The Russian language is a real mystery even for its native speakers. After all, in fact, not all words are familiar to us, and even if they are familiar, they are not always fully understood. For example, who is balamut? We are vaguely aware that this can be called a person whose behavior is characterized by temper, irrationality and even aggression.
This short article will talk about the meaning of this expression.
A little about the modern meaning of the word
If we turn to explanatory dictionaries, we learn from them that a person is usually called a balamut, who causes increased concern among the people around him.
Moreover, the lexical range of meanings of this word is extremely wide. This expression means a chatterbox, incapable of the present case, a liar, a liar, a troublemaker, the instigator of various adventurous projects, etc.
Thus, we see that in modern Russian this expression is used with a wide "fan" of lexical meanings.
Etymology of the expression "balamouth"
The most amazing thing is that this word is truly ancient. In the opinion of many authoritative philologists, it goes back to the expression "babbie", that is, too much talk. Analogs of this word are present in all Indo-European languages.
But in Slavic languages, this root is considered already as the root of “ball”, hence the “balak” (“speak”). A related root can be found both in West Slavic languages, for example, Polish, and in South Slavic, for example, Bulgarian.
Hence, philologists believe that the word “balamut” is complex, and it has two roots: “ball” and “mut” (“balak” and “stir up”).
Therefore, we found the answer to the question of who is the balamut: is the person positive or negative? Of course, we have a character with a negative line of behavior.
Thus, we were able to establish that this expression denotes a person who confuses those around him with absolutely superfluous, unnecessary conversations.
Expression in works of literature
This word is well-known not only in colloquial speech, but also as a bright trail from some literary works. For example, often this word is found in the works of N.V. Gogol. It can be seen on the pages of the poems of N. A. Nekrasov and other famous Russian writers and poets.
The latter testifies to the fact that this word is alive, it continues to exist actively both in Russian speech and in Russian life.
Thus, in this short article, we were able to answer the question of who is balamut.