These are sentence-ending characters (period, exclamation point, question mark, ellipsis), sentence-middle characters (comma, semicolon, dash, colon), paired characters (double comma, double dash, parentheses, quotation marks). Thus, the main body of punctuation marks in the Russian language includes twelve characters that students should know well. In a broad sense, punctuation marks include signs of the spatial organization of text: space, paragraph indents, asterisks, etc.
Without the ability to put punctuation marks, it is impossible to master written speech as a whole, which is why it is so important to know punctuation - a branch of the science of language that talks about their use. And without mastering written language, thanks to which human knowledge and experience are passed on from generation to generation, it is impossible to even imagine life today.
Punctuation marks arose from the need to divide written text into segments of greater or lesser independence in accordance with the semantic structure of speech. Thus, the first punctuation marks indicated pauses of greater or lesser duration within a written text. It goes without saying that writers could be satisfied with such primitive punctuation only during the initial stages of using writing. And indeed, as writing developed, especially after the introduction and spread of printing, the system of punctuation became more complex and deepened, until in a relatively short period it reached a state that remains in its basic features in modern European languages.
The principles of punctuation are interrelated and in the same punctuation fact we can find a combination of different principles, although the leading one is syntactic (structural). Modern Russian punctuation is based on meaning, structure, and rhythmic-intonation division of the sentence in their interaction. Therefore, Russian punctuation is quite flexible and, along with mandatory rules, contains instructions that allow punctuation options.
Comparing the punctuation of texts that are chronologically distant from each other helped to understand the essence of modern Russian punctuation. Punctuation is a living, mobile, developing, historically established system.
Having analyzed the history of the use of punctuation marks in the Russian language and examined the norms for the use of punctuation marks in European languages, we can come to the conclusion that Russian punctuation is very similar to the punctuation of European languages (Spanish, English).
Summarizing the centuries-old history of writing and printing, it can be noted that it has steadily developed towards an increase in both the number and variety of functions of the signs used - this was facilitated by the improvement of methods of presenting information, and the complication of human activity and the emergence of new forms of it led to the emergence of new categories of written signs that appeared as a response to the need for new types of information:
The invention of printing, the spread of literacy and paper correspondence, the transition of books from the field of highly specialized, mainly religious texts, to the field of sources of various worldly content required the introduction of punctuation marks that help convey intonation and semantic features, dialogues, etc.
The increasing complexity of legal practice and the need to compose structured texts led to the development of chapters, paragraphs, paragraphs, footnotes, explanations and the invention of symbols to highlight them.
The emergence of computer correspondence and conversational communication without direct contact has created a need for written transmission of emotions, gestures and facial expressions, which contributed to the emergence of emoticons.
In order to learn how to use punctuation marks, you need to understand what is the basis for their use. Do you think intonation? Oh no! This is a dangerously shaky approach. Everyone here would have done something like this in their own way! Remember about writing words by ear?
So what lies at the basis of Russian punctuation, what features of a sentence should be used in order to put punctuation marks correctly?
Russian punctuation has a double base. The great Lomonosov pointed out this in his “Russian Grammar”: Lowercase characters are placed according to the strength of the mind and according to its location, and conjunctions.
Remember: To put this or that punctuation mark, you must first determine the semantic side of the sentence and then its structure, that is, act according to the formula:
MEANING+STRUCTURE=PUNCTION MARKS
Here is an example of how a sign affects the meaning of sentences: There were a lot of people that day. They crowded around in the woods, along the shore, and settled on all the benches: some in tracksuits, some in pajamas, with children, dogs, guitars. (Yu. Trifonov). Firstly, thanks to the comma, the little forest was not on the shore; and secondly, the comma made it possible to avoid “pajamas with children and dogs.”
Goltsova Nina Grigorievna, professor
Today it is difficult for us to imagine that books were once printed without the well-known icons called punctuation marks.
They have become so familiar to us that we simply don’t notice them, which means we can’t appreciate them. Meanwhile punctuation marks live their own independent life in the language and have their own interesting history.
In everyday life, we are surrounded by many objects, things, and phenomena that are so familiar that we rarely think about the questions: when and how did these phenomena appear and, accordingly, the words that call them? Who is their creator and creator?
Have the words so familiar to us always meant what they mean today? What is the story of their entry into our lives and language?
Such familiar and even to some extent ordinary (due to the fact that we encounter it every day) can include Russian writing, or more precisely, the graphic system of the Russian language.
The basis of the graphic system of the Russian language, like many other languages, are letters and punctuation marks.
When asked when the Slavic alphabet, which is the basis of the Russian alphabet, arose and who was its creator, many of you will confidently answer: the Slavic alphabet was created by the brothers Cyril and Methodius (863); The Russian alphabet was based on the Cyrillic alphabet; Every year in May we celebrate the Day of Slavic Literature.
And when did they appear punctuation marks? Are everyone famous and so familiar to us? punctuation marks(period, comma, ellipsis, etc.) appeared at the same time? How did the punctuation system of the Russian language develop? What is the history of Russian punctuation?
Let's try to answer some of these questions.
As is known, in the system of modern Russian punctuation 10 punctuation marks: period [.], comma [,], semicolon [;], ellipsis […], colon [:], question mark [?], exclamation mark [!], dash [–], parentheses [()] and quotes [" "].
The oldest sign is dot. It is already found in monuments of ancient Russian writing. However, its use in that period differed from modern use: firstly, it was not regulated; secondly, the dot was placed not at the bottom of the line, but above - in the middle of it; In addition, at that time even individual words were not separated from each other. For example: the holiday is approaching... (Arkhangelsk Gospel, 11th century). This is the explanation of the word dot gives by V.I. Dal:
“POINT (poke) f., an icon from an injection, from sticking to something with the point, tip of a pen, pencil; small speck."
The period can rightfully be considered the ancestor of Russian punctuation. It is no coincidence that this word (or its root) was included in the names of such signs as semicolon, colon, ellipsis. And in the Russian language of the 16th–18th centuries, a question mark was called interrogative point, exclamation – point of surprise. In the grammatical works of the 16th century, the doctrine of punctuation marks was called “the doctrine of the power of points” or “of the point mind,” and in the grammar of Lawrence Zizanius (1596) the corresponding section was called “On points.”
The most common punctuation mark in Russian it is considered comma. This word is found in the 15th century. According to P. Ya. Chernykh, the word comma– this is the result of substantivization (transition into a noun) of the passive past participle of the verb comma (xia) – “to catch”, “to touch”, “to stab”. V.I. Dal connects this word with the verbs wrist, comma, stammer - “stop”, “delay”. This explanation, in our opinion, seems legitimate.
Need in punctuation marks began to be acutely felt in connection with the advent and development of printing (XV-XVI centuries). In the mid-15th century, the Italian typographers Manutius invented punctuation for European writing, which was adopted in basic outline by most European countries and still exists today.
In the Russian language, most of the punctuation marks we know today appear in the 16th–18th centuries. So, brackets[()] are found in monuments of the 16th century. Previously, this sign was called “roomy”.
Colon[:] began to be used as a dividing sign from the end of the 16th century. It is mentioned in the grammars of Lavrenty Zizaniy, Melety Smotritsky (1619), as well as in the first Russian grammar of the Dolomonosov period by V. E. Adodurov (1731).
Exclamation mark[!] is noted to express exclamation (surprise) also in the grammars of M. Smotritsky and V. E. Adodurov. The rules for setting up an “amazing sign” are defined in “Russian Grammar” by M. V. Lomonosov (1755).
Question mark[?] has been found in printed books since the 16th century, but to express the question it was fixed much later, only in the 18th century. Initially, [;] was found in the meaning of [?].
Later signs include dash[-] And ellipses[…]. There is an opinion that the dash was invented by N.M. Karamzin. However, it has been proven that this sign was found in the Russian press already in the 60s of the 18th century, and N. M. Karamzin only contributed to the popularization and consolidation of the functions of this sign. The dash [–] sign called “silent” was first described in 1797 in “Russian Grammar” by A. A. Barsov.
Ellipsis sign[…] under the name “preventive sign” was noted in 1831 in the grammar of A. Kh. Vostokov, although its use was found in writing practice much earlier.
No less interesting is the history of the appearance of the sign, which later received the name quotes[" "]. The word quotation marks in the meaning of a musical note (hook) sign is found in the 16th century, but in the meaning punctuation mark
it began to be used only at the end of the 18th century. It is assumed that the initiative to introduce this punctuation mark into the practice of Russian written speech (as well as dash) belongs to N. M. Karamzin. Scientists believe that the origin of this word is not entirely clear. Comparison with the Ukrainian name pawka makes it possible to assume that it is derived from the verb to waddle – “to hobble”, “to limp”. In Russian dialects kavysh – “duckling”, “gosling”; kavka – “frog”. Thus, quotes – „traces of duck or frog legs,” “hook,” “squiggle.”
As you can see, the names of most punctuation marks in the Russian language are originally Russian, and the term punctuation marks itself goes back to the verb punctuate - “stop, detain in motion.” The names of only two signs were borrowed. Hyphen(dash) - from it. Divis(from lat. divisio– separately) and dash (trait) – from French tiret, tїrer.
The beginning of the scientific study of punctuation was laid by M. V. Lomonosov in “Russian Grammar”. Today we use the “Rules of Spelling and Punctuation” adopted in 1956, that is, almost half a century ago.
Source: Website of the Open International Russian Language Olympiad
Punctuation (1913)
I. A. Baudouin de Courtenay
Selected works on general linguistics: In 2 volumes - M.: Publishing house Acad. Sciences USSR, 1963.
Punctuation (pp. 238–239). Printed entirely from the manuscript (Archive of the USSR Academy of Sciences, f. 770, op. 3, item 7).
Punctuation marks, elements of writing or written-visual language, associated not with individual elements of the pronunciation-auditory language and their combinations, but only with the division of current speech into separate parts: periods, sentences, individual expressions, words. There are two main categories of punctuation marks.
1) Some of them relate only to morphology of written speech, i.e. to its dismemberment into ever smaller parts. These are: dot(.), separating periods or isolated sentences from one another; in addition, it serves as a sign reductions words (b. h. instead of “for the most part”, because instead of “since”, etc.); colon(:), used mainly before counting individual parts of what was said before a colon or when a quotation is given, i.e. verbatim text before that expressed by another person or the author himself (see “Colon”); semicolon(;) separates combinations of incomplete [? – nrzb.] sentences or countable parts of a dismembered whole; comma(,) serves to separate from each other sentences that are not further separated or isolated, intercalated expressions, such as the vocative case, combinations of words or even individual words that impart a certain connotation to a given sentence, etc. (for example, Thus, however and so on.).
This also includes: dividing the book into departments, on chapters, on paragraphs(§§), articles...; paragraphs(from the red line); dividing lines; short lines, dash(tiret), connecting two parts of a compound word; spaces, both larger ones, between lines, and the smallest ones, between individual written words; brackets(), containing words, expressions and phrases that are introductory, explanatory, etc.; callouts(*, **, 1, 2...), at the bottom of the pages or at the end of the book, with links or with explanations of individual words of the main text.
2) Another category of punctuation marks, also related to the morphology or dismemberment of written speech, emphasizes mainly semasiological side, indicating the mood of the speaker or writer and his attitude to the content of what is being written. By using quotation marks(“”) differs from someone else’s or supposed with the reservation “as if”, “so to speak”, “they say”, “they say” from one’s own without reservations.
This also includes: question mark(cm.), Exclamation point(cm.). A special sign of irony was also supposed, but so far without success. These latter signs are associated with the different tone of speech, that is, they are reflected in the general mental shade of what is spoken. Of course, morphological punctuation marks (dots, spaces...) are reflected to a certain extent in pronunciation, especially at a slow pace: pauses, stops, respites.
Special types of punctuation marks: ellipses(...) when something is left unfinished or implied; a dash replacing an ellipsis (–), which, especially in fictional works, replaces either a comma or parentheses, or quotation marks; apostrophe(cm.). Quotation marks and parentheses are placed on both sides of the given text - both before and after; An exclamation mark and a question mark are placed only at the end. The Spaniards, however, mark not only the end, but also the beginning of an exclamation (I!) or a question (??). The system of punctuation marks adopted in Europe goes back to the Greek Alexandrian grammarians; it was definitively established from the end of the 15th century especially by the Venetian printing family Manutius. Different nations have different ways of using punctuation, especially the comma. In ancient Indian writing (Sanskrit) there are no punctuation marks at all; there the words are written together, and the signs / and // separate either individual verses or individual phrases. Previously, in European scripts, among other things in Church Slavonic, words were written together and without punctuation.
Interpuncture
Interpuncture (lat.) – theory of use punctuation marks in writing and their placement itself. Subject to well-known certain rules, interpuncture makes the syntactic structure of speech clear, highlighting individual sentences and members of sentences, as a result of which oral reproduction of what is written is facilitated. The term interpuncture is of Roman origin, but the very beginning of interpuncture is unclear.Whether interpuncture was known to Aristotle is not clear. In any case, the beginnings of it were among the Greek grammarians. The very concept of interpuncture, however, among the ancient Greek and Roman grammarians differed from the modern one. The interpuncture of the ancients had mainly in mind oratorical requirements (pronouncing a speech, reciting it) and consisted of placing simple periods at the end of sentences or using paragraphs called lines or verses (versus).
The new interpuncture originates not from this ancient one, but from interpuncture. Alexandrian era, invented by the grammarian Aristophanes and developed by later ones. By the end of the 8th century. according to R. Chr. it, however, fell into such oblivion that Warnefried and Alcuin, contemporaries of Charlemagne, had to reintroduce it. At first the Greeks used only one sign - a dot, which was placed either at the top of the line, then in the middle of it, or at the bottom. Other Greek grammarians, like Nicanor (who lived a little later than Quintilian), used other systems of interpunction (Nicanor had eight signs, others had four, etc.), but they all mixed the syntactic side of speech with the logical and did not develop any definite rules (see Steinthal, "Geschichte der Sprachwissenschaft bei d. Griechen und Romern", vol. II, Berl. 1891, pp. 348-354).
The same uncertainty prevailed in the Middle Ages, until approximately the 15th century, when the printer brothers Manutius increased the number punctuation marks and subjected their use to certain rules. They, in fact, should be considered the fathers of modern European interpuncture, in which no significant changes have been made since that time. However, the interpuncture of various modern European nations differs in some features from each other. Thus, in English a comma or dash is often placed before and ( And) and is not used at all before relative clauses (as in French). The most complex and most accurate interpuncture is German. Its theory is described in great detail in Becker ("Ausfuhrliche deutsche Grammatik", 2nd ed., Frankfurt, 1842), and its history and characteristics are in Bieling: "Das Prinzip der deutschen Interpunction" (Berlin, 1886).
Russian interpuncture is very close to German interpuncture and has the same advantages. Its presentation can be found in J. Grot: “Russian Spelling”. Old Slavonic interpuncture followed Greek models. In Russian interpuncture the following are used: punctuation marks: comma, semicolon, colon, period, ellipsis, question and exclamation marks, dash, parentheses, quotation marks.
Punctuation(from lat. punctum - point) is a section of the Russian language that studies punctuation, as well as the punctuation system itself. Punctuation in Russian serves in order to convey as accurately as possible in writing what the author wanted to express. Punctuation rules created in order to regulate the intonation structure of speech, as well as syntactic and semantic relationships in the language.
We all remember the greatness and power of our language. This means not only its lexical richness, but also its flexibility. This also applies to punctuation - there are both strict rules and guidelines that depend on the situation, stylistic features and meaning of the text.
Punctuation in Russian speech achieved through punctuation. Punctuation marks- these are graphic symbols necessary to convey the intonation and meaning of a sentence, as well as to place certain accents in speech.
In Russian there are the following punctuation marks:
1) End of sentence marks: period, question mark and exclamation mark;
2) Sentence separation marks: comma, dash, colon and semicolon;
3) Signs highlighting individual parts of a sentence: quotes and parentheses.
I came home late. Why is the bedroom light still on? That's right, she was waiting for me! “Back at work again?” - she asked tiredly. The apartment smelled of medicine (she probably drank valerian tincture so as not to worry), so I tried to calm her down and go to bed as soon as possible. All the events of that day flashed before my eyes: a scandal at work; a reprimand from the boss who unfairly blamed me for what happened; walking through the city at night in thought.
Punctuation marks can be repeated and combined. For example, the use of a question mark and an exclamation mark at the same time indicates that we have a rhetorical question(a question that does not require an answer or the answer to which everyone already knows):
Who knew that everything would happen exactly like this?!
How long?!
Can also be combined comma and dash. This combination allows you to connect different values:
A cool wind blew, it became dark in the forest, and a summer village evening was approaching.
This combination of punctuation marks can also be explained by the use of different constructions, for example, referring to a sentence with a dash between the subject and the predicate:
You, brother, are the dearest person left on earth.
Despite the fact that in the Russian language there are cases when there are no strict rules for the use of certain punctuation marks, even in such cases there are certain recommendations. For example, are there such cases basic punctuation, that is, one that is given preference. For example, the main punctuation mark when using inserted structures is parentheses:
After yesterday's downpour, all of us (except Anna, who happened to have a raincoat) fell ill with a cold.
In this case, it is possible to highlight the inserted structure using a dash (a minor punctuation mark in this case):
He sat down thoughtfully on the bench - it was wet after the rain - and thought about what happened today.
All punctuation rules and punctuation rules we will look in more detail in subsequent articles.
Each of us at school had to write dictations in our native language. And, probably, the most offensive thing was the reduction in the final grade due to a missing or extra comma. Let's find out why this symbol and others like it are so important in language, and what science specializes in this issue.
What does punctuation study?
At the end of the previous sentence there is a familiar one that signals to every reader that this is a question, not a statement. It is on the study of such signal elements that such a science as punctuation concentrates.
Moreover, she specializes not only in the formation and regulation of norms and rules for setting punctuation marks, but also studies their history.
What is it for?
Having learned what punctuation is studying, it is worth paying attention to its practical value. After all, for example, the practical significance of spelling is clear to most of us - if you do not teach people to write correctly, it will become unclear to others what they want to say: flight or litter, etc. At the same time, many “victims” of school punctuation repressions are still perplexed : what difference does it make where to put a comma, why is it needed at all, and why a whole science was formed to study it.
Let's figure it out. So, punctuation is important to make the text easier to understand. With its help, sentences or their parts are separated from each other. This allows the writer to concentrate on the thought he needs.
To more clearly understand the meaning of punctuation marks, it is worth recalling the “bearded” example from the cartoon “In the Land of Unlearned Lessons” - “Execution cannot be pardoned.”
The life of the main character, Vitya Perestukin, depended on where the comma was placed. If he had put it this way: “Execute, cannot be pardoned,” Vita would have faced death. Fortunately, the boy correctly translated the sign: “You cannot execute, but have mercy,” and thus was saved.
In addition to emphasizing certain parts of a sentence, punctuation often helps to understand its meaning.
For example, if you simply put a period at the end of the sentence “Our mother has come,” this will be a statement of the fact of the mother’s arrival.
If you replace it with a question mark, it will no longer be a statement of a fait accompli, but a question: “Has our mother come?”
Etymology of the term
Having considered what punctuation studies and why it is needed, we can pay attention to the origin of this concept.
The term under study was derived from the Latin word punctum, which translates as a point. Based on this, we can assume that the first punctuation mark in history is precisely the period (at least in Russian punctuation this is so).
It is believed that the ancient Greeks were the first to use it as a mark for the end of a sentence or even an entire paragraph.
Punctuation marks
Knowing what punctuation studies, it is worth going into more detail on this. In other words, let's pay attention to punctuation marks. They are also called punctuation and are elements of writing necessary to achieve such goals.
The main ones are:
- Separation/highlighting of words, phrases, semantic segments in a sentence or whole text.
- They indicate grammatical and sometimes logical connections between words.
- They indicate the emotional coloring of the sentence and its communicative type.
- They signal the completion/incompleteness of a statement/thought.
Unlike words, punctuation symbols are not parts of a sentence, although they perform very important functions in it.
The need for such signs is emphasized by the fact that in most text editors, when checking spelling, punctuation errors are highlighted in a separate color - green, while spelling errors are highlighted in red.
Types of punctuation marks that are in the Russian language
To remember exactly which separating characters are used in Russian, it is worth remembering any lesson about punctuation. It necessarily mentioned most of these elements. All of them are divided into two categories: paired and unpaired.
The first is a much smaller number: quotes "", brackets (), 2 commas and 2 dashes.
They serve to highlight a word, phrase or part of a sentence and are always used together, functioning as a single whole.
In this case, quotation marks are also used to highlight names in Cyrillic and as a designation of direct speech.
By the way, the most common mistakes in punctuation of paired characters is forgetting to put the second one.
There are significantly more unpaired punctuation symbols. They are divided into groups according to their direct functions. Moreover, some of them are capable of performing not one, but two roles at once.
Analyzing the above, you will notice that nothing was said about the apostrophe. However, this symbol is a spelling symbol, not a punctuation symbol. Therefore, we cannot talk about him in this context.
History of Russian punctuation
In the Russian Empire, punctuation as such did not exist until the second half of the 15th century. It was only in the 80s that the dot began to be used.
About 40 years later, commas began to be used in grammar.
The combination of these characters into one (semicolon) happened later. Moreover, checking the punctuation of ancient texts showed that it initially served as a question mark. So if, when reading a document dating back to earlier than the 18th century, there is a question mark, we can conclude that the paper is probably a fake.
However, since the 18th century. a special symbol began to be used to indicate a question. By the way, during the same period, the exclamation mark began to be used in the empire, which initially signaled surprise, and not an exclamation. That is why it was called "amazing".
The first paired characters in the grammar of the Russian language were parentheses, first noted when checking punctuation in a document of 1619.
Dashes, quotation marks and ellipsis also appeared only in the 18th century. Moreover, one of their first and main popularizers was Nikolai Karamzin.
Unusual punctuation marks that are not used in modern Russian
In addition to the symbols that are well known to us, there are a number of signs that are not recognized by Russian and many other grammars. If you try to put them in a text editor, you will definitely receive a message about the need to correct the punctuation in the sentence.
- Interrobang is a hybrid of question and exclamation marks.
- A rhetorical question mark that looks like a mirror image of a regular symbol of this kind. It was used in English only for a few decades at the end of the 17th century.
- Ironic sign. Externally similar to the above, but slightly smaller and placed at the beginning of the sentence. Originated in France in the 19th century.
- A love symbol that is recommended to be used in greeting cards. It looks like a question mark and its reflection, together forming a heart.
- The consonant symbol looks like two exclamation marks written from one point. Symbolizes the expression of goodwill.
- A sign of confidence. It looks like an exclamation symbol crossed out in the form of a cross.
- Authoritative. Similar to the previous one, but it is crossed out not by the direct line, but by the league. Used in orders or advice.
- Asterism. Looks like three stars arranged in an inverted pyramid. Previously, it served to separate semantic chapters, as well as parts of books, or to indicate minor breaks in a long text.
- Exclamation and question commas. Designed for intonation highlighting of words or phrases within a sentence.
