civil script
- noun
- /ˈsɪvəl skrɪpt/
- Archaic
:
escritura civil
- Under Peter the Great, the civil script was adopted for publishing secular literature in Russia.
Examples
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The civil script marked a departure from the traditional church Slavonic used for religious texts.
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Historians often study how the civil script influenced Russian literacy and education reforms.
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The civil script was widely used in Russia.
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Many books were printed in civil script during the 18th century.
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Under Peter the Great, the civil script was adopted for publishing secular literature in Russia.
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Historians often study how the civil script influenced Russian literacy and education reforms.
-
The civil script marked a departure from the traditional church Slavonic used for religious texts.
Surface Forms
Morphology
The phrase combines 'civil' (relating to ordinary/public or secular affairs) with 'script' (a writing system), so a learner who knows both words can infer it denotes a writing system used for civilian or secular purposes. The specific historical detail (Peter the Great, simplified Cyrillic) is specialized knowledge but does not prevent a B1 learner from deriving the basic compositional meaning.
Etymology
The term civil script comes from when Peter the Great made the old church writing simpler so printers could use it for everyday books. Here civil means 'for ordinary people' and script means the writing style, so the phrase now refers to a simpler alphabet used for texts that are 'not about religion'.
