okay, i see this post like for the hundredth time on my dash today and it actually makes me laugh a little because of some inaccuracies which i find funny.
i hear john mulaney’s voice in my head saying ‘just ‘cause you’re accurate does not mean you’re interesting’ but, following my duty as a russian rper, i really have to add some words.
important: this wasn’t written to offend or upset the original author, i know you listed your favorites. but some things just need to be clarified and explained.
also i’m sorry for the longpost, i just can’t use ‘keep reading’ in it since tumblr plays an ass tonight.
first of all, see those names in brackets? they aren’t actual names that you can use officially. those are mostly nicknames that are used by family members or friends, but if you want to give your child (same for characters) name verochka, oh, people would laugh you and your daughter in the face.
well. don’t believe jennifer lawrence and red sparrow movie (this movie is a huge bunch of unrealistic shit btw). we don’t use the name dominika, at least for women who were born before 2010. you probably can find 3 y.o. girls called dominika or stefania or zlatozara here because, of course, western culture influences our country and names are not an exception but even now this name may sound really silly if your surname is russian af, it just doesn’t fit. ‘dominika ivanova’ - nope, this sounds horrible. and it sounds even worse in official documents, on passport and so on, because we have a patronym in our full names.
important: nobody has a middle name here but everyone has a patronym instead. also important: we use our patronym only in documents and papers. or, e.g. if you appeal to your teacher - you don’t call her ‘miss/mrs ivanova’, no, you should use her name + patronym.
svetla, khristya, jelena. these names doesn’t exist here. but we have svetlana, kristina and elena. also lena, which is mentioned in the original post, is a nickname for elena, it’s not a name in itself. and tanya is a nickname for tatiana.
elisavetta has only one ‘t’ in it and ‘s’ is actually a ‘z’ so it’s elizaveta. and if you need a soft nickname for this one, you can use liza which is pronounced like LEE-zuh.
viola. debatable one, i don’t think we use this name. i’ve seen it only once in my life and it was in a bad and cheap detective book.
same for lenora, it was used in poetry which is actually a translated ballad by gottfried bürger.
male names are listed pretty accurately but still. the one that doesn’t exist here as a name (but can be used as a nickname) - vasil. it should be vasiliy.
we don’t use christov.
kazimir, samuil and lavrenti are so outdated.
damian wasn’t popular at all until 2010s.
danya is not a name but a nickname for danil and daniil (or danila but this variant isn’t actually in use).
we also don’t use tsezar, and even despite this fact there’s one another huge ‘no way’ for tsezar. it’s actually a ‘caesar’ like in julius caesar, but people would most likely think about caesar salad when they hear this name.
i would also add that every name should be used in connection to the period. things change very fast, popularity of some names increases/decreases all the time and it’s crazy sometimes how different people are named in different generations. a lot of names on this list are outdated, outlived their lives, like larissa, antonina and roza which are great names but they were popular in 20th century. you also should always remember about your character’s nationality, russians are not all the same, we have different background (e.g. zilya is not a common name for russians, it’s tatarian).
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