Russian phonology

Main article: Russian language

This article discusses the phonological system of standard Russian based on the Moscow dialect (unless otherwise noted). For discussion of other dialects, see Russian dialects. Russian possesses five vowels and consonants which typically come in pairs of hard / plain (твёрдый [ˈtvʲo.rdɨj]) and soft / palatalized (мягкий [ˈmʲæ.xʲkʲɪj]).

Vowels

The standard view among linguists and grammarians is that Russian possesses five vowel phonemes in stressed syllables; this interpretation is assumed in this article. A minority view regards the sounds [i] (which is usually rendered by the Russian letter ⟨и⟩) and [ɨ] (usually rendered by ⟨ы⟩) as distinct phonemes. These two sounds appear quite different to the ear, and Russians are normally taught in school that they are two separate "vowels". In Proto-Slavic times they clearly were separate phonemes, with /i/ deriving from Balto-Slavic (and late PIE) /iː/ and /ei/, and with /ɨ/ deriving from Balto-Slavic (and late PIE) /uː/. The five-vowel analysis rests on the complementary distribution of [ɨ] and [i] in modern Russian, with the former occurring after hard (non-palatalized) consonants and [i] elsewhere, showing them to be allophones of a single phoneme /i/.

Russian vowels are subject to considerable allophony, especially between stressed and unstressed syllables. In most unstressed positions, in fact, only three phonemes are distinguished after hard consonants, and only two after soft consonants. Unstressed /a/ and /o/ merge (a phenomenon known as akan'je); unstressed /e/ and /i/ merge (ikan'je); and all four unstressed vowels merge after soft consonants, except in absolute final position in a word. None of these mergers are represented in writing.

	Front	Central	Back
Close	i	(ɨ)	u
Mid	e	(ə)	o
Open		a

Vowel allophony is largely dependent on stress and the palatalization of neighboring consonants:

Front vowels

When a preceding consonant is hard, /i/ is retracted to [ɨ]. Formant studies in Padgett (2001) demonstrate that [ɨ] is better characterized as slightly diphthongized from the velarization of the preceding consonant, implying that a phonological pattern of using velarization to enhance perceptual distinctiveness between hard and soft consonants is strongest before /i/. When unstressed, /i/ becomes near-close; that is, [ɨ̞] following a hard consonant and [ɪ] in most other environments. Between soft consonants, both stressed and unstressed /i/ are raised, as in пить [pʲi̝tʲ] ('to drink') and маленький [ˈmalʲɪ̝nʲkʲɪj] ('small'). When preceded and followed by coronal or dorsal consonants, [ɨ] is fronted to [ɨ̟]. After a labial + /l/ cluster, [ɨ] is retracted, as in плыть [plɨ̠tʲ] ('to float'); it is also slightly diphthongized to [ɯ̟ɨ̟].

In native words, /e/ only follows unpaired (i.e. the retroflexes and /t͡s/) and soft consonants. After soft consonants (but not before), it is a mid vowel ([e̞] or [ɛ̝]), while a following soft consonant raises it to [e]. Another allophone, an open-mid [ɛ] occurs word-initially and never before or after soft consonants (hereafter [ɛ̝] is represented without the diacritic for simplicity). Preceding hard consonants retract /e/ to [ɛ̠] and [e̠] so that жест ('gesture') and цель ('target') are pronounced [ʐɛ̠st] and [t͡se̠lʲ] respectively.

In words borrowed from other languages, it is often the case that /e/ does not follow a soft consonant until the word has been fully adopted into Russian. For instance, шофёр (from French chauffeur) was pronounced [ʂoˈfɛr] in the early twentieth century but is now pronounced [ʂɐˈfʲor]. On the other hand, the pronunciations of words such as отель [ɐˈtɛlʲ] ('hotel') retain the hard consonants despite a long presence in the language.

Back vowels

Between soft consonants, /a/ becomes [æ] as in пять [pʲætʲ] ('five'). When not following a soft consonant, /a/ is retracted to [ɑ̟] before /l/ as in палка [ˈpɑ̟lkə] ('stick').

For most speakers, /o/ is a mid vowel but it can be more open for some speakers. Between soft consonants or simply following one, /o/ is centralized to [ɵ̞] as in тётя [ˈtʲɵ.tʲə] ('aunt').

As with the other back vowels, /u/ is centralized between soft consonants, as in чуть [t͡ɕʉtʲ] ('narrowly'). When unstressed, /u/ becomes near-close.

Vowel reduction

Main article: Vowel reduction in Russian

Unstressed vowels tend to merge. /o/ and /a/ generally have the same unstressed allophones and unstressed /e/ becomes /i/ (picking up its unstressed allophones). Russian orthography (as opposed to that of closely related Belarusian) does not reflect vowel reduction.

The realization of unstressed /o/ and /a/ goes as follows:

• After hard consonants, both reduce to [ə] or [ɐ]; [ɐ] appears in the syllable immediately before the stress and in absolute word-initial position. Examples: паром [pɐˈrom] ('ferry'), облако [ˈobləkə] ('cloud'), трава [trɐˈva] ('grass').
  • When ⟨aa⟩, ⟨ao⟩, ⟨oa⟩, or ⟨oo⟩ is written in a word, it indicates [ɐ.ɐ] so that соображать ('to use common sense/to reason'), is pronounced [sɐ.ɐ.brɐˈʐatʲ].
• Both /o/ and /a/ merge with /i/ after soft consonants and /j/ (/o/ is written as ⟨e⟩ in these positions). This occurs for /o/ after retroflex consonants as well. Examples: жена [ʐɨ̞ˈna] ('wife'), язык [jɪˈzɨk] ('tongue').
• These processes occur even across word boundaries as in под морем [pɐˈd‿morʲɪm] ('under the sea').

Across certain word-final suffixes, the reductions do not completely apply. In certain suffixes, after soft consonants and /j/, /a/ and /o/ (which is written as ⟨e⟩) can be distinguished from /i/ and from each other: по́ле (ˈpo̞.lʲɪ) ('field' nom. sg. neut.) is different from по́ля ('field' sg. gen.), and these final sounds differ from the realization of /i/ in such position.

There are a number of exceptions to the above comments on unstressed /o/ and /a/.

• Firstly, /o/ is not always reduced in foreign borrowings, e.g. радио, [ˈra.dʲɪ.o] ('radio').
• Secondly, there are at least two word roots for whose derivatives some speakers pronounce /a/ as [ɨ] after retroflex consonants (/ʐ/ and /ʂ/: жал- 'regret' and лошадь 'horse'. This pronunciation applies to жале́ть [ʐɨˈlʲetʲ] ('to regret'), к сожалéнию [ksə.ʐɨˈlʲe.nʲɪ.ju] ('unfortunately'), and plural oblique cases of лошадь ('horse'), such as лошаде́й, [lə.ʂɨˈdʲej] (pl. gen. and acc.).
• Thirdly, /i/ replaces /a/ after /t͡s/ in the oblique cases of some numerals, e.g. двадцати, [dvə.t͡sɨˈtʲi] ('twenty').

In addition to this, the unstressed high vowels /i/ and /u/ become lax (or near-close) as in ютиться [jʉ̞ˈtʲit͡sə] ('to huddle'), этап [ɪˈtap] ('stage'), дышать [dɨ̞ˈʂatʲ] ('to breathe'), and мужчина [mʊˈɕɕinə] ('man').

In weakly stressed positions, vowels may become voiceless between two voiceless consonants: выставка [ˈvɨstə̥fkə] ('exhibition'), потому что [pə̥tɐˈmu ʂtə] ('because'). This may also happen in cases where only the following consonant is voiceless: череп [t͡ɕerʲɪ̥p] ('skull').

Diphthongs

Russian diphthongs all end in a non-syllabic [i̯], which can be considered an allophone of /j/, the only semivowel in Russian. In all contexts other than after a vowel, /j/ is considered an approximant consonant. Phonological descriptions of /j/ may also classify it as a consonant even in the coda. In such descriptions, Russian has no diphthongs.

The first part of diphthongs are subject to the same allophony as their constituent vowels. Examples of words with diphthongs: яйцо [jɪjˈt͡so] ('egg'), ей [jej] ('her' dat.), действенный [ˈdʲejstvʲɪnnɨj] ('effective'). /ij/ (written ⟨ий⟩ or ⟨ый⟩) is a common adjectival affix where it is often unstressed; at normal conversational speed, such unstressed endings may be monophthongized to [ɪ̟].

Consonants

⟨ʲ⟩ denotes palatalization, meaning the center of the tongue is raised during and after the articulation of the consonant.

Consonant phonemes of Russian

	Labial		Dental & Alveolar		Post- alveolar/ Palatal		Velar
	hard	soft	hard	soft	hard	soft	hard	softa
Nasal	m	mʲ	n	nʲ
Plosive	p   b	pʲ   bʲ	t   d	tʲ   dʲ			k   ɡ	kʲ   ɡʲ
Affricate			t͡s	(t͡sʲ)		t͡ɕ
Fricative	f   v	fʲ   vʲ	s   z	sʲ   zʲ	ʂ   ʐ	ɕːb   ʑːb	x	xʲ
Trill			r	rʲ
Approximant			l	lʲ		j
Note	^a The soft/hard distinction for velar consonants is typically allophonic. They might be considered marginal phonemes because they do occur before non-front vowels, although this distribution is found predominantly in loanwords. ^b /ɕː/ and /ʑː/ are also marginal phonemes. A formerly common pronunciation of /ɕ t͡ɕ/ indicates the sound may be two underlying phonemes: /ʂ t͡ɕ/. The status of /ʑː/ as a phoneme is also marginal since it may derive from an underlying /zʐ/ or /sʐ/ and its use is becoming more archaic compared to a geminated hard [ʐː] (although the former continues to be common in media and government). For more information, see Alveolo-palatal consonant.

Phonetic details:

• Almost all consonants come in hard/soft pairs. Exceptions are /ʂ/, and /ʐ/, which are always hard, and /t͡ɕ/, /ɕː/, /ʑː/, and /j/, which are always soft. /t͡s/ is also typically listed among the always-hard consonants, however certain foreign proper names, including those of Polish, Ukrainian, or Lithuanian origin (Цюрих (Zurich), Цюрупа, Пацюк, Цявловский), loanwords (e.g., хуацяо, from Chinese), and occasional neologisms (фрицёнок, шпицёнок, принцёнок, pl. фрицята, шпицята, принцята) contain a soft /t͡sʲ/. There is a marked tendency of Russian hard consonants to be velarized, though this is a subject of some academic dispute. Velarization is clearest before the front vowels /e/ and /i/.
• /ʐ/ is similar to the ⟨g⟩ in genre, but the tongue is curled back (as with the /r/ = [ɻ] of American English) rather than domed. /ʂ/ differs from this only by being voiceless. For more, see retroflex consonant.
• Hard /t/ /d/ /n/ /l/ and soft /rʲ/ are both dental [t̪] [d̪] [n̪] [l̪] [r̪ʲ] and apical [t̺] [d̺] [n̺] [l̺] [r̺ʲ] while soft /tʲ/ /dʲ/ /nʲ/ and /lʲ/ are alveolar and laminal [t̻ʲ^sʲ] [d̻ʲ^zʲ] [nʲ̻] [lʲ̻]. Note that, for /tʲ/ and /dʲ/, the tongue is raised enough to produce slight frication. Hard /l/ is typically pharyngealized ([ɫ], "dark l").
• /s/ and /z/ are laminal and dental (or dento-alveolar) while /t͡s/ is alveolar and apical.
• Hard /r/ is postalveolar: [r̠].
• Some linguists (like I. G. Dobrodomov and his school) postulate the existence of a phonemic glottal stop /ʔ/. This marginal phoneme can be found, for example, in the word не-а [nʲeʔ]. Claimed minimal pairs for this phoneme include суженный [ˈsʔuʐɨnɨj] 'narrowed' (a participle from сузить 'to narrow', with prefix с- and root -уз-, cf. узкий 'narrow') vs суженый [ˈsuʐɨnɨj] 'betrothed' (originally a participle from судить 'to judge', now an adjective; the root is суд 'court') and с Аней [ˈsʔanʲɪj] 'with Ann' vs Саней [ˈsanʲɪj] '(by) Alex'.

In the mid-twentieth century, a small number of reductionist approaches made by structuralists put forth that palatalized consonants occur as the result of a phonological processes involving /j/ (or palatalization as a phoneme in itself), so that there were no underlying palatalized consonants. Despite such proposals, linguists have long agreed that the underlying structure of Russian is closer to that of its acoustic properties, namely that soft consonants are separate phonemes in their own right.

Phonological processes

Voiced consonants (/b/, /bʲ/, /d/, /dʲ/ /ɡ/, /v/, /vʲ/, /z/, /zʲ/, /ʐ/, and /ʑː/) are devoiced word-finally unless the next word begins with a voiced obstruent. /ɡ/, in addition to becoming voiceless, also lenites to [x] in some words, such as бог [ˈbox].

Russian features a general retrograde assimilation of voicing and palatalization. In longer clusters, this means that multiple consonants may be soft despite their underlyingly (and orthographically) being hard. The process of voicing assimilation applies across word-boundaries when there is no pause between words.

Voicing

Within a morpheme, voicing is not distinctive before obstruents (except for /v/, and /vʲ/ when followed by a vowel or sonorant). The voicing or devoicing is determined by that of the final obstruent in the sequence: просьба [ˈprozʲbə] ('request'), водка [ˈvotkə] ('vodka'). In foreign borrowings, this isn't always the case for /f(ʲ)/, as in Адольф Гитлер [ɐˈdolʲf ˈɡʲitlʲɪr] ('Adolf Hitler') and граф болеет [ɡraf bɐˈlʲeɪt] ('the count is ill'). /v/ and /vʲ/ are unusual in that they seem transparent to voicing assimilation; in the syllable onset, both voiced and voiceless consonants may appear before /v(ʲ)/:

• тварь [tvarʲ] ('the creature')
• два [dva] ('two')
• световой [s(ʲ)vʲɪtɐˈvoj] ('luminous')
• звезда [z(ʲ)vʲɪˈzda] ('star')

When /v(ʲ)/ precedes and follows obstruents, the voicing of the cluster is governed by that of the final segment (per the rule above) so that voiceless obstruents that precede /v(ʲ)/ are voiced if /v(ʲ)/ is followed by a voiced obstruent (e.g. к вдове [ɡ vdɐˈvʲɛ] 'to the widow') while a voiceless obstruent will devoice all segments (e.g. без впуска [bʲɪs ˈfpuskə] 'without an admission').

/t͡ɕ/, /t͡s/, and /x/ have voiced allophones before voiced obstruents, as in дочь бы [ˈdod͡ʑ bɨ] ('a daughter would') and плацдарм [plɐd͡zˈdarm] ('bridge-head').

Other than /mʲ/ and /nʲ/, nasals and liquids devoice between voiceless consonants or a voiceless consonant and a pause: контрфорс [ˌkontr̥ˈfors] ('buttress').

Palatalization

Before /j/, paired consonants are normally soft as in пью [pʲju] 'I drink' and пьеса [ˈpʲjɛ.sə] 'theatrical play'. However the last consonant of prefixes and parts of compound words generally remains hard in the standard language: отъезд [ɐˈtjɛst] 'departure', Минюст [ˌmʲiˈnjust] 'Min[istry of] Just[ice]'; and only when prefix ends in /s/ or /z/, there exists an optional softening: съездить [ˈs(ʲ)je.zʲdʲɪtʲ] ('to go/travel').

Paired consonants preceding /e/ are also soft; although there are exceptions from loanwords, alternations across morpheme boundaries are the norm. The following examples show the different types of alternations.

• дом [dom] 'house' nominative) vs. доме [ˈdomʲɪ] 'house' prepositional)
• ржавый [ˈrʐavɨj] 'rusty' vs. ржаветь [rʐɐˈvʲɛtʲ] 'to rust'. (The verb ржаветь has a dual pronunciation: an older norm prescribes stress on the first syllable, but younger speakers stress it on the second syllable.
• отве́т [ɐˈtvʲɛt] 'answer' vs. ответить [ɐˈtvʲetʲɪtʲ] 'to answer'
• несу́ [nʲɪˈsu] 'I carry' vs. несёт [nʲɪˈsʲot] 'carries'
• жена́ [ʐɨˈna] 'wife' vs. же́нин [ˈʐɛnʲɪn] 'wife's'
• корова [kɐˈrovə] 'cow' vs. коровий [kɐˈrovʲɪj] 'bovine'
• прям [prʲam] 'straight' vs. прямизна [prʲɪmʲɪˈzna] 'straightness'
• вор [vor] 'thief') vs. воришка [vɐˈrʲiʂkə] 'thief (pejorative)'
• написа́л [nəpʲɪˈsal] 'he wrote) vs. написа́ли [nəpʲɪˈsalʲɪ] 'they wrote'
• горбу́н [ɡɐrˈbun] 'hunchback' vs. горбу́нья [ɡɐrˈbunʲjə] 'female hunchback'
• высо́к [vɨˈsok] 'high' vs. высь [vɨsʲ] 'height'

Because velar consonants are unpaired, palatalization contrasts do not exist, especially before front vowels. Allophonically, they become soft as in короткий [kɐˈrotkʲɪj] ('short') unless there is a word boundary, in which case they are hard (e.g. к Ивану [k ‿ɨvanu] 'to Ivan').

Before hard dental consonants, /r/, /rʲ/, labial and dental consonants are hard: орла [ɐrˈla] ('eagle' gen. sg).

Before soft labial and dental consonants or /lʲ/, dental consonants (other than /t͡s/) are soft (In literary pronunciation this is more complicated and, for example, dental continuants are hard before soft labial consonants across a prefix or presupposition boundary.)

Velar consonants are soft when preceding /i/; within words, this means that velar consonants are never followed by [ɨ].

/x/ assimilates the palatalization of the following velar consonant лёгких [ˈlʲɵxʲkʲɪx] ('lungs' gen. pl).

Palatalization assimilation of labial consonants before labial consonants is in free variation with nonassimilation, that is бомбить ('to bomb') is either [bɐmˈbʲitʲ] or [bɐmʲˈbʲitʲ] depending on the individual speaker.

When hard /n/ precedes its soft equivalent, it is also soft (see gemination). This is slightly less common across affix boundaries.

In addition to this, dental stridents conform to the place of articulation (not just the palatalization) of following postalveolars: с частью [ˈɕːasʲtʲju] ('with a part'). In careful speech, this does not occur across word boundaries.

Russian has the rare feature of nasals not typically being assimilated in place of articulation. Both /n/ and /nʲ/ appear before retroflex consonants: деньжонки [dʲɪnʲˈʐonkʲɪ] ('money' (scornful)) and ханжой [xɐnˈʐoj] ('hypocrite' instr.). In the same context, other coronal consonants are always hard. A partial exception to this is the velar nasal, which occurs as an allophone before velar consonants in some words (функция [ˈfuŋk.t͡sɨjə] 'function'), but not in most other words like банк [bank] ('bank').

Consonant clusters

As a Slavic language, Russian has fewer phonotactic restrictions than many other languages, allowing word-initial clusters that would be difficult for English speakers such as word-initial /xv/, /zd/, and /ʐd/. Fricatives, in particular, can cluster with other consonants much more freely in Russian. There are words that begin with a cluster of four consonants, such as in встретить [ˈfstrʲetʲɪtʲ] ('to encounter'), вздрогнуть [ˈvzdroɡnutʲ] ('to flinch'), and взгляд [ˈvzglʲat] ('to gaze'). However, these aren't very common.. The phrase к взгляду [k ˈvzglʲadu] ('to (the) gaze') begins with a cluster of five consonants.

Some potential clusters are reduced. Dental plosives are dropped between a dental continuant and a dental nasal: лестный [ˈlʲɛsnɨj] ('flattering'). At word boundaries, there is usually an audible release between consecutive consonants at word boundaries (rather than an overlap) so that each consonant is pronounced distinctly, especially in comparison to English (the major exception is clusters of homorganic consonants Zsiga (2003:403).) This allows for a more accurate perception of similar consonants such as /t/ and /tʲ/.

Supplementary notes

/n/ and /nʲ/ are the only consonants that can be geminated within morpheme boundaries. Such gemination does not occur in loanwords.

The historical transformation of /ɡ/ into /v/ in the genitive case (and also the accusative for animate entities) of masculine singular adjectives and pronouns is not reflected in the modern Russian orthography: его [jɪˈvo] ('his/him'), белого [ˈbʲɛ.lə.və] ('white' gen. sg.), синего [ˈsʲi.nʲɪ.və] ('blue' gen. sg.). Orthographic г also represents /x/ when it precedes other velar sounds: легко [lʲɪxˈko] ('easily').

Between any vowel and /i/ (excluding instances across affix boundaries but including unstressed vowels that have merged with /i/), /j/ may be dropped: аист [ˈa.ɪst] ('stork') and делает [ˈdʲɛləɪt] ('does'). (Halle (1959) cites заезжать and other instances of intervening prefix and preposition boundaries as exceptions to this tendency.)

Stress in Russian may fall on any syllable and words can contrast based just on stress (e.g. мука [ˈmukə] 'ordeal, pain, anguish' vs. [mʊˈka] 'flour, meal, farina'); stress shifts can even occur within an inflexional paradigm: до́ма [ˈdomə] ('house' gen. sg.) vs дома́ [dɐˈma] ('houses'). The place of the stress in a word is determined by the interplay between the morphemes it contains, as some morphemes have underlying stress, while others do not. However, other than some compound words, such as морозоустойчивый [mɐˌrozəʊˈstojtɕɪvɨj] ('frost-resistant') only one syllable is stressed in a word.. Russian also has an intonation pattern similar to that of English.

Non-open back vowels velarize preceding hard consonants: ты [tˠɨ] ('you' sing.). /o/ and /u/ labialize all consonants: бок [bʷok] ('side'), нёс [nʲʷos] ('he carried').

Historical sound changes

See also: History of the Russian language

Russian scribe, 15th century

The modern phonological system of Russian is inherited from Common Slavonic, but underwent considerable innovation in the early historical period, before being largely settled by about 1400.

Like all Slavic languages, Old Russian was a language of open syllables. All syllables ended in vowels, and consonant clusters, in far lesser variety than today, existed only in the syllable onset. However, by the time of the earliest records, Old Russian already showed characteristic divergences from Common Slavonic.

Around the tenth century, Russian may have already had paired coronal fricatives and sonorants so that /s z n l r/ could have contrasted with /sʲ zʲ nʲ lʲ rʲ/, though any possible contrasts were limited to specific environments. Otherwise, palatalized consonants appeared allophonically before front vowels. When the yers were lost, the palatalization initially triggered by high vowels remained, creating minimal pairs like данъ /dan/ ('given') and дань /danʲ/ ('tribute'). At the same time, [ɨ], which was already a part of the vocalic system, was reanalyzed as an allophone of /i/ after hard consonants, prompting leveling that caused vowels to alternate according to the preceding consonant rather than vice versa.

The nasal vowels (spelled in the Cyrillic alphabet with yuses), which had developed from Common Slavic *eN and *oN before a consonant, were replaced with nonnasalized vowels, possibly iotated or with softening of the preceding consonant:

• PIE: *h₁sónti
• Latin: sunt
• Common Slavonic:
• sǫtь
• Old Church Slavonic: sǫtь
• obsolete Russian: суть [sutʲ] ('they are', 3rd person pl form of быть 'to be', cf. Polish są).

Borrowings in the Uralic languages with interpolated /n/ after Common Slavonic nasal vowels have been taken to indicate that the nasal vowels did exist in East Slavic until some time possibly just before the historical period.

Simplification of Common Slavic *dl and *tl to *l:

• Common Slavonic:
• mydlo
• Polish: mydło
• Russian: мыло [ˈmɨ.lə] ('soap').

A tendency for greater maintenance of intermediate ancient [-g-], [-k-], etc. before frontal vowels, than in other Slavic languages, the so-called incomplete second and third palatalizations:

• Ukrainian нозі /nozʲi/
• Russian: ноге [nɐˈɡʲɛ] ('leg' dat.).

Pleophony or "full-voicing" (polnoglasie, 'полногласие' [pəlnɐˈɡlasʲɪɪ]), that is, the addition of vowels on either side of /l/ and /r/ between two consonants. Church Slavonic influence has made it less common in Russian than in modern Ukrainian and Belarusian:

• Old Church Slavonic: vrabii *[ˈvrabii]
• Russian: воробей [vərɐˈbʲej] ('sparrow')

• Ukrainian: Володимир /woloˈdɪmɪr/
• Russian: Владимир [vlɐˈdʲimʲɪr] ('Vladimir') (although the nickname form in Russian is still Володя [vɐˈlodʲə]).

Major phonological processes in the last thousand years have included the absence of the Slavonic open-syllable requirement, achieved in part through the loss of the ultra-short vowels, the so-called fall of the yers, which alternately lengthened and dropped (the yers are given conventional transcription rather than precise IPA symbols in the Old Russian pronunciations):

• Old East Slavic: объ мьнѣ /o.bŭ mĭˈně/ > R: обо мне [ə.bɐ ˈmnʲe] ('about me')
• OR: сънъ /ˈsŭ.nŭ/ > R: сон [son] ('sleep' nom. sg.), cognate with Lat. somnus;
• OR: съна /sŭˈna/ > R: сна [sna] ('of sleep') (gen. sg.).

The loss of the yers has led to geminated consonants and a much greater variety of consonant clusters, with attendant voicing and/or devoicing in the assimilation:

• OR: къдѣ /kŭˈdě/ > R: где [ɡdʲɛ] ('where').

Consonant clusters thus created were often simplified:

• здравствуйте [ˈzdra.stvuj.tʲə] ('hello'), not *[ˈzdra.fstvuj.tʲə], although such a pronunciation could be affected in the archaic meaning be healthy
• сердце [ˈsʲɛ.rt͡sə] ('heart'), not *[ˈsʲɛ.rdt͡sə]
• солнце [ˈso.nt͡sə] ('sun'), not *[ˈso.lnt͡sə].

The development of OR ѣ /ě/ (conventional transcription) into /(j)e/, as seen above. This development has caused by far the greatest of all Russian spelling controversies. The timeline of the development of /ě/ into /e/ or /je/ has also been debated.

Sometime between the twelfth and fourteenth century, the allophone of /i/ before velar consonants changed from [ɨ] to [i] with subsequent palatalization of the velars.

The retroflexing of postalveolars: /ʒ/ became [ʐ] and /ʃ/ become [ʂ]. This is considered a "hardening" since retroflex sounds are difficult to palatalize. At some point, /t͡s/ resisted palatalization, which is why it is also "hard" although phonetically it is no different than before. The sound represented by ⟨щ⟩ was much more commonly pronounced /ɕt͡ɕ/ than it is today. Today's common and standard pronunciation of ⟨щ⟩ is /ɕː/.

The development of stressed /e/ into /o/ when between a soft consonant and a hard one.

• OR о чемъ /o ˈt͡ʃe.mŭ/ ('about which' loc. sg.) > R о чём [ɐ ˈt͡ɕom].

This has led to a number of alternations:

Word	Gloss	Word	Gloss
весе́лье	merriment	весёлый	merry
вле́чь	to attract	влёк	he attracted
деше́вле	cheaper	дешёвый	cheap
е́ль	fir-tree	ёлка	fir-tree
жечь	to burn	жёг	he burned
коле́сник	wheel-wright	колёса	wheels
лечь	to lie down	лёг	he lay down
Пе́тя	Pete	Пётр	Peter
поме́лья	brooms	мёл	he swept
сельский	rural	сёла	villages
се́стрин	sister's	сёстры	sisters
смерть	death	мёртвый	dead
шесть	six	сам-шо́ст	with five others

Note that the /e/ that derives from the now obsolete vowel, yat (ѣ) usually did not undergo this change with only the following fifteen exceptions:

• звёзды 'stars'
• гнёзда 'nests'
• сёдла 'saddles'
• издёвка 'jibe'
• смётка 'apprehension'
• медвёдка 'mole crickets'
• вёшка 'pole for hanging'
• вдёжка 'something to be inserted'
• цвёл 'flowered'
• обрёл 'found'
• зёвывал 'was yawning'
• надёвывал 'was putting on'
• надёван '[is] put on'
• запечатлён '[is] captured'
• подгнёта '[is] rotten'

Loanwords from Church Slavonic reintroduced /e/ between a soft consonant and a hard one, including:

• лев vs. лёв 'lion'
• небо 'sky' vs. нёбо 'roof of the mouth'
• хребе́т vs. хребёт 'spine'

A number of the phonological features of Russian are attributable to the introduction of loanwords (especially from non-Slavic languages), including:

• Sequences of two vowels within a morpheme. Only a handful of such words, like паук 'spider' and оплеуха 'slap in the face' are not loanwords.
  • поэт [pɐˈɛt] 'poet'. From French poète.
  • траур [ˈtraur] 'mourning'. From German Trauer.
• Word-initial /e/, except for the root эт-.
  • эра [ˈɛrə] 'era'. From German Ära
• Word-initial /a/.
  • авеню [ɐvʲɪˈnʲu] 'avenue. From French avenue.
  • афера [ɐˈfʲɛrə] 'swindle'. From French affaire.
  • агнец 'lamb'. From Church Slavonic
• The phoneme /f/ (see Ef (Cyrillic) for more information).
  • фонема [fɐˈnɛmə] 'phoneme'. From Greek φώνημα.
  • эфир [ɪˈfʲir] 'ether'. From Greek αἰθήρ.
  • фиаско [fʲɪˈaskə] 'fiasco. From Italian fiasco.
• The occurrence of non-palatalized consonants before /e/ within roots.(The initial /e/ of a suffix invariably triggers palatalization of an immediately preceding consonant, as in брат / брате.)
• The sequence /dʐ/ within a morpheme.
  • джин [dʐɨn] 'gin' from English.
  • джаз [dʐas] 'jazz' from English.

Many double consonants have become degeminated, though they are still written with two letters in the orthography. (In a 1968 study, long [tː] remains long in only half of the words that it appears written in, while long [fː] only a sixth of the time. The study, however, did not distinguish spelling from actual historical pronunciation, since it included loanwords in which consonants were written doubled but never pronounced long in Russian.)

See also

• Wikipedia:IPA for Russian
• Russian alphabet
• Russian orthography
  • Reforms of Russian orthography
• List of Russian language topics
• List of phonetics topics

Bibliography

• Агеенко Ф. Л., Зарва М. В. [Ageenko, F. L.; Zarva, M. B.]. 1993. Словарь ударений русского языка. Мoscow: Russkij Yazyk. ISBN 5-200-01127-2.

• Bidwell, Charles (1962), "An Alternate Phonemic Analysis of Russian", The Slavic and East European Journal, 6 (2), American Association of Teachers of Slavic and East European Languages: 125–129, doi:10.2307/3086096, JSTOR 3086096
• Crosswhite, Katherine Margaret (2000), "Vowel Reduction in Russian: A Unified Accountof Standard, Dialectal, and 'Dissimilative' Patterns" (PDF), University of Rochester Working Papers in the Language Sciences, 1 (1): 107–172
• Davidson, Lisa; Roon, Kevin (2008), "Durational correlates for differentiating consonant sequences in Russian", Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 38 (2): 137–165, doi:10.1017/S0025100308003447
• Dobrodomov, I. G. 2002. Беззаконная фонема /ʔ/ в русском языке. In Проблемы фонетики IV. 36−52.
• Dobrodomov, I. G., Izmest'eva I. A. 2009. Роль гортанного смычного согласного в изменении конца слова после падения редуцированных гласных ["Guttural obstruent role in the word end alternation after reduced vowels fall"]. Известия Самарского научного центра Российской академии наук [Izvestija Samarskogo Nauchnogo Tsentra Rossijskoj Akademii Nauk], volume 11, 4(4): 1001-1005.
• Folejewski, Z (1962), "[An Alternate Phonemic Analysis of Russian]: Editorial comment", The Slavic and East European Journal, 6 (2): 129–130
• Jones, Daniel; Dennis, Ward (1969), The Phonetics of Russian, Cambridge University Press
• Halle, Morris (1959), Sound Pattern of Russian, MIT Press
• Hamann, Silke (2004), "Retroflex fricatives in Slavic languages", Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 34 (1): 53–67, doi:10.1017/S0025100304001604
• Ladefoged, Peter; Maddieson, Ian (1996), The Sounds of the World's Languages, Blackwell Publishing, ISBN 0-631-19815-6
• Lightner, Theodore M. (1972), Problems in the Theory of Phonology, I: Russian phonology and Turkish phonology, Edmonton: Linguistic Research, inc
• Padgett, Jaye (2001), "Contrast Dispersion and Russian Palatalization", in Hume, Elizabeth; Johnson, Keith (eds.), The role of speech perception in phonology, Academic Press, pp. 187–218
• Padgett, Jaye (2003a), "Contrast and Post-Velar Fronting in Russian", Natural Language & Linguistic Theory, 21 (1): 39–87, doi:10.1023/A:1021879906505
• Padgett, Jaye (2003b), "The Emergence of Contrastive Palatalization in Russian", in Holt, D. Eric (ed.), Optimality Theory and Language Change
• Padgett, Jaye; Tabain, Marija (2005), "Adaptive Dispersion Theory and Phonological Vowel Reduction in Russian" (PDF), Phonetica, 62 (1): 14–54, doi:10.1159/000087223, PMID 16116302
• Schenker, Alexander M. (2002), "Proto-Slavonic", in Comrie, Bernard; Corbett, Greville. G. (eds.), The Slavonic Languages, London: Routledge, pp. 60–124, ISBN 0415280788 {{citation}}: External link in |chapterurl= (help); Unknown parameter |chapterurl= ignored (|chapter-url= suggested) (help)
• Stankiewicz, E. (1962), "[An Alternate Phonemic Analysis of Russian]: Editorial comment", The Slavic and East European Journal, 6 (2), American Association of Teachers of Slavic and East European Languages: 131–132, doi:10.2307/3086098, JSTOR 3086098
• Vinogradov, V. V. Origin and the meaning of the word "суть" (Russian). Istorija slov. Okolo 1500 slov i vyraženij i bolee 5000 slov, s nimi svjazannyh.
• Zsiga, Elizabeth (2003), "Articulatory Timing in a Second Language: Evidence from Russian and English", Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 25: 399–432

Further reading

• Hamilton, William S. (1980), Introduction to Russian Phonology and Word Structure, Slavica Publishers
• Hamann, Silke (2002), "Postalveolar Fricatives in Slavic Languages as Retroflexes" (PDF), in Baauw, S.; Huiskes, M.; Schoorlemmer, M. (eds.), OTS Yearbook 2002, Utrecht: Utrecht Institute of Linguistics, pp. 105–127, retrieved 2008-02-07
• Press, Ian (1986), Aspects of the phonology of the Slavonic languages: the vowel y and the Consonantal Correlation of Palatalization, Rodopi, ISBN 9062038484
• Rubach, Jerzy (2000), "Backness Switch in Russian", Phonology, 17: 39–64, doi:10.1017/S0952675700003821
• Shcherba, Lev Vladimirovich (1912), Russkie glasnye v kachestvennom i kolichestvennom otnoshennii, St. Petersburg: Tipografiia IU.
• Sussex, Roland (1992), "Russian", in Bright, W (ed.), International Encyclopedia of Linguistics (1st ed.), New York: Oxford University Press