Manual for Translating Russian Names into English

Author: Xin Hua (Editor)
Publisher:
Publish Date: April 1, 1982
Features:
1. This manual includes approximately 46,000 Russian names with Chinese translations, serving as a reference for those engaged in translation and foreign affairs work.
2. The manual includes both male and female names, but to reduce, only male surnames are listed, while female surnames and patronymics are excluded. Surnames and names are arranged in mixed order according to the Russian alphabet.
3. The manual follows the principle of translating identical names and surnames uniformly, but personal Chinese names chosen by individuals apply only to them, such as Фелореико (Feloreiko) and H. T. Фёдоров (Fyodorov). For other people with the same surname, translations are made according to the Russian-Chinese Transliteration Table (see Appendix Five).
4. Translations of names (excluding foreign names) generally follow the Russian-Chinese Transliteration Table issued by the Chinese Name Commission in 1979 (see Appendix Five). However, some long-standing and widely recognized translations are retained appropriately, such as Гоголь (Gogol) and Лермонтов (Lermontov).
5. Islamic names used in some Central Asian republics of the Soviet Union are translated into Chinese as consistently as possible with the transliteration of Islamic names from Arab countries. For example, Ибрагим (Ibrahim) is translated as "," and Абдул (Abdul) as "." For compound names, the final consonant of the first part and the initial vowel of the second part are not transliterated together, such as Абдулазиз (Abdul+Aziz), which is translated as "." However, names that have been fully Russianized are transliterated together, such as Абдуллаев (Abdullaev), which is translated as "." If a name has multiple spelling variations, the manual strives to collect them and ensure consistent Chinese translations, such as Maroмед, Moxaммел, Moxзммед, Myxaммед, and Mxaммед, all translated as "."
6. Foreign names are handled according to the following principles:
1. For major languages such as English, French, German, and Spanish that have commonly used translations, the standard translations are adopted, such as Еорис (Yoris) translated as "" and Виктор (Viktor) translated as "."
2. When translations differ across major languages, the name closest to the Russian pronunciation is used, such as Ееиджамии (Yejami) translated as "" (to align with English and American translations. The French translation "," German translation "," and Spanish translation "" are not used).
3. Names derived from a specific language are transliterated according to the conventions of that language, such as Гейрих (Heinrich) translated as "."
7. When transliterating a single Chinese character for a name, it is generally expanded to two characters, such as Кон (Kon) translated as "" instead of "."
8. For compound sounds (excluding "e" and "н"), they are generally treated as single letters, such as Исаак (Isaak) translated as "" and Аббас (Abbas) translated as "."
9. The double consonant "н" is treated as follows:
1. For names ending with "на," "н" is generally treated as a double consonant when the preceding letter is a vowel, such as Ангелина (Angelina) translated as "."
2. For some common stems ending with "н" (e.g., Антон (Anton), Иван (Ivan)), when a suffix starting with a vowel is added, "н" is treated as a double consonant, such as Антонов (Antonov) translated as "." Common stems are listed in Appendix Two. In all other cases, "н" is not treated as a double consonant.
10. For female names, the translation generally only needs to indicate femininity by adding a suffix to the last character, such as Маяковская (Mayakovskaya) translated as "" instead of "." If there is no suitable character to indicate femininity at the end of the word, a character can be chosen from the end. Only the suffix "-вна" () retains two feminine characters.
11. Names derived from place names generally follow the transliteration of the place names, such as Рязанский (Ryzansky) translated as "" instead of "." If the pronunciation differs significantly, the transliteration table is used, such as Рим (Rim) translated as "" instead of "." Due to limited expertise, errors and inaccuracies in this manual are inevitable. Kindly point them out for improvement.