Russia
name, noun, slang ·Common ·High school level
Definitions
- 1 Ellipsis of Russia leather. abbreviation, alt-of, countable, ellipsis, uncountable
"Dull Russias will prove a good selling line for women according to the predictions of certain manufacturers."
- 1 A transcontinental country in Eastern Europe and North Asia. Official name: Russian Federation. Capital and largest city: Moscow. It borders the Pacific and Arctic Oceans and the Baltic, Black, and Caspian Seas. Part of the Soviet Union from 1917 through 1991. countable, uncountable
"“Revoking PNTR for Russia is going to make it harder for Russia to do business with the United States and doing it in unison with other nations that make up half of the global economy will be another crushing blow to the Russian economy that’s already suffering very badly from our sanctions,” Biden said."
- 2 Russia. derogatory, humorous, offensive, slang
- 3 The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (a very common name, although more formally Russia, the RSFSR, was one of several constituent republics of the USSR). broadly, countable, historical, uncountable
- 4 The Russian Empire; the tsarist empire in Russia lasting from 1721 to 1917. countable, historical, uncountable
"Ukraine (“frontier”), the name formerly given to a district of European Russia, now comprising the governments of Kharkov, Kiev, Podolia and Poltava."
- 5 Kievan Rus; the medieval East Slavic state centered in Kiev. countable, dated, historical, uncountable
"Ukraine (“frontier”), the name formerly given to a district of European Russia, now comprising the governments of Kharkov, Kiev, Podolia and Poltava."
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- 6 Any of several East Slavic states descended from Kievan Rus, typically including Russia (Great Russia), Belarus (White Russia) and Ukraine (Little Russia). countable, dated
"Or rather if I be attaining a better autocratship than that of the Emperor of all the Russias — the empire over self."
Example
More examples"Our company is planning to build a new chemical plant in Russia."
Etymology
First use appears c. the 1390s, from Medieval Latin Russia, from Old East Slavic Русь (Rusĭ) (whence Arabic رُوس (rūs) and Byzantine Greek Ῥῶς (Rhôs)), which originally referred to a group of Varangians who established themselves near Kiev in the 9th century and ruled Kievan Rus; probably from Proto-Finnic *roocci, from Old East Norse *roþs- (“related to rowing”); related to Old Norse Roþrslandi (“the land of rowing”), an older name of Roslagen, where the Finns first encountered the Swedes. Ultimately from Old Norse róðr (“steering oar”), from Proto-Germanic *rōþrą (“rudder”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₁reh₁- (“to row”). By surface analysis, Russ + -ia. Doublet of Rossiya.
Blend of Russia + SS (“Schutzstaffel”), implying that Russia is a fascist state.
Related phrases
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.