# Shalman



## Maroseika

Hello.

There is a word in Russian - shalman (шалман) meaning "inferior, low-class pub". This word exists in Russian at least since the XIX century and was borrowed, according to etymological dictionaries, from one of the Turkish languages. However I failed to find anything like that in the Etym. dict. of Turkish languages.

Is there anything like that in any of the Turkish languages nowadays or was there in the past?


----------



## Volcano

*We have salman which means free, independent...*


----------



## nsabah

Maybe we borrowed it from the greeks as well. They were with us until 20th century.


----------



## AlpArslan

It may be derived from "Salaş" too, which has similar meaning.


----------



## nsabah

Şalman - salaŞ


----------



## aniltem

*Salaş* looks great for this!


----------



## kazim

Maroseika said:


> Hello.
> 
> There is a word in Russian - shalman (шалман) meaning "inferior, low-class pub". This word exists in Russian at least since the XIX century and was borrowed, according to etymological dictionaries, from one of the Turkish languages. However I failed to find anything like that in the Etym. dict. of Turkish languages.
> 
> Is there anything like that in any of the Turkish languages nowadays or was there in the past?



Salman and salash seem very far from Shalman to me. Salman(as a first name) comes from Arabic and the meaning is something like healthy, integral, etc.(same family as salim,muslim,salam,islam etc). 

Salash: never heard it (we don't have that in Azeri. What does it mean exactly?) But still this seems to be very different from Shalman, since the roots differ: sh and s are two different roots (ex: shal vs. sal)...

Here's what I think, Maroseika: your dictionary probably says Turkic languages (Тюркские языки) and not Turkish (Турецкий)

So, most probably the word came from Tatar language, like most of the Turkic loan words in Russian. But Tatar is in the Kypchak branch of Turkic languages, Turkish is in the Oguz branch. Thus, I can see why we don't find the exact word in Turkish.  

Now, I thought of the word "şalban" (that's how we call a "log" ("бревно") in Azeri). Maybe it is this very word "shalman" that you are looking for. The m/b mutation is common in Turkic languages. Ex. Az/Tr : mən/ben, min/bin, bənövşə/menekşe, etc... Perhaps, this is the Kypchak legacy in Azeri language (maybe dating back to the time when Khazar kingdom dominated parts of Caucasian Albania or even earlier when Barsils,Huns,etc.mixed into the Caucasian populations).

With a pinch of imagination one could think of a simple house made of logs where low-class population was served snacks and drinks) (By the way, nomadic Turkic tribes did have that kind of constructions).

Otherwise, the word sounds very much Turkic. -man/-mən is a common suffix: names like Elman, Bilman carry it. Other words include orman, xırman,kətmən,batman,etc.

Şal in itself is the same as shawl (шаль), but i don't think it could be relevant here.


----------

