The Nomination of Russian Currency Units

Abstract

Money has been a part of life ever since it came into being. It serves as a measure of value, a
circulating medium, a payer, and a means of hoarding. For long centuries, its function has been
replaced by various goods, precious metals and banknotes until recently when money in account
was introduced. The study of nomination of currency units provides a true picture of economic
processes and networks in different ages. Although, basically, names of currency units are not
considered to be a part of ESP for Business and Economy, we can still regard them as the
terminologised lexis of flow of goods and cash flow, as they are incorporated in a total of
everyday lexical units used by a given community. In our presentation, we offer a survey of the
nomination of Russian currency units, juxtaposed to facts and processes in Russian history and
economy. An analytical survey of aspects of etymology, historical semantics, economic history
and cultural history constitutes a basis for drawing up a potential classification of currency
denominations according to names and motivations (e.g. goods, material, processing
technology, partonomy, i.e. part and whole relations, colour, number, depiction, geographical
names, loanwords and international words, etc.) and the periods of Russian money history are
presented until the establishment of national currency.