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The Russian Language : Fast Facts
Russian is an Eastern Slavic language, most closely linked to the two remaining Eastern Slavic languages, Byelorussian and Ukrainian. Russian is spoken by an estimated 250 million people worldwide, with the majority of speakers hailing from the area formerly known as the Soviet Union. The earliest written example of Russian is dated from the 10th Century. Modern Russian began to be a language of international significance in the 20th century mainly because of its influence in the areas of science, technology and politics.
Russian is the official language in Russia, and one of the official languages in of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Belarus, as well as being an official language of the United Nations. There few diversifying dialects spoken in Russia, classified according to two groups – the northern and the southern – most people speak a common literary vernacular. Russian words adapted to the English language include |
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Russian
is part of the Indo-European language family, and is the most broadly
used Slavic language in the world. 