On Hydronymic Catalogues Composition Principles: Cataloguing of Hydronyms of the Msta River Basin

Abstract

The article presents a brief review of the few Russian hydronymic catalogues (relating to the basins of the Don, Oka, Svir and other rivers) based on the hydrographic principle. The authors argue that, in comparison with alphabetized hydronymic dictionaries, hydronymic catalogues have some obvious advantages for onomastic lexicography. This kind of catalogues should include, firstly, all historically attested forms of a hydronym (including those considered to be occasional miswritings) and, secondly, all non-hydronymic names making part of the respective hydronymic microsystem and providing “external” (i. e., chronological, derivational, etymological, ethno-historical) information about the hydronym. The authors point out that the cataloguing of hydronyms based on the hydrographic principle entails some difficulties: impossibility to localize some bodies of water mentioned in ancient and medieval documents; differences in the indication of the same bodies of water on old and contemporary maps; historical differences in establishing hydrographic hierarchies; historical changes of lake-river systems, etc. The authors also share their experience in creating a hydronymic catalogue of the Msta River basin in Novgorod and Tver Regions of Russia. They describe the principles of the composition of the catalogue and present a short excerpt of it that orders names in the system of the Volma River, one of the Msta’s left tributaries.

Keywords

• Russian language
• hydronymy
• hydrography
• hydronymic catalogues
• the Msta River basin