Russenorsk

Barter existed between Russians and Norwegians for 150 years in Troms and Finnmark counties. This barter was supported by the Norwegian government, and King Christian VII conferred city status to several settlements, such as Tromsø, to facilitate it.[1] Norwegians mainly traded fish for flour and wheat from Russians. The trading went on throughout the sunny months of the year and was beneficial to both sides; Norwegians had access to cheap fish in the summer, whilst Russians had surplus wheat.[2] Traders came from the areas near Murmansk and the White Sea, most often to Vardø, Hammerfest, and Tromsø, sometimes reaching as far south as Lofoten.[2][3]

The earliest recorded instance of Russenorsk was in 1785.[4] It is one of the most studied northern pidgins; many linguists, for example, Olaf Broch, studied it. Unlike equatorial pidgins, it was formed from only two languages: Norwegian and Russian. Furthermore, these languages are not from the same branch of Indo-European languages. Also unlike equatorial pidgins, Russenorsk was formed from one social class.[5]

Until 1850, Russenorsk was socially acceptable for all social classes. In 1850, Russenorsk became more limited to Norwegian fishermen, whereas Norwegian traders spent more time in Russia, often formally studying the language to the extent that they could communicate in rudimentary Russian.[2] This caused Russenorsk to lose some of its prestige.[6]

In 1917, Finland's declaration of independence from Russia caused the Russian–Norwegian border to decrease significantly. In 1919, the border disappeared completely.[4] Furthermore, the Soviet Union limited international contact significantly, decreasing the need for the common language between Norwegians and Russians. The last such Norwegian–Russian trade occurred in 1923.[4]

Russenorsk uses many of the phonemes mutual to Norwegian and Russian, altering phonemes only used in one.[4][7][8]

• /h/, absent in Russian, became /g/: hav (sea) → gav.
• /x/, absent in Norwegian, became /k/: хорошо (khorosho, good) → korosho.
• /mn/, absent in Norwegian, became /n/: много ли (mnogo li, many?) → nogoli.

One of the characteristics differentiating the pidgin from jargon is its grammar.[2] Russenorsk is mainly influenced by Norwegian grammar, leading some to conclude that it is a variant of Norwegian with some Russian influence.[9]

There are no clear verb conjugations. The main indication of a verb is the suffix -om, for example, kapitan på kajuta slipom (the captain is asleep in his cabin). Nominative nouns usually end with -a.[9] Conjunctions used to make compound sentences or dependent clauses are ja, i, and jes. Kak is used as an interrogative word. The general word order is SVO, with some alterations for questions and sentences with adverbs.[7]

På is used as the only preposition for the oblique case:[4]

• For possession: klokka på ju (your watch)
• For location: mala penge på lamma (little money in the pocket), and principal på sjib? (Is the captain aboard the ship?)
• For temporal relation: på morradag (tomorrow), på gammel ras (last year).
• For direction: moja tvoja på vater kasstom (I will throw you in the water), nogoli dag tvoja reisa på Arkangel otsuda? (How many days did you travel from here [to get] to Arkhangelsk?), på Arkangel reisom (go to Arkhangelsk).

Corpora of Russenorsk consist of lists of individual words and phrases as well as records of dialogues compiled by linguists such as Just Knut Qvigstad. The corpora include c. 400 words, about half of those only appear once in the records (so-called hapax legomena).[2][10]

The origin of its vocabulary is generally held to be approximately 40% Russian and 50% Norwegian, with the remaining 10% from Dutch, Low German, French, English, Sami, and Swedish. [4][6]

Many words in Russenorsk have a synonym from the other primary language.[7]

• Balduska, kvejta (halibut)
• Muzhik, man (man)
• Eta, den (this)
• Njet, ikke (not)

Some words can be etymologically traced to both Norwegian and Russian, for example, vin (Norwegian) and вино (Russian). Some words have an unclear etymology, for example, tovara or vara can come from Russian, Swedish, or Finnish.[7]

Some Russenorsk words survive in the dialect of Vardø:[2]

• kralle (Russenorsk: krallom, Russian: красть, tr. krast', to steal)
• klæba (Russian: хлеб, tr. khleb, bread)

Russenorsk does not have extensive morphology, but has some unique characteristics. The ending -om does not come from Russian nor Norwegian, but it may come from Solombala English.[2] The ending -mann, from Norwegian, is used to indicate nationality or profession, for example russmann (Russian), burmann (Norwegian), or kukmann (trader). Other morphological features are reduplication, such as morra-morradag (after tomorrow), and compounding, such as kua (cow) and sjorta (shirt) to kuasjorta (cowhide).[4]

One characteristic syntactical attribute of Russenorsk is the tendency to move the verb to the final position when the sentence has adverbs. This is found in neither Russian nor Norwegian.[2] Another is that the negator (ikke, njet) precedes the verb, but can be separated from the verb. This is unlike negation in either Russian or Norwegian, but it may have come from Finnish, in which this syntax was probable.[7]

A lack of metalinguistic awareness amongst Russenorsk speakers may have led them to believe they were speaking the language of their interlocutor; that is, that Russians believed they were speaking Norwegian and vice versa.[9]

^R marks Russian origin, ^N marks Norwegian.

Moja	på	tvoja.
моя́R	påN поR[lower-alpha 1]	твоя́R
my	in	your
I speak in your language.

Kak	sprek?	Moja	njet	forsto.
какR	språkN	моя́R	нетR	forståN
how	speak?	my	no	understand
What are you saying? I don't understand.

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