бьрковьске

Old Novgorodian

Alternative forms

• бьрьковьске (bĭrĭkovĭske) — second pleophony
• берковеске (berkoveske), берековеске (berekoveske) — late form

Etymology

First attested in c. 1140‒1160. Shortened from *бьрковьске пѫде (*bĭrkovĭske pǫde, “pood from the city of Birka”). By surface analysis, *Бьркꙑ (*Bĭrky) +‎ -ове (-ove) +‎ -ьске (-ĭske) or +‎ -овьске (-ovĭske), borrowed from Old Norse Birka (“a port city in medieval Sweden”), ultimately from birki- (“birchen”), bjǫrk (“birch”). Compare Estonian perkapund, dialectal põrgepund (“ship-pound”) < Old Swedish *biærköa pund, while Old Norse *birkiskr pund could serve as a model for Old Novgorodian *бьрковьске пѫде (*bĭrkovĭske pǫde) and Old East Slavic *бьрковьскъ пѫдъ (*bĭrkovĭskŭ pǫdŭ).

Cognate with Old East Slavic бьрковьскъ (bĭrkovĭskŭ), Old Ruthenian берковескъ (berkovesk).

Pronunciation

• Hyphenation: бь‧рко‧вь‧ске

Noun

бьрковьске • (bĭrkovĭske) m

1. berkovets (an old unit of weight, approximately 164 kilograms or 10 poods)

Related terms

Old Novgorodian terms derived from the Proto-Indo-European root *bʰerHǵ- (0 c, 2 e)

Further reading

• Zaliznyak, Andrey (2004) Древненовгородский диалект [Old Novgorod dialect]‎^[1] (in Russian), 2nd edition, Moscow: Languages of Slavic Cultures, →ISBN, page 711
• “бьрковьске”, in Берестяные грамоты – Национальный корпус русского языка [Birchbark Letters – Russian National Corpus], https://ruscorpora.ru/, 2003–2024