Drevnost’ Malorossiiskogo Yazyka [Antiquity of the Little Russian Language] was published in 1880 in Odesa. It is available in the original language at Archive.org. Very telling is the only sentence on the second page – ‘Permitted by censorship’ because it demonstrates the scrutiny of both the author and his work by Tsarist Russia before the book went into print. The book was suppressed by Moscow since then and one can easily understand why. Here is a translation of just one paragraph of the Introduction: “On studying and comparing the Aryan languages for a long time, I have arrived at the conclusion that the Malorussian [Ukrainian] language is not just older than all the Slavic languages, not excluding the so-called Old Slavic, but also Sanscrit, Greek, Latin, and other Aryan languages. But, believe it or not, the Malorussian language does not even have a decent dictionary! This circumstance prevented the foreign Philologists from discovering the real source of the ancient languages…” A little below, Krasusky demonstrates how certain Ukrainian words made their way into other languages and what transformations they underwent during the process:
“From the Malorussian word khodyty (to walk) derive the words nakhodyty and znakhodyty (to find) and then znakhar (healer), a person who knows where to find something or how to start a business. From here, a new word znaty (to know), in the Sanskrit it is gnatum which is pronounced as dzhanatum. Malorussian znavtsia or znatok, in the Polish is znawca, in the Sanskrit – gnawant, in the Latin – gnavus, in the Anglo-Saxonian cnaven, in the German – kennen, in the English – know.
From this we see that our original z, in Sanskrit was transformed into g, or dz; in Latin into g; in German and English into k; in French and Italian into c, for example conoscere, connaitre (to know)…”
Krasusky’s theory helps better understant etymology of other English words. Here are just some of the most obvious examples:
Cold derives from the Ukrainian ‘kholod’
Hut is from the Ukrainian ‘khata’
Pale is from the Ukrainian ‘palia’ (stick)
(the most famous English expression ‘beyond the pale‘)
At around 1800, famous English traveler Edward Daniel Clarke described his first impressions after meeting Ukrainians:
“We began to perceive that the farther we advanced from the common hordes of the Russians, the more politeness and hospitality we should experience; exactly the reverse of that which we had been taught to expect by the inhabitants of Moscow.
The first regular establishment of Malo-Russians which we saw, occurred after leaving lestakovo. It was called Locova Sloboda. The houses were all whitewashed, like many of the cottages in Wales; and this operation is performed annually, with great care. Such distinguishing cleanliness appeared within them, that a traveller might fancy himself transported, in the course of a few miles, from Russia to Holland. Their apartments, even the ceilings and the beams of the roof, are regularly washed. Their tables and benches shine with washing and rubbing, and reminded us of the interior of cottages in Norway. Their courtyard, stables, and out-houses, with everything belonging to them, bespoke industry and neatness. In their little kitchens, instead of the darkness and smoky hue of the Russians, even the mouths of their stoves were white. Their utensils and domestic vessels were all bright and well polished. They kept poultry, and had plenty of cattle. Their little gardens were filled with fruit-trees, which gave an English character to their houses the third nation with whose dwellings I have compared the cottages of Malo-Russia; that is to say, having a Welsh exterior, a Norwegian interior, and the gardens and out-houses of the English peasantry.
Their language is pleasing, and full of diminutives. But the resemblance which these people bear, in certain circumstances of dress and manners, to the Scottish Highlanders, is very remarkable.”
Can the passage above be yet another proof of the common genetics between the Ukrainians and the British? It can also serve as proof that the Ukrainians and the Muskovites are not and have never been ‘one nation’.
