The basic color terms of Russian* - Walter de Gruyter

74 /. Dames and G. Corbett
Table 2. continued
Term
trayjanoj
goröiönyj
ryäj
brusniönyj
nebesno-goluboj
kirpiönyj
apel'sinovyj
pesocnyj
bagrjanyj
malaxitovyj
elektrik
kofejnyj
Gloss
grass green
mustard
ginger
cranberry red
sky blue
brick red
orange
sandy
purplish red
malachite
electric blue
coffee
Frequency
7
7
7
5
5
5
5
5
4
4
4
4
Rank
of freq.
45.5
45.5
45.5
50
50
50
50
50
54.5
54.5
54.5
54.5
Mean
position
14.72
15.86
17.29
14.80
16.20
17.60
20.00
20.60
12.00
14.50
16.25
21.00
Rank
of M.P.
the frequency with which terms were offered, for those terms that were
offered by at least four people.
It can be seen from Table 2 that the 11 standard basic terms plus
goluboj 'light blue' form the first 12 terms according to the frequency
measure, and the total number of times these terms are offered — 824 —
is over half of the total responses. There is also a relatively neat separation
between the first 12 terms and the rest: sirenevyj 'mauve', the most
frequent of the remaining terms, is offered 13 times less than rozovyj
'pink', the least frequent of the first 12 terms. The disputed basic term,
goluboj 'light blue', shares the fourth rank with zeltyj 'yellow'.
Furthermore, fioletovyj 'purple' is much more frequent than sirenevyj
'mauve', purpurnyj 'purplish red', or lilovyj 'violet', which have sometimes
been considered contenders for the basic purple slot.
The data on the mean serial position of the terms shows a similar
albeit less clearcut pattern. Most of the first 12 terms on the frequency
measure also have low scores on the position measure, but the separation
between these terms and the remainder is now not complete; koricnevyj
'brown' and seryj 'gray' have lower mean serial positions than several of
the less frequent terms: sirenevyj 'mauve', bordovyj 'claret', malinovyj
'raspberry', birjuzovyj 'turquoise', limonnyj 'lemon', purpurnyj 'purplish
red', lilovyj 'violet', and alyj 'scarlet'.
In addition to separating the basic terms from the nonbasic terms,
there is some degree of correspondence of the rank orders of the basic
terms on both measures to the Berlin and Kay hierarchy. The primary
basic terms tend to score higher than the secondary basic terms; the
exceptions are the achromatic terms cernyj 'black' and belyj 'white', which
29
40
45
30
43
47
51
52
18
28
44
54