The word century in the Russian language has several meanings. Let's pay attention to three of them (in our opinion, the most important ones):: 1) "century", 2)" epoch, a period of time characterized by something", 3)"life, the period of existence of someone". In the general literary language, of course, the first of them is the main one. In dialects, the third comes to the fore.
The meaning of" life "in the word century is also given by dictionaries of the literary language, but it is interpreted differently: in the dictionary edited by D. N. Ushakov - with the mark "colloquial", in the dictionaries of S. I. Ozhegov and V. V. Lopatin and L. E. Lopatina-without litter, in MAC-with the mark " in the literary language only with the definition": my century, in its own time. We can only say that in the literary language this is a rather limited use associated with certain contexts.
The connection between the concepts and lexemes of vek-zhizn is not just a part of Russian culture. As he writes in the book " Constants. Dictionary of Russian Culture " Yu. S. Stepanov, "the very concept of" century, century " saeculum in Rome was determined by the life span of one generation."
In many Russian dialects, the words century and life are synonymous. For example: People have lived for a century. That's how life was lived. Maeshsya vek-ot. I've been desperate all my life. See also the literary and dialect versions of proverbs: To live life is not a field to cross. A century to live -
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to go to the field; To live a century is not to plow the field. However, there are semantic and stylistic differences between these words. The century in this sense has a high stylistic coloring, which is also evident in dialects, although it should be spoken carefully, since the problem of stylistic differentiation of dialect vocabulary has not yet been solved.
In dialects (in particular, Bryansk, which is recorded in the "Dictionary of Bryansk Dialects"), there is also a shade of meaning" a certain period in a person's life " (I live on the dog century, on the horse was), they are also characterized by phraseological combinations God gave (did not give) to the century. For example: That's how much God has given to the age. Similar examples can be found in V. Dahl's dictionary. We can talk about the presence of a "predestination" component in the meaning of the word. This is confirmed by the phraseology God gave a century with the meaning "such is fate, so it is fated", recorded in the Novosibirsk and Kurgan dialects.
In dialects, as well as in colloquial speech, the meaning of "end of life, death" is noted, for example: You will not die before a century (Dal);
From birth to a century. A similar meaning is realized in the well - known proverb Forty years-Babi age. Such use of the word century can be found in V. Rasputin's story "Farewell to the Mother": "And as there seemed to be no end to the running water, there is no end to the village."
There is an idea among the people that God can add (or subtract) to the age, that is, extend or shorten the time of the existence of the human race. The golden Age is "the period of existence of the human race". Cf. in the dictionary edited by D. N. Ushakov: until the end of the century (church) - "until the end of the world", and in the dictionary of V. Dahl, one of the meanings of the word century is "life, the existence of the universe in its current order". We can say that it reflects, on the one hand, Christian ideas about the finiteness of time (especially since the century is connected with God), and on the other hand, there is a call with the literary meaning of the word century "century" and the naive connection of the end of the century (century) with the end of the world.
When referring to literary and poetic texts, one common pattern is found - the predominant use of the word century in the meaning of "epoch, period of time": about the loud age of military disputes, witness to the glory of the Russians; A terrible age, terrible hearts: In our age, you know, and tears are a crime (Pushkin); In our age everything is different. feelings only for a short time (Lermontov); A new, better age will come (Pasternak). The meaning of vek - "life" is also noted (especially often in Pushkin): I know, my age is already measured; Your long clear age was still cleverly diversified from your youth (Pushkin); The righteous old man was hiding at that time, he lived out his life in fasting and prayer (Lermontov); We are passing the age of work (Blok); I catch in a distant echo what will happen in my lifetime (Parsnips).
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In the twentieth century, the meaning of "century" comes to the fore in poetic texts (and probably in general literary texts in general) (meaning, first of all, our century). Moreover, the word century in this sense is poetically interpreted as an active beginning: The Century follows an iron path (Blok); The century hits the walls of rooms with an unadorned lump (Pasternak); The wolfhound century throws itself on my shoulders; My Century, my beast (Mandelstam). A "personal" relationship is established with the corresponding concept: I am in the heart of the century (Mandelstam); And I grew up in the patterned silence, in the cool nursery of the young century; And I was exactly ten years older than the century (Akhmatova). By the way, the consonance of the lexemes age and man allows not only to rhyme them in verse, but also to match the corresponding concepts. The conjugation of the concepts "century-epoch-time in general" and "person, personality" can have a contrasting character or reflect other relations. For example:
The nineteenth century, an iron age, a truly cruel one! You have thrown a man into the darkness of the night, starless and careless.
(Block)
Along the way, we note that the phrase Iron Age, which originally had a terminological meaning (cf. Stone Age, Bronze Age), is metaphorized in poetry, acquiring the meaning of "cruel": Our age is a merchant, in this age there is no iron without money and freedom (Pushkin). In one row with this phrase, the combinations of the golden age and the silver age are also lined up. Each of them has acquired a special meaning, but phraseological dictionaries do not record them. The golden age is the time of the highest prosperity (in the past) or some times of prosperity that will come in the future. For example: This is when there will be a golden age (Akhmatova); When they were relaxed, they dreamed of a golden age (Blok). Finally, the expression Silver Age was firmly attached to the period of the turn of the XIX and XX centuries, which was characterized by a significant rise and flourishing of Russian culture. First used by N. Berdyaev, and then by N. Otsup, it entered general literary usage.
The presence of different meanings of the word century is supported by a number of indicators. Vek1 has the plural form-century. Vek2 also has this form, but it is rarely used. And finally, vek3 practically does not have it, which is easily explained: human life is unique, unrepeatable (although the word life forms the form of plural). In addition, the word form of the century is often not just a grammatical form of plural from vek1. It takes on a special semantics - "a long period of time": Here is the execution for centuries of villainy (Lermontov);
Night is like ages (Blok); And a wise spherical building will outlast nations and ages (Pasternak). This lexicalization is also noted in others
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nouns that denote time periods, for example: year - years (and years), where the pl.h. form also denotes the age of a person, often middle-aged.
The given material allows us to draw some conclusions. The word century has three main meanings in the Russian language, which partially receive a formal expression. In different subsystems of the language, different meanings come to the fore: in the literary-poetic language, this meaning is "epoch", in the folk - colloquial language - "life". The word has a semantic versatility, shades of meaning seem to flow into each other, reaching antonymic ones, which is a vivid example of semantic diffusion of the word.
The meaning of" life " in the word century is archaic, connected with the church tradition. At the same time, it actively lives in the vernacular, reflecting some Christian ideas.
In conclusion, we can say that in poetic texts, where, as is known, there is a combination of several meanings of the word, you can find examples of this kind with the word century. This is illustrated, for example, by an excerpt from a poem published on the pages of the newspaper Argumenty I Fakty without specifying the author:
The shuffling of my feet will turn into running and my vision will weaken - I will not see how my age will go away and someone else's time will come in handy.
Tyumen
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