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11 i- and u-Stem Nouns

After the o, jo- and a, ja-declensions the next most numerous class of nouns is the i-stem declension. Not only does it contain a large number of very common words, but over time words from less well-represented declensions often had a tendency to adopt endings from the i-declension. The u-declension by contrast contains very few words; the words it does contain, however, often come from the inherited core vocabulary of the language.

11.1 i-Stem Nouns

The i-stem declension ultimately derives its name from its role as representing the reflexes of the original declension of short-*i-stem nouns in Proto-Indo-European. But by a lucky twist of fate, or of historical phonology, the name remains apropos due to the fact that -и appears in a large number of the declensional endings, and those endings which do not contain -и often contain -ь- [-ĭ-]: in particular we see this in the dative plural, where we found the historical thematic vowel in the twofold declension. Thus, in contrast to the twofold or o, jo-declension, the name of the i-declension serves as a useful mnemonic device. Less helpful is the alternate terminology employed by some scholars: the simple nominal declension.

For the most part the nouns of the i-declension are feminine, though some masculine nouns also belong to this declension. For example, гость 'guest' and господь 'lord' are masculine i-stems, while вьсь 'village' and кѹпѣль 'bath' are feminine. The feminine noun кость 'bone' and the masculine noun путь 'way, path' serve to illustrate the declension.

		Singular		Dual		Plural						Singular		Dual		Plural
N		кость		кости		кости						путь		пути		путьє
A		кость		кости		кости						путь		пути		пути
G		кости		костью		костьи						пути		путью		путьи
L		кости		костью		костьхъ						пути		путью		путьхъ
D		кости		костьма		костьмъ						пути		путьма		путьмъ
I		костью		костьма		костьми						путьмь		путьма		путьми
V		кости		кости		кости						пути		пути		путьє

As we have seen numerous times in other declensions, the rules pertaining to strong/weak and tense jers apply. For example the front jer in the instrumental singular костью [kostĭju] is tense, so we often find the sequence -ĭj- vocalized as -и-: костию. Moreover, in the instrumental singular путьмь, the first (penultimate) jer falls in strong position, so that we occasionally find this form written as путємь. Similarly for other forms throughout the paradigm.

One also encounters situations in which i-stem nouns adopt endings from the twofold declension: whereas господь 'lord' typically shows the form господи in both genitive and dative singular, we occasionally find twofold forms господа and господу, respectively.

11.2 u-Stem Nouns

The u-declension consists of a handful of nouns, exclusively masculine, which maintain reflexes of the original Proto-Indo-European *u-stem nominal inflection. For example, the following masculine nouns belong to the u-declension: домъ 'house', чинъ 'order', станъ 'camp'. In Indo-European terms, the inflectional endings of this declension broke down into two types: those forms showing stem-final *-u- and those showing stem-final *-oō(t) or *-eō(t). The former provides the zero-grade of the root, the latter the *o- and *e-grades, respectively. In the linguistic evolution of Common Slavic we find that tautosyllabic *oō and *eō yield *u, while in heterosyllabic position they yield *-ov-. The latter occurs in particular before endings beginning with a vowel. This distinction provides for the characteristic alternation between endings showing -у- and endings showing -ов- that runs through the u-declension paradigm.

The masculine noun сынъ 'son' serves to illustrate the inflectional pattern followed by u-stem nouns.

		Singular		Dual		Plural
N		сынъ		сынꙑ		сыновє
A		сынъ		сынꙑ		сынꙑ
G		сыну		сынову		сыновъ
L		сыну		сынову		сынъхъ
D		сынови		сынъма		сынъмъ
I		сынъмь		сынъма		сынъми
V		сыну		сынꙑ		сыновє

In this declension we find one of the few instances in which Old Russian texts appear more conservative than those of Old Church Slavonic. In particular, as is typical of Old Russian declensions, we see the Proto-Indo-European thematic vowel appear in the dative plural: сын-ъ-мъ, where the penultimate -ъ- is the regular Common Slavic reflex of PIE short *-u-, and hence also in both Old Church Slavonic and Old Russian. But in this particular form, we never find this reflex; rather we always find OCS сꙑномъ. We would expect such a form in both Old Church Slavonic and Old Russian, either by virtue of the fact that the penultimate back jer is in strong position and so would vocalize as -о-, or because, owing to the relatively small number of u-stem nouns, we might expect conflation with the endings of the much more common o-stem nouns. In Old Russian we do in fact find the dative plural сꙑномъ alongside сꙑнъмъ for just this reason (whichever of the two choices it happens to be); but in Old Church Slavonic, as it happens, the more archaic reflex never appears in the extant texts. This applies as well for the instrumental singular сꙑнъмь: this archaic form appears in Old Russian, but never in Old Church Slavonic, which retains only the fully vocalized form сꙑномь.

As the above discussion might lead one to believe, Old Russian texts commonly show u-stem nouns with forms inflected along the lines of o-stems: thus the u-stem домъ 'home' shows an o-stem dative singular дому alongside the normal u-stem dative домови. This process works in both directions, so that the proper name Ольгъ 'Oleg', an o-stem noun, shows dative singular Ольгови.

Moreover, in a palatalized environment the sequence -jov- often fronts to -jev-. Thus instead of *конови (unattested) as an alternate to the expected dative коню 'to the horse', we find конєви; similarly we find воробиєвє 'sparrows' for the nominative plural of воробии. In addition, we even find the -ов- suffix inserted as if part of the nominal stem before another full ending: e.g. dative plural сыновомъ 'to the sons'.

12 o- and a-Stem Adjectives

Adjectives in Old Russian fall broadly into two categories: definite and indefinite, sometimes called long-form and short-form, or compound and simple, respectively. The indefinite category is the more basic in the sense that its formation is simpler, while the definite category derives its forms from a process of composition. In the broadest terms, the indefinite adjectives employ the endings of o- and jo-stem nouns for masculine and neuter forms, while they employ the endings of a- and ja-stem nouns for feminine forms. By contrast, definite adjectives employ not only the endings of the indefinite adjectives just described, but they append to these corresponding forms of the third person pronoun *и.

This section treats the indefinite adjectives. As with the nouns whose endings they employ, the indefinite adjectives fall into two basic classes: hard and soft stems.

12.1 Hard Indefinite Adjectives

The hard indefinite adjectives, or hard simple twofold adjectives, take their masculine and neuter forms from the o-stem nominal paradigm as outlined in Section 3.1 and their feminine forms from the a-stem nominal paradigm as outlined in Section 3.2. The adjective добро 'good' serves to illustrate the paradigm.

		Masculine		Neuter		Feminine
N Sg.		добръ		добро		добра
A		добръ		добро		добру
G		добра		добра		добры
L		добрѣ		добрѣ		добрѣ
D		добру		добру		добрѣ
I		добромь		добромь		доброю
V		добръ		добро		добра
N Du.		добра		добрѣ		добрѣ
A		добра		добрѣ		добрѣ
G		добру		добру		добру
L		добру		добру		добру
D		доброма		доброма		добрама
I		доброма		доброма		добрама
V		добра		добрѣ		добрѣ
N Pl.		добри		добра		добры
A		добры		добра		добры
G		добръ		добръ		добръ
L		добрѣхъ		добрѣхъ		добрахъ
D		добромъ		добромъ		добрамъ
I		добры		добры		добрами
V		добри		добра		добры

As with the twofold nominal declension, palatalization of stem-final velars occurs in those positions where historically they followed a front vowel. For example the adjective вєликъ 'great' has masculine genitive singular вєлика, but locative singular вєлицѣ and nominative plural вєлици. Moreover, note that the vocative of adjectives always remains identical to the corresponding nominative form; there is no special vocative ending in the singular, unlike the twofold declension of nouns.

12.2 Soft Indefinite Adjectives

The soft indefinite adjectives, or soft simple twofold adjectives, by contrast, derive their masculine and neuter forms from the jo-stem nominal paradigm of Section 3.1 and their feminine forms from the ja-stem nominal paradigm of Section 3.2. The adjective син҄ь 'blue' serves to illustrate the paradigm.

		Masculine		Neuter		Feminine
N Sg.		син҄ь		син҄є		син҄я
A		син҄ь		син҄є		син҄ю
G		син҄я		син҄я		син҄ѣ
L		син҄и		син҄и		син҄и
D		син҄ю		син҄ю		син҄и
I		син҄ємь		син҄ємь		син҄єю
V		син҄ь		син҄є		син҄я
N Du.		син҄я		син҄и		син҄и
A		син҄я		син҄и		син҄и
G		син҄ю		син҄ю		син҄ю
L		син҄ю		син҄ю		син҄ю
D		син҄єма		син҄єма		син҄яма
I		син҄єма		син҄єма		син҄яма
V		син҄я		син҄и		син҄и
N Pl.		син҄и		син҄я		син҄ѣ
A		син҄ѣ		син҄я		син҄ѣ
G		син҄ь		син҄ь		син҄ь
L		син҄ихъ		син҄ихъ		син҄яхъ
D		син҄ємъ		син҄ємъ		син҄ямъ
I		син҄и		син҄и		син҄ями
V		син҄и		син҄я		син҄ѣ

Some adjective stems end in a front glide, such as божи- [božĭj-] 'of god, divine'. In such instances the masculine nominative singular ending -ь [-ĭ] combines with the glide to yield -и: божьи [božĭjĭ], or due to the tense position of the first jer, божии.

13 Pronominal Declension

The first introduction in this series to the more general paradigm of pronominal declension was with the third person pronoun *и 'he'. There we first encountered the surest marker of pronominal declension, namely the masculine and neuter genitive singular ending in -го. Old Russian contains a wide range of pronouns, all of which employ this genitive ending and many of the remaining features exhibited by the third person pronoun. Moreover several adjectives, both possessive and other, follow the pronominal declension rather than the twofold declension of nouns. Generally speaking, pronouns and adjectives exhibiting the pronominal declension fall into two categories: hard and soft, based largely on whether the genitive singular ending -го is preceded by the vowel -о- or -є-, respectively.

13.1 Hard Stem Pronominal Declension

The hard stem pronominal declension is characterized by a masculine and neuter genitive singular in -ого. The same declension also typically exhibits a genitive and locative plural in -ѣхъ for all genders. The distal deictic pronoun онъ 'that one there' serves to illustrate the paradigm.

		Masculine		Neuter		Feminine
N Sg.		онъ		оно		она
A		онъ		оно		ону
G		оного		оного		оноѣ, оноя
L		ономь		ономь		онои
D		оному		оному		онои
I		онѣмь		онѣмь		оною
V
N Du.		она		онѣ		онѣ
A		она		онѣ		онѣ
G		оною		оною		оною
L		оною		оною		оною
D		онѣма		онѣма		онѣма
I		онѣма		онѣма		онѣма
V
N Pl.		они		она		оны
A		оны		она		оны
G		онѣхъ		онѣхъ		онѣхъ
L		онѣхъ		онѣхъ		онѣхъ
D		онѣмъ		онѣмъ		онѣмъ
I		онѣми		онѣми		онѣми
V

The common deictic pronoun тъ 'that one' also declines according to the hard stem pronominal declension, as well as the correlative demonstratives овъ... овъ 'this... that, the one... the other' and овъ... инъ 'this one here... that one there'. The adjective мъногъ 'much, many' follows the same declension, showing the effects of second palatalization in certain case forms, such as masculine dative plural мънозѣмъ and instrumental plural мънозѣми.

13.2 Soft Stem Pronominal Declension

A masculine and neuter genitive singular in -єго characterizes the soft stem pronominal declension. This declension also typically exhibits a genitive and locative plural in -ихъ for all genders. The proximal deictic pronoun сь 'this one here' illustrates the paradigm.

		Masculine		Neuter		Feminine
N Sg.		сь, сьи		сє, сьє		си, сия
A		сь		сє, сьє		сю, сью
G		сєго		сєго		сєѣ, сєя
L		сємь		сємь		сєи
D		сєму		сєму		сєи
I		симь		симь		сєю
V
N Du.		сия		сии		сии
A		сия		сии		сии
G		сєю		сєю		сєю
L		сєю		сєю		сєю
D		сима		сима		сима
I		сима		сима		сима
V
N Pl.		си, сии		си, ся		сиѣ
A		сиѣ		си, ся		сиѣ
G		сихъ		сихъ		сихъ
L		сихъ		сихъ		сихъ
D		симъ		симъ		симъ
I		сими		сими		сими
V

We see in the above paradigm the introduction of a secondary form сьи. Phonetically this represents [sĭjĭ], and as usual the sequence -jĭ- is represented as -и-. Since the first jer, inasmuch as it precedes a yod, is tense, it may also be written as -и-, and so we frequently find the form сии. Alternately, since the first jer is strong, yet soft, we may find it vocalized as -є-: сєи. The same rules apply throughout the remainder of the paradigm, leading to a large list of possible variant forms.

In addition the personal possessive adjectives follow the above paradigm of the soft declension. The adjective мои 'my' serves to illustrate the paradigm.

		Masculine		Neuter		Feminine
N Sg.		мои		моє		моя
A		мои		моє		мою
G		моєго		моєго		моєѣ, моєя
L		моємь		моємь		моєи
D		моєму		моєму		моєи
I		моимь		моимь		моєю
V
N Du.		моя		мои		мои
A		моя		мои		мои
G		моєю		моєю		моєю
L		моєю		моєю		моєю
D		моима		моима		моима
I		моима		моима		моима
V
N Pl.		мои		моя		моѣ
A		моѣ		моя		моѣ
G		моихъ		моихъ		моихъ
L		моихъ		моихъ		моихъ
D		моимъ		моимъ		моимъ
I		моими		моими		моими
V

We also find in the declension of possessive adjectives the introduction of plural endings proper to the hard pronominal declension, such as genitive and locative plural моѣхъ, as well as dative plural моѣмъ.

The remaining personal possessive adjectives follow the same declension: твои 'thy, your'; свои 'one's own'; нашь 'our'; вашь 'your'; and even the relative-interrogative possessive adjective чьи 'whose'.

13.3 Mixed Pronominal Declension

The extremely common adjective вьсь 'all, every, whole' displays a declensional paradigm which contains a mixture of elements from both the hard and soft pronominal declensions. The paradigm is as follows.

		Masculine		Neuter		Feminine
N Sg.		вьсь		вьсє		вься
A		вьсь		вьсє		вьсю
G		вьсєго		вьсєго		вьсєѣ, вьсєя
L		вьсємь		вьсємь		вьсєи
D		вьсєму		вьсєму		вьсєи
I		вьсѣмь		вьсѣмь		вьсєю
V
N Du.		вься		вьси		вьси
A		вься		вьси		вьси
G		вьсєю		вьсєю		вьсєю
L		вьсєю		вьсєю		вьсєю
D		вьсѣма		вьсѣма		вьсѣма
I		вьсѣма		вьсѣма		вьсѣма
V
N Pl.		вьси		вься		вьсѣ
A		вьсѣ		вься		вьсѣ
G		вьсѣхъ		вьсѣхъ		вьсѣхъ
L		вьсѣхъ		вьсѣхъ		вьсѣхъ
D		вьсѣмъ		вьсѣмъ		вьсѣмъ
I		вьсѣми		вьсѣми		вьсѣми
V

14 The Aorist System

The term aorist denotes a past tense formation which, in contrast to the imperfect, serves to represent a completed past action, with no reference to the so-called internal structure of the action. By internal structure we mean such characteristics as the temporal duration of an action (i.e. whether or not it requires an extended period of time to occur) or its continuity (i.e. whether it is a single, continuous action that unfolds over an unbroken time interval; or whether it amounts to a sequence of repeated actions, each individual one being more or less instantaneous, and only the sequence as a whole requiring an extended time interval to occur). By saying that the aorist denotes a completed past action with no reference to internal structure, we are stipulating

1. that, by virtue of being completed, both the beginning and end of the action have occurred, so that there is no possibility that the action may be viewed as potentially continuing up until the time of utterance; and
2. that, by virtue of excluding reference to internal structure, the beginning and end of the action, and hence the middle as well, cannot be distinguished from one another.

These two stipulations combine to render the aorist an essentially point-like past tense, whereas the imperfect by contrast suggests an open-ended interval beginning in the past. In concrete terms, while the imperfect might have the connotation in English of a form like I was jogging, the aorist would be rendered by I jogged. In the former, the grammatical form itself highlights that the action took place over an interval of time; in the latter, there is no such reference: only the lexical content of the verb jog provides the connotation of an expanse of time, inasmuch as one generally finds it difficult to jog instantaneously.

Proto-Slavic inherited two types of aorist construction from Proto-Indo-European. In the first, the endings follow directly upon the verbal root, or upon the thematic vowel appended to the verbal root. Naturally this formation has received the name root aorist. In the second, the suffix *-s- intervenes between the root and thematic vowel. As this formation pervades Greek past tense formation, and as the *-s- appears as sigma in Greek, this formation has been termed the sigmatic aorist.

Within Proto-Slavic, however, we find the advent of a new aorist formation, aptly titled the new aorist, or the ox-aorist after its characteristic suffix. Though Old Church Slavonic retains both the root and sigmatic aorists alongside the new aorist, Old Russian has largely eliminated the earlier formations in favor of the later. We will nevertheless discuss briefly the two more archaic aorists, since those verbs which retain those forms still occur frequently in the Old Russian texts.

Construction of the aorist, regardless of the particular formation, begins with identification of the infinitive-aorist stem. We have already outlined in the discussion of the imperfect in Section 4.2 how one arrives at this stem. Briefly, one takes the infinitive, undoes any sound changes that resulted from the addition of the infinitive marker -ти, and then removes the -ти altogether. The remaining verbal stem serves as the stem for the construction of the aorist.

14.1 Asigmatic Aorist

The root aorist is often termed the asigmatic aorist, to distinguish it from its sigmatic cousin, or merely the simple aorist to highlight the fact that it has no distinguishing suffix. This formation has all but completely disappeared from Old Russian by the time the extant texts were written down, except in two situations:

1. isolated remnants of the aorist of a pair of common verbs, and
2. in the second and third person singular aorist of most verbs, where the root aorist forms seem to have replaced the etymologically expected forms in both the sigmatic and ox-aorist paradigms.

Of the true root aorists that survive into Old Russian, the most prevalent is that built to ити 'to go', with stem ид-. The root aorist paradigm of this verb is listed below.

		Singular		Dual		Plural
1		(идъ)		(идовѣ)		(идомъ)
2		идє		(идєта)		(идєтє)
3		идє		(идєта)		(иду)

In the chart above, those forms listed in parentheses do not occur in the Old Russian texts.

The second verb to exhibit a root aorist formation is рєчи 'to speak', with stem рєк-. Again, the root aorist forms occur only in the second and third person singular, and they are identical: рєчє, derived from CS *rekes in the second person, from *reket in the third.

14.2 Sigmatic Aorist

The sigmatic aorist derives its name from the addition of *-s- to the root preceding the thematic vowel. Though several verbs show conjugations following this pattern in Old Church Slavonic, only one such verb remains in Old Russian: рєчи 'to speak', with stem рєк-. The sigmatic aorist paradigm of this verb is as follows.

		Singular		Dual		Plural
1		рѣхъ		рѣховѣ		рѣхомъ
2		рєчє		рѣста		рѣстє
3		рєчє		рѣста		рѣша

Again we see the intrusion of the root aorist in the second and third person singular with the common form рєчє. But in the remaining forms we see the presence of the s-suffix. The first person singular рѣхъ follows via the ruki rule (cf. Section 6.5) from *re:k-s-om > *rěksŭ > рѣхъ, though the front environment prevents this retraction in the third person plural: *re:k-s-nt > *rěksę > рѣша. Note the lengthening of the root vowel that typically accompanies the addition of the sigmatic suffix. This lengthening occurred in the Proto-Indo-European period, so that its result in Old Russian is not a change in vowel quantity, but rather in vowel quality. In this instance we see the natural reflex PIE *e: > CS *ě of the long vowel, rather than of the expected short root vowel PIE *e > CS *e.

14.3 New Aorist

By far the most common aorist formation in Old Russian is the new aorist or ox-aorist. As with other aorist formations, construction of the new aorist begins with the infinitive-aorist stem. To this Old Russian adds a suffix which appears mostly as -ox-, but as -os- before endings beginning with a consonant, and as -ош- in the third person plural. The ox-suffix does not appear at all in the second and third person singular. To this suffix Old Russian then adds the endings encountered above in other aorist formations. Where the infinitive-aorist stem ends in a vowel, the -o- of the the ox-suffix does not appear. The verbs рєчи 'to speak', with infinitive-aorist stem рєк-, and знати 'to know', with infinitive-aorist stem зна-, serve to illustrate the paradigm.

		Singular		Dual		Plural						Singular		Dual		Plural
1		рєкохъ		рєкоховѣ		рєкохомъ						знахъ		знаховѣ		знахомъ
2		рєчє		рєкоста		рєкостє						зна		знаста		знастє
3		рєчє		рєкоста		рєкоша						зна		знаста		знаша

In the second and third person singular we once again note the retention of root aorist forms. We see that the ending -є of these forms does not appear when the stem ends in a vowel. We also see clearly that the infinitive-aorist stem, here рєк- for the verb рєчи, contains stem-final sounds in the form that precedes any sound changes that might occur upon adding the infinitive suffix -ти. Thus, for example, грє-ти 'to row', from *greb-ti, builds the aorist on the stem грєб-. The verb ити 'to go' also builds a new aorist, with stem ид-. The forms of these verbs are as follows.

		Singular		Dual		Plural						Singular		Dual		Plural
1		грєбохъ		грєбоховѣ		грєбохомъ						идохъ		идоховѣ		идохомъ
2		грєбє		грєбоста		грєбостє						идє		идоста		идостє
3		грєбє		грєбоста		грєбоша						идє		идоста		идоша

Certain anomalies, however, present themselves. For example, рєчи 'to speak' also shows signs of a stem рьк- alongside the more common рєк-: ркоша 'they said'. Similarly the verbs тєчи 'to run' and жєчи 'to burn' show stems тьк- and жьг-, respectively.

Moreover verbs whose stem derives from an etymological nasal, or -r-, among a handful of others, often show an ending -тъ in the second and third person singular. Athematic verbs, such as дати 'to give' and вѣдѣти 'to know', also show an alternate suffix -стъ in these forms, which in certain instances may derive originally from a stem-final -д followed by the -тъ suffix just mentioned. Consider the following examples.

Infinitive		Meaning		Stem		2nd/3rd Sg.		OCS
въз-я-ти		take		възя-		възятъ		възѧти
на-чя-ти		begin		начя-		начятъ		нацѧти
у-мєрє-ти		die		умрѣ-		умрѣтъ		ѹмрѣти
да-ти		give		да(д)-		дастъ		дати
вѣд-ѣ-ти		know		вѣд-		вѣстъ		вѣдѣти

Verbs with the -ну- suffix show two different aorist formations. In one formation, the ox-aorist is built from the stem including the ну-suffix. In the other formation, the ну-suffix itself is dropped and the ox-aorist is built directly to the remaining stem. The verb двиг-ну-ти 'to move' illustrates the forms.

		Singular		Dual		Plural						Singular		Dual		Plural
1		двигъ		двигоховѣ		двигохомъ						двигнухъ		двигнуховѣ		двигнухомъ
2		движє		двигоста		двигостє						двигну		двигнуста		двигнустє
3		движє		двигоста		двигоша						двигну		двигнуста		двигнуша

We find in the above paradigm another illustration of the fact that the -o- of the ox-suffix does not appear when the aorist stem ends in a vowel.

15 Genitive Objects & Negation

Old Russian shares with Old Church Slavonic some special uses of the genitive case that are somewhat unexpected when viewed in comparison to other ancient sister languages within the Indo-European family. These uses occur with sufficient frequency that they merit attention early in the study of Old Russian.

15.1 Genitive Objects

Old Russian shows the emergence of a special treatment of direct objects. Old Russian generally places the direct object of a transitive verb in the accusative, as do others of the ancient Indo-European languages. But when the direct object happens to be human and male -- i.e. a man -- Old Russian regularly puts the direct object in the genitive case. For example: убиша Игоря и дружину єго "They killed Igor and his retinue" (Primary Chronicle). Here we see that the aorist убиша 'they killed' takes the direct object дружину 'retinue' (from the feminine noun дружина) in the accusative as expected. But rather than employing the normal accusative Игорь of the proper noun Игорь 'Igor', we see that Old Russian places the male human direct object in the genitive case. The following example shows that Old Russian makes a clear distinction between women and men: поимѣмъ жєну єго Ольгу за кънязь свои Малъ, и Святослава... "Let us take his wife, Olga, for our prince, Mal, and Svjatoslav..." (Primary Chronicle). Here жєну (from жєна 'wife') and Ольгу (from Ольга 'Olga') show the distinct accusative singular appropriate to feminine nouns. But Святослава (from Святославъ 'Svjatoslav'), also the direct object of поимѣмъ 'let us take', clearly shows the genitive singular ending.

It seems that this tendency to distinguish direct objects that are men does not always extend to groups. In the previous example we saw that дружина 'retinue' retains the accusative, even though it clearly represents a group of men. But in such a situation we might argue that the noun represents a collection, and so not men per se. Consider however the following example: то присълитє мужа нарочитꙑ, да въ вєлицѣ чисти поиду за вашь кънязь "... then send me your best men, that I marry your prince in great honor" (Primary Chronicle). Here we clearly have direct reference to men, but the word мужа (from мужь 'man'), together with the adjective нарочитꙑ (from the adjective нарочитъ 'distinguished'), distinctly show the endings of the accusative plural.

15.2 Genitive with Negation

Another striking feature of Old Russian is the interaction of the genitive case with negation. In particular, the direct object of a transitive verb takes the genitive in the presence of negation. For example: и нє послуха ихъ Игорь "and Igor didn't listen to them", or slightly more literally "and Igor didn't hear them", emphasizing the fact that послуха expects a direct object (Primary Chronicle). Rather than the proper accusative plural ѣ or я (cf. OCS ѩ), we find the direct object in the genitive plural ихъ. Similarly нє вѣси закона "You don't know the law" (Primary Chronicle), where the proper accusative would be законъ 'law'.

Even more noteworthy is the extension of this trend to the actual subject of a sentence. Specifically, in the presence of negation the subject of the verb may take the genitive rather than the nominative. This typically occurs in statements concerning the existence of some quantity, or the lack thereof, where the verb is a copula like 'be'. For example: нынѣ у васъ нѣсть мєду ни скоры "Now there is neither honey nor wine in your possession" (Primary Chronicle). Here меду is the genitive singular, rather than the expected nominative of the u-stem noun медъ 'honey'. Likewise скоры is the genitive singular of the feminine noun скора 'fur'.

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