Russian given name

Such names include Ivan (Иван, "John"), Andrei (Андрей, "Andrew"), Yakov (Яков, "Jacob"), Yuri (Юрий, "George"), Tatyana (Татьяна, "Tatiana"), Maria (Мария, "Mary"), Avdotia (Авдотья, "Eudocia"), Elizaveta (Елизавета, "Elizabeth"), Margarita (Маргарита, "Margaret").

Ancient Slavic names include Stanislav (Станислав), Rada (Рада) and Radomir (Радомир), and Dobromila.

Old Russian names include Zhdan (Ждан), Peresvet (Пересвет), Lada (Лада), and Lyubava (Любава).

Soviet-era names include Vilen (Вилен), Avangard (Авангард), Ninel (Нинель), and Era (Эра).

Names borrowed from other languages include Albert (Альберт), Ruslan (Руслан), Zhanna (Жанна), and Leyla (Лейла).

Given names in Old East Slavonic language (nickname, epithet, handle) are similar to appellation after a particular episode.

However, when a person entered a broader social group (changing his occupation or place of residence), his name was replaced or supplemented by another.

Popularity of pagan names resulted in formation of various diminutive forms: Bychko from Byk, Zhdanko from Zhdan, Puzeika from Puzo and so on.

For example, root -bel- produced a wide range of names like Bela, Belka, Belava, Beloy, Belonya, Belyay, Belyash.

Increasing influence of the Russian Orthodox church on social life led to gradual elimination of pagan nicknames.

Names were given according to Menaion (Месячные минеи), special books which described religious services, ceremonies for each day, including which saint to praise.

Religious tradition dictated that children should be named in honor of a saint, praised on the day of baptism.

Pagan nicknames being more diverse and less restrictive provided a convenient way to distinguish people bearing one name.

One of the ventures he undertook was to correct religious books, which had accumulated a lot of errors and misreadings as they used to be copied by sometimes illiterate scribes.

Patriarch Nikon set the goal to unify service in Russia and to correct errors in religious books (including menologia).

As a matter of fact, any word could be used as a name; function of civil registry was reduced to proper registration of citizens.

In baptismal register books, people bearing names Yuriy and Egor appeared as Georgy, but in other documents, they could use the variant they were used to.

Short forms emerged in spoken language for convenience as majority of formal names are cumbersome.

Such transformation results in a short word ending with an open syllable, convenient to address or call a person.

For example, Irina → Rina, Risha, Irisha, Ina; Vitaliy → Vitalya, Vita, Vitya, Talya, Vitasha.

Petrovskiy corresponds Alya to 19 masculine and 18 feminine names including Aleksey, Oleg, Yuvenaliy, Aleksandr and Aleksandra, Alisa, Alla, Galina.

As already stated above, the short form is generally used in spoken conversation between acquainted people and usually doesn't act as an official or public name.

However starting from the late 1980s in popular culture, in artistic circles short names gained new status.

They demonstrate warm and tender attitude towards addressee, although some diminutive forms can bear slighting or pejorative emotions.

This is related to a historical tradition to use semi-names to refer to oneself when speaking with a person of higher social status.

Nonetheless, in modern Russian diminutives like Vasyka, Marinka, Vit'ka, Alka are considered stylistically lowered.