Throughout the history of Russia, with the exeption of a
brief period around the beginning of the present century, it
has been the official policy of the govenment to forbid the
appearance in print of a large body of words used in the
everyday speech of many Russians and known to virtually all.
These words are considered too obscene for inclusion in
dictionaries, even through some of them have existed in the
language from its beginnings (e.g. perdet', Common slavic
*perdeti, c.f. Sanscrit pardati, English 'fart').
Unfortunately, the compilers of most Russian reference works
outside Russia have also deemed these words unsuitable for
inclusion.
A Short Dictionary of Russian Obscenities is a modest
attempt to fill this gap. It has been compiled from various
lists which have circulated for some time but have not been
avalable to a wide public, from Baudouin de Courtenay's
edition of Tolkovyi slovar' zivogo velikorusskogo jazyka by
Vl. Dal', and from material provided by several native
informants.
The compilers of the present work have attempted to
avoid strictly dialectal forms, but have included some
archaic words. It is intended simply as a defining dictionary
: those who use it for the purpose of building an active
vocabulary do so at their own risk. Determining exactly how
obscense a given word is frequently presented some
difficulty. As a matter of prinsiple, words which are
included (in their "vulgar" sense) in the four-volume Slovar'
russkogo jazyka (Akademija nauk SSSR, institut
jazykovedenija, Moskva, 1957-1961) are exluded.
The compilers are painfully aware of the inadequacy of
this first, preliminary edition of A Short Dictionary of
Russian Obscenities, but feel that it will serve a useful
purpose in the absence of any equivalent work. They will be
grateful for any critisizm of content or form. Indeed, it is
their fervent hope that the present work will stimulate an
interest in this neglected facet of Russian lexicography,
which might lead to the complication of a modern and complete
list of Russian obscenities.
