THE COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF PRINCIPLES OF FORMATION OF TOPONYMS AND EXPLANATION OF THEIR NAMES CHARACTERISTIC OF RUSSIAN AND CHINESE LINGUOCULTURES (THE CASE STUDY OF TOPONYMS OF VORONEZH REGION AND PROVINCE OF SHENGXI)

Abstract

The article presents a comparative analysis of principles of naming settlements of Voronezh Region (Russian Federation) and Shangxi Province (People’s Republic of China). The article examines both scientific and folk etymological versions of names explaining the origin of local and district-level toponyms grouped within two separate regions of Russia and China. Аt the end of the article the following conclusions are made: unlike Russian toponyms, explained by not only scientific and folk etymological versions of origin, Chinese toponyms are explained by only one of the versions; Chinese toponyms are more often than Russian are named as a result of an arbitrary act, and do not arise spontaneously; Chinese toponyms do not just have an orienting function, but stimulate an axiological function, implicitly or explicitly contain a positive aesthetic assessment, good luck, etc.