From the history of written fixation of the Udmurt name arlan ‘a hamster

Introduction: the object of study of the article is the written history of the borrowed word arlan ‘a hamster’ in the Udmurt language. As the ancient and very widespread word, it was recorded in the earliest monuments of Udmurt writing. According to lexicographic sources, the graphic design and lexical and semantic content of the analyzed lexeme are traced. Objective: to reveal the history of fixation of the word arlan ‘a hamster’ in written sources of the Udmurt language and to investigate its origin. Research materials: monuments of early Udmurt writing (XVIII century), as well as the most important lexicographic sources of the late XIX – early XXI centuries, etymological correspondences from contacting languages. Results and novelty of the research: the article for the first time in the Udmurt language presents a detailed history of the fixation of the word arlan ‘a hamster’ from the XVIII century and ending with sources of the XXI century. This denotation of a rodent, written in Latin, is found already in the earliest written monument of the Udmurt language – in the handwritten dictionary of D. G. Messerschmidt of 1726. The lexeme arlan is the borrowing of the general Udmurt period of development of the base language, since it is found in almost all Udmurt dialects and has no parallels in other Permian languages. Materials of written documents, as well as later lexicographic sources show that different meanings of the borrowed word were adopted in different dialects of the Udmurt language