DEFINITIONAL ANALYSIS OF THE VERB МОЛОТИТЬ

Abstract

The article presents a definitional analysis of the instrumental verb molotit’ (‘to thresh’), based on six authoritative lexicographic sources: the explanatory dictionaries edited by D. N. Ushakov, S. I. Ozhegov, V. I. Dahl, A. P. Evgenieva, and S. A. Kuznetsov, as well as the Small Academic Dictionary. The study identifies and systematizes the prototypical and non-prototypical semes of this verb, establishes their representation in different dictionaries, and highlights unique meanings. The central seme is found to be ‘to beat out grain from ears or panicles’, recorded in most sources and consistently occupying the first position in dictionary entries. On the near periphery are the meanings ‘to strike, beat’, ‘to thrash, delivering strong, repeated blows’, ‘to chatter incessantly’, and ‘to subject to heavy shelling’. Unique semes are recorded in V. I. Dahl’s dictionaries (‘to flatten, smash’, ‘to drive something into something’) and in D. N. Ushakov’s dictionary (‘to thresh grain from ears using a tool’). Based on the Russian National Corpus, new meanings not previously recorded in dictionaries are identified: ‘to play a musical instrument’ and ‘to eat heartily’. Special attention is paid to manifestations of instrumentality: in literal meanings, it is explicitly expressed through the subject–instrument–object structure, while in figurative meanings it is realized implicitly or metaphorically. The results of the study contribute to the research on the semantics of instrumental verbs, the dynamics of their polysemy, and the specifics of lexicographic representation.