What is winter? When pronouncing this word, an association with winter arises. Such an association is true, since this token relates to crops that grow under conditions of low temperature. Details that this is winter will be discussed in the article.
Let's turn to the dictionary
Two meanings of the word winter are given there. Consider them.
Firstly, it is an agricultural term for winter crops, their seedlings.
Secondly, also in agriculture, this field is occupied by the above crops.
To better understand that this is winter, we give examples of sentences with this token.
Examples of use
You can bring such as:
- Fog hung over the humid field, and each winter grass blade was covered with many droplets.
- The tiled red roofs of the villages were visible from afar, they were very different from the bright winter, cheerfully standing out against its background.
- In the absence of rain, winter perished in dry land, all hope was for precipitation soon.
- Saying goodbye to spring ground, snow poured with diamonds among the surrounding winter so that it was painful to look at it.
- I wanted to quickly hide in the forest, but the road, accompanied by winter, stretched for almost a kilometer.
- This year misfortune happened again, neighbors launched horses at our winter. It was useless to deal with it.
A better understanding of the meaning of “winter” will be facilitated by a consideration of the origin of this word.
Etymology
It is formed of two parts. The first of these is the preposition "o", and the second is the noun "winter". The latter comes from the pre-Slavic zīmā in the meaning of "winter". Among other things, from him were formed:
- Old Russian and Old Slavonic “winter”;
- Bulgarian and Serbo-Croatian "WINTER";
- Ukrainian “winter”;
- Slovenian zíma;
- Czech, Slovak, Polish zima;
- Lower Luzhsky and Upper Luzhsky zyma.
According to etymologists, the pre-Slavic noun zīmā goes back to the pre-Indo-European form g'heim in the same meaning. Is related:
- Lithuanian žiemà in the meaning of "winter";
- Latvian zìema - the same as in Lithuanian;
- Old Prussian semo in the same meaning;
- ancient Indian hḗman, meaning "winter" and himás - "winter";
- Avestan zyå, zimō, the meaning of which, respectively, is “frost” and winter ”;
- Greek χεῖμα, which translates as “winter”, and χειμών, which means a winter storm, as well as χειμερινός, the meaning of which is “winter”;
- Albanian dimën - “winter”;
- Latin hiems - “winter”, hībernus - “winter”, bīmus - “two years”.
Continuing the consideration of the meaning of the word "winter", we proceed to its writing.
Literacy issue
How is the word winter written? As a rule, difficulties arise due to the fact that in the second syllable the vowel is unstressed. Therefore, it is not clear what letter should be in it - “e” or “and”.
As can be seen from the etymological analysis, the lexeme under study comes from the noun “winter”, therefore the verb of the same root word is the same noun in the plural with emphasis on the first syllable - “WINTERS”, as well as the adjective “WINTER”. Therefore, in the word “winter” in the second syllable the letter “and” is written.
The second question, which often arises when writing this word, is associated with a soft sign at the end. The fact is that when pronouncing, the softness of the consonant sound “m” cannot always be clearly grasped. Is he needed here or not? The answer is yes. What is the reason for this?
There is a rule according to which a soft sign is placed in the third declension nouns related to the feminine, having a zero ending and standing in the nominative case. This is exactly the word in question.
Thus, the wrong spelling is: "winter", "winter", "winter", and the correct one is "winter".
Winter culture
In conclusion of the consideration of the question of what is winter, let's say a few words about the crops with which the studied word is associated.
They are a form of annual cereal plants, usually cereals, in which the life cycle requires overwintering. It can be either one or several months. In this case, lower temperatures are needed.
Winter sowing time is autumn. They germinate before the onset of winter, and in spring their life cycle continues. And they ripen before spring. The latter are annual crops that are sown in spring.
Typically, winter crop yields are higher. This is due to the use of moisture reserves in the soil in early spring. But the possibility of growing them exists only in areas where there is high snow cover and mild winters.
In addition, winter crops are more demanding on the soil, less drought tolerant. Often, in comparison with spring, their baking qualities are worse. For example, wheat, rye and barley have a winter form.