# Why жи, ши and not жы, шы?



## Encolpius

Hello, I learnt not long ago, ж, ш and  ц are always hard consonants,  so why is -i- always soft after those consonants? The situation is different with ц as I saw. So why not жывот, жыла (Poles use y after those hard consonants)? Thank.


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## Vadim K

We also pronounce "ж*ы*вот", "ш*ы*на", "ж*ы*ла", "ж*ы*молость". But we always write "_и_" after "_ж_" or "_ш_". (живот, шина, жила, жимолость).

Please just remember this easy Russian grammar rule - _"Жи" и "Ши" пиши с буквой "И"_. It is one of the Russian grammar rules which Russian pupils study in the first grade.


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## Encolpius

Wow, very interesting, thank you!!! And the pupil example is really wonderful.
So no historical reason, explanation or something.
Now I could ask why you can say hard and soft i after ц..


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## GCRaistlin

Encolpius said:


> So no historical reason, explanation or something.


Of course there is. Formerly it was being pronounced like it is being written. Just like in any other language.


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## Saley

Encolpius said:


> Now I could ask why you can say hard and soft i after ц.


Both _цы_ and _ци_ are pronounced the same: hard [ц] followed by [ы].


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## rusita preciosa

While *жи, ши* is always spelled with an *и*, there are some exceptions with цы/ци: there are 5 words that are spelled with an *ы*: цыган, цыпочки (tiptoes), цыплёнок, цыкнуть (to shush) and цыц (shush!). There is a mnemonic to memorize these exceptions:
Цыган на цыпочках цыкнул на цыпленка: "цыц!"


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## Encolpius

Saley said:


> Both _цы_ and _ци_ are pronounced the same: hard [ц] followed by [ы].



Oh, so that must be a rather tough part of Russian grammar for pupils, right?


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## Encolpius

rusita preciosa said:


> While *жи, ши* is always spelled with an *и*, there are some exceptions with цы/ци: there are 5 words that are spelled with an *ы*: цыган, цыпочки (tiptoes), цыплёнок, цыкнуть (to shush) and цыц (shush!). There is a mnemonic to memorize these exceptions:
> Цыган на цыпочках цыкнул на цыпленка: "цыц!"



Very interesting. There is something like that in Czech as well. 
So the standard is ци but there are a few exceptions. And the plural is always -цы. 
And I have found adjectives are also mostly -ций (except: -лицый, куцый)


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## Maroseika

Encolpius said:


> so why is -i- always soft after those consonants?


Just to specify: a vowel cannot be soft or hard, only consonant can.



Encolpius said:


> And I have found adjectives are also mostly -ций (except: -лицый, куцый)


To say the truth, I cannot think of any adjective ending on -ций. But there is a lot of such nouns, mostly (if not all) of Latin origin: кальций, нунций, панариций etc.


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## Vadim K

Maroseika said:


> To say the truth, I cannot think of any adjective ending on -ций. But there is a lot of such nouns, mostly (if not all) of Latin origin: кальций, нунций, панариций etc.



Yes, there are no any anjectives ending on _-ций_ in Russian. And the only two adjectives ending on _-цый_ in Russian are "_куцый_" and "_~лицый_". There are no others.


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## Awwal12

rusita preciosa said:


> While *жи, ши* is always spelled with an *и*, there are some exceptions with цы/ци: there are 5 words that are spelled with an *ы*: цыган, цыпочки (tiptoes), цыплёнок, цыкнуть (to shush) and цыц (shush!).


These are exceptions regarding "цы" in the root only. On the other hand, in inflections and certain suffixes it's always "цы" (пальцы, девицын etc.). Generally it's one of the most messed up parts of the Russian orthography (and there is no phonetic and no etymological reason behind that all, this spelling just partly reflects the foreignized, artificial pronunciation of the Russian elite of the XIX century, which is a long time gone).
With ши and жи it's at least partly logical: these consonants are etymologically soft, and the Russian orthography here simply copies Old Russian and Church Slavonic. However, it fails to be consistent about these consonants with other vowels (so we write шу and жу, - except in a couple of loanwords, some of which are also supposed to have as much weird pronunciation, - шо and жо, жа and ша; the use of э and е is utterly messed up in general, so it's pointless to take it into account here).


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## rusita preciosa

Awwal12 said:


> These are exceptions are regarding "цы" in the root only.


 I should have mentioned that!


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## viezis

Awwal12 said:


> These are exceptions regarding "цы" in the root only. On the other hand, in inflections and certain suffixes it's always "цы" (пальцы, девицын etc.). Generally it's one of the most messed up parts of the Russian orthography (and there is no phonetic and no etymological reason behind that all, this spelling just partly reflects the foreignized, artificial pronunciation of the Russian elite of the XIX century, which is a long time gone).
> With ши and жи it's at least partly logical: these consonants are etymologically soft, and the Russian orthography here simply copies Old Russian and Church Slavonic. However, it fails to be consistent about these consonants with other vowels (so we write шу and жу, - except in a couple of loanwords, some of which are also supposed to have as much weird pronunciation, - шо and жо, жа and ша; the use of э and е is utterly messed up in general, so it's pointless to take it into account here).



Where could one read about these phonological changes and their historical contexts? Specifically what you mentioned about the use of э and е, and also the influence the XIX century russian elite had on the language. Any other interesting phonological changes would also be welcomed!!


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## Awwal12

viezis said:


> Specifically what you mentioned about the use of э and е


What I mentioned about е and э has not (too) much to do with phonetics. Originally Russian didn't have /э/ vowel after hard consonants with soft pairs at all (you can see for yourself that in all native Russian words /э/ follows either a soft or an unpaired consonant: левый, тело, цена etc.); those simply didn't occur before /э/, and there was no reason to have a separate letter for /э/ after hard consonants. "Э", being pretty old itself, till the XX century served only to indicate the absence of iotation after vowels and in the word-initial positions. Meanwhile, during the XVIII and XIX centuries Russian has acquired a lot of loanwords from European languages, and in many cases the consonants before /э/ weren't softened (that reflected how they were percieved by Russian natives, and the Russian phonology  was potentially allowing hard consonants before /э/; after all, *unpaired* hard consonants existed before /э/ at least since the XIV century). But the ortography didn't reflect that distinction at all; partly it was because with the "ѣ" letter the room for possible mistakes was too small (compare the modern spellings "мэр" and "мер" with the pre-revolutionary "меръ" and "мѣръ"; in the both cases mistaking for "мёр" is possible if "ё" isn't properly marked, but it's another story).

In the XX century philologists finally decided to do something about this situation, especially since "ѣ" was abolished in 1918. The trouble is, they failed to be consistent about it (probably being afraid to make too big changes). So they created a small white list of words with "э" after consonants in the root ("мэр", "сэр", a couple more) and noted that "certain" proper nouns can contain it too. And if you add to it the fact that authors of transliteration & transcription systems obviously didn't consult with them and the existing systems (according to which we, for example, have to write the Japanese word "酒" as "сакэ") weren't changed, you'll generally have the picture of the mess we're in. If a Russian knows some word of foreign origin which has /э/ after a consonant in the root, he's never quite sure about its spelling (especially when it's a proper noun), while foreign learners cannot guess how to read words with "e", and even the natives aren't etirely sure sometimes - because older loanwords tend to soften the consonants before /э/ (especially before the unstressed ones, but not only; cf. "леди" [л'э́д'и]), and there is considerable variation in their actual pronunciation.

As for "ци" vs. "цы", I'll try to find the source, even though it may prove difficult. But, obviously, it was the Russian nobility which ultimately dictated the norms of both spelling and standard (i.e. metropolitan and non-dialectal) pronunciation in Russian during the first half of the XIX century; suffice it to say, by 1800s about 90% of the entire Russian population were peasants (mostly, even though not entirely, illiterate), while the nobility made up a considerable share of city population, enjoying huge educational and economical benefits; nearly ALL Russian writers and poets (and a large share of Russian scholars) before the mid XIX century were of noble birth; most of them spoke French more often than Russian, and knew Church Slavonic at least passively. By the beginning of the XIX century Russia was still a feudal, if highly centralized, state.


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## Lorenc

Awwal12 said:


> What I mentioned about е and э has not (too) much to do with phonetics. Originally Russian didn't have /э/ vowel after hard consonants with soft pairs at all



Yours was a very interesting and informative post, Awaal12, thanks for that! Just to be sure, when you write /э/ you mean 'the sound of the open-mid front unrounded vowel, which in IPA would be written /ɛ/', right? As you say, words spelled with <е> but which `should' be written with <э>, such as интернет, купе, секс are very deceptive for us foreigners. I think I'd heard that кофе was pronounced 'кофэ' in the past but now only the spelling pronunciation is used (with soft 'f'); can you confirm this?


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## Awwal12

Lorenc said:


> I think I'd heard that кофе was pronounced 'кофэ' in the past but now only the spelling pronunciation is used (with soft 'f'); can you confirm this?


It is quite possible at least. As I heard, some people in St.Petersburg even now pronounce this word as [kɔfə], although it's very rare. Still, this particular word has a too complicated history (cf. archaic variant "кофий") to jump to preliminary conclusions.


Lorenc said:


> Just to be sure, when you write /э/ you mean 'the sound of the open-mid front unrounded vowel


When I write /э/ I mean a certain vowel *phoneme* of Russian (hence phonetic accuracy is unnecessary and not intended). As with any other Russian vowel phoneme, its actual realization greatly depends on surrounding sounds and its position in relation to the stress; the main allophone (in the stressed position after a hard consonant) is, indeed, [ɛ] sound ([э] in traditional Russian notation); the total number of allophones is about 5 (small nuances and personal variations make it difficult to give some exact and final number).


Lorenc said:


> секс


In fact, for some speakers it is /с'экс/ indeed, even though such pronunciation is marginal.


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