Uryvka or Uryvki? Variation and Standardization in Toponymy

The article deals with the issue of standardization of toponyms having singular and pluralia tantum variants. The relevance of the research is due to the necessity to clarify methods of standardization of toponyms with morphological variation to improve standardization activities in the field of toponymy. The State Catalogue of Geographical Names was used as the main material for the research, also used were current normative legal acts of the Russian Federation subjects, administrative-territorial division reference books and lists of settlements of different publication years, as well as cartographic sources. The variation of singular and pluralia tantum forms in toponymy is considered in the article as a kind of word-formation variation. It has been established that this type of variation is observed mainly in the names of settlements formed from anthroponyms and geographical terms. The analysis of toponymic variants indicates that the pluralia tantum form is secondary in many toponyms. The pluralia tantum form is developing in the process of using a toponym in the original singular form. A source for pluralization is the perception of a locality as a collective of residents united by the common surname or the name of the locality, as well as a desire for better differentiation of homonymous adjacent geographical objects. It is pointed out that the functions of pluralization in toponymy are being rethought, and that it is becoming one of the alternative means of grammatical word-formation. The analysis of standardized toponyms has shown that the standardization of toponyms subjected to this type of variation is carried out either in accordance with their modern usage, or with one of the well-known historical spellings of the toponym. The obtained research results clarify the methods of toponym standardization based on the traditions of their employment and can be used in further standardization of toponyms subjected to morphological variation. All the examples of the toponyms under study show that the standardized spellings correspond to their spellings in the current normative legal acts. In some cases, an officially codified variant of a toponym differs from the variant used in oral speech. This fact indicates the coexistence of two norms of toponym use.

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